The next morning, Adelani woke up to a second voice note from Ronke, this one longer, with the kind of energy that meant bad news wrapped in good intentions. She played it while making her tea, already bracing herself.
"Babe, I know you're rolling your eyes but just listen." A dramatic sigh. "I saw him at a wedding. He's still fine, still successful, and he was asking about you. Like, real questions, oh. 'How is she? Where is she now? Does she ever come to Nigeria?' You know what that means, right?"
It meant nothing. Or worse, it meant he was bored.
She deleted the voice note and stirred her tea, watching the steam curl into the air like an omen. It wasn't that she hated him. Hate required too much energy. What she felt was closer to exhaustion the kind that came from carrying memories that should have been laid to rest long ago.
She met Dayo in her early twenties, when she still believed in grand romantic gestures and forever. He had been everything her mother prayed for: handsome, ambitious, Yoruba. He knew the right things to say, when to hold her hand in public, when to show up at her doorstep with amala and ewedu after she'd had a bad day. He was, by all accounts, a good man.
But good men were not always enough.
Theirs had been a relationship built on promises: of fidelity, of forever, of a future painted with the glow of mutual respect and mutual desire. But somewhere between the late-night phone calls and the long drives through Ibadan's humid streets, something had started to crack. And one day, with a finality she still didn't understand, it broke.
Dayo hadn't been unfaithful. But he had been emotionally unavailable, retreating into the convenient numbness of his career and the weight of his family's expectations. He had promised her forever, and she had believed him until she realized forever wasn't a promise he intended to keep.
She'd let him go.
She had to.
Now, at thirty-one, she still couldn't decide whether to be angry at him or at herself for ever loving him. It was easier not to think about it. Easier to hide behind her quiet, calm life in Norwich.
And then Ronke came along, stirring the pot.
Adelani took her tea to the tiny balcony, letting the cold air bite at her skin. Norwich was quiet this morning, the kind of Sunday calm that made her feel both at peace and slightly displaced, as if she were a character in someone else's novel.
Dayo was a closed chapter. She had made sure of that. So why did his name feel like an ink stain that wouldn't wash off?
Her phone buzzed. This time, it wasn't Ronke.
A Twitter DM.
From a name she didn't recognize.
"I think I know who you are."
Her heart knocked against her ribs.
She clicked on the profile. No display picture, only a cryptic bio: A thinker, a reader, a seeker of truths.
Her palms grew clammy. She had been careful so careful to keep her anonymous account separate from her real identity. No pictures, no personal details, nothing that could link Adelani, quiet church girl in Norwich, to the sharp-tongued woman who tweeted truths people weren't ready for.
She reread the message, pulse quickening.
This was not good.
The message from the stranger sat in her inbox like a secret she wasn't ready to confront. For a full hour, Adelani debated whether or not to reply. She could block the user, pretend it never happened, keep living her life without another word about the Twitter account that nobody, not even her closest friends, knew existed. But something maybe curiosity, maybe the thrill of being noticed made her tap the screen instead.
"Who are you?"
That was all she sent. No pleasantries. No deflection. Just a direct question.
She stared at the screen, watching the three little dots appear and disappear as the stranger typed and retyped their response. It felt like an eternity, and in that silence, she realized just how much she wanted to know who this person was, what they thought of her words, and, most importantly, how they knew her. Was it a coincidence, or was someone maybe Dayo finally tracing her digital footprints?
When the response came, it was simple. Too simple.
"I know who you are. You're not the person you pretend to be."
Adelani's stomach twisted into a knot. Her hands went clammy again, and she felt her heartbeat thudding in her ears. She wanted to throw her phone across the room. There was no way this person could know her. How could they? She had been so careful.
But, then again, hadn't she always said that the truth had a way of creeping into your life whether you wanted it to or not?
She was about to type a response, something sharp, something dismissive, when another message came through, this time a new message from Tara, her colleague at the environmental consultancy firm where she volunteered
"Don't tell me you've forgotten about tonight. Alumni event. You promised you'd come. Or at least, you implied you would. I need moral support, and you need a social life. Don't make me come drag you out of your flat."
Adelani sighed, staring at the message. She had hoped Tara would forget. The invitation had arrived weeks ago, an elegant cream-colored card with gold embossed lettering, the kind of thing that carried an air of importance.
The University of East Anglia Alumni Event – Celebrating Excellence in Research and Teaching
Lani stared at the alumni event invitation sitting on her coffee table, she had tossed it there weeks ago, telling herself she'd decide later. Now, "later" had arrived, and she was still uncertain.
She had no real reason to attend. It wasn't as if she kept in touch with her old classmates. Networking had never been her strong suit, and the thought of standing in a room full of ambitious academics and polished professionals smiling, making small talk, pretending to belong felt exhausting.
