The morning after Tunde left, Edena felt heavier. The air hung still, as though the wind itself had gone quiet out of respect.
Amara woke before dawn, her pillow damp with tears. The Man Tree outside her window stood tall against the pale sky, its branches reaching toward the horizon like it was trying to touch the same distance Tunde had gone.
Her mother's voice came faintly from the kitchen. "Amara, wake up well o. You'll be late for school."
"Yes, Mama," she answered softly, though her heart wasn't in it.
She dressed slowly, tying her scarf with trembling hands. The world looked the same — the dusty street, the cracked compound wall — but something was missing, like a page torn from her life.
When she got to school, she caught herself glancing at the old bench under the Man Tree, half-expecting to see him sitting there, grinning, tossing a mango into the air. But there was only the rustle of leaves and the hum of bees.
The laughter of other students carried from across the field, loud and careless. Amara felt invisible again — a shadow among faces.
Still, she walked to the tree and sat. It felt wrong not to. She opened her notebook and touched the space where his name used to be scribbled in the corner. Then she began to draw — lines and curves that didn't make sense at first but slowly took the shape of a soldier standing beneath a tree.
She whispered, "Be safe, Tunde."
---
In Zaria, the sun was harsher — no shade of the Man Tree here. The training ground was a stretch of red dust and iron will. Boys ran until their legs gave way. Boots thudded in rhythm; voices barked commands that left no room for weakness.
Tunde was fifteen now, his hair cut close, his face sharper with discipline. But at night, when the lights went out and the wind hissed through the open windows, his thoughts went home.
He'd pull out Amara's drawing from a hidden pocket in his uniform and stare at it. The Man Tree, drawn in pencil but alive with her soul.
Some nights, he could almost hear her voice.
"Don't forget the tree," it whispered.
He never did.
The first year was hard. Letters weren't allowed often, and even when they were, he had no address for her. His father believed distractions made soldiers weak. "The world doesn't wait for those who dream," Major Adebayo would say.
But Tunde didn't see Amara as a distraction. She was the quiet in his chaos.
One evening, during drills, the commandant's voice boomed, "Adebayo! You think this is play? Drop and give me twenty!"
Tunde fell to the ground, sweat pouring down his face. As he pushed through each repetition, he whispered to himself, "Don't stop. Don't fall. Be strong."
Somewhere in that rhythm, he thought of Amara's calm voice, the way she said, "Trees listen."
It became his strength.
---
Back in Edena, two years passed like seasons of the same grief.
Amara grew taller, quieter. The teasing stopped — not because her classmates became kinder, but because she'd learned to look them in the eye and smile as if their words meant nothing.
Her art grew stronger too. The walls of her small room became a gallery of sketches — soldiers, trees, sunsets, a boy with a crooked grin.
She joined the school's art club, and her teacher once said, "Amara, your drawings feel alive. Who do you draw when you close your eyes?"
Amara smiled faintly. "Someone far away."
At night, she'd sit under the Man Tree with her lantern, reading or sketching. Sometimes, she'd write letters she couldn't send.
"Dear Tunde,
Today the mangoes ripened early. I kept one for you, but Mama said it would spoil before you came.
I still sit under the Man Tree every day. It misses you too.
—Amara."
She'd fold the paper and hide it inside a small metal box buried beneath the roots.
It became her ritual — her quiet conversation with the boy who once made her laugh when the world felt cruel.
---
In Zaria, life hardened Tunde. He learned to shoot, march, and obey without question. He grew used to pain — bruised knuckles, sore feet, hunger. But nothing hurt like silence.
One night, after a brutal exercise, he sat alone behind the dormitory, looking up at the moon. His friend Musa dropped beside him, panting. "You dey always look sky like woman go come out from there."
Tunde chuckled weakly. "Maybe she already did."
Musa laughed. "Ah! You get woman for home?"
Tunde smiled. "Not woman. Just… someone who believes in me."
"Then you better hold onto that," Musa said, patting his shoulder. "Because this place go teach you to forget everything."
But Tunde never forgot. Each month, he marked small notches into his belt — one for every moon since he'd left Edena.
---
Three years later, Edena had changed. The Mango Tree was still there, but the compound now echoed with the noise of motorbikes and traders. Amara had finished secondary school and was working part-time at a local art center.
She'd stopped expecting Tunde to return, but she never stopped remembering.
One evening, as rain clouds gathered, she sat beneath the Man Tree sketching a soldier in full uniform. She didn't hear Ngozi approach until a voice said, "So you're still drawing that ghost boy?"
Amara looked up calmly. "He's not a ghost."
Ngozi scoffed. "You think he'll come back? Boys forget fast. Especially soldiers."
Amara smiled faintly. "Maybe. But this one promised."
The wind rose suddenly, scattering leaves around them. One fell gently on Amara's sketch — shaped like a heart.
Ngozi muttered something and walked off, shaking her head.
Amara traced the leaf's veins with her finger and whispered, "If you can hear me, Tunde… come back when the wind calls."
---
That same night, hundreds of kilometers away in Zaria, Tunde sat by the barracks gate after drills, exhaustion pulling at his bones. The night was cool, the air heavy with the scent of rain.
He reached into his pocket and unfolded Amara's old drawing — the lines faded but still clear.
He stared at it for a long time, then looked up at the sky. The moon was full.
Somehow, he knew — she was looking at it too.
He whispered into the night, "I'll come back, Amara. One day."
And as the first drops of rain began to fall, he felt — deep in his chest — that the wind had just carried her whisper to him.