The waiting was always worse in the last few hours.

Six months had somehow passed, one ordinary day at a time. Yet now that Jide was finally on his way back again from Birmingham, the hours refused to move. Every glance at the clock seemed to steal only a minute, sometimes less.

Yetunde had given up pretending she could concentrate on anything. A piece of fabric rested across her lap, the needle suspended between her fingers as her eyes drifted, once again, to her phone.

When it finally rang, she had it in her hand before the second ring could finish, her heart already running ahead of her fingers, afraid the call would end before she reached it.

“Jide! Have you moved?”

“Not yet.” His voice was flat, clearly tired but trying not to sound it. “They’ve pushed it back again. Another three hours.”

“Three hours?” She let the needle rest against the fabric on her lap. “Birmingham to Lagos should not be this complicated.”

“Tell the airline, my love.”

“It’s fine. I can wait. It’s not like I even miss you.”

“Babe, that is not funny. I know I am not alone in my mystery. Yetunde, I can’t wait to see you, and I know it’s the same for you.”

She laughed, but it came out thinner than she meant it to, because underneath the joke was the plain fact that he was right, she had missed him more than she had let herself admit these past weeks.

Feels like yesterday when Elizabeth’s father died, and Yetunde had told Jide, gently but without hesitation, that he should go and support her through the burial. It was the kind thing to do, the Christian thing, and she had meant it even with the small ugly feeling underneath that she had prayed over more than once since. The burial had been set for October, but the family could not agree among themselves about so many crucial moving parts, and it had been pushed all the way to the first week of March. Nearly six months of waiting for the man to be laid to rest properly. 

“How’s the shop?” he asked. “Still drowning?”

“Still drowning. I don’t know where all these customers were hiding two years ago.” She picked the needle back up, out of habit. “Nobody knew my name then. Now everybody wants their Easter clothes from me specifically. That social media marketing is really working.”

“You should get a team. I have told you this twice now. You need to slow down on physical labour.”

“I know, but I am still young. I have the energy, and I cannot disappoint my clients for Easter.”

She did not tell him the rest of it. That she was not only sewing for Easter. That every naira that came in, was more than the shop needed to run, however, it was going somewhere he did not know about, folded away toward the day she would need to buy a ticket and a visa, and pay a deposit for a room in a country that was not this one. She was going to England, but she wanted to be able to do it without relying on him.

She passed the IELTS in October. Band seven, high enough for anything she wanted to apply for. She had not told him that either, not properly, only a passing “I am working on it,” when he asked, because the moment she told him it went well, he would start asking when, and when led to how, and how led to the truth that she was trying to build the how by herself so it would not sit entirely on him.

“You’ve gone quiet,” he said.

“I’m sewing.” She turned the fabric under the machine’s foot without looking at it. Then, because it had been sitting in her for months she said, “Can I ask you something, and you won’t be offended?”

“Of course, ask.”

“Six months, Jide. The burial was delayed for almost six months, and despite the fact that you already came, you are flying back to sit through it with her again.” She kept her voice even, though something under it wasn’t. “I’m not saying you’re doing anything wrong. I just don’t understand why your presence is so important there.”

“Because I promised to support her through it, and I try to always keep my word. I also loved her father, and would love to do right by him. That’s the honest answer. It has nothing to do with wanting to be there.”

“I know.” She pressed the seam flat with two fingers. “I just needed to say it out loud, instead of only thinking about it.”

“You can always say it out loud to me.” A pause, and something eased into his voice. “Once this is finally done, that’s it. Just me and you; the rest of my leave will be spent distracting you from work. I am crazy about you.”

“I know,” she said again, smiling, because that part at least had never been in question between them.

The bell over the shop door went. Sade came in shaking rain off her umbrella, took one look at Yetunde’s face and the phone against her ear, and grinned.

“Ehen. Is that your bobo? When’s he landing?”

Yetunde covered the phone. “Delayed.”

“Those people.”

Sade dropped into the chair by the mannequin, unwinding her scarf, and said nothing more about it, which for her was its own kind of mercy.

“Jide,” Yetunde said into the phone, “let me leave you to go and find out what’s happening with this flight.”

“I will call you the moment we’re moving.”

She held the phone a second longer than she needed to, then whispered because Sade was at the other end of the room. “I love you, Jide.”

“Music to my ears. I love you more.”

