Christopher
Bonn, Germany

What would anyone expect a grown man to be looking for at a maternity home? What would be that first thing that comes to mind? A man applying for the job of a babysitter? Or just a sweet, loving husband who had offered to go for prenatal advice on his wife's behalf? The latter wasn't very likely but the options irrespective of how moderately reasonable they were, people had it made it look abominable and ridiculous.

Hence, I wasn't expecting the pregnant women and nurses that walked past at the kiddies store to look at me like a normal human being when I made my reason for stopping by known.

"Are you sure you don't have a toddler at home?" the only English-speaking assistant on deck asked me.

"Get me what I asked for so I can pay you your money," I answered very sharply.

It was infuriating to have the same question asked in fifty different ways like I wasn't fully aware of what I was doing and they were no different from nosy and unnecessarily silly Nigerian nurses and assistants who would rather ruminate on your business than theirs.

Quietly after my salty reply, the assistant walked into the storeroom and came back with what I requested. Dropping the dollar bill on the counter, I picked the commodity up and walked away briskly.

It was crazy to what extent inspiration could drive people. Ever since I saw that maternity home afar off from where I sat at the milkshake store, I became a wanderer momentarily, stopping at nothing till I found the store that had what I was looking for.

When I visited the first maternity home I saw and couldn't get what I was searching for, I was discouraged, questioning the smartest of my plan but the motivation to try kept me moving till I was able to find one.

Through the night, I thought endlessly, wondering if my plan was going to work even with how shallow it looked. Even after getting what I was searching for, I still wasn't sure.

All I wanted was to put a smile on her face knowing that I made her bitter. I owed it to myself to make her twice as happy as I had taken away the little crumbs of joy she had.

There was a smile I saw on one of her old Christmas photos. She was only ten or eleven-years-old in the picture with the best smile I had never seen her flash at me nor the kids. At least at me. Not that all of her smiles were fake before I saw that photo but it was nowhere near authentic as the one in that photo.

With my plan, I hoped to recreate that look on her face even if I wasn't worthy of eliciting that expression from her.

I still wanted to try.

After a week of planning and preparations, I sent a couple of texts throughout the week, telling her that I cared and I was sorry for lying to her but got no reply. On the eve of the morrow when I was mentally preparing myself to physically meet with her, I sent another text, letting her know of my intention and I got a reply.

Only that the reply was what I expected from her. I got rejected based on the fact that she didn't want to have any business associating aimlessly with a liar. Instead of taking that as an outright no, I saw it as something because she'd chosen to reply to me after days of consistently trying to get her to reply to me.

The following day, I got dressed in the most casual way possible; not overly confident or arrogant but not as an unimportant entity either. I wasn't sure if she was going to come to the venue I provided in her text because Yemisi was no moody, teenage girl. Most times, her no was no.

Still, I wanted to try but in a different way.

Thankfully, I managed to know her friend, Myron within a short time so I deciphered that stopping at her apartment to drop off my gift with hopes that it would be delivered to Yemisi would be a much better thing.

Someone might want to ask how I got to know Myron. Well, I did my findings thoroughly. I'd asked Karen when last she spoke to Yemisi on the phone and when she told me,  I went further to ask, guided by my instincts, what environment she seemed to be in during the call. Through that way, I was able to know that Yemisi was attending a law school program.

So, I drove all the way there and asked if Yemisi had any friends at the school and I got to know about Myron.

Parking my car by the manageable space provided, I had arrived at a small, elite apartment in the outskirts of Bonn. I walked right into the front door of the house without much difficulty, thanks to the security that was anything but uptight. Anyway, I guess it was because they speculated me to be their boss' spouse perhaps.

But I was glad. I simply prayed that Miss. Myron would not freak out beyond necessary on seeing a stranger at her doorstep talk more if she gets to find out how I knew about her location.

After taking a deep, assuring breath, I knocked at the door. There was no response. I made another attempt and the sound of footsteps came to my hearing. Then, a voice.

"Who is at the door?" the voice asked.

