READING IN THE OPEN
1976 Words
*Chapter 6: Reading in the Open*
4:00 PM. Amara unlocked early. Tolu wasn’t in yet. The shop smelled like dust and lemon cleaner. She walked to the window table. The stack of paper sat on the empty chair, string loose from yesterday. Three years of letters. Three years of weight.
She didn’t move them. She sat, untied the string, and pulled the top page. _15/03/2023_. The first one. The one she’d started last night and stopped.
_Amara,_
_I don’t know where to start except the truth..._
She read it. Three pages. She didn’t cry. She let the words sit in her chest like stones. Heavy. Real.
At 3:55 PM she retied the string and put the stack back. She made ginger tea. No lemon. But today she sliced a piece and dropped it in. She wanted to taste what he tasted.
4:01 PM. The bell.
Kelechi walked in and stopped. Amara wasn’t behind the counter. She sat at the table. On his side. The stack was open. One page on the table, the rest in her lap.
He set down ₦1,500. “Ginger tea. One.”
Amara nodded without looking up. She was on _16/03/2023_.
_I keep reaching for my phone to tell you stupid things. The danfo driver had a sticker: “God’s Time is the Best.” I almost laughed. Then I remembered you hate those stickers. Lazy theology..._
She set it down and looked up. Kelechi stood at the counter, waiting. He didn’t go to his chair until she told him to.
“Sit,” Amara said. Quiet. Not cold.
He exhaled and sat. Half an inch away. The stack between them.
Amara picked up _17/03/2023_ and read aloud. Her voice didn’t shake.
_The apartment is too quiet. I used sugar by accident. It tasted wrong. Everything tastes wrong without you correcting it. I keep your receipt in my wallet. The ink is fading. I trace the letters when I can’t sleep..._
She stopped. “You traced my handwriting.”
Kelechi looked at his mug. “I did. Badly.”
She picked up _22/03/2023_. One week after.
_I went to the market for ginger. The woman asked if I wanted lemon. I said no. Then I stood there five minutes because I couldn’t remember if you took lemon. I had to call my sister. She said, “Since when do you cook?” I don’t cook. I make tea. Badly._
Tolu arrived in back, saw them at the table with paper between them, and closed the door softly.
Kelechi looked up. “You don’t have to read them out loud. I didn’t bring them for a performance.”
Amara folded the page. “I’m not performing. I’m listening. You wrote them for me to hear.”
She picked up _04/04/2023_. Three weeks after.
_My father asked if I regretted choosing the company over... he didn’t say your name. I said yes. He said “Then fix it.” I said I don’t know how to fix leaving. He said men fix problems, not feelings. I think that’s why I’m bad at both._
Amara set the page down and pushed the stack toward him. Not back. Just to the line between them.
“You were twenty-seven,” she said. “A boy playing at being a man because your father said that’s what men do.”
Kelechi’s jaw tightened. “I was twenty-seven and I still made the wrong choice.”
“You were twenty-seven and scared,” Amara corrected. “There’s a difference.”
She picked up _30/06/2023_. Three months after.
_I saw a wedding today. The bride laughed like you when her shoe strap broke. I stood on the sidewalk and wanted to tell her groom to memorize that laugh. To not leave. I just stood there and hated him a little for getting to stay._
Her voice cracked once. She cleared her throat.
_I hate that I left. I hate that staying would have meant 200 people losing their jobs. I hate that choosing you meant choosing, and I’m bad at choosing. I hate that you make me want to be better at it._
She set the page down. “You hated me a little.”
“I hated myself,” Kelechi said. “Never you.”
Amara picked up _14/03/2024_. One year after.
_One year today. I went to the shop at closing and stood across the street like a coward. The sign said Closed. Then you walked out and looked the same. Tired, but the same. I followed you two blocks before I realized I was following a ghost. I went home and wrote this instead of calling._
She folded it and put it in her apron pocket. Next to the napkin from the chin-chin.
“You followed me,” Amara said.
Kelechi nodded. “Not to bother you. Just to know you were real.”
_I learned to make tea today. Just black tea. It tasted like nothing. That’s what three years of silence tastes like. Nothing. I keep making it because doing nothing is still doing something. Is that stupid?_
She set it down. Maybe a hundred pages left. She closed the book in her lap and pushed it to the center line. “I’m not reading all of them today.”
Kelechi nodded. “You don’t have to.”
Amara made his tea. Ginger, thin slices, lemon, no sugar. Then one for herself. They drank in silence. The half-inch felt smaller with paper on the line.
At 5:05 PM, Kelechi stood. He left ₦1,500. “I’ll come tomorrow. Same time.
Amara nodded. “Same stack.”
He left. The bell jingled.
Amara untied the string and took _18/09/2024_ from the stack. She folded it with the other page and put both in her pocket. Two pages. Two years. Two weights.
Tolu came out. “You read them with him?”