Before she could decide how to respond, another message came through.
"Dayo's been asking about you. I thought you should know."
Adelani's heart stuttered. Her fingers froze on the screen. Dayo. The name sent a ripple of panic through her chest, mixing with anger and the quiet ache she had buried deep for so long. She had moved on, hadn't she? She had buried that part of herself, and yet there it was, a ghost knocking at her door.
She couldn't handle this. Not now. Not when she had barely begun to make sense of her own thoughts.
The morning light had shifted when Adelani left her apartment. She had always found that the air in Norwich was different from the humid, oppressive breeze of Ibadan cool and crisp, with the smell of rain always hovering in the background, ready to fall. The walk to work was predictable. She passed Mrs. Jones, the elderly neighbour who lived in the flat across the hall, as she was on her way to the Cornershop.
"Morning, dear! How's your day shaping up?" Mrs. Jones asked, her glasses perched on her nose as she reached for her trolley.
"Morning, Mrs. Jones. Same old, really," Adelani replied, smiling politely.
"Well, you should do more than same old. You should come to dinner sometime! I make the best roast chicken. My son says so." Mrs. Jones winked, adjusting her cardigan as though she were preparing for a sales pitch.
Adelani bit back a laugh. The woman meant well, she always did, but dinners were never the highlight of her week. "That sounds lovely. Maybe one day soon."
Mrs. Jones smiled and waved her off as Adelani continued down the street.
Work was a blur of books, quiet murmurs, and the ever-present hum of people who were content with their lives. At the library, Adelani's job was simple organize the shelves, help people find what they needed, and stay out of the way. She liked it that way. Today, however, her boss, Mr. Holloway, wanted to talk about an upcoming event at the library.
"Adelani, are you available for the book club's next meeting? We're discussing a novel by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Americanah and I think your perspective could really add something to the conversation," Mr. Holloway said, leaning on the counter with an easy smile.
There it was again—that unsettling attentiveness wrapped in professional politeness. She had noticed it before, the way his compliments always carried a little too much weight, the way he always seemed to find a reason to linger when she was alone.
"I'm sure the meeting will be great," Adelani replied, keeping her voice even. She wasn't sure how much of herself she was willing to share in those kinds of discussions, especially with people who didn't understand the weight of the topics they debated over biscuits and tea. But more than that, she wasn't sure she wanted to spend an evening sitting across from Mr. Holloway, feeling his eyes study her as if she were one of the books on the shelf.
"I'll think about it."
Mr. Holloway didn't seem to mind her noncommittal response. If anything, his smile widened, his fingers drumming idly on the counter as he held her gaze a moment too long. "Good, good. Let me know if you change your mind."
As he finally stepped away, Adelani exhaled, only then realizing how tense her shoulders had become. She needed air. She needed to be somewhere else.
As she continued her shift, Adelani passed by Sarah, the young woman who worked the front desk. Sarah, with her bright blonde hair and an unnerving enthusiasm for small talk, greeted her with a cheery, "Hey, Adelani! How's your day going?"
"Not bad, just the usual." Adelani forced a smile, knowing Sarah would fill the silence if she didn't.
"Yeah, I hear you. Just finished a new Netflix series 'The Night Agent'. You should check it out sometime!" Sarah chirped, returning to her duties.
Adelani nodded politely, but the invitation felt empty. It wasn't that she disliked Sarah—it was just that the world Sarah inhabited felt like a foreign country. Sarah's life, her loud, carefree nature, didn't fit into Adelani's own quiet orbit. Still, she knew Sarah was doing her best to be friendly. That was the thing about people here: they wanted to be nice but rarely asked if you were okay.
She returned to her desk, her mind still buzzing with the strange messages from the cryptic stranger. Neither seemed to understand the invisible walls she'd spent years carefully building.
By lunchtime, the weight of it all—the messages, the encounters, the questions about Dayo had built into a pressure that squeezed at her chest. The world kept moving, and Adelani was simply… part of the background, her internal world a million miles away. But for how long could she keep hiding? For how long could she resist the pull of something deeper, something maybe?
As Adelani wheeled a cart of returned books back to their shelves, she heard the familiar, deliberate footsteps of Mr. Holloway before he even spoke. "Staying late again, Adelani?" His voice was smooth, but there was something about the way he lingered that always put her on edge. She turned, forcing a polite smile. "Just finishing up."
He leaned casually against the counter, watching her with the kind of interest that had begun to feel too familiar. "You work too hard," he mused. "A bright young woman like you should have more fun." His gaze lingered a beat too long, and suddenly, the library her safe, quiet space felt suffocating.
Maybe Tara had a point. She did have a life outside of this place. And she was not about to let another evening slip away in the company of dusty books and uncomfortable attention.
She pulled out her phone and typed quickly: "Fine. I'm coming. You owe me."