Dayo did not tell Amaka everything. He discovered there were memories that could be described and memories that changed temperature when approached. So he gave her the shape. His father's business began failing when Dayo was eight. The drinking got worse after that. His mother became quieter in some rooms and louder in others. She could laugh beautifully outside the house. Inside, she learned economy. His father never became one thing. That was the complication. “He could be good for three weeks,” Dayo said. “Sometimes two months. Then you'd start feeling stupid for being afraid of him.” Amaka sat beside him now, though a cushion remained between them. “And then?” “And then something would happen.” “What?” “Anything. Money. Work. Somebody disrespecting him. Nothing.” Dayo rubbed his thumb across the seam of the sofa. “Was he violent?” The question came gently. He stared ahead. “Not the way that word makes you imagine.” Amaka did not rescue him from the sentence. He continued. “He hit walls. Doors. Once a table broke. He grabbed my mother a few times. I saw one. Maybe there were others.” “Did he hit you?”
“No.” The answer came too fast. Dayo heard the relief inside it and felt ashamed. “He didn't need to.” Amaka looked down at her hands. “He shouted. He could say things that made you feel…” Dayo searched. “Small is not the word. Temporary. Like your place in the house depended on how well you understood him.” “And your mother stayed.” “Yes.” “Why?” “I asked her once.” “What did she say?” Dayo looked at Amaka. “Where would I go?” Amaka's eyes closed briefly. “She said that?” “Yes.” “How old were you?” “Fourteen.” They sat with it. Outside, a delivery motorcycle revved below the balcony. Dayo leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “There was one night when I was seventeen.” Amaka waited. He saw the clock. 11:47. His father's voice. A lamp hitting the wall.
His mother's hand raised, not to strike, just to say stop. Dayo's back pressed against cold paint. He stopped breathing for a moment. Amaka noticed. “You don't have to tell me now.” He managed a nod. “It was a Thursday.” She did not ask why that mattered. “I decided that night I was leaving.” “At seventeen?” “Yes.” “When did you?” “Twenty.” “Why did it take three years?” “WAEC. University admission. Money. My mother.” “Your father?” “No.” The answer was not completely true. Dayo sat back. “I left with twelve thousand naira.” Amaka turned to him. “Twelve?” “I had more saved. My mother found the envelope and added money over time without telling me. Then two days before I left, my father needed something for the car and she used most of it.” “You still left?” “I had already decided.” “Where did you go?” “A friend's place in Lagos for two weeks. Then one terrible room. Then another slightly less terrible room.”
“And you never went back.” “No.” “Not for Christmas?” “No.” “Birthdays?” “No.” “Funerals?” “I meet my mother elsewhere when I can. She has come to Lagos.” “What about your father?” Dayo looked at the floor. “He calls on my birthday.” “Every year?” “Most years.” “What do you talk about?” “Work. Weather. My car. Seven minutes.” Amaka looked at him for a long moment. “You've built your whole life around seven minutes.” His head lifted. “What does that mean?” “With you, there is always a limit,” she said. “Enough to keep people close. Not enough for them to get anywhere you cannot manage.” Dayo's face hardened. “You're doing therapist voice.” “I'm a physiotherapist.” “You know what I mean.” “Yes.” “Don't diagnose me.” “I'm not.” “It sounds like it.”
She leaned back. “Fine. Then I'll tell you what I've watched.” He did not like the sentence. Amaka continued anyway. “I've watched you stay with me longer than you stayed with anyone before me.” Dayo went still. “You know about them?” “You told me enough.” “Not the timelines.” “I asked Tunde once whether you'd ever had a long relationship.” “You asked Tunde?” “Two years ago. Before I agreed to stop pretending we were casual.” Despite himself, Dayo almost smiled. Amaka did not. “When things are easy, you're here. You cook. You remember things. You show up when I'm sick. You send my mother fruit at Christmas. You know exactly how I take coffee.” Dayo held her gaze. “But the minute something asks more of you than you can plan, I can feel you leaving.” The words landed close enough to truth to sting. “That is not fair.” “You keep saying that like unfair means untrue.” Anger rose in him. “Maybe I just don't want to destroy somebody the way he did.” Amaka's expression changed. “There.” “What?” “That.”
He waited. “I think that house taught you that needing people is dangerous.” He scoffed. “Which is?” Dayo opened his mouth. She continued. “And now you're treating distance like it's a form of protection.” “That's easy for you to say.” “No. It isn't.” Her hand went instinctively to her lower abdomen, still flat. “I am currently the person most exposed to whether you're right.” The anger left him. Amaka's eyes shone, but she did not cry. “I'm not asking you to promise me you'll never be angry, tired or difficult. I'm asking whether you believe you still get to choose what you do with those things.” Dayo said nothing. She looked directly at him. “Do you think that house is something that happened to you,” she asked, “or something that is you?” The question entered him cleanly. For years, he had arranged his life so he would never have to distinguish between the two. His voice was quiet when he answered. “I've been afraid they're the same thing.” Amaka nodded once. Then she said, “Go to Ibadan.”