child, they mirrored a sorrow far too old for someone so young. Her father said she had her mother's eyes-h

rs. Only silence. Her name wasn't spoken, not in stories, not in anger, not even in forgivene

s mechanic workshop, quiet as a tomb. Her father, Raymond, had loved once. So fiercely, in fact, that it broke him. The day her m

er rem

ess. He brushed her hair but didn't braid it. He cooked noodles but forgot to slice the onions

," he'd say, looking off into spaces Alero couldn't

made her father's eyes water, just enough to embarrass them both. Instead, she folded her wonderin

of friends who invited each other for sleepovers but skipped her, in the aunties at church who pitied her but

came

e wasn't just her first kiss-he was her first everything. They met in

mind," he t

ever said

should. Yo

c can be

letters he wrote her, the ones where he promised to marry Alero, to take

er eyes. "Heartbreak?" he asked, pl

vice. He simply placed his han

still

ty was a

tudy Sociology. Not because she wanted to

amatically, just a soft, surrendering kin

he whispered. "You

reedom, but it

oke Yoruba like poetry and kissed her like a secret he was desperate to keep. But after a

this much," he said once, dur

rly. "I never asked

her chest. That was the first time she cut her

the world swal

sistant for a sketchy influencer who paid her in exposure. Lago

he met

him intense. She ca

ted like scripture-cheated on by an ex-wife, abandoned by his mot

t then, but she was

gown. Just court papers and a lunch at a re

s earlier and was learning to walk again. "You don'

. Attentive. Generous. B

en came the anger-smashed glasses, slammed doors. Then came

without you

ould run from," she whispered o

late from work. He didn't speak. Just stared. Then

you listen?

ng like her father taught her. That night, she p

her father's bedsid

a nightmare

you woke up. Tha

later, her

but something unexpect

as pr

e it was her father's voice in her head. Maybe it was the emptiness of

he s

g in December, she gave birth

aming, fists cle

e," she whispered, crad

he touched his cheek. And in t

of it. B

o let he

make her

s pa

he abandonment, about the pain. She told him stories about his grandfat

ked her, "Mumm

then you smile, and I rememb

t was t

n married t

Her son was

me, she wou