Here's the thing about collisions—they hurt. Concussion kind of hurt. No matter how long you have known they are coming, or how prepared you think you are, you are always in for a surprise, good or bad. It may be a weekday, and you are walking to school or riding to work, or the weekends and you're just at home; chilling. It could be a phone call, a gas leak, a knock on the front door with your ex telling you that you both had a child way back in secondary school. It could be fire, from the amber stained kerosene you bought at the junction for half the usual price. Something happens to something, like a catalyst. And then you are moving at increasing velocity, accelerating faster than you want to. And there are lights. Bright lights, just before the crash. Bright lights that help you see the bigger-frightening picture. Then Blam! Your life is altered, forever.

 The bell rang almost on cue, after Miss Bernice had embarrassed us all to her satisfaction, with the worst topic choice to revise: Oestrus Cycle. I have never seen a person's face turn as many shades of red as Chideziri's did, from terracotta to brownish red to copper and russet. Considering the number of "she's on heat" and "abi you are on heat period " i have heard within the last two seconds i think it's safe to say the class was very-very conversational. I don't have time to think more on it because Chidi slips his hand into mine underneath the desk where no one can see. When did he go from boy-girl to chidi? Effing beautiful boy. It's not right for someone to be so pretty, it breaks the laws of humanity. Like mixing Chadwick Boseman to Jacob Latimore. In his hand, mine looks like a little girl's; where mine are lean and long, his are broad with long immaculate fingernails lik

 Saturdays teach you how real life works. When you are a child, saturdays are like gorgeous puppies–beautiful, adorable, unforgettable. Then gradually, they morph along with you as you grow–into very un-adorable, un-hug-able, bleeding, black, over-sized rottweilers. Saturdays are the days you  can't escape home, the days you work from eight to ten o'clock before you get a bite of food. The days you want to stop and ask if you really are a legit child or you were adopted. Pascal alway says i take life too gently. He says "You dey like to do your things soft-soft". When it comes to saturdays, he's right; I take them soft-soft, a step before another. I wake up to the sun glowering into my face. It actually seems pissed that i get to sleep in so late. I am tempted to stick my tongue out at it, Jealousy. It glowers even more. Tobi barges into the room at that instant and frowns at the grin on my face and my sprawled form. He always

 For the first time since the Abyss, since never, since thine kingdom come, Ahmed is clowning and i am not in on it. Being so close to Amanda is distracting. Intoxicating. She's shed her denim, and the homey scent of the outdoors after rain is directly in my face. Her body is warm in the sudden chill that accompanied the cloudburst, and pressed against mine it produces an electrifying feeling. It's like rapture came early and i made it to heaven. I managed to snake an arm around her back, slid it to her waist, almost to her hip before my courage burnt itself out. She pulls at the tail of a long cornrow and her scent wharfs over. Heady. Strong. Maddening. Lord have mercy. Now i am fairly positive any guy could turn stalker given the right woman. Like yesterday i was on that girls-are-for-little-boys kind of vibe. Now i am almost losing it, breathing in a body fragnance.  I am so focused on her that i don't even notice when the semblance of

 She kissed me then. No—she kisses me then, with her face sandwiched between my hands. The present is a better way to describe it. I am here in the now, in the present, not unsure of tomorrow, or trying to imagine i am Eragon or Frodo or Okonkwo. Her face is pressed against mine, so hard that it's a surprise her forehead doesn't melt into mine. Her fingers are soft against my nape. For once Deziri is speechless and i can't feel that ever-present, ever-terrified eight year old part of me lurking, trying to find an escape route from the present. For once the world i'm in is perfect enough. She made that world. She is that world.