Summary

Chapter 1 begins in the city of Jos, Nigeria in December of 2008. The reader does not know yet, but the first-person narrative is from the perspective of the main female character Yejide. Yejide is preparing to move and has packed her furniture and her bags. She mentions “My Olamide” and “Akin” though their relationships are not clear yet (4). She also references a lamp that Akin bought her. She thinks about how she has wanted to leave since several students were killed. She thinks about the fifteen years she has spent in the house. The chapter ends as Yejide enters the car thinking, “The road stretches before us, shrouded in a darkness transitioning into dawn as it leads me back to you” (6).

Chapter 2 starts with Yejide’s perspective again, now in the city of Ilesa, Nigeria in 1985 (23 years prior to Chapter 1). Yejide notices her four...