Dos

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Ijeoma POV

It has been a week since I moved into Noah's place and every day I wake up, it still feels weird. A good kind of weird though. The feeling was still new to me, living with him that is. Starting the day with him, seeing him in his comfort zone, slowly learning his quirks.

This past week had been a bit tedious for me. With Zozo not having anyone to look after her when she got back from school put me in a very tight spot. The first two days I had to take the rest of the day off, telling my boss that I had a family emergency but I couldn't keep giving that excuse.

Noah and I had to look for a sitter quickly on such short notice. It took a while before we could settle on one, either they looked too angry and frustrated or they just gave me instant bad vibes. With all the videos about sitters maltreating children, I was really scared about leaving my child with just anybody.

A little hypocritical of me. I practically left Zozo with friends and neighbors when I just couldn't help it.

Luckily for us, we found an eighteen year old girl, Gift who we finally settled on. She had babysat for two other people before now and they left very good and compelling reviews that made us pick her. She also gave me really good vibes when I met with her for the first time and even Zozo felt the same way.

It was a Saturday morning, so I decided to pull my weight around the house. I didn't want it to seem as if I was just living off Noah, so I woke up as early as 6:30am to start cleaning up the house. I knew Noah loved his things neatly kept and in the right order but with Zozo in the house, toys laying around the house was inevitable.

I was in the middle of wiping the glass center table when Noah walked into the living room with his laptop in hand.

"What are you doing?" he said

"Good morning to you too" I replied playfully

"Sorry. Morning, my love" he walked over to me and placed a chaste kiss on my lips.

"Now to my question" he said

"What does it look like I'm doing? I'm doing some Saturday cleaning" I gestured around me

He shook his head. "You don't need to do all of that. I have someone who comes in on Wednesdays to do that"

"It doesn't look like this place was cleaned on Wednesday but it doesn't matter. I'm fine doing this" I shrugged my shoulders.

"But you don't have to" he said

"I want to" I assured him. "Go and sit down now because when I start mopping the floors, you won't be able to do so"

He walked over to the couch behind me and took a seat before opening up his laptop and switching it on. I resumed my previous action of wiping the center table.

A couple minutes later, the tapping sound of the keyboards from Noah stopped and I got this intense feeling from behind me. I turned around to find Noah watching my every move intently. He didn't seem bothered that I had just caught him staring openly at me.

I awkwardly turned back to what I was doing despite the uncomfortable feeling of him drilling holes into my body. Two seconds later, I sensed a body behind me before I actually saw him reach me.

Noah wrapped his arms around me from behind. "Your booty short is making it really hard for me to concentrate on the medical article I'm reading" he whispered huskily into my ears.

Oh my God. I completely forgot that I had my really short bum shorts on. I only wore them when I wanted to clean back at my place, it was a force of habit. I decided to play with him a little bit.

An evil smirk played at the corners of my lips, I turned around and wrapped my arms around his neck. "Really?"

"Yes, really" he whispered

"How so?" I said feigning ignorance

He quickly read through my actions and immediately took my lips in an intense and passionate kiss. His hands traveled down my exposed legs and he squeezed my thighs indicating that I jump which I did. We were so lost in our bubble that we didn't hear the soft steps of Zozo's little feet.

"Mummy?"

We immediately pulled apart just in time for Zozo to appear from around the corner. She was sleepily rubbing her eyes, dressed in her cute 'Dora the explorer' night gown.

"Hey baby" I said in a high pitched voice

She walked over to me and lifted her hands in the air. I chuckled and picked her up balancing her on my hips.

"GuMorning mummy and Nono" she said

"Morning sweetie" Noah placed a kiss on her cheeks.

"Morning, my love" I smiled at her.

Noah whispered into my ears. "I'm going to take a shower now"

A blush crept up to my cheeks but I quickly masked it. "You do that"

A giggle escaped my lips as he walked past me and into the other room. I turned my attention to Zozo.

"Are you hungry, baby?" I said and she nodded

"Of course, you are" I placed her back on the ground. "Come on, let's go and find you something to eat"

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Noah walked into the kitchen as Zozo and I ate our breakfast. He had changed from his sweats to a plain white T-shirt and a black knickers. I got a whiff of his old spice deodorant as he walked past me to sit at head of the dining table.

He glanced at our plates. "What are you eating?"

"Bread and Akara" I said taking a sip of my coke. (Akara- aka beans cake. It's from beans)

"Bread and what?" he said with raised eyebrows

My eyes widened and my mouth agape. "You've never had bread and akara before?"

"No"

I dramatically placed my hands on my chest. "Please tell me you've at least eaten akara on its own"

He chuckled. "I have but it has been a long time since I had it"

I exhaled dramatically. "Don't worry. We are about to cure that... only in a much better way"

He chuckled. "Okayy"

I cut out a sizeable chunk of the whole bread on the table. "It would have been better with Agege bread but this would have to do".

I sliced the bread into two equal half and placed three small pieces of the akara balls on the first half before covering it with the second half. I placed the plate in front of Noah.

"You're taste buds are about to experience literal goodness. I present to you... Akara burger" I gestured to the plate.

I watched with bated breath as he took a bite of the Akara burger. I looked at him with curious eyes as he swallowed.

"How was it?"

"I'm going to need to take a second bite before I decide" he said before taking another bite.

"Woo, you better like it oo. If not all that hype would be for nothing" I stated playfully

Zozo giggled at us.

