The ceiling fan in Femi’s apartment spun with a low, monotonous hum that did nothing to soothe the irritating humidity of a Lagos morning.
He sat on the edge of his unmade bed, his bare feet resting on the cold terrazzo floor, staring at his phone.
It had been several months since he relocated back to Nigeria from Manchester.
Months of navigating the chaotic, aggressive rhythms of a city that felt entirely alien to the one he had left behind eight years ago.
The truth, heavy and suffocating, was that Femi was lonely.
When you leave the country for almost a decade, you think you’re coming back to a waiting circle of childhood friends.
You don’t realize that people move on. They marry.
They build walls of corporate stress and high-society cliques.
They grow into versions of themselves you no longer recognize.
He had no friends in this city. Not really. He had business associates, people who smiled at him at networking dinners, and guys who clinked glasses with him at lounges.
But true friendship?
The kind where you could pull off your shoes, sit on a rug, and talk about the quiet anxieties of your soul?
He had only Tammy.
Their connection was entirely a product of the Lagos matchmaking network.
A few weeks after Femi stepped off the plane from the UK, his aunt had practically forced them together, desperate to link her “Manchester returnee” nephew with her friend’s sensible and hardworking niece.
They had met up for a cautious date.
The romantic spark had been there; maybe on his end. After a while, they both realized that their chemistry was purely platonic.
But the human connection had been instant.
Tammy had looked past his awkward, out-of-practice returnee energy, and Femi had instantly respected her fierce, unyielding drive.
Since then, she had become his absolute anchor in Lagos.
He reached for his phone and scrolled to her name. It was exactly 9:15 AM.
He hesitated, his thumb hovering over the call button.
He knew she would be at her studio, probably buried under lots of work.
He clicked call anyway.
The phone rang three times before her voice cut through the line, vibrant, sharp, and instantly warm.
“Femi! Femoooo!!. Good morning.”
Femi smiled, the heavy knot in his chest loosening just at the sound of her voice.
“Tammy. Good morning. Are you very busy at the studio today? I need to see you.”
There was a brief pause on the other end, the sound of heavy paper audible in the background.
“For you? Never too busy. What’s wrong? Ṣé o wà okay?.”
Femi let out a slow breath, rubbing the back of his neck.
“Yes. Yes. I’m fine. It’s about that date, Tammy. The one from last week. With that lady I met .”
“Aha!” Tammy gasped, her laughter echoing through the speaker.
“Oya nau. Tell me everything. Did you finally find your Lagos queen?”
Femi groaned, leaning back onto his pillows, staring up at the white ceiling.
“Tammy. It was a complete disaster. A total, unmitigated train wreck.”
“Shuoooo,” Tammy chuckled.
“Come to the studio later. I just rounded off consultation with a client. Come and gist me.”
“Are you sure I’m not disrupting your workflow?”
“Disrupting keh? Femi, if you don’t pack your legs and come here right now, I will change it for you. Come jare.”
“I’m on my way, boss” he chuckled, already standing up to find a clean shirt.
As he threw on a simple black linen shirt and a pair of well-fitted jeans, Femi couldn’t shake the irritating memory of the date.
He had been forcing himself to like Cynthia for the past week, trying to rationalize her bizarre behavior because his family kept pushing for him to try giving someone a chance after Tammy dumped him. In their words.
“But you told me yourself that she is from a good family, Femi. Her father owns prime real estate in Banana Island. She will help you forget Tammy. ” his aunt had screamed over a WhatsApp voice note.
But Femi didn’t care about wealth nor class. He wanted substance.
He wanted a woman who didn’t spend the entire dinner taking videos of her food for Instagram while ignoring his questions.
He grabbed his car keys and wallet, taking a deep breath as he stepped out into the blinding sun.
He needed to vent, and Tammy’s studio was the only safe haven he had in this entire country.
Across town, the atmosphere inside Setto’s private office at Bello & Sons Global was thick with corporate gravity.
The walls were lined with dark mahogany shelves holding heavy glass jars filled with raw export samples.
Pale, premium gum arabic from Borno, rich, unrefined shea butter from Niger State, and golden sesame seeds from Benue.
