When reality became unfamiliar
#
For three days, Se’ad lived somewhere between sleep and waking.She ate because Mama insisted, slept because exhaustion eventually dragged her under and prayed because the words came automatically, even when her mind could barely follow them.
But she was not entirely present.
The first morning, she woke up and asked Mama why the room looked unfamiliar.
The second afternoon, she stood in the hallway for several minutes, staring at a family photograph as though she had never seen the people in it before.
The third night, she asked Hauwa a question that made her sister's face change completely.
“Am I dead?” Hauwa froze. “What?” she replied with shock Se’ad looked around the room.
“I don't know where I am.” “You're home.” Hauwa replied staring at her sister who’s clearly in a state she couldn’t explain
“Home?” “Yes.” Se’ad nodded slowly.Then looked down at her hands. “I don't feel real.”
Hauwa's eyes filled with tears. She turned away before Se’ad could see.
---
Mama spent those three days beside her whenever she could,She fed her, Combed her hair.
Sat beside her during the long hours when Se’ad stared into nothing.Sometimes she recited Qur'an softly.Sometimes she simply held her daughter's hand. “Ki yi hakuri, Se’ad. Ki cigaba da addu’a you’ll be fine Insha Allah“ Se’ad would nod. But sometimes she wouldn't even seem to understand what her mother was saying.
It frightened everyone. Especially Abba.
He had been away from home when everything began, occupied with work and one of his business commitments. When he returned and saw his daughter sitting silently in the sitting room, something in his expression changed.
He stopped at the doorway. “Se’ad.”
She looked up. For a few seconds, there was no recognition.
Then— “Abba?” His face softened. “Eh, my daughter.”
He walked toward her and sat beside her. “You know me?” he asked staring at her face with pity, he doesn’t know what was wrong but it had affected his daughter deeply
She nodded. “My Abba.” He smile, “Come.”he extended hid hand She looked at him. “Where?” she asked still seeing everything like a dream
He squeezed her fingers.“Just sit with me.”
And for the first time in days, she did.
---
Abba did not ask her too many questions. He didn't force her to explain what had happened.
He simply stayed.He would sit with her in the mornings.Sometimes they drank tea together.
Sometimes he took her outside orher times they drove around Abuja to shop .
It was strange.
Se’ad had always loved her father. But they had never been particularly close.There had always been an invisible distance between them.
Not hatred. Not fear.
Just the natural awkwardness that sometimes exists between a daughter and a father who love each other but have never quite learned how to say it.Something changed during those weeks.
Perhaps pain had a strange way of rearranging people. Or perhaps they had simply needed a reason to finally find one another.
---
One afternoon, Abba walked into her room holding his laptop. “Are you busy?” Se’ad looked at him. “No.” “Good.” He sat beside her and opened the laptop.
“I need your help regarding Your IT.”
She blinked. “My IT? I haven't even started looking.” “Exactly.”He turned the laptop toward her.“We're going to find somewhere suitable.”
She smiled faintly and said “Abba…You're doing too much, Thank you”
He looked at her sternly.“Am I?”
She laughed softly. “You are.”He smiled.
“Then let me do too much.”
---
What was supposed to be a short conversation lasted more than two hours.They searched, Compared and Cross-checked departments.
Discussed what kind of practical exposure Pharmacology students could realistically obtain.
By the end of it, they had narrowed the list down to five places.
NIPRD, NABDA, NAFDAC, National Hospital, Abuja And a Nigerian Air Force hospital.
Abba leaned back. “This one.” “NIPRD?” she asked”. He nodded and replied “ Its a good institution.” Yes.”
“But I want you to actually learn something.” She nodded. They discussed NABDA. Then NAFDAC, The National Hospital.Each had advantages and limitations.
Abba wasn't interested in simply finding her somewhere that would stamp her documents and call it an internship. “If you're going to spend your time there,” he told her, “you should come back knowing something you didn't know before.”
She smiled. “Okay, Abba.” “Tomorrow, we're going.” He said closing the laptop “Tomorrow?” “Yes, Sleep early.” He stood.Then turned back.
“And Se’ad?” “Yes?”
“You'll be fine.” The words were simple. But she knew he wasn't talking about her IT.
She looked at him.He gave her a small smile.
“Allah yana tare da ke.”
Her eyes stung. She couldn’t reply just simply nodded.
---
They went everywhere. Day after day. Abba spoke to administrators, department heads and senior staff. At each institution, the response was encouraging. Yes, they could accept her.
Yes, there was room, her background was suitable. But there was always a qualification.
The practical system wasn't what it used to be.
Some departments could expose her to only limited hands-on work.
Some places had more administrative routines than actual laboratory involvement.
Some could accept her without necessarily giving her the depth of experience she wanted.
Abba listened to everything. He never rushed the decision.
Then they visited the Air Force hospital. It was around the Abuja airport axis, and the location immediately caught Abba's attention.
“It's close to me,” he said. Se’ad laughed.
“That's your main concern?” “No.”
He looked at her. “But it is an advantage.”
She smiled. He was right.The hospital offered something she wanted. Exposure and Structure.
And, importantly, the possibility of learning within a functioning healthcare environment.
When they drove back that afternoon, Abba glanced at her. “So?” She looked through the window. “I think this one.”“Are you sure?”
“Yes.” He nodded. “Then it's settled.”
She smiled.