"It's actually good" Noah said after swallowing

"Seriously? You're not just saying that because of what I said" I said

"No, no. it has a very peculiar taste to it, very nice." He said firmly

"Good" I walked over to the fridge and took out a cold bottle of coke. "It goes well with this"

"Coke as breakfast?"

"That's Saturday breakfast for you" I said settling back down on my chair

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Noah

I gently closed my laptop and looked up to find Ijeoma and Zozo walking into the living room. Zozo had her hair in a two equal puffs. Ijeoma took her hair out of the braids, it was getting untidy so she was getting a new style done tomorrow in time for school.

I placed my laptop beside me on the sofa. "I haven't really given you guys a proper tour of the house. Are you up for it?"

"Sure" Ijeoma nodded

"Okay" I rose from the sofa

I led them down the hallway, past the kitchen to my mini gym room. There were a few indoor gym equipment like a balance trainer, a treadmill, a power tower, a bench press, a cycling exercise bike, barbell pushup stands and other stuffs. I wasn't completely a gym person so I didn't use half of the things in the room.

We made our way up the stairs and I showed them what my room looked like; it was rather simple. The house didn't really have that much of a personal touch, all that was done in the house was done by an interior decorator.

"Okay, so... this was supposed to be a surprise but I'd just show it to you now. Although, I'm not done with it" I said as we approached a door that was opposite my room.

Ijeoma nodded

I turned the door handle and pushed it open. I watched the look on Ijeoma's face as we walked into the room.

A child sized, high rise bed with protective rails on each side sat in the middle of the room and a few meters away stood a little reading table and chair. A medium heighted shelf filled with children story books and toys stood at one side of the wall. A mini couch was placed my one of the windows with three small throw pillows on both ends.

"I used this room to keep the unpacked boxes I had brought when I moved to Nigeria" I said as I looked around the room. "I figured that Zozo could have a room of her own here, so I cleared the room out"

"You didn't have to this" Ijeoma looked astonished.

"I wanted to" I stated firmly

"Oh my God" she muttered to herself as she took in every detail in the room.

"I'm still trying to figure out which wall should have wallpapers and which one should be painted purple" I said to her. (Purple was Zozo's favorite colour)

"Are you kidding me? This is already perfect, I can't even believe you did this" she said gob smacked. "Thank you so much"

She walked over to me and wrapped her arms around me. I heard little sniffles come from her, she released me and used her fingers to wipe a tear that escaped from her eyes.

"I love you so much. Thank you" she placed a quick kiss on my lips

"I love you too. You guys deserve more" I said as I wrapped my hands around her waist.

"When did you even do all of this?" She looked around the room wide-eyed.

"I actually started ordering them bit by bit and putting it together since both of you moved in" I replied.

"Wow. Thank you so much" she gave me a side hug

"You're welcome babe"

Ijeoma looked towards Zozo who was busy pulling out a teddy bear from the lower portion of the shelf.

"Baby, do you like it?"

Zozo nodded excitedly as she lifted the teddy bear in her hands. "Yes"

We both chuckled at her excitement

"Tell no-no thank you" Ijeoma said to her.

Zozo ran and threw herself at me. "Thank you"

I caught her just in time and I placed a big sloppy kiss on her cheeks. "You're welcome"

She giggled loudly in excitement as she reciprocated my actions.

"There's one more place left to see" I said to them

"Where?" Ijeoma looked up at me.

"The pool" I said

"Okay, let's go. Zozo, please drop the teddy back" Ijeoma pointed to the shelf.

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Zozo squealed in pure excitement and joy as she splashed water around her.

After taking them to the pool side, Ijeoma revealed that Zozo had never been in a swimming pool before and I could see in Zozo's eye how fascinated she was by the pool. Fortunately, Ijeoma had a cute little swimming trunk she had gotten for Zozo but never got to use it. I decided to take Zozo for a swim since the weather was quite warm.

I was teaching Zozo how to float in water and the armband floaties made it easier for her to do just that. She was so excited and it was completely contagious because I found myself smiling the whole time.

"Okay, baby. I want you to flap your legs like this" I made a demonstration with my legs in the water.

She tried to do a replica of what I did but she was a little off. It took a couple of minutes for me to get her to do the right thing. I held her little hands and move her around the swimming pool while she flapped her legs as we moved.

I was really amazed at how fast she was learning.

"WOOOO!!" Ijeoma made a whooping scream at us. "Go baby"

Zozo screamed back in delight and I smiled at her.

Ijeoma declined the idea of swimming so she resorted to sitting by the pool with her legs in the water. She had her phone out, recording us in the pool and taking pictures.

A mischievous plan formed in my head. I moved Zozo to where her mum was sitting and asked Ijeoma to show us the pictures she had taken of us previously.

"These are really nice" I said to Ijeoma

"I know right" she nodded in agreement.

Time to put my plan into action

"Give me a kiss" A mischievous smirk played on my lips.

As soon as she moved to place a kiss on my lips, I quickly slid her phone far away from the pool to avoid the splash and pulled her into the pool with my other hand. She shrieked in horror as she was completely taken off guard.

"NOAH!! I swear to God... if you know what's good for you, avoid me," she said when she surfaced from underwater.

Her orange sundress stuck to her body, completely soaked. She sent an evil glare my way and Zozo giggled from her spot in the pool.

"That's for this morning" I laughed at her

She gave me a quizzical look before realization washed over her. "Ohh, it's on"

I laughed at her and she splashed water in my direction and before I knew it, we were all splashing water at each other, having a good laugh.

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