Setto stood by the floor-to-ceiling window, a heavy porcelain mug of black coffee in his hand.
He was dressed in his usual corporate uniform: a crisp, dark blue long-sleeved senator suit, the fabric expensive and perfectly tailored to his massive, broad-shaped frame.
His phone sat on the desk behind him.
The FaceTime call with Tammy from morning was still fresh in his mind.
They had read through Psalms 25 together, their voices blending in the quiet of the dawn, anchoring their spirits before the madness of Lagos took over.
But Setto was troubled.
He was a man who engineered solutions.
He managed complex supply chains across international borders, ensuring that tons of natural resources moved from local northern farms to European ports without a single hitch.
He hated friction.
And right now, the friction inside his own family was an issue he was determined to resolve.
The door to his office opened, and Koda stepped inside, her high heels clicking sharply against the polished hardwood floor.
She looked effortlessly chic, carrying herself with the dramatic, fluid grace of a true creative.
Koda was a visual artist, a painter whose heavy abstract canvases and charcoal drawings were quickly becoming the talk of the West African contemporary art scene.
She ran her own upscale, minimalist art gallery, a sleek space where elites gathered to buy up her work for millions of Naira.
Today, her fingers carried a faint, near-invisible smudge of dark charcoal near the cuticle.
A stark contrast to her immaculate, expensive aesthetic.
“Setto,” she said, leaning against the edge of his mahogany desk, not bothering to sit.
“Your secretary said you called for me. I was in the middle of curating a new exhibition layout for the gallery.”
Setto turned around slowly, his expression serious but calm.
He took a sip of his coffee before setting the mug down.
“Koda. Good morning.”
“Morning, big bro” she muttered, her eyes already wandering to her phone screen.
“What is it? Is there an issue with the foundation paperwork?”
“No,” Setto said, his deep bass voice filling the room.
“The paperwork is fine. I need you to do something for me. A personal favor.”
Koda lifted her head, her perfectly shaped eyebrows rising in suspicion.
“A personal favor? From you? That’s rare.”
Setto walked over to a leather armchair near the lounge area of his office.
Resting on the glass coffee table was a thick, heavy coffee-table book wrapped in protective silk paper.
It was a rare, out-of-print copy of The Golden Age of African Textiles & Couture, a legendary publication sourced from an archival collector in Paris.
He had spent weeks tracking it down because he knew Tammy had been searching for it to inspire her upcoming editorial collection with an international brand.
“I want you to take this book to Tammy’s studio.” Setto said clearly.
The silence that followed was instant and heavy.
Koda’s expression hardened, her lips thinning into a straight, defensive line.
“You want me to do what?” she asked, her voice dropping into a sharp, incredulous whisper.
“You heard me, Koda,” Setto said, his tone firm, leaving absolutely no room for negotiation.
“It’s a rare fashion archive book. I want you to drop it off for her on your way to your gallery.”
“Setto, are you serious right now?” Koda scoffed, throwing her hands up in the air.
“You have a driver. You have an entire logistics department with dispatch riders who move across Lagos every single hour. Why on earth am I being turned into a delivery girl for your girlfriend?”
Setto’s jaw tightened, a hard, unyielding light entering his eyes.
He stepped closer to his sister, his massive height completely dominating the space between them.
“She is not just my girlfriend, Koda. She is my future wife. She is going to be your sister-in-law. And her name is Tammy.”
“I don’t care….”
“Listen to me,” Setto interrupted, his voice dropping into that low, vibrating register that always made Koda stop talking.
“I am not asking a dispatch rider to take this because this isn’t just about a book. It’s about you. It’s about your behavior last time.”
Koda looked away, her chest heaving with resentment as she stared at the raw shea samples on the shelf.
“I apologized to her, Setto,” she muttered bitterly.
“What else do you want from me? Do you want me to bow down every time she walks into a room?”
“Your apology was plastic, Koda, and you know it,” Setto said, his voice softening slightly, though the iron authority remained.
“Tammy is a good woman. She carries a peace that this family needs. I am trying to build a bridge between two important women in my life. I want you to go to her studio, look at what she has built with her own two hands, and have a civil, adult conversation with her. No tantrums. No icy one-liners.”
