THE TRANSFER

CHAPTER FOUR-THE ROOM WITH NO CLOCKS

Late evenings became routine, stay back, Kemi would say, already slipping off her heels. “We need to reconcile the international transfers.” What began as a necessity slowly acquired rhythm. The building emptied, lights dimmed floor by floor, and the bank took on a different personality; quieter, softer, almost conspiratorial. They spoke between spreadsheets, between coffee refills, between silences that grew heavier each night.

Kemi talked as if the numbers loosened her tongue. About deadlines. About pressure. About how success could still feel like suffocation. One night, she paused mid sentence, heels dangling from her fingers, her bare feet pressing into the cool tile.

“I used to be happy,” she said, not to him exactly, but to the room.

Tosin looked up, unsure whether the comment required a response or restraint. “Marriage doesn’t end happiness,” he said carefully, choosing caution over-curiosity.

“No,” she replied, meeting his eyes with a steadiness that unsettled him. “Neglect does.”

The word lingered.

It settled between them like an open file neither could close. Tosin returned to his screen, but the numbers blurred. He noticed how her voice softened after that, how she lingered longer over explanations he already understood.

At home, her husband spoke in checklists appointments, errands, obligations completed or deferred. Conversations ended where they began, efficient and hollow. At work, Tosin listened. He didn’t interrupt, he absorbed her pauses as attentively as her words.

That difference mattered more than either of them wanted to admit. It carved a space that was not physical but emotional, a quiet territory shaped by attention and restraint. They didn’t touch nor confess. But each night, when the security lights clicked on and the city hummed below, they lingered a moment longer than necessary, occupying something fragile, unnamed, and already dangerous.

The silence of the room was heavy, thick with the scent of Kemi’s perfume and the hum of the air conditioner, a mechanical pulse that felt like a countdown.

Kemi watched the red standby light of the television on the far wall, a tiny unblinking eye witnessing her betrayal.

​She thought of her life outside this door, the structured, predictable world she had built with such agonizing care. There was a desk with her name on it, a calendar filled with deadlines, and a man at home who believed her "late nights were truly what she made him believe. Tosin hadn't just offered her affection; he had offered her an exit from herself.

They chose hotels without familiarity, buildings that could not be traced, rooms that had never known them. Windows overlooked city lights but refused recognition. The clocks were absent, removed, ignored; time itself seemed suspended. In that space, Kemi whispered, “You make me feel alive.”

Tosin said nothing. He didn’t need to. His hands answered, steady and deliberate, tracing lines over her skin as if memorizing maps that existed only at that moment. There was no rush, no clumsiness, no careless claiming of territory. With him, every movement had intent. Attention itself became intimacy.

She marveled at the paradox: she had betrayed, yet been seen. She had feared, yet been understood. She had thought love would be reckless, but with Tosin, it was measured, intense, deliberate.

When it was over, silence returned first. He leaned back, quiet. “You’re married,” he said softly, almost to himself.

“And you’re lonely,” she replied, meeting him halfway, a confession and accusation entwined.

They became reckless with emotion, meticulous with evidence. No messages, no calls, no photos, no names. Just stolen hours. Just the fragile illusion that discretion could protect them, that secrecy could preserve something untouchable.