If you want to recap what happened in Episode 1, find it here.
The one-time Aderonke had tried to fall in love, it blew up in her freaking face, leaving her with a million pieces of shattered hearts - no, not hearts, because that love didn't happen. So, something else. Like glass. A million pieces of shattered glass.
So, when Mike asked her if she ever had any friends, she had to take a few seconds to answer. Thinking. Wondering if she was ready to go over the embarrassing story of a ‘situationship’ she wished progressed more than it did.
It was four years ago, and the jerk of a white boy who caught her attention was cheating on her before they even committed to one another. Ok, fine. She's not sure if what Murphy Brown did could be considered cheating because she hadn't told him she liked him...too? But, it had to be that he liked her, right? Why would he have been nice to her? That time he buried his fist in the scrawny face of that racist scumbag, in her defense, it had to be thanks to something he had for her. Right? The early morning 'hi's and midday lunch grabs. The random winks, known for sending heat to her cheeks. The smiles that seemed to be only for her (Murphy didn't smile much, but he did, whenever he was with her. That had to count for something). Ah, yes, the gentle and persistent hugs that always left her in the embrace of his Eau de Parfum for the rest of her day.
It wasn't a sweeping-you-off-your-feet kind of 'love', but she had found herself gradually looking forward to the misty blue of his eyes at every rising of the sun. That's how real the blooming vibe felt in her chest. Maybe not. Maybe the medical jargon that filled her brain had just left no room for common sense, because when she saw him in the hallway swallowing that Latina babe's tongue and performing a magic she wished he'd do on her own ass, her mouth betrayed her. She called his name. Murphy Brown. Her lips flew into a purse once she realized her folly. Why on earth had the name escaped her being with traces of pain? What's worse? Murphy had turned with a broad smile, saying hi and waving like a jolly balloon to her. That damned smile again. The one that seemed to be only for her. Murphy waved at her like he saw a friend he grew up on a farm with. Like it was nothing, and that his act shouldn't hurt her. But it did, and she had to swallow a huge lump as he approached her - Latina babe in hand.
"Hi, Ronks" he called the shorter version of her name that rolled off easily on his tongue - the one she had suggested and allowed only him to use. To everyone else, it was Aderonke, despite how their Caucasian vocal cords murdered the name. But at that moment when Murphy said 'Lisa, meet Aderonke, my friend from Nigeria' he became like everyone else to her. The waves of feelings that had been stubbornly gathering flutter power in her tummy turned into a lake. A lake drying so fast as seconds ticked by, leaving a bed of salt she willed to pour on him. But that wouldn't be civil. So she smiled and shook the outstretched arm of Lisa. Aderonke wasn't sure if that was a mocking smile she had seen on Lisa's face - like, duh, loser, the Greek statue with the 'Murphy' moniker is mine. Murphy indeed looked like a statue straight out of Greek mythology. Literally.
Thankfully, none of that mattered anymore.
But, just like the stint with Murphy, life was running a circus around Aderonke's heart, again. Only this time, life went too far. It made her almost kiss Mike. Their lips faintly greeted one another with a contact that wasn't there, cursing her with warm regret of what could have been.
Everything went downhill when Nurse Omolara barged into the room.
The shock on Mike's face confounded Aderonke at that moment. And it stayed with her for the four full moons afterward, leading to now.
The shock. She had never seen Mike's face like that before then. Yes, they hadn't spent much time together. But in the two weeks leading to that day, she had seen different expressions enjoy life on his perfectly symmetrical face. Pain from his leg breaking. Sadness from being unable to hit the gym. Happiness, when his boss sent him an email that his application for medical leave was granted, accompanied by some hundreds of dollars credited to him from the company's account. Even in that sensually tense moment when reason was locked out of her brain and estrogen controlled her being, she still saw passion tell stories on his face. So, she had seen Mike's face reveal an array of emotions, but not the one of that day. Not when he said 'Omolara', and the nurse's mouth released the sound of 'Mike.’
When Aderonke searched Mike's face in the brief still and heavy moment, he looked like emptiness smeared with confusion and pain. Throw a little bit of loathe in there, and some gobbles of regret and sadness. What do you have? Aderonke combed through her brain for the perfect one word to describe the look on Mike's face as he sat up in bed, but she came up with nothing. For four months. Nothing. Aderonke had no answer. And Mike? He wasn't saying anything.
He was a new Mike - one with a dead spirit. One who no longer replied to her messages.
