Chapter 1
Fragments of the Past
Ayo’s POV
I don’t know if there was a moment when I first realized it—when the warmth in my chest began to wither, or when I started to question everything. My life split into pieces the day my mother left my father. I was a child, not even twelve years old, but even then, I knew something was wrong. I had seen the cracks forming long before they shattered everything.
My father had been the gatekeeper at one of the many restaurants owned by the Baron. We weren’t rich. My father loved my mother, and she loved him too, at least I thought so. They were high school sweethearts, caught in a whirlwind of dreams and poverty. My father was educated enough to fall in love with her; they had met at school, but his family’s poverty had sealed his fate. The dream of higher education, a future beyond the menial labor of their small village, was never meant for him. He struggled to find work, and his pride stood firm in a world that demanded more.
When I was younger, I believed it was just the way life worked—my father worked long hours, we lived modestly, and my mother kept the house running. But as the years passed, I began to see things differently. She grew tired of the same routine. Tired of the smallness of our world. The constant struggles.
It wasn’t just her frustration with the lack of wealth, though. It was more than that. The Baron, the man who owned the restaurant where my father worked, had always been a family friend. But I began to notice his frequent visits to the restaurant. His presence became less about business and more about something else entirely. It wasn’t until much later that I learned the truth—that he’d fallen in love with my mother, and she had returned his feelings.
My father knew too. He’d started hearing whispers, and his suspicions turned into certainty. The Baron, with his smooth talk and wealth, was pursuing her. He was everything my father wasn’t—educated, powerful, and rich. He made the decision to quit his job, thinking that distancing himself from the Baron would protect his family. He believed my mother would see the value in his sacrifice, but he was wrong.
A year later, my mother divorced him. And a year after that, she married the Baron.
The betrayal ran deep. It wasn’t just about money. It wasn’t just about her leaving him for someone with more to offer. It was about the love they had once shared, the trust that was broken, and the life that was torn apart. I couldn’t understand it then, but I knew I couldn’t stay with her. I couldn’t stay in that house with the man who had destroyed everything. So I left.
That’s when the anger set in. I was a boy, but I felt like I had been robbed of something that I could never get back. The love, the bond, the family—shattered. It wasn’t just a divorce. It was a betrayal. It was a betrayal that cut deeper because I was left with the knowledge that it wasn’t a sudden thing. It had been brewing for years. He had been coming into their lives long before they admitted it to themselves.
The Baron’s name never passed my lips. He was never “Dad” or “Uncle” to me. To this day, he’s nothing but “the Baron.” And that’s how it will always be…
Hawawa’s POV
I woke up this morning with a sense of excitement buzzing in the air. It wasn’t just because of the sunshine peeking through the curtains or the sweet smell of breakfast wafting through the house—it was because today was different. Today was the first day of my father’s new beginning.
For years, my father had been lost in the haze of alcohol and the disarray of his own poor decisions. He hadn’t been the father I’d always hoped for, and we’d learned to get by without expecting much from him. But that all changed a few weeks ago when Auntie Marie, his elder sister, had paid us a visit. Her words were harsh and cutting, but they were exactly what my father needed to hear. She told him she wouldn’t fund his irresponsibility anymore—that he had to stand on his own two feet. At first, I didn’t think he’d listen. But something in her words, and maybe something deep inside him, made him finally see what needed to change.
Since then, it had been small steps. First, he stopped drinking so much. Then, he started waking up earlier, trying to find some purpose to his day. And today… today was his first day at his new job as a gatekeeper at a nearby restaurant. I couldn’t help but feel a burst of pride in my chest. It wasn’t a glamorous job, but it was steady. Honest work. He was doing something right for the first time in a long while.
As I watched him get ready this morning—dressing in a button-up shirt that still wasn’t quite right, with his old, worn-out shoes—I couldn’t help but smile. There was something about the way he straightened his back, something about the determination in his eyes, that felt new. He was nervous, I could tell, but he was trying, and that was enough for me. He was really doing it. He was turning his life around.
“I’m proud of you, Papa,” I said as he tightened his shoes.
He gave me a soft smile, one that I hadn’t seen in a long time. “Thanks, Hawawa. I’ll make you proud. I’ll make it work.”
I nodded, swallowing the lump in my throat. It wasn’t going to be easy, and there were still so many things to prove. But seeing my father try was a feeling I hadn’t known in years.
My mother, of course, was already up and getting ready for the market. She always was—her dedication to us never wavered. Selling fish every day at the market, from the crack of dawn to late in the afternoon, was a hard job, but it was the life she knew. And still, through it all, she had supported us, no questions asked.
I watched my father leave for his first day on the job, walking with a new kind of purpose, and for the first time in a long time, I felt hope rising in my chest. Things were changing. Maybe, just maybe, this was the start of something better. Maybe, just maybe, we were on the right path.
