Chapter 10(II)
🎵: Best part of me by savy Henry
🏚️
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**Kainene**
My breath caught in my throat.
Involuntarily, I touched the scar on my chest. My hands shook, a tremble ran across my body. Kes stepped closer and rubbed soothing circles behind my back.
"Breathe with me," he said.
I did just that. Ten times, slow and deliberate, until I finally breathed out.
He held my jaw. Really looked at me.
"Are you okay? I need you to be okay, Kai."
I nodded.
"Use your words."
"Yes." A pause. "Frankly, I don't know." I looked at him properly for the first time since we had come inside. "This is all too much. I almost got killed twice — once from drowning, the other from whoever it was that nearly sliced Tiara's throat and fed it to the ocean creatures." I felt the tremble return and pressed it down. "I have no idea what this person wants, Kes. But it is becoming scary. We have no idea who they are. We have no idea why they are so obsessed with Sophie."
I steadied myself.
"Mum must not find out about this. Not until we confirm whether any of it is true. She would lose her mind."
Kes nodded. He said nothing, which was sometimes the most reliable thing about him.
He gently pulled me into a hug. My hands stayed loose by my sides, not quite committing. When he held on a moment longer I awkwardly let him. He smelled of aftershave, something warm and cedar-adjacent that I had stopped noticing and had now noticed again.
We slowly let go.
We parted ways to continue.
---
**Kainene**
After tossing for seven hours, the birds chirped across the sky.
The weather here has a scent. Something green and cold and specific to this place, the kind of morning air that arrives before the sun has made any decisions. I watched the cold, dewy atmosphere settle over Ogun State. The mountain looked far from here, fog swallowing Olumo Rock from the base up. I got on my knees to say a prayer.
Today was the last day.
I could not be more relieved. This F8 festival had been nothing but stressful. I had almost been killed twice for a reason still unknown to me. Kes and I were still walking on eggshells. I couldn't stand the possessiveness, the hot and cold, the high maintenance of a man who didn't know how to be consistent about what he wanted. I walked out to the glass balcony and sat with tea and a robe and the particular quiet of a morning that hadn't been ruined yet.
My phone lit up.
Nana: *I haven't seen you in forever. How does gist, books and a picnic sound? Let's hike up to Olumo Rock. The rest can catch up with us.*
I started typing *I don't think so, Kes might flip* — then I stopped. Put the phone down. Looked at the fog on the mountain for a moment.
I was not going to let this man rob me of my happiness.
I changed into a long-sleeve buttercup yellow shirt with a silver zip at the front, buttercup yellow sports leggings, white and black sneakers, and threw a see-through cap on my head. I grabbed my keys from the counter and spotted the sticky note on my way out.
*Don't wait up for me, would be late — Kes.*
I jogged out to find Nana already waiting. Pastel pink sports bra, pastel pink leggings, a fitting jacket, running shoes. She was ready like she had been ready for hours. I slid into the back seat and she took the other side. 5:30 AM. The kind of hour that belongs only to people who have decided something.
The security guards at Olumo Rock cleared us through. We were pulling away from the gate when someone jumped down from the car. We startled. We both screamed.
Lola.
"Got space for one more?"
Nana, still holding her chest, managed to nod. "How did you — don't tell me you had my phone tracked."
Lola said she'd been on her way to Nana's because Duke had been disturbing her, insisting she get her mind off him, when she saw us getting into the car. She looked unbothered in the way of a woman who had decided that the situation entitled her to join.
We looked at each other.
We got inside.
We hiked up with guards trailing closely behind and in front, fully covered. We chatted all the way to the top, the kind of conversation that doesn't need a subject — it just goes, easy and warm and necessary. At the top, Nana spread the tie-and-dye blanket. I passed Lola the snacks from her café and the leftovers from Ruby's dinner. She set everything down with ceremony: the zobo cheesecake with tapioca toppings, the chin chin cheesecake, the Fab's vanilla banana bread, Nestlé ice cream with Fab's biscuit toppings. My mouth watered just looking at it. We also had suya tacos from Ruby's dinner, Milkose cinnamon rolls and coffee from Taraba sourced directly from Lola's café. We wasted no time.
