The contract wasn't signed with a ceremony. There was no crowd, no press, no grand announcement.
Just a pen, a page, and a trembling hand.
Titi sat across from Tunde in the Governor's private study, the polished mahogany desk separating them. The late afternoon sun poured through the tall windows, casting slanted shadows on the cream walls. Outside, the sounds of distant traffic and birdsong melted together life going on, unaware that something sacred had just shifted.
Tunde slid the final page toward her.
"Read it carefully. You can amend any clause. The salary is fixed at six thousand dollars monthly, full benefits, with no expiration clause unless either party chooses to end it. You'll be assigned your own room in the household, unlimited access to Mama. The only unbreakable clause is this "
He pointed to the final line, highlighted in faded gold ink.
"Presence over protocol. Care beyond duty. This is not a job. It is a vow."
Titi blinked. "Did Mama write that?"
Tunde gave a small smile. "She asked for it to be added by hand. Every caregiver before this had a rulebook. You? You'll have a relationship."
Titi read the words again, then nodded.
She signed. Carefully. Not like a nurse. Like someone signing for a life she didn't know she'd been waiting for.
When she finished, Tunde didn't shake her hand. He stood, walked around the desk, and embraced her lightly like family, not employer.
"You saved something," he said quietly. "In her. In all of us."
That evening, Titi moved into the Iroko household.
Her room was at the rear wing, facing a small courtyard garden Mama had planted decades ago mint, ginger, basil, and a single hibiscus tree that had outlived every gardener.
She unpacked slowly, methodically. Placed her grandmother's photo frame by the bedside. Lined her books most of them unread on the window ledge. Hung her uniforms in the closet. Then, she changed into a soft cream blouse and walked toward Mama's room.
She knocked once.
"Come in," came the familiar voice.
Mama Iroko was seated in her favorite chair, feet wrapped in a blanket, glasses perched low on her nose as she leafed through a faded journal.
Titi entered silently.
For a moment, they said nothing.
Then Mama looked up. "So you came."
"I said I would."
"Yes, but many say it. Not many mean it."
Titi approached slowly. "How are you feeling today?"
"Like I've been peeled," Mama said, voice dry. "Stripped of titles, tested like a politician's ghost. But strangely… I feel lighter."
"Would you like to rest?"
Mama gestured to the chair beside her. "Sit. Let me look at you. Not your resume. Not your posture. You."
Titi sat.
They watched each other for a long, quiet moment.
Then Mama spoke.
"Do you know why I pretended to be Aunty Kike?"
"To test us?"
Mama smiled. "Partly. But also to remind myself what it feels like to be invisible. To see if I could still be… loved, even when not recognized."
Titi nodded. "You can."
A long pause.
Then Mama asked, "What are you most afraid of?"
The question came so softly, it took a moment for Titi to register it.
She swallowed. "That I'll fail you. That I'll grow tired. That one day, you'll cry and I won't have the right words."
Mama closed the journal. "Then we are alike. Because I fear needing too much."
The silence that followed was not uncomfortable. It was sacred.
Then Mama reached for her hand.
"Care for me. But more than that… witness me. I am still here, even when my bones forget how to hold me."
"I will," Titi whispered.
And she meant it.
Over the next few days, the household settled into a rhythm.
Titi learned how Mama liked her tea mild ginger, no sugar. How she napped with classical music playing low. That she could sense tension before anyone entered the room.
She also discovered Mama's pain flared most at night spiritual pain, not just physical. The kind that whispered old regrets. The kind that made her stare at the ceiling and say names Titi didn't recognize.
Titi didn't always speak during those moments.
Sometimes she just held her hand.
Sometimes that was enough.
Elsewhere, life moved on.
Joy returned to Port Harcourt, where she resumed work at the community home. But she started singing again soft hymns, just like her mother used to. She sent a letter to Titi, with a single line:
"You reminded me that not all goodness gets rejected."
Remi opened a small care center in Ibadan, calling it "Presence Over Protocol." The name caught attention. So did his work. He sent Mama a hand-written poem titled "The Woman Who Listened."
Farouk and his brother Kayode relocated to a quieter district, with the help of a grant recommendation from Governor Iroko himself. Farouk framed the origami bird and placed it in Kayode's room.
Cynthia started therapy. Real therapy. For herself. And later began volunteering once a week in geriatric homes not as a social worker, but as a woman rediscovering softness.
Chika returned to Enugu and wrote her first essay: "The Performance of Strength in Nigerian Women." It went viral.
Idowu never spoke of the retreat again. But he did call his sister more. And when a fellow nurse broke down during a shift, he sat beside her and simply said, "Stay."
Baba Kareem became a mentor to three of the younger applicants. He never once asked if Titi had called him back.
He knew she would when the time was right.
Weeks later, Mama Iroko and Titi sat in the garden during the golden hour.
The hibiscus tree had bloomed again.
Mama held a photo in her hand an old picture of her younger self, in full nurse uniform, cradling a newborn in a village clinic.
"Is that your first patient?" Titi asked.
"No," Mama said. "That was my son. Tunde. He came too fast. I delivered him myself."
Titi laughed. "Seriously?"
Mama smiled. "Yes. And ever since, I've lived my life choosing the hard way. But this" she looked around the garden, "this peace? I did not choose. It found me."
She turned to Titi.
"You gave me back something. The right to be cared for, not managed. The right to be human."
Titi blinked back sudden tears.
"You gave me the same."
They sat in silence.
Two women separated by decades, joined by something deeper than blood. By choice. By presence. By loyalty not purchased, but lived.
And as the wind moved gently through the garden, Titi whispered a quiet prayer.
Not for success.
But for strength to stay.