In the beginning, God created the heavens. He gave it a short, almost stubby nose, a round face, deep brown eyes, soft hair, and brown skin. He looked at it, saw it was good, and called it Moremi. Then He created me. Gave me lips and made kisses and the night-time so the heavens could keep in touch.

At first, she was nameless. Just another beautiful girl creating sparks in a young man’s bleak heart. Until I noticed her on one of those afternoons when the harmattan went gaga. Blazing sun, wild wind, me licking my lips a lot. I was walking. Returning home, I guess, when I heard this smooth voice.

“Excuse me.”

I turned. Carelessly. She was smiling.

“Sorry”, she said.

“No don’t you bother.” I replied, making a better impression this time.

“Could you take a photo of me? With the, uh, flowers.”

“Yeah… Yeah, of course.”

So she gave me her phone, retreated towards the fence of flowers, and posed. Those flowers were probably beautiful. But her smile, her brown skin, her shape. Girl was fire. Chocolate fire.

It wasn’t long before my heart learnt to disobey me, playing itself, whenever I saw her.  An opportunity soon presented itself in the way of her sitting alone at the hangout close to the department. I took it.

“Hey”, I greeted.

“Hello”, she replied.

“Remember me?” I asked.

“Of course. The photo guy.”

My stupid heart made one solid gbim.

“You know, I never got your name.” I said.

“And I, yours.”

“Nah”, I smiled, “I asked first.”

She smiled.

“The name’s Moremi.”

“And I’m Fechi.”

“Nice meeting you, Fechi. For the second time.”

We laughed.

“And I you”, I said. “Can I join you?”

“Please.” She said.

And there we were. Talking, and laughing.

We exchanged numbers, spent nights Whatsapp-ing, stuck to each other whenever we met… Come on, you don’t expect me to spell it all out, do you? You know what a brother does when he’s shooting his ‘shot’.

The night Moremi kissed me, I realized that the human brain is a seed that spits lightning when it bursts. The silvery halo of that night, the whisper of leaves from the surrounding trees, the flow of life along the arteries of campus streets, my palm on Moremi’s hands, it’s softness, the fleshiness of her kiss, are particles stuck in the teeth of my memory.

When our lips first met, they were strangers saying Hi. They closed in on themselves, slowly, looking for acceptance, searching to discover buds with new sensations. The clocks ceased to account for time as my heartbeat replaced its ticking. And then our lips danced in blank verse. It was wet tissue against wet tissue, each trying to match the other’s pace and heat. We stopped and everything spoke again, reprimanding us for losing ourselves in each other. We smiled. Then our lips smashed into each other, no longer strangers but acquaintances that couldn’t just wait to trace the lines of love.