We dug in and opened *Again*.
Lola got roped in within the first chapter. She completely disliked Diadem for trying to get back with Nneoma and was not quiet about it. We bickered pleasantly. We took pictures. I told Nana that reminded me — they would be here today, the ones who couldn't make it that day.
She screamed so loud a bird left its tree.
Kes called. I picked up feeling like a teenager who was about to be drilled.
"Where are you?"
"Somewhere on earth."
"Not funny. Let's do this again, Kai. Where. Are. You." He spelled it out slowly, one word at a time.
"Somewhere on earth."
Nana grabbed the phone and deepened her voice to mirror a man's. She held it for approximately three seconds before dissolving into laughter. Kes asked her to give it back and she did, still giggling.
"You almost gave me a heart attack," he said.
"You'll survive."
"I'll love to die for you," he said.
I chuckled out loud before I could help it.
He cleared his throat. "Everyone is coming to Olumo Rock. Something about how you're all party poppers."
I chuckled again and cut the call.
We took more pictures. The tour guard came by 7 AM and we did another lap. He took us to the Elders of Longevity. Nana felt immediately uncomfortable. Lola announced she served God. I said so did I. I barely allowed them to touch me.
The elderly woman scribbled on paper, unhurried, like someone writing something they had been waiting to write for a long time. "Ancient Igbo," she said, folding it and pressing it into my hand.
She turned to Lola. *Let him.* Just that.
Lola went very still.
She turned to Nana. *When would you fight for yourself.*
Not a question. An observation. The kind that sits with you.
We waited for the others to join us and then went for the third lap. I spotted the women calling out to Kes from a distance — *you're closer than you think* — their voices carrying down the rock face like something thrown into the wind.
We wrapped up and headed to the art gallery downstairs. Somkele got so many pieces I lost count, and so did Ugo. They moved through the gallery practically attached, pointing at the same things, making the same sounds, twins assembled from different families.
Surrounded by people, I still felt alone.
I was hit, without warning, with the thought of Kamara. The way absence has a texture when it belongs to someone specific. Hers was felt like a deep chain beneath the depth of the sea.
---
We arrived back at Obasanjo's Library and were met with his presence. We talked for a little while, easy and unhurried, and then he let us go.
I went to the horse paddock.
I needed to clear my head. I climbed gently onto the white horse I had gotten acquainted with over the past few days and raced around the paddock, the wind doing the thing wind does when you give it your full speed — it takes everything with it temporarily, all the weight, all the noise. I went around once, twice, and on the third lap I noticed someone standing at the edge of the paddock as though they couldn't stand themselves.
Strange.
I slowed. Made out the figure.
Mr. Umeh.
I halted the horse and looked at him.
"What do you want?"
"Can't you greet your father-in-law?"
I stared at him for a long moment. He looked the way powerful men look when they are standing somewhere they cannot control — slightly displaced, slightly smaller than usual, wearing their discomfort like a coat they hadn't chosen.
"I came to ask about Kamara," he said. "She hasn't picked up. Hasn't responded to my calls. I just want to know if she's okay."
I stared at him.
Not quite knowing how to respond. Turning it over. And then I settled on the only question that mattered.
"Do you love her?"
He nodded, looking uncomfortable.
"Use your words. Do you love her?"
"Yes." He looked at me directly. "Yes I do. So damn much."
My stomach churned. I nodded, unable to bring myself to do anything else. His stare was intense in the way of a man who was not accustomed to being asked to account for himself and was discovering that he didn't hate it.
"Tell her to call me," he said. "I am not a very patient man."
He turned to leave. He made it about three steps before the media found him, cameras and questions arriving like they had been waiting behind the fence the entire time.
"Do you have a comment, Mr. Umeh? Did the slut manage to convince you?"
Mr. Umeh's hand clenched and Unclenched at his side. Once. His bodyguards made a circle around him without being asked and they moved away together, swallowing him back into the machinery of his own life.
I watched them go.
Far across the paddock, Duke was helping Lola down from a horse. Gently. Both hands. Like something he had been practising in his head before he got there. I gave her a small smile she didn't see.
"Hello, Kai. How are you and Kes today?"
Duke, beside me now. I nodded. "Fine."