“I read them to him,” Amara said.
Tolu wiped tables. “The shop feels different today.”
Amara retied the string, turned off the lights, locked the door.
That night she sat with the two pages. She read them again, then a third from memory: the wedding. The groom who got to stay. Her chest hurt. She didn’t cry.
Next day she opened at 6:30 AM and set the stack on the table. She read _19/09/2024_ while waiting.
At 3:55 PM she tied the string and waited behind the counter.
4:01 PM. The bell. Kelechi came in, saw the stack on the line, sat without ordering.
Amara picked up _25/12/2024_. Christmas.
_The city is loud. I’m in a room with no decorations and tea that tastes like nothing. I bought you a book today. Poetry. Left it across town. Didn’t sign it. Just hoped you’d find it someday. Stupid, right? Hoping a book would find you when I couldn’t._
She set it down. “Did I find it?”
Kelechi shook his head. “I don’t know. I was scared you would, and scared you wouldn’t.”
Amara reached under the counter and pulled out a slim book. _Romeo Oriogun. The Origin of Waves_. No inscription. Just a faded price sticker.
“I found it six months ago at a secondhand store in Yaba,” she said. “Bought it because the cover was blue. Your favorite color. I didn’t know it was from you until now.”
Kelechi gripped the table. “You kept it.”
Amara set it on the line with the stack. “I read it. The poem about the man who leaves and the woman who keeps the door open. I cried in the bathroom so Tolu wouldn’t see.”
Kelechi closed his eyes. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t,” Amara said. “Read the next one with me.”
She picked up _01/01/2025_. New Year’s Day.
_Happy New Year, Amara. I know you won’t hear this. I hope your year is full of things that don’t remind you of me. And things that do, and you don’t hate them. I hope you’re happy. I hope you’re not. I’m a mess of hope and selfishness. I’m learning to live with that too._
Amara stopped. “You’re still a mess.”
Kelechi almost smiled. “I am. But I’m a mess that sits here. Every day.
They read for an hour. One page each.
At 5:10 PM, Tolu cleared her throat. “Boss, we’re past closing.”
Amara didn’t move. “I know.”
Kelechi stood, left the money. “Same time tomorrow?”
“Same stack. Same reading,” Amara said.
He left. Amara tied the string and put the stack back. She put the poetry book on the shelf, one slot over. Habit. Or hope.
That night she read three more pages. _14/02/2025_. Valentine’s.
_I didn’t buy flowers. I bought a notebook. I write to you in it. I know you’ll never read this one. This is where I say the things I’m too scared to write on the paper I give you..._
She pressed the page to her forehead.
Next day she came early and started reading before he arrived. When he walked in at 4:01 PM, she didn’t look up.
_10/03/2025_. One month before he came back.
_I’m running out of things to say. Not because I have nothing. Because I’ve said everything and you still haven’t answered. I know this is one-sided. But not talking to you feels like dying. And I’ve done enough dying._
Amara stopped and looked up. Kelechi stood at the counter, money in hand, looking at her. At the paper.
“Sit,” Amara said.
He sat. She pushed the page to him. “Read this one out loud.”
His hands shook. He read. His voice broke on _I’ve done enough dying._
Amara reached across the half-inch. She didn’t touch his hand. She touched the edge of the paper he held. Their fingers brushed one second. Then she pulled back.
“The half-inch stays,” Amara said. “But I’m reading with you now. Out loud. In the open. Not hiding in the back room anymore.”
Kelechi nodded, couldn’t speak.
Amara picked up _24/04/2026_. The day he came back.
_If you ever close early, save me a seat by the window. I’ll find my way back._
She read it, then looked at him. “You found your way back.”
Kelechi nodded. “Because you kept the receipt.”
Amara untied the string and retied it loosely. “There are still more pages.”
She picked up _26/04/2026_. Two days after he came back.
_The chair was empty. I didn’t move it closer. I’m learning distance._
She read it aloud, then turned the empty chair facing the street slightly toward her. Just enough that if she looked up, she’d see the chair instead of the street.
Kelechi saw. His shoulders dropped another half-inch.
They read until 5:15 PM. Tolu locked the back door and left quietly.
When Kelechi left, he didn’t take the stack. He left it on the table, on the line.
Amara locked the door after him and stood in the dark shop.
She walked home past the university. The gate was open. Students laughed. Music played from a car.
Amara walked slower tonight. She wasn’t running from anything.
At home she sat with the two pages from her pocket and the new one from today. Three pages. Three years. Three steps closer.
She didn’t know how many pages were left. She didn’t know what the last page would say.
But she knew she wasn’t reading them alone anymore.
She was reading them in the open. With him across from her, half an inch away, learning how to stay.
The seat was still unclaimed. But the reading had started.
And reading out loud meant he couldn’t hide in the paper anymore.
Neither could she.
- Writer
