Not more than strangers✔️

subtly staring

"And if the sky should ever die.
We'd make our own light,
You and I."
~John Mark Green

————

December 30th, 1970

Maybe the sun was a bulb and wasn't as hot as people made it out to be. Because how else would they explain the cold when it's shining this brightly. A lot of people wake up with gratitude but a loud horn can easily butcher your good mood for the day. Their home wasn't so much as a residential part in town, one of the things she's grown to hate.

She shivers at the intense cold of the city billowing into her bedroom. It's tiring acting like she was still asleep after nine after hearing another loud honk. She frowned, pulling the blanket closer to her chest. Her numb fingers and toes made her all the more lazy to shut the window. The blasted weather, another thing she hated. It stopped her from exploring— not like her uncle would let her but she could dream in the least.

And beyond her petty complaints and flowery Yoruba curse words sat a bartender just outside her window with his face held up by his palm as he watched the neighborhood in boredom. He was that one guy that sat at the window seat in the far back of the bus to avoid conversation with the other passengers. He didn't need another hello that would send him to a shrink, he combs his fingers through his hair, he just got out and he was going to get it right this time.

He's been in traffic for almost an hour and if whatever it was that kept them from moving continued, he'd have to walk the rest of the way. He sighed grabbing his bag as his attention deviates for a moment. But apparently that's all it took. The curtain to the house on his right sways and a sleepy girl peeps through to see the fuss ruining her Saturday morning.

Quite the figure and eyes, his subconscious jitters as he stares. Something in him warms and maybe the stars were aligning in the morning and it was summer— it didn't matter, the world became slow, a little too slow. Goosebumps rise to her skin and slowly her eyes meet his. She's taken aback by his looks immediately and her breath hitches in her throat. They look at each other as if just realising the former is real. Maybe she's supposed to do something to acknowledge his presence—

And then he waves, a little friendly wave that heats her up and has her fingers letting go of the curtain. Trust her mind to make her subconscious of her appearance, then again she hadn't combed through her short hair or changed out of her night gown. She's sure to look like a wreck.

She sighs, pulling a shirt over her head and a pair of loose jeans. She slaps her cheeks and huffs out some air, mortified she looked like a creep in a house that watches people from a distance. 

"No one should look that good." She grumbles. Nothing she thought of him really did him justice, he wasn't one of those things you just see and forget— he was just too pretty. Coming down the stairs, she pops her head through the living room opening and smiles. "e kaaro."

Her uncle angles his neck to look at her, the bitter aroma of coffee wafting in the air. "How're you?"

Dressed in his usual suspenders and brown pants, his yellow teeth aged and discolored by booze and cigar stretches into a smile. Sade loved Funmi like his own daughter and would raise the dead to please her if possible but his overprotectiveness was a little more annoying than affectionate.

"Cold!" She almost runs to the fireplace and grabs the axe, hauling it over her head to get a fire going before she got frostbite.