The call ended and she sat for a moment with the phone warm in her hands, and prayed, “Lord, let him land safely, and please, let this be the last time I have to share him with a grave.”

Then she picked the needle back up, because the dress would not finish itself, and there was still money to make before anyone could go anywhere.

———————————————————————————————————————

Jide bought a cup of coffee and a sandwich that he didn’t want, because there was nothing else to do for two hours except sit somewhere that wasn’t a plastic airport chair. He could have flown business. His salary raise had come through in October, and a premium airline  seat would have felt like proof of something, like arriving. However, he had looked at the price difference instead and thought of it as a significant contribution towards Yetunde’s tuition if she chose to school here. So, he booked the economy seat without much of a fight with himself.

She still hadn’t sat for the English exam. Or she hadn’t told him if she had. He kept turning it over the same way. He didn’t want to push her on it, didn’t want to be the man putting her under pressure. But going back to England without knowing when their lives were actually going to start together was starting to wear on him in a way he couldn’t fully name.

His phone lit up. Elizabeth.

“You didn’t call,” she said, without greeting him. 

“Why would I call you? You know I’m coming, and that I will see you tomorrow for our trip to Ibadan.”

“You used to tell me before you moved anywhere.”

“That was before.”

“So you have no feelings left at all. Just like that, they switch off?”

“I’m starting to think going with you could be a mistake.”

“No, no, no.” Her voice dropped fast, the fight going out of it. “I’m sorry. I won’t say it again.”

“Fine. I’ll see you tomorrow morning. 

I already bought the train ticket. Lagos to Ibadan. It would be nice, the two of us on the train.”

“That’s not necessary. Taiwo has a car, he’ll take us.”

“I don’t want a crowd, Jide. Just us.”

He closed his eyes for a second. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”

“Call me tonight when you land, I don’t mind. I could even come by. Are you using the flat?”

“Did I use the flat last time?”

“It’s a three bedroom. Why would you go and book a hotel like a stranger.”

“Because I’m not staying under the same roof as you, Elizabeth.”

“We’re basically brother and sister at this point.”

“We are not brother and sister. I will sort out my own accommodation. Thank you.”

He hung up before she could find another angle to push from, and finished the coffee in one long pull, already tired of the trip that hadn’t even started.

————————————————————————————————————–

Yetunde worked until 9 pm that night, two hours past her usual closing, because this was the last day she would be able to push herself like this until Jide left again after Easter. Once he landed, everything else would have to wait.

She locked the shop door and tried his number. It rang out without connecting. She stood on the step for a moment, phone still against her ear. Her phone pinged. She opened it fast, already smiling, sure it was him.

It wasn’t. It was a text from a number she didn’t recognize.

Leave my man alone. You don’t know what we’ve been through. If it wasn’t for you, he would be back with me by now. Don’t put yourself in something you don’t understand. He’s just using you to punish me.

She read it twice. There was no name attached, but there didn’t need to be. She stood there with the phone in her hand and felt something curl tight in her stomach, and thought, so this is what he’s walking into tomorrow.

The phone rang before she’d decided what to do with any of it. Jide.

“Baby, I’m in town. We’ve landed.”

“You’re here.” She felt her whole face change, forgetting the message for a second. “I’m so happy.”

“The moment I walked through arrivals, it was your face I wanted to see. We should have planned it.”

“Jide.”

“I mean it. I wanted to hug you. Smell your hair.”

“Smell what. You will just smell coconut oil, that’s all.”

“Coconut oil is my favourite smell in this world.”

“Oh! Jide, you are such a lover boy.” She started walking toward where the bikes waited at the corner. “I will see you tomorrow. I am heading home now.”

“Home? You’re still at the shop this late?”

“I had orders to finish. I am taking tomorrow off to be with you.”

“I’m going to Ibadan tomorrow. Come tonight instead. Take a taxi, meet me at the hotel. We will have tonight and tomorrow morning before I have to leave for the burial.”

“Jide, we have talked about this. I am not staying over with you.”

“I just miss you.”

“I will bring you breakfast in the morning. That’s what you will get.”

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”

She sighed before she could stop herself.

“You okay?” he said.

“I’m fine.”

“You’re keeping something from me.”

“I’m fine, Jide.”

“Tell me.”

“I love you. Go and get your taxi.” And she ended the call before he could ask again.

