Chapter 4 Ilẹ̀ Ayọ̀ (Land of Joy)

Femi Olalekan Ajani was the kind of man whose life didn't shout - it whispered. It hummed softly through the rustle of cassava leaves in the morning breeze and the quiet clink of metal buckets being filled at the stream. Born and raised in Ede, Osun State, he carried his roots not like a burden, but like a song - familiar, grounding, and ever present.

Ede had shaped him in ways no classroom could. The dusty town, lined with mango trees and quiet mosques, was more than home - it was soil under his fingernails, the scent of fried akara in the morning, and the echo of adhan bouncing off compound walls at dusk. The rhythms of that town had trained his senses: the shift in wind that signaled oncoming rain, the subtle difference in soil texture across just a few meters of farmland, the feel of honest work.

At twenty-eight, Femi led a life many overlooked. But he never did.

He noticed everything. The way the colour of the soil darkened just before the first drops of rain kissed the earth. How the taste of waterleaf grown in shaded areas differed - more tender, slightly sweeter - from those grown under the harsh sun. The grateful glint in his mother's eyes when he returned from Suleja with palm oil, a sack of yam, and frozen chicken wrapped in layers of nylon.

Little things. But to him, they were everything.

Femi was the only son of Kemi and Olalekan Ajani - middle-to-lower class Muslims who lived in a modest compound tucked behind the central mosque in Ede. A quiet family. Honest. Devout. His father, once a civil servant with the Ministry of Agriculture, now spent his days listening to crackly broadcasts on his old transistor radio and reciting proverbs from a time when words still carried weight. His mother sold fabrics and fried akara on market days, her voice always humming old fuji songs as her hands moved with muscle memory over hot oil and batik cloth.

They had placed their hopes on their son. And by the grace of God, Femi had not let them down.

A First Class graduate from the University of Ilorin in Agriculture, he wasn't just good with theory - he was made for the land. He could draw up a soil fertility map from memory, calculate yields in his sleep, and still kneel to press his fingers into the earth just to feel its truth. When his NYSC posting arrived, assigning him to Suleja in Niger State, his mother had shed a few quiet tears. It was far. And unfamiliar. But Femi had smiled.

He believed in starting anywhere.

In Suleja, he taught Agriculture Science in a small village school, the kind of place where chalk still broke easily and textbooks came in secondhand. He took a battered motorcycle to the school each morning - twenty minutes of bumping over potholes, dodging goats and laughing children. The salary wasn't much, but he barely touched it. He saved. Took on extra classes. Helped older farmers draw up planting schedules. On weekends, he cleared brush for people's farms, even if it meant blisters and backaches.

He didn't complain. He had a vision.

By the end of his service year, he had scraped together just enough to lease four acres of fertile land near the village. It wasn't much in the grand scheme, but to him, it was everything. Rich, black soil. Good sun. A stream nearby.

He called it Ilẹ̀ Ayọ̀ - Land of Joy.

Each ridge he dug, each seed he planted, was a prayer. That land wasn't just his investment - it was his dream, his dignity, and his future.

And it was on that land - or close to it - that he met her.

It had been an ordinary day. Dry, quiet, the kind of afternoon where the sun pressed down like a hand. He was on his rickety motorcycle, returning from a nearby town where he'd gone to pick up bags of fertilizer. Sweat beaded his brow. His shirt clung to his back. But his thoughts were light - already drifting to where he'd place the new cassava mounds.

Then he saw her.

A car parked awkwardly by the roadside, flashers blinking faintly. And beside it, a tall woman in a navy blue blazer - clearly not from around here - standing with one hand on her hip and the other shielding her eyes from the sun.

She looked up as he approached. Their eyes met.

Something shifted.

It wasn't love at first sight - Femi didn't believe in such things - but something like curiosity, like the sudden sense that the day had just turned into a page in a different story.

She didn't look helpless. In fact, she looked like someone used to solving her own problems. But she also didn't wave him off when he stopped.

"Are you okay, madam?" he asked gently.

