Loving Him

Epilogue

The day of their meeting marked the first time Sophie had seen Alex physically nervous about anything and it had warmed her heart that meeting her family held so much importance to him. He hadn't needed to be worried though, her mother had loved him especially after all he'd done for them. But that wasn't the only reason, Sophie had found out Alex was quite the charmer once he put his mind to it. Her mum and sister had been all laughter and grins throughout the meeting. Needless to say, she referred to that incident every chance she got to embarrass the life out of all of them.

That wasn't the fun part of the meeting though. Hope had developed quite an obvious crush on Raymond. It had been cute at first until she'd heard he was in a relationship with someone else and made it her life's goal to avoid him. Sophie hadn't met the woman he was dating in person, she only knew her name was Rose. For some reason, Raymond was being super secretive about the relationship.

"I still think she'll come though. She loves Angel too much," Sophie said with another shrug when they'd managed to get control over their laughter. "Daniel says he'll be stopping by as well. He'll probably bring Sharon along."

Sophie watched her friend's face keenly so she didn't miss the twitch of her nose whenever she heard Daniel's girlfriend's name. The relationship had been going on for quite a while and it didn't look like it was ending anytime soon. Daniel had also confided in Sophie he was thinking of marrying the girl but she hadn't mentioned that to Ama for obvious reasons. Ama didn't like the girl at all. She kept claiming there was something suspicious about her but Sophie knew it was just her jealousy showing face. Sharon seemed like a nice girl after all.

"I don't care," Ama replied with a huff.

Sophie placed her hand over her mouth to keep herself from laughing but she couldn't stop the slight shake of her shoulders.

"I hate you," Ama declared with an angry frown before hastily walking away from Sophie.

"A-Ama, wa-it!" Sophie called, her words incoherent due to the laughter spilling out of her mouth. "S-sorry. I'll stop laughing, Ama!"

Her friend ignored her as she scampered off, causing Sophie to give in to another burst of laughter. It wasn't fair making fun of her like that but what were best friends for, really?

She was forced to calm down when the door opened, revealing her mother and sister. Happiness grew in her heart at the fact that her mum had taken it seriously enough to attend. She walked hastily up to them and pulled her mum into a hug. "Thank you so much for coming, mummy."

Her mum huffed and patted her back. "Bii omoomo ni Angel simi. Mi o se nii wa."(Angel is like my grandchild now. Of course, I'll come)

"I love you, mummy." Sophie squeezed her mum a bit tighter before releasing her and facing Hope. "I thought you weren't going to come."

Hope rolled her eyes as if her sister had said the most ridiculous thing. "And why wouldn't I?"

Sophie gave her a look that read, 'Really?' Already, she could see her sister's eyes scanning the crowd as if looking for something, or in this case someone. "Raymond is not here, ogbeni."

"I didn't ask," Hope retorted, glaring at her sister.

"You didn't have to," Sophie replied, sticking her tongue out playfully at Hope who rolled her eyes again at her sister's childishness.

"Don't mind her jare," Her mum said, laughing. "If you see how she was making a fuss over coming here today. I had to practically pull her out of the house."

"Mummy!" Hope whined.

"Shut up, my friend!" Her mum retorted. "Because you've passed jamb now, you're feeling like you've arrived and thinking of man abi? The Raymond himself, he has finished school and has a good job already. You that you're just entering university, let me hear that you have a boyfriend, you hear? If I would not kill you there. You will not have a boyfriend until you finish school and go for service like your sister here, do you hear me?"