She stood there a moment longer, looking at the message still open on her screen. She thought about telling him. Then she thought about what it would mean if she did, how it would sit on him the night before he had to walk into that family’s house. If this was Elizabeth, and she was fairly certain it was, then telling him tonight would only hand her exactly what she wanted, Jide distracted and defensive before he’d even gotten through the burial he’d flown home for.

She closed the message without replying to it, got on a bike, and rode home.

———————————————————————————————————————

The taxi crawled off the airport road into traffic that had no business existing at 11 pm.Jide sat back and let himself want, for one weak minute, tell the driver to forget the hotel and go straight to Ogba instead. He didn’t say it. This was not the hour to be knocking on a woman’s door, however much he had missed her, and he told himself that plainly until the wanting quieted down to something manageable.

He had booked his accommodation on Allen Avenue instead of the flat in Lekki he usually took when he came home, the one still standing in the same building where Elizabeth’s rented flat was. Allen put him fifteen minutes from Yetunde instead of an hour. It also put an entire lagoon between him and anywhere Elizabeth might expect to find him, which he told himself wasn’t the main reason, though he knew it was at least half of one. He wanted to be careful. He had no lingering feelings for Elizabeth, but she was not a woman to underestimate.

His phone buzzed. Yetunde.

Traffic getting to you yet?

He laughed under his breath and typed back. Lagos is showing me its true colours.

Yetunde: Ah, things have actually improved. Traffic is nothing like it used to be.

Jide: You could have fooled me. This is terrible. And I’m starving.

Yetunde: I feel bad now. If your hotel was closer to me I’d have cooked something and brought it.

Jide: It’s not that far. You could still bring it.

Yetunde: You just want a chance to get me with you. Better you just order from the hotel kitchen, Jide.

He was smiling at the screen when the phone rang. Elizabeth.

He let it ring out and typed instead. Landed. How are you? Goodnight, see you tomorrow.

Elizabeth: Oh my God! I’ve been trying to reach you. Why did you cut my call?

The phone rang again before he could answer the text. He looked at it for a long moment, then picked it up, because letting it ring twice unanswered the night before her father’s burial felt like a cruelty he didn’t actually want on his conscience.

“Elizabeth. What’s up.”

“I just wanted to hear your voice.” Her voice had gone soft, the way it did lately, tired and grateful at once. “I’m glad you’re home. I feel like everything might actually be alright now that you’re here.”

“You’ll get through this,” he said. “It’ll be fine.”

The driver half turned from the front seat. “Oga, which hotel again, you said?”

“Prestige Hotels and Apartments,” Jide said, without thinking, catching himself a half second too late, the name already out and gone down the line to Elizabeth.

“It is on Allen Avenue right?” Something shifted in her tone. “That’s unlike you. It’s far from your usual base.”

“Elizabeth.”

“It doesn’t matter. In fact it’s a good thing. I’m at my aunty’s place tonight, in Yaba, so we’re already closer to the train station than if we were coming from the island. We’re taking the seven a.m. train.”

“What?”

“The seven a.m. train. I already booked it.”

“I told you I’m not leaving until later in the morning. The burial isn’t for two days, Elizabeth. Why are we travelling this early?”

“There’s so much to prepare when we get there. My uncles are already fighting about different things.”

“I can’t do seven a.m.” He almost said the rest of it, that he had someone he needed to see in the morning, and that it mattered more to him than a train timetable, but it seemed wrong in his mouth the moment it rose, not the right thing to say to a woman in mourning. He swallowed it instead. “I’m not available until afternoon. Honestly, it might be simpler if you go ahead with your people and I meet you there.”

“Jide, I need you there. You know I need you.”

His line lit up. Yetunde. 

“Goodnight, Elizabeth. It’ll be fine. I have another call.”

He switched over before she could answer. “Hey, babe.”

“You there?”

“Yeah, just now. I will call you properly once I am in the room.”

“No, no, it’s fine, we can talk tomorrow. I am already half asleep, I only wanted to hear your voice before I sleep. Send me your address, I’ll come first thing in the morning.”

“I’ll send it. I love you.”

“I love you too.”

He ended the call, and before the screen had even gone dark, it lit again. Elizabeth.

He sat with the phone buzzing in his hand and let his head fall back against the seat.

“God,” he said, to no one.