Stay with Me

by Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀

The things that matter are inside me, locked up below my breast as though in a grave, a place of permanence, my coffin-like treasure chest.

If the burden is too much and stays too long, even love bends, cracks, comes close to breaking and sometimes does break. But even when it’s in a thousand pieces around your feet, that doesn’t mean it’s no longer love.

But I did want him to call me sweetie again, only me and no one else. I wanted him to reach across the table, hold my hand and tell me we would be all right. And I still believed then that he would know what to do and what to say just because he was Akin.

These days I tell myself that is why I stretched to accommodate every new level of indignity, so that I could have someone who would look for me if I went missing.

Besides, what would be left of love without truth stretched beyond its limits, without those better versions of ourselves that we present as the only ones that exist?

the way she mirrored me in those moments, mirrored my passion and dreams for a better country. I was convinced more than before that I had found my soul mate.

Then she was there beside me, rapping on the car window. I’d never been so happy to see another human being, wanted to strap her in the seat next to me, live with her in the car forever, never let her out of my sight again.

His eyes held something I hadn’t seen in Akin’s eyes for so long, for far too long. Faith in me, in my words, in my sanity.

I had become immortal, part of a never-ending chain of life. New life kicked within me and soon I would have someone that I could call my own.

but I couldn’t stop thinking about Funmi. I could see her clearly as I studied the stained glass. I could hear her final yelp, see the way her hands tried to grab the banister after I pushed her down the stairs.

But I felt so alone, as though within the space of time it had taken Yejide to say, “They have taken Olamide to the mortuary” I had been transported to a planet with no human life.

The part of me that could do that had gone into the morgue’s freezer with Olamide to keep her company and to beg her forgiveness for all the signs I had missed.

She said the word “beautiful” as if beauty was a bad habit Bolu had developed, something bordering on criminal behaviour for which she would one day be justifiably punished.

He was the most beautiful child in the world. I wanted to tuck him back into my stomach and keep him safe from life, from hospitals, from stiff white caps and ward coats.

If, for the rest of his life, he did nothing but stay alive, that would have been enough for me.

Perhaps because I knew even then that what Dotun was afraid of, what he wouldn’t admit to himself, was that with Yejide it could never be just sex for him because a part of him had always wanted her.

I was not strong enough to love when I could lose again, so I held her loosely, with little hope, sure that somehow she too would manage to slip from my grasp.

I blamed myself for the way she spoke, as though all possibility of joy had been wrung out of her.

But I think I did believe that love had immense power to unearth all that was good in us, refine us and reveal to us the better versions of ourselves.

But the biggest lies are often the ones we tell ourselves. I bit my tongue because I did not want to ask questions. I did not ask questions because I did not want to know the answers. It was convenient to believe my husband was trustworthy; sometimes faith is easier than doubt.

She twisted until she was facing me, then she tilted her head this way and that beneath my gaze, as though I was the only mirror that mattered to her.

Since the day she was born, I had been getting myself ready for the worst but a lifetime was not enough to prepare me for the dizziness that hit me.

There is no point denying that the worst has happened to me more than once, and not seeing their graves does not change the fact that I have outlived the ones who should have stood on freshly dug earth and thrown the first handfuls of sand on my coffin.

You are looking for somebody. You pass by my table. I push my nails into my palms so I won’t reach out to touch you.

I should know better—do know better—but with you, I can never let go of hope.

But that is not all she wants. That is not all I want either. She wants you to hold her, to tell her you didn’t forget about her, even when you thought you’d never see her again. She wants you to stay.

I should find words to break the silence, but all I can think of is how beautiful you are to me, after all this time, and I know that is not what you want to hear.