The morning light catches on the edge of the shuttered windows as I emerge from the basement, blinking like a man reborn from underground. My shirt clings to my back, sweat-drenched from hours hunched over documents and forged identities. The thick folder in my hand feels heavier than paper like it holds my survival stitched between legal loopholes and fabricated timelines.
I don't sleep. There's no use pretending rest would come.
Instead, I shower quickly and drive across the city before the roads fill. I pick a quiet law firm on the mainlandvfar from the polished glass towers of Ikoyi or VI. A place no one would associate with me. I've already routed the emails through a burner domain. A fake name. A fake client. But the documents, the structure of the argument, the legal shell that's real. As real as I need it to be.
I tell them it's for a discreet client with a checkered history, hoping to erase affiliations with certain business transactions gone awry. I speak with the receptionist and drop off the folder like a courier would. No signatures. No faces. Just instruction.
"Client wants initial feedback by Tuesday," I say flatly, then walk out before she can ask anything more.
Back in the car, I sit still for a long time.
There's a subtle danger in testing the strength of your own lies. If they hold, you start to believe you're untouchable. If they don't, you spiral. I've lived in both extremes. But today, I feel a new version of fear a kind that doesn't come from what I've done, but from who's watching.
Because someone is watching.
And I don't know who.
+++
Later, I take my lunch in the backseat of a tinted Prado, parked outside a mechanic's shop in Surulere. I've had this car stored here for two years, barely driven, license plate registered to a fake name. I eat jollof rice from a nylon-wrapped bowl, barely tasting it, while watching people move. The street feels normal. Too normal. That makes it worse.
I call Tunji again. The friend from the NIMC office who tipped me off about the inquiry into my past. He picks on the second ring.
"Omo," he greets, voice wary. "You good?"
"No," I answer. "Any updates?"
A pause. Then he exhales. "Guy, whoever they are, they didn't stop at your BVN."
My jaw tightens.
"What else?"
"They pulled record history passport, driver's license, even land registry data. They're cross-referencing locations from, like, five years ago. It's surgical."
I pinch the bridge of my nose. "They using a firm?"
"That's the thing. It's not showing as a private investigator. It's coming through a legal chamber. Legit source code, not backdoor. Like they're prepping for court."
The silence that follows is thick enough to choke on.
Court.
Not just revenge. Not just curiosity.
This is someone building a case.
"And there's more," Tunji says reluctantly.
"Say it."
"They flagged a death certificate from Alagbado. 2019. A guy named Sunday Adigun. That's what triggered the deep-dive. His records were one of the last linked to your old NIN."
My blood runs cold.
Sunday Adigun.
The man who died the night everything shifted. The night I became Kolade. The reason I disappeared.
"Do they have my name on it?" I ask, forcing the words through a dry mouth.
"Not directly. But the registrar at the time wrote a note about an unnamed witness. Tall. Male. Gave conflicting statements. They reopened the file."
I can't breathe for a second. My vision pulses.
"Bro," Tunji continues, quieter now. "You said this was dead and buried. What the hell did you leave behind?"
I hang up without answering.
Because I don't know what I left behind.
And that terrifies me.
+++
That night, I don't go home.
Instead, I circle. I drive to an estate in Lekki I haven't entered in months. One of the old flats under a dummy corporation, barely furnished. No staff. No cameras. I use a keypad lock and don't turn on the lights when I enter. The air inside smells like sealed silence damp drywall, stale electricity.
I sit at the dining table and unfold a map.
Then I open my laptop.
And begin tracing timelines.
+++
The plan, in theory, is simple.
Shift blame where it can be shifted. Reinvent where necessary. Use legal fiction to recreate a version of events that feels plausible and distant enough to confuse timelines and dissolve direct ties.
But that only works if no one has a witness.
And if no one knows your real name.
Now both are at risk.
I trace my hand over the name again.
It looks alien now. A relic from a life I've erased so well even I sometimes forget it was mine.
But someone has remembered. And they're pulling at the loose thread.
+++
Around midnight, I call someone I haven't spoken to in years. A man named Fola.
He answers with suspicion in his voice. "Who is this?"
"It's me," I say. "Deyemi."
A beat.
Then laughter. Cold. Unamused.
"You're calling me from the grave?"
"I need a cleanup. Digital. Legal. Quiet."
"Why should I lift a finger?"
"Because if I fall, I won't be the only one."
The line crackles.
I hear him take a drag of something probably the same rolled-up habit he's had since polytechnic.
"You always were good at tying people to your downfall," he mutters.
"I was always good at surviving," I correct.
He sighs.
"You still in Lagos?"
"Yes."
"Alright. I'll meet you in person. But only once. And not in the city."
"Where then?"
"I'll text you."
He hangs up.
I lean back in the chair, heart pounding.
Fola is the last person who remembers the full story. The only one who knows what really happened in 2019. The only one who helped me disappear.
If he turns, I'm finished.
+++
The next morning, I'm on edge.
The firm I dropped the papers at calls back. They want clarification on a few items language around financial authorization, prior board appointments under the alias. I answer with a new voice. New cadence. Slight northern accent. I've practiced it enough to make it believable. I thank them, say I'll review, and hang up.
Then I walk into a pharmacy and buy burner SIMs.
Five of them.
Each one for a new role.
A new contact.
A new lie.
+++
By noon, my phone buzzes. It's Fola. A single message:
Obafemi Awolowo Way. Abandoned textile warehouse. 3 p.m. Come alone.
I stare at the message until the letters blur.
It's not a trap.
But it's not safe either.
Still I go.
Because the past is clawing at my name, and if I don't stitch it shut, it will bleed me dry.