Chapter 6: A Chance Encounter

Five years had passed since Amaka and David had gone their separate ways. On the surface, life had moved on. Amaka had settled into her marriage with Kunle, a kind and dependable man who provided her with stability. David, too, had moved forward, building a life with Sade, whose ambition mirrored his. Yet, despite their attempts to bury the past, the scars of their love lingered, hidden but not forgotten. Love, once deeply rooted, never truly disappears—it waits, dormant, for the right moment to awaken.

It was a crisp autumn afternoon when fate intervened. Amaka strolled through the bustling shopping mall, her arms laden with bags and her thoughts adrift. Kunle had sent her on errands, and she welcomed the distraction from the quiet restlessness that had begun to creep into her seemingly perfect life. Kunle was everything she could have hoped for—loving, stable, reliable—but even so, there were moments when she felt a hollow ache, as if a vital piece of her life's puzzle was missing.

Turning a corner, she adjusted her shopping bags, her eyes fixed on the ground. Then she heard a voice—a voice that stopped her in her tracks, sending a chill of recognition through her.

"Amaka?"

She frozen, her heart pounding. It couldn't be. But when she looked up, there he was—David, standing just a few feet away. His expression mirrored her own disbelief.

Time seemed to pause. The noise of the mall faded, and all Amaka could see was the man who had once been her everything. His hair was shorter now, with streaks of silver framing his temples, but his eyes—the same soulful eyes that had once captivated her—still held that familiar intensity.

"David," she whispered, his name a mix of shock and longing.

He smiled, though his expression was tinged with disbelief. "Amaka, I can't believe it's you."

For a moment, they simply stared at one another, the weight of five years of silence pressing down on them. The world continued to move around them, but they remained frozen, bound by a history too powerful to ignore.

Amaka finally broke the silence. "How have you been?" she asked hesitantly, unsure of what else to say.

David ran a hand through his hair, his gaze briefly dropping to the floor before returning to hers. "I've been... good. Busy with work. Sade and I are fine. And you? How's Kunle?"

Her chest tightened at the mention of Kunle, but she forced a smile. "We're good. Still adjusting to married life, but it's been a journey."

David nodded, his eyes searching hers as though trying to read the emotions she was so carefully masking. "I'm glad to hear that," he said softly. But beneath his words lingered something unsaid, a lingering connection that neither could deny.

They talked, exchanging small talk about work, life, and the years that had passed. But the conversation felt like a dance around the truth. Under the surface, the emotions they had buried were stirring, threatening to rise.

"Do you ever think about... what might have been?" Amaka blurted out before she could stop herself.

David's expression faltered for just a moment, but it was enough for Amaka to see that he had thought about it too. "Sometimes," he admitted quietly. "But life doesn't stop. We both had to move on."

"I know," she said, her voice thick with emotion. "But it doesn't make it easier, does it?"

"No," David replied, his voice heavy with the weight of their shared regret. "It doesn't."

The silence that followed was almost unbearable, filled with all the words they couldn't say. Amaka wanted to reach out, to bridge the gap between them, but reality held her back. They had made their choices. They had built lives with other people.

"I should go," Amaka said finally, breaking the tension. She looked down at her shopping bags, gripping them tightly as if they could ground her. "Kunle will be waiting."

David nodded, his bittersweet smile not quite reaching his eyes. "Yeah, I should get going too. Sade's expecting me."

For a moment, they hesitated, as if waiting for the other to say something that could change everything. But neither did.

"It was good to see you," Amaka said, her voice trembling just slightly.

"You too," David replied. "Take care of yourself."

And with that, they walked away from each other, their steps heavy with the weight of what had just transpired. The mall, bustling with life, swallowed them back into its flow, but for Amaka and David, the world had momentarily stopped.

As Amaka left the mall, her heart felt a strange mix of emotions—nostalgia, longing, and an ache she hadn't felt in years. She didn't know what the future held, but one thing was clear: some loves never truly fade. They simply wait, quietly and patiently, for the moment when they can resurface, changing everything in their wake.

This encounter, brief yet powerful, had reignited something that could no longer be ignored.