She blinked. Then nodded. "Flat tire. I've called someone, but..." She looked down the empty road. "They're taking forever."

Femi nodded. "Would you like help while you wait?"

And just like that, something soft passed between them.

He ended up staying with her for almost forty minutes. He checked the tire. Talked her through local shortcuts. Even helped calm her nerves after a truck passed too close. They talked - light, easy. She told him her name: Suraiyah.

She was from Kaduna, in town for a meeting. Elegant. Poised. Hausa. Clearly educated and successful - everything about her car, her tone, her manner said so.

But she hadn't looked at him like a roadside mechanic or a passerby. She'd looked at him like a man.

She thanked him more than once. Her voice soft. Almost surprised. As though kindness from a stranger - and a farmer - wasn't something she expected.

And then she was gone.

But she left something behind. A spark. A wondering. A weightless ache.

Weeks later, Femi still caught himself thinking about her - the tilt of her head when she smiled, the way she'd said "thank you."

That evening, after a long day tending the farm, he returned to his bachelor flat. A simple, clean one-room space. Mattress raised on a wooden platform. Books lined along cement shelves - farming guides, Qur'anic tafsir, a worn collection of African poetry. The fan sputtered in the corner like it had asthma.

He washed. Prayed. Ate the leftover yam and garden egg stew his mother had packed on her last visit. Then he lay back on the mattress, listening to the night sounds.

His phone buzzed.

"Omo Ede!"

The voice was familiar. Dayo - his NYSC friend turned lifelong brother.

Femi chuckled. "Dayo. Wetin happen?"

"I just dey come from work, abeg. Traffic wan kee me. These Abuja people drive like Lagos demons with new licenses."

Femi laughed. "You fit relocate come Suleja join me for farming. No traffic for ridges and furrows."

"Make I hear word. I dey manage AC and tie my tie. But wait-how far that your fine madam from the other day? The one with the big car and stranded face?"

Femi hesitated. His voice softened. "Her name is Suraiyah."

"Oh? So you got name. Na serious progress."

"She's... different."

"Different how?"

Femi leaned against the wall. The fan whirred behind him like a lazy insect. "She's older, I think. Hausa. From Kaduna. Rich. Polished. Educated. The kind of woman who discusses policy with ministers. Me, I'm still figuring out how to rotate my crops better."

Silence. Then Dayo said, "Guy, you no kill person. Because you no get G-Wagon, now you no qualify for fine woman again?"

"It's not that," Femi said quietly. "It's just... we come from different planets, not just worlds. I plant maize and cassava. She probably flies to Abuja every week. I use fertilizer; she uses perfume that smells like jasmine and power."

Dayo laughed. Then grew serious. "You be First Class graduate. You built a farm from scratch. You feed people. You employ people. You dey pay tithe, take care of your parents, and you no borrow money anyhow. If she no see say you be man - a full man - then na she lose."

Femi let out a breath. Smiled, but there was still a weight in his chest. "Thanks, Dayo. But I don't want to be a project. I've seen how some women look at men like me. Like charity work. A renovation. That's not what I want."

"I know," Dayo said. "But this one... you said she listened, abi?"

"She did."

"She gave you her number?"

"She did."

"Then my guy, make you move. Let her decide what she wants. No dey disqualify yourself before match even start."

Femi laughed softly. "You sure say you no go abandon banking come open motivational school?"

Dayo snorted. "No o. But when she invites you out, just call me. I go come wear agbada as backup."

They laughed together - that long, shared laughter only friends who've seen each other broke, broken, and rising can share.

After the call ended, Femi stood up and walked to the window. The moon hung like a quiet witness over the rows of cassava on Ilẹ̀ Ayọ̀. A few crickets chirped. Somewhere distant, a muezzin called the late prayer.

He didn't know what would come of this thing with Suraiyah. Maybe nothing. Maybe everything.

But he knew one thing:

He had something to offer.

Maybe not the kind of wealth counted in cars and corner offices. But something real. Something rooted.

And sometimes, that was enough to begin.