Every day after that intrusion, Aderonke willed to inherit Superman's Cape and power, ready to use it all to initiate a reverse rotation of the earth. Turn back the damn hands and legs of time, then make sure she locked the damn door so Omolara wouldn't be able to throw stones in her glass house. Better still, she'd have not left her phone on the office table, which had caused someone to come 'looking' for her when she wasn't picking up the phone.
Not her fault though. Rushing out of her office after a 12:30 am consultation to see the man with the broken leg certainly wasn't her fault. It was her heart's. Before condemning her head to the gallows, what should she have done when being in his presence was the only lunch she craved ever since they met? When it wouldn't be right to start her end-of-workday night without those recurrent two hours, gisting about everything with him. Even his jokes about whales always left a sweet tingle at the root of her belly.
Sadly, thanks to one freaking nurse Omolara, the only sweet thing about her life was up in flames. The distance between Aderonke and Mike kept adding miles, and it burned her. How did a stranger become such a balm to her soul? A balm that was now missing, leaving the charred spots on her heart to itch like crazy. Leaving her befuddled mind to scamper for answers.
Aderonke itched to know what had gone on between Mike and Omolars, but who would she have asked? Mike? The man with whom conversations started feeling like solving a 3x3 matrix question? Every moment together since then became less interesting till he was discharged. Like a sore wound that went in the direction of the superlatives of ‘bad.’ The two hours end-of-day hangouts gradually eroded to ten minutes. The smiles and lit-up eyes faded into curt nods and distant stares of silence.
Or should she have asked Omolara? The nurse she didn't notice before, but now became so aware of, over the past four months? Every working hour, Omolara now existed in Aderonke's consciousness. The awkward meets in the hallway, the stiff exchange of daily pleasantries. When Aderonke asked Mike who the nurse was - a day after the botched kiss, "My ex," he simply replied. And that was it. Two words that excruciatingly bore a gaping hole in Aderonke's heart. Two words that sent her on the journey of bereavement, alone.
Aderonke's father died.
It was on Christmas Eve. The hospital turned on its head in those final hours when every effort was hurried to save Chief Ayoola. His death hit Aderonke. Hard. Like the punch of a heavyweight champion, straight to the chest. Choked by tears and wrapped in fears, Aderonke gasped for breath as the weeks blurred into each other. From the national death announcements to Will-reading sessions to Funeral day, it was all a single-length nightmare for Aderonke. Going through the messy motions imbued fresh perspectives on people, purpose, family, and career, in her. Aderonke, at the end of the day, you are all alone. Thanks to her father's preparedness, she was able to keep most of his estate from the prying and furious eyes and hands of ‘family.’ Chief also allocated the rest to them - the family - in deserved proportions.
Papa was all Aderonke had. He was everything, every time, and everywhere. Papa shielded her. My only angel, he used to call her. He was a father. He was a mother. He was a brother. And he was a friend. And none of the things she worked so hard for was going to replace him in any of these roles. Not ever. So, Aderonke cried herself into an empty shell. No one could fill the void Papa left. Not even... Mike? Mike. Maybe Mike could?
Mike was there on 'funeral day.' But he wasn't there as she wanted him to be. In the black tux Aderonke only came to appreciate weeks after the day, Mike stood beside her. Stoic. More like a bodyguard than the lover she hoped he was.
He was her only friend in the country. Her only friend in the world. God, how did I become so lonely? On occasions, as her father's body went into the ground, she looked over her shoulder and up at him. In search of strength. But he only offered a flat smile. Not the bright, heavenly smile he offered in their first two weeks even when he was in pain. Fine. She took whatever strength the flat smile offered, and pulled through the day. Up until she crashed into his embrace just as the last visitor to the tomb site drove off. She bawled and emptied herself of every droplet of tear. The solace of his arms, the soothing beat of his heart against her ear, the palm that kept patting her, everything balmed her to ease.
"Don't tell me you're going to fall asleep here?" Mike had said.
She knew he wanted her to laugh, and she gladly ran with it. Her first chuckle in weeks escaped her tummy, and into his chest, it went. But that had been it. He took her home and disappeared.
As of the funeral, they hadn't been able to talk. They needed to, right? About them - Aderonke and Mike. About them too - Omolara and Mike. Mike, the common factor in these talks about the past, present, and future.
Mike Ogundele, where the hell are you?
"I'll find you today," Aderonke said, to herself, cladding herself in her white night robe before settling behind her desktop.
First stop. LinkedIn.
"There you are!" New life descended on her being as she scrolled through Mike's page at eleven in the night, after typing his name in the search box. This wasn't Aderonke stalking. It's a simple professional search for the expert who held the keys to helping her feel good. And like every other professional service one needed to pay for, she was paying for this search with her pride. So, watch her scour his resume, and click the link on there to his Twitter (not X) profile.