He looked between me and Lola. Something moved across his face that he didn't try to hide particularly. "Ladies, catch you both later." A wink in Lola's direction and then he was gone.
As soon as the coast was clear I turned to her.
"Put that man out of his misery. He loves you."
She fiddled with her bracelet. The one she always fiddled with when she was going somewhere she wasn't sure about. "It's not that easy, Kai. Rendoll is involved. I don't know if she'll ever forgive me. We used to be best of friends until I selfishly ran away."
I placed my hand on her shoulder.
"It would all align. I believe it."
She nodded slowly. "I pray so too."
---
**Bonfire & Chinese Lantern Night**
We set up our camp tents around the resort side as the evening came in.
The Chinese lanterns lit up the stars beautifully, hundreds of them climbing the dark in slow deliberate arcs. Somewhere in between the fight Krystal and Marobi were always giving each other, they had managed to build something extraordinary together — the design for tonight was the Santorini team bringing Greece to Ogun State, and at some point we had the exact Tulum look-alike, warm and golden and improbable in the best way. The tents sat directly in front of a very large projector screen. We were watching *Off Campus* while the kids were inside with Adaeze, my mum, Dad and Mr. Umeh. Adaeze Jr. had been whining all evening that her name felt like it didn't belong to her anymore.
Nobody had a good answer for her on that one.
The movie started. Nana found me with her blanket pooling at my feet, settling in with the specific intent of someone who had decided this was her spot and the world could arrange itself accordingly. We started arguing immediately about Garrett and Dean and Allie. Kes said we were watching glorified porn. We sat through eight hours of it anyway, all of us arguing, all of us invested, though we the book readers had already read it and already knew and watched anyway because knowing doesn't ruin it, it just changes what you're watching for.
Then the bottle.
Kes was asked how he felt about me.
His cheeks turned a slight shade of pink. I had not seen a man blush before. Not like that. Not like something arriving before he could decide whether to let it.
"I feel like I am falling head over heels for her."
My thighs clenched. My heart beat fast, as though I had just run the longest race, as though my body had received news that my face was still processing.
Neato was next, asked if he would drop everything for love.
"Yes," he said. Simply. No performance.
Then Duke. Asked if it was really worth it.
He found Lola's eyes across the circle. She looked away. He kept looking at where she had been.
"Yes," he said.
Morenike had been awfully quiet all night. She looked close to tears in the way of someone who has been holding something at arm's length for so long their arms have started to give. Later I spotted her and Jidekene at the edge of the gathering, talking with the intensity of two people renegotiating something important. A small smile played on my lips.
One door closes.
Tolu Faramde moved through the crowd taking pictures for the Da Silva & Al-Buzair magazine, stopping to inform each cluster of us that the last photo shoot was tomorrow and attendance was not optional.
Somewhere across the bonfire, Adora and Roman looked like people who had recently made a decision.
I minded my business.
---
**Barbie as Narrator**
Ouuuuuuu.
Picnic, check. Kes confession, check. The man blushed. He blushed. Keside Umeh, who carries the energy of a man who has not been caught off guard since approximately 2009, went pink in the face and said *head over heels* in front of everyone with the bottle pointing at him and nowhere to go.
I need a moment.
I also need someone to explain to me what is happening with Mr. Umeh and this *so damn much* that came out of his mouth at a horse paddock with the media circling and his bodyguards at the ready. That was not a man performing an answer. That was a man who got asked the right question for the first time in thirty years and didn't know how to lie about it.
Lola fidgeting with her bracelet while Duke watched the space she had just looked away from. I am adding this to my evidence board.
Neato said drop everything. For love. Without flinching. I need his whole story. I need it now. Someone write that book.
Morenike and Jidekene at the edge of the firelight talking like they were rebuilding something — I see it, Ugo sees it, we are all pretending not to see it and doing a terrible job.
Marobi and Krystal somehow produced the most beautiful thing at this entire event while arguing about it the entire time. That is a whole lesson on something.
Adaeze Jr. says her name doesn't feel like it belongs to her anymore.
Baby girl. You have no idea.
Thank you to all my new readers .
🖤🍿
🎵: Best part of me by savy Henry