I met my 10-year-old for coffee to break my engagement news

Today, I met my ten-year-old self because I had the best news to share with her.

She was already at the café when I arrived, legs too short for the chair, swinging her feet like she had music in her bones. Her punctuality hasn’t changed. If anything, it seems childhood made it a personality trait. She looked around the café suspiciously. I knew that face; it always came right before a complaint.

“Uh… why are we in a coffee shop?” she asked the second I sat. “Why not ice cream?  I laughed. “Coffee helps us survive mornings.”

She blinked at me, clearly horrified. “What do mornings do to you?”

If only she knew.

Before I could explain the life-balancing circus called adulthood, her eyes caught the sparkle on my hand. And then it happened, that dramatic, wide-eyed reaction only little girls and Nigerian aunties can pull off naturally.

“Wait. whatttttt?!” She pointed like I was smuggling diamonds.  “Are we MARRIED?!”

“Relax,” I said, smiling. “We’re engaged.”

She squinted like she was letting her future sink in. Then:

“So, we didn’t become an independent, single mom with a cute son who travels the world.”

Bless her imagination.

“No,” I said softly. “We changed the dream. When we met him… everything shifted. Turns out we still got the independence; we didn’t have to do life alone to prove it.”

She hummed thoughtfully. She wasn’t convinced, but she kept listening, a good sign. 

“Okay, fine. Story time. Who is he? And how did you meet him?”

How We Met

I told her.

How I moved to Abuja in 2020 with so much hope, ambition, joy, that I escaped the chaos of Lagos, and no social life.  Sometime in 2021, I asked a colleague (now friend) to plug me into the social scene, and he added me to this fun social group that organizes hangouts.

How I decided to finally show up for one of those nights (unknown to me then that it was his first time hanging out with the group too, after a long time, a friend had forced him out) and how I saw him first, he wore a fez cap, quiet, sitting on a car trunk like he didn’t need to speak to be noticed. I had thought he was the cutest guy at the party that day, and again, unknown to me, he found me very attractive at first sight too.

“How did we get him?” she asked, eyes shining.

“Oh, we didn’t,” I laughed. “We didn't text back for a while.”

She gasped. “We still suck at communicating.”  “Very.”

Then I told her about the night he walked up to me, unbothered by the two men talking to me, confident enough to move anyway, like he already knew his place in my story, and without hesitation, placed a drink gently in my hand. In his calm voice, he said

“Your hand shouldn’t be empty. You should have something to drink.”

That small gesture that wasn’t loud but was intentional caught my attention. Her little face softened like she finally understood romance wasn’t always violins and rose petals, sometimes it’s presence and having audacity.

“Was it love at first sight?”

“No,” I told her honestly.

“But it was love at the first kiss. Everything aligned. Something in us knew he would be in our lives for a very long time.” She looked proud. Our intuition was always our superpower.

The Proposal And The Realization

I told her how I suspected it was coming. Because a woman always knows.

How expectation slowly turned into quiet daydreams, turned into Pinterest boards, turned into mental timelines I pretended not to create.

“How did you feel when it happened?” she whispered, eyes wide.

“Shocked,” I admitted. “Shocked that it was finally happening, that this moment I had replayed in my head was suddenly real. And shocked because our closest friends helped plan it. They kept the secret so well I almost want to hire them as FBI agents.”

She giggled.

“With the ring on my finger, I didn’t suddenly feel like a new person. I felt like myself, just steadier. More rooted. Like I wasn’t stepping into a new life, but into a future I had already emotionally lived in.”

Her lips parted in awe. “So, we’re… happy?”

“Yes,” I smiled. “And not pretend to be happy. Not Instagram-happy. Peace-in-the-bones happy. I found home in his arms.”

I took a breath, feeling the truth settle warmly in my chest.

“He is my person. He understands me. Challenges me. Teaches me, molds me, supports me. He guides me. Feeds my soul. Prays for me, and with me. He values me, appreciates me, reassures me, and respects me. He chooses me in every little ordinary moment.” “God handpicked him for me.”

She smiled, a small, satisfied smile, like she had always known this was waiting for us somewhere in the future.

“I am weird,” I told her. “He is weird. Everyone is weird in this life. One day, two people met, recognized each other’s weirdness as familiar, and fell in love.”

She giggled again, that loud, carefree laugh we used to have before the world taught us to sit quietly.

“I like him,” she declared confidently.
“You should keep him.”

I nodded.
“I plan to. Forever.”

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