A bio that read "Pulling my weight in the gym and VSCode" could only be Mike’s. Sipping from her cup of juice preceded her scrolling through his tweets and replies. There was barely any tweet of his in the past few days, just retweets (Aderonke's mind failed to see it as a 'repost'). His last tweet finally caught her attention.
"So close, yet so far. The future that could have been, haunted by the past. But all we can control is the present, and it tells me to let it go."
Aderonke Ayoola stormed to her feet. Fists in the air in celebration, as she hopped around like a mad woman. Yes. Yes. Yes. She found him. She found his heart. She found hope. He longed. Mike longed for her too. For a future with her. A future haunted by the past, yes. But a future anyway. All she - they - needed to do was resolve the past. That will be easy, right?
Calming her nerves, Aderonke dug deeper into Mike's socials, until she found something. The name of his gym. The one he was probably headed to on the day their race unfolded. Motion pictures of how his muscles flexed, while he ran that day, flooded her mind. Those damned muscles, properly mounted in appropriate areas. Gosh.
It's time for a new mission. Ecstasy flooded her biological system. Smiles painted her face with blush. It's time to get to work. So far, the series of her adult life has been titled "Saving Dad". But now, everything in her willed the new season to be titled "Finding Mike," and that's exactly what she planned to do.
"How may I help you?" The gym attendant at Agura Hotel Fitness asked with wide eyes as he checked her out.
She was in a good mood today, so she’d let him feed his eyes.
"You can help me tell that man he's mine," Aderonke replied. A smile as bright as the sun shone brightly on her face as she set eyes on Mike who was hard at work on the bench press. Surprised at her newly found boldness, she went through the registration process hastily.
"Welcome to Agura Hotel Fitness," the attendant said as he handed her the member's pass.
But Aderonke no longer paid attention to the unnecessarily bulky attendant. His voice was in the background as her mind zeroed in on the real deal. Mike Ogundele. As she watched him put in the reps, her joy morphed into fear. All the plans she had figured out grew wings and soared. Her newly developed self-confidence deflated like a punctured balloon. But before all the air left her balloon body, she plastered paper tape on the leak. You can do this, Aderonke. He likes you too.
Heads turned as she made her way through the gym. Expected. Even if she couldn't explain why she decided on gym wear that tightly hugged all her features, parting into the folds and crevices of her backside, she could explain the head-turn of these old men trying to work their backs back to shape. Focus, Aderonke, focus. Her standard smile sat pretty on her face as she closed in on her target.
"Come on. One more. Come on! You can do this, bro. Come on." The huge Spotter monitoring Mike kept shouting.
Aderonke gestured and smiled at the Spotter, suggesting she was there for the man pushing what looked like 120kg of multiple weights.
In no time, Aderonke stood in the Spotter's spot. Making her best impression of Mr. Bean's smile.
Mike looked up. His eyes burst with surprise.
“Aderonke. What are you doing here?” he asked, with a ghost of a smile as his leg pushed him into an upright stance.
He was full. Tall, ripped, and towering over her in a non-intimidating way. Had he always been this tall? Maybe her fear suddenly made her feel small. But it was now or never. She knew that. So, there was no room for fear. What’s the worst that could happen? Papa was gone anyway. That’s the worst thing she feared, and it had happened, and life continued, painfully. It was time to build a new world. Here, in Nigeria. A world where she gets to manage more than she could have imagined. A world where her one decision affected the livelihood of a thousand others. Literally. A world where she had everything. All, but one. Mike Ogundele. Mike was the only puzzle missing in her rebuild, and she was here to change that.
“I came for you.” The words crawled out of her mouth, sending cheers and hails around the gym. Those gossipy old men. Anyway, there was more. “I’ve been thinking of you, Mike. Every day. You suddenly changed. Everything just changed between us, and I don’t know why. Ever since the day we almost…”
Mike’s hand flew over her mouth. A mention of that word here, and Mike knew he’d have to register at another gym. These old men came to the gym for two things: to mend their backs or knees, and to discuss every other topic under heaven. Mike sure as hell wasn’t planning to become the topic for the next two weeks.
Let the woman breathe, Mike. Mr. Cranium sang some sense into Mike’s mind as he saw the smile on Aderonke’s face. Was she enjoying his palm over her mouth?
“Enough. Let’s go outside. You can’t do this in here.” His large palm wrapped around her wrist.
