In between sundays

Two brothers

Chapter Two

The week that followed wasn’t anything special. Ordinary days rolled over each other, quiet and uneventful. Classes, routines, sleep, the usual things. But my mind wasn’t quiet. Inside me, something small but alive had started moving, and it kept circling back to one thing—him asking for my name.

It wasn’t even like he asked me directly. No. He asked someone else. I only overheard it. Still, the sound of my own name on his lips—borrowed through someone else—sat in my chest like a song I couldn’t stop humming.

I held on to it. Maybe too tightly. The way he came to sit beside me. The way he made sure no one broke that space between us. The way his eyes drifted toward me when I was recording the congregation, pretending not to notice but noticing all the same.

It was silly, really, but sometimes the smallest things are the loudest.

By the next Sunday, I didn’t go expecting anything. But somehow, without planning it, we ended up sitting beside each other again. Coincidence, maybe. Or maybe not. I don’t know. All I know is that when he sat down, something in me felt like it was picking up where last week had left off.

Pastor was preaching, his voice rolling over the hall, when he called out a Bible verse. Without hesitation, the guy beside me leaned slightly and asked me for it. His tone was simple, casual, as though it was the most natural thing to do. But to me, it felt different. Like he wasn’t just asking for the verse—he was stretching out a thread, pulling me gently into his space. I gave him the verse, and for a brief second, I caught myself smiling at how ordinary yet not-so-ordinary it was.

He has a brother. We don’t talk. We’ve never talked. But after service, his brother came over and they started chatting, standing so close I could hear their voices mix with the crowd. Then pastor’s voice carried again, reminding everyone to greet those around them with a “Happy Sunday.”

That’s how it happened: both of them reached out to shake my hand. A simple gesture, polite, church-like. Yet, in that moment, I felt caught between two brothers. one whose glances I noticed, and another who seemed to be watching me too.

I thought that would be the end of it. But later, his brother came to me directly. He walked up casually, phone in hand, as if he just wanted to show me something. No buildup, no explanation,he simply turned the screen toward me.

A picture.

Not just any picture. It was me.

A picture of me, taken around last year. And not only that, but I was wearing the exact same outfit I had on that day.

For a moment, the world tilted. I didn’t know whether to be shocked, amused, or unsettled. My first reaction was to laugh. So I did,I smiled, then laughed, my surprise spilling out because I didn’t know what else to do.

He looked at me, maybe expecting that reaction, maybe not. Then he asked if I wanted to see the picture again. My curiosity got the better of me, so I said yes. But just as he tapped the screen, the phone locked. He chuckled, a little embarrassed, and told me it wasn’t even his phone.It was his brother’s. The same brother who had been sitting beside me.

I stood there, smiling at the strangeness of it all. Why would someone take a picture of me last year? Why today, of all days, did it find its way back to me? And why did it matter that I was wearing the same outfit?

I’ve always had a crush on Peter, the lighter-skinned one. He was the kind of boy my eyes naturally followed, the one I would quietly like from a distance, never expecting anything in return. Philemon, his elder brother, is darker. He’s the one who sat beside me, the one whose presence kept drawing me in without me asking for it.

And here I was, stuck between the two of them. A picture from Philemon’s phone, a name he had gone out of his way to ask for, a space he made sure no one broke. And Peter,the crush I had carried silently,never once looked at me the way Philemon did;maybe we've exchanged glances before.

It made me happy. Happier than I wanted to admit. But beneath the happiness, a little sadness sat quietly too. Because none of my crushes had ever liked me back. Not Peter,not anyone before him. That kind of attention never belonged to me. Until now.

For the first time, I felt seen. Properly seen. And somehow, that changed the way I saw myself.

Another Sunday ended, another week began. But I knew I wouldn’t carry it lightly.