"My name is Christopher. I'm your friend's husband, Yemisi." I answered the voice of whom I presumed to be Miss. Myron.

"Why are you here?" she asked sharply.

Hmm. I wasn't expecting to be nice anyway.

"I came to give you something. I will appreciate it if you could deliver it to my wife."

"She's very busy right now. I am busy. We are both busy."

"I won't take up to ten minutes of your time."

"Ten? Knowledge is power is time is money. Have you heard that before?"

"Alright, five, " I bargained. "I know you have every right not to open this door because to you, I'm some bloody creep who shows up at your doorstep asking for a crazy favor but please."

"You sure are one. Tell me, how did you find out about where I live if we haven't met before?"

Damn. Here comes the question I was foolishly hoping she wouldn't ask.

"I did my findings and asked a few questions from the students at law school, " I admitted. "and I did that for the sole purpose of approaching you today because Yemisi and I are currently not on good terms. She doesn't want to see my face right now and I don't want to push it too much either. I just want to be able to show her that I have her in mind all the time."

That elicited silence from her end. A silence mixed with processing thoughts from her end and intense anxiety on mine. Minutes afterward, the door opened slowly and it was...

Her.

Shocked to the very extreme and indecisive as to what to do or how to act, I stood still like a helpless rock, letting her stare at me. Her eyes glowered with several sentiments.

Lawyers loved to keep it brief in every possible way because they worked around the clock but at that moment, profession was forsaken. Knowledge was no longer time, power, or money.

When it occurred to her that she was most likely going to cry if she didn't stop staring, her gaze shifted to my hand, the occupied one.

"I thought I made my intentions clear that I didn't want to associate aimlessly with a liar. Besides, I'm bust at the moment if you are wondering why I'm here of all places. I have a case to solve with—

"I only wanted to give you this."

Removing the nylon bag sharply, a pink box was revealed. I placed it on the concrete decking before me. The more I went further in unwrapping the box, the more convinced I was as to how shallow my plan was but two things kept me going; the fact that I had gotten this far already and the fact that no material thing that I had ever gifted Yemisi was able to make her smile as I had seen in that picture.

After untying the last, silk ribbon, I opened the lid diligently, revealing a pink Barbie dollhouse with every other thing that could be found in a dollhouse - combs, shoes, coats, and bags. All doll-sized and at the center of the miniature house stood Barbie and Ken in the fanciest wedding clothes ever. This was exactly what I saw in that photo. I could only hope that it would be the same for her.

I raised my body to let her have a view of the dollhouse. I looked at her face eagerly, with my heart throbbing in a kind of anticipation that I could not interpret.

I saw that insane urge to smile and let go of the anger and every other negative thing she felt. I saw it all in her expression from how her lips moved slightly from one end to the other and how tense her jaw seemed to look as though she were biting her tongue or her cheek.

I didn't want to jump to conclusions yet. Maybe she wasn't pleased and I was merely interpreting what I wanted to interpret but with her attention keen on the dollhouse before her, I knew it was able to make her feel something. Something positive.

She fell on her knees, gazing at the house before her as she had mentally traveled back in time to Disneyland. To the exact memory where she saw these things. To the happiest day of her life.

She roamed her hands around it gently, afraid that she would dismantle the whole structure if she held it too tightly. I couldn't see her face but I knew there was a lot she was passing through at that moment so I let her be.

"What made you get me this?" she murmured. If I wasn't yearning for a response from her, I was sure that I wouldn't have heard on it telling from how inaudible her voice was.

"Umm...I saw it in a photo and you looked delighted to have it. I wanted to make you smile the same way I'd seen you smile in that photo."

Finally, she looked at me. If she was holding back her smile before, it vanished completely now and suddenly, she tossed the entire dollhouse right into the mud in between the grass.

My heart dropped. My dumb self had only made her angrier with the stupid thing I had done. I hung my head lowly, staring at my feet, scared like the coward that I was when I heard her footsteps approaching me closer and closer.

I knew she was going to slap me telling from the way she pulled my face up to look right into hers. She raised her other hand high in the air. I made the resolve not to flinch so she wouldn't miss her shot at dehumanizing my face since I made her so angry.