Koda let out a long, dramatic sigh, her acrylic nails tapping aggressively against her designer bag.
“This is ridiculous,” she whispered.
“You’re forcing this relationship, Setto. You can’t force me to like her.”
“I am asking you to respect my choices, Koda,” Setto countered, picking up the heavy silk-wrapped book and extending it toward her.
“Take the book to her. Spend time with her. Maybe fifteen minutes in her space. That is all I am asking from you as your older brother. Do this for me.”
Koda stared at the book in his hands.
She looked at Setto’s face, seeing the absolute seriousness in his eyes.
She knew that if she refused, the consequences on her relationship with her brother would be severe.
He had been her shield for years, and she couldn’t afford to lose his favor completely.
With a sharp, dramatic jerk, she snatched the heavy book from his hands.
“Fine,” she snapped, her voice dripping with venom.
“I’ll drop off your precious book. But don’t expect us to start painting portraits of each other, Setto.”
“Just be civil,” Setto said quietly, a faint, relieved sigh escaping his lips.
“Thank you, Koda.”
Koda didn’t answer.
She turned around on her high heels, her black silk trousers swishing violently as she marched out of his office, slamming the heavy mahogany door behind her.
Inside the bright, minimalist interior of Tammy’s studio, the atmosphere was entirely different.
Sunlight poured through the large display windows, exposing modern sketches pinned to corkboards.
Femi sat on a plush cream armchair in the lounge area, a cold bottle of malt in his hand.
He had his legs crossed, his black linen shirt slightly unbuttoned at the collar as he animatedly gestured with his free hand.
Tammy was still in the back room, finishing up a sketch, but her voice drifted out clearly over the low background music.
“So wait,” Tammy called out from the back, her voice laced with amusement.
“You’re telling me she didn’t say a single word to you for the first twenty minutes?”
“Tammy!” Femi replies, taking a sip of his malt.
“The lady walked into the place, sat down, and immediately put her phone on a small tripod table stand. A tripod, Tammy! At a dinner date!”
Tammy walked out from the back room, wiping her hands on a small white towel.
She looked elegant yet functional in a pair of high-waisted denim trousers and a simple white ribbed top, her long hair held up securely in a bun.
Her beautiful, smile was wide as she shook her head in disbelief.
“A tripod? For what?”
Femi threw his head back, groaning dramatically.
“For her TikTok Live, Tammy! She told me and I quote ‘Hey Femi, do you mind if my followers join us for the appetizers? It’s content creation season.’ I was sitting there like a complete clown while three thousand strangers commented on the structure of my jawline!”
Tammy burst into a loud, clear laugh, sitting down on the matching armchair opposite him.
Her radiant skin caught the studio lights as she leaned forward, her eyes bright with entertainment.
“No, Femi, stop it! Are you serious right now? What did you do?”
“What could I do?” Femi said, his expression a mix of irritation and self-deprecation.
“I tried to be a gentleman. I ordered the steak. But then the food arrived, and she wouldn’t let me eat it! She said the lighting wasn’t right for the ‘aesthetic food drop’ video she wanted to shoot. I had to sit there for ten minutes watching my steak turn ice cold while she waved a portable ring light over her food!”
Tammy was laughing so hard she had to cover her mouth, her shoulders shaking.
“Femi, you are a magnet for weird women, I swear. Your angel really tried with this one.”
“I think the angel completely missed,” Femi muttered, shaking his head.
“The whole thing was just fake, Tammy. The vibe, the conversation, the laugh... everything felt like a rehearsed performance for social media. I felt like I was forcing myself to smile the entire night. By the time the bill came, she looked at me and said, ‘Femi, you’re a bit too quiet, you need to work on your branding .’ My branding keh! At a dinner table!”
“Lagos girls will show you pepper,” Tammy laughed, leaning back against the plush cushion.
“But honestly, Femi, why did you stay till the end?”
“Because I’m an idiot who listens to family,” Femi sighed, setting his malt bottle down on the glass coffee table.
“I’ve been trying to convince myself all week that maybe she was just being petty. But today, I woke up and realized I can’t do it. I can’t force myself to like someone who values her screen reception more than human connection. It’s exhausting.”