Like a puppy after its master, she followed. Smiling and taking in the bulge of his tricep as he led her out of the gym. This wasn’t the Mike clad in hospital wear. This Mike was hotter. Tall, sweaty, and in the wild. Not bound by swarming Nurses, or Omolaras.
The smile disappeared from her face thanks to her remembrance of that name. Omolara. The ex they needed to talk about. Just in time, they arrived at a quiet place after making a few turns away from the gym area. He still held her wrist. A subconscious act to which she let herself flush from head to toe. Oh. How she had missed that feeling of holding him. The last time was at the funeral.
Say something, bro. Mr. Cranium rightly advised Mike.
Releasing her wrist and pocketing his hands, he took a firm stance.
“What do you mean you came for me? I thought you said I didn’t need to worry about the hospital bill.”
“Good try.” Aderonke paused, focusing on the brown of his eyes. Woah! So, this was Mike. In flesh. Holding her gaze with the confidence he held them in those magical two weeks. But now, he checked the time to let her know he itched to escape the stillness. “Why are you avoiding me, Mike? What happened to us?” Forgive Aderonke, she had no better word to describe things than ‘us.’ Her stress-induced memory loss was all down to this man.
“Us?” His mocking surprise laced the word. His finger waved between him and her, to establish the physical representation of the word ‘us.’ “Aderonke, there was no us. There will never be a us. I’m sorry. So, I don’t think there is anything to talk about. We were just friends, and that’s all it should be. We don’t…”
She’s had enough of his bullshit, so, she cut in. Because the last time she didn’t speak up fast enough, the man she liked was rocking a Latina babe against the wall. Fuck you, Murphy Brown! Really.
“So close, yet so far. The future that could have been, haunted by the past. But all we can control is the present, and it tells me to let it go.”
Her words felt familiar but didn’t quite register in his brain.
“What’s that?” His eyes and neck asked the question too, in gestures.
“That’s your tweet.” Aderonke paused, searching his eyes for a reaction. She got it. Shit. His whole body spoke. “You miss us. You know we had something, and you want it too. So, I don’t quite understand why you’re chickening out and not replying to my messages. The whole one hundred and three of them!”
Did she count the total number of messages she’s left you? Man, she’s a keeper! Lose her at your peril. No one else but Mr. Cranium continued, relentless.
“Shut up!” Mike blurted. With a quick follow-up. “Sorry. That wasn’t for you.” His eyes, hand, and mouth pleaded with Aderonke. His outburst wasn’t directed at her, but at…himself. Willing his brain and mind to be in accord before voicing a response, Mike took his time. Mulled over what to say - how to say it, how to let her know that he was scared. That the past is too complex to analyze and come to terms with in one conversation. That with a past like his, there would be no future. That, rather than waste her time with him, she was better off finding someone to take her confidently by the hand without the fear of being outed.
He knew Aderonke was relentless. It’s how she made it through medical school studying neurosurgery. So, he had to hit the hammer on the head. He needed to. If not, she’d keep coming at his heart like a raging bull.
“So, you talk to yourself now?” Aderonke cut into his thoughts. A few seconds passed. “Tell me what happened between you and Omolara, because I noticed everything changed after you saw her that day. You became this… this different person. Why would seeing your ex-girlfriend change things for us?”
“Again. I said there’s no ‘us’, Aderonke!” His finger flew into the air to draw the quotes, accompanied by his words several decibels high. “There’s no us!” He repeated.
“But, you like me!” she shouted back at him. Fury in her eyes, but plea in her heart.
“Yes. I like you.” Shit. No. You wanted to say No, nigga. Mr. Cranium whispered into Mike’s inner ear before running to take cover. “No, I mean…” Mike’s words stumbled to the I-told-you-so eyes of the beautiful little 5’9 devil standing at akimbo, and crowding into him. “Fuck. Yes. Yes. I like you. Hell! I love you. I’ve thought about you every fucking day since I met you. I miss the kiss we almost had. I loved it when you cried into my chest at the funeral. I loved it so much I wish we could do your dad’s funeral every day because I want to be the guy that consoles you.” Mike stopped to breathe. “I love you, but I won’t have you. I can’t have you, Aderonke.”
“Why can’t you have me? What’s so difficult about two adults loving each other? You like me, I like you. So, why do I have to go to bed hugging a picture of your leg’s x-ray?”
“I raped her! I raped Omolara. That’s why she broke up with me. It had to be.”
See you soon with the third episode. Till then, kindly share this with 1 person who means so much to you.
Our stalking scope has been exposed. Oh no!😂
You are such an amazing writer. I always love the details.