"Many things made me happy at that age, Christopher. You are so dramatic."

"I—

And I got lost in her lips, with the rest of my words following right after. Her hands only came to rest at the nape of my neck, rubbing a few strands of my hair smoothly, begging to differ from the purpose I thought it was to serve. Those hands weren't for my cheekbones but even those only turned red now and it was due to the heavenly heavens I was tottering in at the moment.

What men could do, women could do better and that was definite. I kissed back, giving all I had and anything that constituted more. Anything I could find, I gave it, leaving nothing behind. Our lips didn't stop their dance for all of eternity. The savoring movement of her fresh lips felt like the Balm of Gilead made to heal my aching heart. A miracle.

One I wanted to hold on to forever. With the way her hands roam around my neck, hovering all through my head and down to the middle of my back, I knew I was home. Home away from intruders and thieves. I knew I'd found my redemption.

Sadly, as immortal as our desires were, the need for the intake of air wasn't so we stopped.

"You already did what you needed to do. It is the most important thing and I needed it," she whispered in my ear like it was something only I needed to hear. A truth made only for me to keep and to register. The truth is that it was important. To her.

Softly, she bit the tip of my ear. 

"You are always on my mind. I love you so much."

"Say that again." her expression changed a bit. I knew she needed the reassurance more than ever before.

"I love you."

"Again!"

Greedy much?

As though she read my thoughts, she added. "Yes for you, I'm greedy."

"I love you."

She kissed my lips briefly.

"I don't want to lose you to anyone. Her especially. I've realized that I shouldn't hold back anymore. I missed you badly and I spent many moments, scared and worried that we would never be together again and she would win. I didn't want to stay angry at you anymore. Well at least, not from afar because I know you truly would not mean to hurt me. I've come to realize that you need help and I need to be there with you so we can save ourselves."

"Thank you for accepting me, " I said, removing a strand of her hair that stuck close to her left eye.

Her cheek flushed briefly and it was gone, and back to its original color. If it wasn't the Yemisi I knew, I would have concluded that she was...shy.

**

"You know, the day my in-laws showed up at my house after Kenneth's death to confiscate all of my hard-earned properties, I was more shocked than livid because it wasn't something I never imagined that they would do that to me. When Kenneth was alive, these people would treat me like a baby and would do anything to ensure that I was comfortable and happy. The way they switched up on me when things became bad is something that I still can't get over whenever I think about it."

Yemisi confessed. I could feel the pain vividly from the way she spoke and could mentally visualize that open wound in her heart that stubbornly refused to be cured. Her head and right hand laid on my bare chest, as she caressed my ear softly. My hand was wrapped around her bare back, skin to skin and beneath the sheets, warmed by the dull ray of light in my bedroom.

"People switch up on you unexpectedly. Very unfair but it happens." I made sure to select my words but even my choice seemed to be wrong in the long run.

"I felt my wound reopen when she came into the picture. I never saw it coming."

My heart picked up its pace. She heard it. "You just have to promise me that I won't get any more unpleasant surprises now that I've decided to stand by your side and save our relationship. I deserve peace of mind."

"You do and I promise you."

She moved her hands from my ear to my face and kissed me again. I kissed back and moved my hands to a few interesting parts of her body.

I was constantly eager to feel her and the warmth that seeped from her cold exterior. Only for me.

"What do we have to do to nullify the engagement?" she asked.

"I can't get her to do it since she wants me for her lustful reasons. I've been trying to get my mother to do it because she was the one who made it happen in the first place. Our betrothal was based on the grounds of our lack of financial capacity to make compensation for the damages caused to Irene's family business so the plan was to have me betrothed to her till I'm able to pay the money back once I'm grown enough. None of them want me to do that."

"Your mother doesn't like me. I've always known that but I don't care. The only people on our sides are each other and that's all that we need."

"Yes, " I approved, rubbing her shoulders lovingly.

"From now on, let's live together. A team should always be by each other for a proper competition to commence."

"I'm all in for that. It's us against the world."