They met in 100 level , the most confusing year of university life.
Zainab was always early to lectures, sitting at the front with neat notes and tired eyes. She came from a home where failure was not an option. Scholarships, grades, discipline, those were her love languages.
Tunde was the opposite.
Always late. Always joking. Always somehow passing exams without anyone understanding how.
Their worlds collided under the old mango tree beside the Faculty of Arts, the unofficial meeting spot for students running from lectures, heartbreak, and hunger.
“Sorry,” Tunde said one afternoon after bumping into her, sending her books scattering on the ground.
Zainab sighed. “You people never look where you’re going.”
He smiled. “And you people never look up.”
That was how conversation began.
They didn’t plan to fall in love.
It happened during night readings when the generator failed and they studied with phone torchlights. During rainy evenings when the hostel flooded and they laughed through discomfort. During exam seasons when hunger was louder than concentration.
Tunde would buy one meat pie and they’d share it, half for love, half for survival.
He listened when she talked about her fear of disappointing her parents. She listened when he spoke about being the “first son” with too many expectations waiting at home.
In school, love wasn’t roses.
It was patience.
Then came final year pressure.
Zainab became distant, overwhelmed by project deadlines and scholarship renewal. Tunde felt her slipping away.
One evening under the mango tree, he finally spoke.
“Is it me that’s disturbing your future?”
Her eyes filled with tears.
“I love you,” she said softly. “But sometimes love doesn’t remove pressure. It only sits beside it.”
Silence hung between them, heavy, honest.
They didn’t break up dramatically.
They just held hands and understood that growing sometimes hurts.
After graduation, life separated them.
NYSC postings to different states. New struggles. Long silences.
Years later, during a campus alumni event, Tunde saw her again confident, smiling, still beautiful in a familiar way.
“Still early to everything?” he teased.
She laughed. “Still late?”
They sat again under the mango tree.
Different people. Same connection.
Some loves don’t end.
They just wait for maturity.