Tammy’s expression softened, her warm eyes looking at him with deep, genuine affection.
“You shouldn’t have to force it, Femi. You’re a brilliant guy. You’re handsome, you’re successful, and you have a very pure heart. The right woman won’t need a tripod to see your worth. She’ll look at you and see the man you are.”
“Thanks, Tammy,” Femi smiled, the residual irritation from his disastrous date finally evaporating.
“Honestly, coming here to gist you is the only thing that has kept me sane today. I was ready to book a one-way flight back to Manchester this morning.”
“Don’t try it oo,” Tammy warned, pointing a playful finger at him.
“You’re stuck here with us.”
Before Femi could answer, the glass front door of the studio chimed loudly, and the cool, serene atmosphere of the studio was instantly punctured by a wave of sharp, high-society arrogance.
Koda walked in.
She didn’t just enter a room; she took possession of it.
Her high heels clicked against the polished concrete floor with a rhythmic, aggressive dominance.
She held the silk-wrapped book in one hand, her designer bag swinging from her forearm, her chin tilted upward at that precise angle that signaled absolute superiority.
“Good morning,” Koda said, her voice smooth, chilly, and entirely formal.
Femi turned his head casually toward the entrance, his relaxed smile still lingering on his face from his conversation with Tammy.
But the moment his eyes locked onto Koda’s face, the smile instantly froze.
His mind flashed back to that humiliating evening he went out with Tammy.
He recognized the cold, beautiful woman who had looked at him like he was dirt on her expensive shoes, the one who had dropped that icy, cutting one-liner that had left his pride bleeding.
It was her.
The sister.
The one who had dismissively labeled him a low-tier man without a single shred of hesitation.
Koda’s eyes scanned the lounge area, ready to drop the book and leave immediately.
But as her gaze landed on the man sitting on the cream armchair, she stopped dead in her tracks.
Her eyes narrowed as she registered him sitting there, entirely comfortable in Tammy’s space.
The man from the bistro.
The man with the deep, expressive eyes and the sharp jawline.
Koda’s posture stiffened into complete rigidity, her defensive walls instantly slamming into place to mask any hint of vulnerability.
Tammy, who had stood up to welcome her guest, stood between them.
Tammy’s sharp, analytical eyes missed nothing.
She registered the sudden, heavy vibration of tension in the room.
A quiet, knowing smile touched Tammy’s lips, but she kept her face completely neutral, stepping forward to break the ice.
“Koda,” Tammy said, her voice warm, smooth, and entirely civil, intentionally ignoring the thick tension.
“Welcome. I didn’t expect to see you today.”
Koda tore her eyes away from Femi with a visible effort, forcing her elite, snobbish mask back over her features.
“Setto asked me to drop this off,” Koda said, her tone clipped and professional as she extended the heavy book toward Tammy.
“He said it’s some rare fashion archive publication you’ve been looking for. He didn’t want a dispatch rider handling it.”
Tammy’s eyes lit up with genuine delight as she took the book, her fingers tracing the heavy structure beneath the silk paper.
“Oh, my goodness. The Golden Age of African Couture . My baby actually found it?” Tammy breathed, a soft, radiant smile breaking across her face.
Koda scoffed at the endearment.
Tammy ignored her and continued.
“This is incredible. Thank you so much for bringing it, Koda. I know you must be incredibly busy with your own gallery.”
“I am,” Koda said quickly, her eyes drifting back toward Femi despite her internal warnings.
“I was just passing by.”
Tammy glanced between the two of them, the playful glint in her eyes deepening as she decided to do a bit of a reintroduction.
“Koda, I don’t know if you properly remember Femi from the other night,” Tammy said smoothly, gesturing toward the armchair.
“Femi, this is Koda, Setto’s younger sister.”
Femi sat perfectly still for a beat, his mind racing.
Every masculine instinct inside him was telling him to match her coldness, to look away and ignore her the same way she had ignored him.
But as he looked at her.
He noticed the tight, defensive line of her shoulders and something shifted inside him.
He didn’t fire back a cold look. He didn’t scoff.