For the first time in weeks, something felt normal. Not perfect.Not healed. But normal.
And sometimes, after losing your footing, normal is enough.
---
Somewhere inside all those days, Snapchat remained quietly alive. The streak never stopped.
Not because Se’ad was particularly interested.
It had simply become routine. A picture. A snap.
Another streak, Nothing more.
The account belonged to a username she had gradually become familiar with Nass💵.
She had never asked for his real name.
She knew almost nothing about him. Except what Snapchat accidentally revealed. A watch, steering wheel, A hotel lobby.
An airport. A blurred photograph of a black car.
A glimpse of a huge house with expensive-looking interiors, A restaurant, private-looking office. A passport tucked beneath something on a desk.
Nothing clear enough to identify him. Nothing personal enough to explain him. But enough to tell Se’ad one thing. The boy was rich.
Filthy rich, perhaps.
The kind of rich that made her wonder whether he lived in a completely different universe from hers.
Yet his personality didn't match the grandeur of the things he occasionally posted.
He was nonchalant. Sometimes ridiculously so.
And slightly weird.
She had discovered one of his strangest obsessions by accident.
Spider-Man.
It began with a snap. A Spider-Man figurine sitting on a desk. She replied: “You like Spider-Man?”
His answer came several minutes later “Like?”
Then another snap. An entire shelf of Spider-Man figures, Posters, Collectibles. Everything.
She laughed. “You're obsessed.”
His reply: “Correct.”
That was how it began.
They exchanged opinions about the different movies. Argued about which version was best.
She teased him for being a grown man obsessed with a fictional superhero. He told her she simply didn't understand greatness.
She told him Spider-Man was overrated. He nearly offended her entire bloodline.
After that, the streak remained a streak. But every now and then, there was a comment.
A reaction, a ridiculous Spider-Man reference.
Nothing more.
---
Then the new Spider-Man movie came out.
Spider-Man: A Brand New Day.
Nass💵 disappeared for a while. Se’ad noticed only because the streak arrived at an unusual hour. Then came a snap. An airport. Another.
A boarding pass blurred beneath his hand. Then a view through an airplane window.
She replied: “Where are you going?”
He answered: “N'Djamena.”
She stared at the words, “Chad? Why?”
His response came less than ten seconds later “Spider-Man.”
She laughed so loudly that Mama called from the next room. “What happened?” she replied “Nothing!”
She stared at the screen. And thought to her self, this man was strange. Who travelled to another country just to watch a movie?
Apparently, Nass💵.
Later that evening, he sent a picture of a cinema.
She smiled. “You're actually crazy.”
His response: “You already knew that.” And then the conversation ended. Just like that.
Nothing that would have made Se’ad think of him as anything more than a strange Snapchat friend whose streak she happened to maintain.
---
Weeks passed. Her recovery continued. Some days were good. Some weren't. There were moments when she suddenly remembered Ridhwan and felt the old ache return.
Other times, she could think of him without crying.bShe began rebuilding herself quietly.
Prayer by prayer. And one night, she mentioned her insomnia to Nass💵.
It was not a deep conversation.
She simply complained about how difficult it was to sleep. She expected a random response.
Instead, a few minutes later, her phone vibrated.
She wasn't holding it. It vibrated again.
She glanced toward it. Then stopped. A notification appeared. “Missed audio call from Nass💵.”
Her heart jumped. “What?”She stared at the screen.
He had called. Actually called. Not a snap, Not a message. A call. Her fingers suddenly felt cold.
Why was her heart beating like that? She picked up the phone.
For several seconds, she simply stared at the screen. Then she pressed call. It rang.
Once, Twice, Three times.
He answered, there was a brief Silence.
Se’ad swallowed. Her heartbeat was embarrassingly loud.She brought the phone closer to her ear. “Assalamu alaikum.”
She tried to make her voice sound normal. It didn't.
A deep voice answered. “Wa alaikumussalam.”
She froze. For a moment, she forgot the conversation entirely.
His voice was nothing like she had imagined. It was deep, Rich and Calm.
There was a strange warmth beneath the nonchalance of it. And something else.
Something she couldn't identify. “Good evening,” she finally managed. A soft chuckle came through the phone. “Good evening.”
She closed her eyes. Why was she nervous? This was ridiculous. They had been streaking for ages. Yet hearing his voice felt completely different.
“You called me,” she said breaking the awkward silence “ “I did.”
“Why?”bshe asked her heart pounding
“You said you couldn't sleep. So I called.”
“That doesn't explain anything.” she said back and there was silence for about 5 secs then “Maybe I wanted to hear your voice.”
Se’ad's eyes widened. Her heart thudded against her chest. The voice on the other end remained calm. Almost too calm.
She tried to recover. “You don't even know what I sound like.”
“I do now.”She smiled despite herself. “That's not fair.”now she was smiling, not even knowing she did
“What isn't?” She could’ve sworn there was an accent but just couldn’t make out which
“You called without warning.”
“I did.”
“And now you're making me nervous.”He laughed softly. “Are you nervous?”
“No.”
She looked away from absolutely nobody. “I am not.”
“Hmm.” that was the only thing he said That single sound made her heart stumble again.
She hated that Or perhaps she didn't.
She wasn't sure.
For the first time, the mystery had a voice. But not a face, not a story. Just a voice.
And somehow, that was more dangerous !