Instead, Femi slowly stood up from the armchair, his tall, lean frame uncoiling with an easy, unbothered grace.
He looked directly at Koda, and a genuinely warm, slow, and disarming smile broke across his handsome face.
It was a smile completely devoid of malice or games. Just pure, gentlemanly warmth.
“I remember,” Femi said, his voice smooth, calm, and entirely welcoming.
He stepped forward, extending his hand firmly toward her for a shake.
“Good to see you again, Koda.”
Koda stared at his outstretched hand, then looked up at his face.
For a split second, the air between them shifted entirely.
The heavy frost she usually carried around herself felt completely useless against the sheer, penetrating warmth of his gaze.
She felt exposed. She felt seen.
She fiercely shook it off, her defense mechanism instantly kicking in to save her pride.
She chose to completely ignore his outstretched hand, pulling her chin up as her lip curled into a familiar, snobbish scoff.
“No, thank you,” Koda said, her voice sharp.
“I don’t have time to sit around gossiping or making small talk. I have a gallery presentation to prepare for.”
Femi slowly withdrew his hand, entirely unbothered, his smile remaining steady and amused as he let her performance play out.
Tammy watched the entire exchange from a few feet away, her eyes moving from Koda’s stiff posture to Femi’s calm, relaxed expression.
Tammy just smiled quietly to herself, acting as if she hadn’t noticed a single thing.
She stepped forward, placing a gentle hand on Koda’s arm, her tone remaining completely civil and sisterly, overlooking Koda’s low-key rude nature.
“Well, you should definitely make time for us next time,” Tammy said smoothly, her eyes bright with a mischievous warmth.
“We can hang out anytime soon. Just a casual lunch. What do you think?”
Koda’s posture remained rigid, her breathing slightly shallow as she tried to ignore the fact that Femi was still standing just inches away, his presence completely filling her senses.
“I’m not sure,” Koda replied snobbishly, adjusting her designer bag on her shoulder with a sharp jerk.
“My calendar is completely booked with exhibition dates. I really have to go.”
“No problem at all,” Tammy smiled beautifully, completely unfazed by the rejection.
“Thank you again for the book, Koda. Drive safely.”
Koda gave a brief, stiff nod to Tammy.
She didn’t look at Femi again.
She couldn’t bring herself to, but she could feel his eyes on her, warm and steady, tracking her every movement.
“Goodbye,” Koda muttered.
She turned around on her high heels and walked toward the glass exit, her stride fast, deliberate, and entirely focused on escape.
The glass door of the studio chimed behind her as Koda stepped out onto the concrete pavement.
The heavy, humid heat hit her instantly, wrapping around her like a suffocating blanket, but she barely noticed it.
She walked straight toward her parked car, her breathing heavy, her chest rising and falling under her white top.
What rubbish was that?
She unlocked her car with a sharp, aggressive click of her key fob, pulling the heavy door open and throwing her designer bag onto the passenger seat with a muffled thud.
She climbed inside, slamming the door shut against the city noise, and instantly started the engine, blasting the air conditioning to its maximum setting.
She gripped the leather steering wheel with both hands, leaning her forehead against it, trying to regulate her breath.
Her entire body felt hot, a restless, chaotic energy humming through her veins.
She couldn’t wipe the image of his face out of her mind.
The way his eyes had looked at her, entirely unbothered by her snobbery, his hand extended, and that slow, disarming smile that had felt like a direct assault on her carefully constructed walls.
“Stupid,” she whispered fiercely into the quiet cabin of her car, her voice shaking slightly with raw frustration.
“Rude and arrogant man. Who does he think he is?”
She pulled out of the parking space, her tires screeching slightly against the pavement as she forced her mind back onto her gallery layout, trying to regulate her uneven breath, completely unaware that the war inside her heart had already begun.
Hi babiesss!!!
I decided to drop a calm, drama-free chapter just to brace y’all for the next one.
Btw…What was that between Koda and Femi?
See y’all on Sunday.
Like, Restack, Comment.
The goal is 70 restacks, 200 likes and 100 comments. 🤭🤭
Koda’s ice against Femi’s warmth= Chemistry 😂🤭
Thank you Isabella🤭