From A Producer To A Global Superstar

Chapter 455: I Asked Her

The house was warm when Dayo stepped inside, the familiar scent of spices and something baking reaching him before he even closed the door. He stood in the entryway for a moment, keys still in his hand, his mind elsewhere. The drive home had been automatic, his body moving through familiar streets while his thoughts replayed the conversation on a loop.

He heard movement in the kitchen. The soft clatter of dishes, water running, the sounds of a home that continued living regardless of what was breaking or mending inside the people who occupied it.

Dayo set his keys in the bowl by the door and walked toward the light.

Abishola stood at the sink, her back to him, washing something with the same methodical care she applied to everything. She didn’t turn around when he entered, but he knew she had heard him. She always heard him, even when he thought he was being silent.

"You’re late," she said, not as an accusation, just as observation.

"I was out."

"I know." She rinsed her hands and turned, drying them on a towel as she studied his face. Her eyes moved across him with the precision of someone who had been reading him since he was small. "Sit down."

It wasn’t a request.

Dayo pulled out a chair at the kitchen table and sank into it. The wood was worn smooth in places, familiar under his forearms. This table had seen every version of him, the child, the teenager, the man who built himself from nothing and carried the weight of memories nobody else could understand. And now this version, the one who had just found out he was a father.

Abishola sat across from him, her hands folding together on the table. She didn’t speak immediately. She just looked at him, waiting for whatever he was ready to give.

"I saw Luna tonight," he said finally.

His mother’s expression didn’t change, but something shifted in her eyes. Understanding. Maybe even anticipation.

"I know."

"How?"

"You told me she had a child." She tilted her head slightly. "You left here carrying that weight. I saw it then. And you came back lighter. And heavier. Both at the same time."

Dayo let out a breath, dragging a hand across his jaw. "I asked her. About the child. And she told me the truth."

Abishola said nothing. She just waited.

"The child is mine." The words came out flat, still surreal even as he spoke them. "Her name is Jennifer. She’s almost five months old. And I didn’t know. Luna didn’t tell me. I didn’t ask. We both failed."

Abishola listened without interrupting. When he stopped, she waited a moment longer, making sure he was finished.

"How do you feel?" she asked.

It was such a simple question. Such an impossibly difficult one.

"I feel everything," Dayo said, searching for words that didn’t exist. "Pain that she kept this from me. Guilt that I didn’t ask sooner. Fear that I’ve already missed too much. And something else. Something I don’t have a name for."

"Responsibility," his mother said. "Real responsibility. Not the kind you choose, like a career or a competition. The kind that chooses you."

Dayo nodded slowly. He thought about all the things he had seen over the years, the families pulled apart by absence, the damage done when a parent chose distance over presence. He had always told himself that if he ever had a child, he would be different. He would show up. And now he had one, and he had already missed five months of her life because he was too proud to ask a question.

"You’re here now," Abishola said firmly. "That’s what matters. Not what you missed. What you do now."

"It’s not that simple." Dayo’s voice tightened. "Luna and I have history. Damage on both sides. She’s careful with me, and she has every right to be. I have to earn her trust before I can earn access to my daughter. And I don’t know how to do that. I don’t have a strategy for this. I don’t have a plan."

"Then don’t have one."

Dayo looked at her, caught off guard.

"You’re always planning," Abishola continued, her voice steady and warm. "Always thinking five moves ahead, calculating angles, managing outcomes. That works for your work. It works for your swimming, your music, your business. But this," she tapped her chest gently, "this doesn’t work that way. A child doesn’t need your strategy, Dayo. She needs your presence. She needs you to show up even when you don’t know what you’re doing. Even when you’re scared. Even when you feel like you’ve already failed."

Dayo’s jaw tightened, emotion pressing against the walls he had built so carefully. "I’m not good at that. Being present without control. Being vulnerable."

"I know." His mother’s voice softened. "You’ve been that way since you were small. Always the child who held everything in. Who solved problems alone. Who didn’t ask for help because you thought needing help meant weakness. You built walls so high that even the people who loved you had trouble climbing them."

She reached across the table, resting her hand over his. Her palm was warm, worn, familiar.

"But Luna reached you," she said. "Somehow, she found a crack in that wall. And Jennifer will find more cracks. Children have a way of doing that. They don’t care about your control or your image. They just care that you’re there."

Dayo looked down at her hand on his, feeling the steadiness of it. His mother had always been his foundation, the person who saw through every version of him to the core that never changed. She didn’t push him. She didn’t overwhelm him with emotion. She just grounded him, the way she had since he was small.

"I don’t know how to be a father," he admitted quietly.

"Nobody does. Not really. You learn by being one. By showing up, making mistakes, learning, trying again." She squeezed his hand gently. "But I know this. You’re not going to run from this. I’ve seen you run from emotional things before. Using work as an excuse, using logic as a shield. You’re not doing that now. You’re sitting here, feeling it, talking about it. That’s already different."

Dayo exhaled slowly, some of the tension in his chest loosening. "She’s going to let me meet her. Jennifer. Soon. I don’t know when yet, but soon."

Abishola’s eyes glistened slightly, the only crack in her composure. "Good. When you do, don’t try to be perfect. Just be there. Hold her. Let her get used to your voice. The rest comes after."

"I don’t want to mess this up," Dayo said, and his voice was rougher now, carrying weight he rarely let show.

"You will mess up," his mother said, with a small smile. "That’s part of it. But you keep coming back. That’s what makes the difference. Not perfection. Persistence."

She stood up then, the conversation reaching its natural end. She didn’t push for more. She never did. She just gave him what he needed and let him carry it forward.

"Go rest," she said, moving back toward the sink. "You have a lot ahead of you. And Dayo?"

He looked up at her.

"I’m proud of you. For asking. And facing this. And not running."

Dayo sat at the table for a moment longer after she left, the kitchen quiet around him. His mother’s words settled into him, finding their place alongside everything else he was carrying. The fear, the guilt, the strange new hope that was beginning to form underneath it all.

For the first time in a long time, he wasn’t thinking about strategy. He wasn’t thinking about the label, or Michael, or the competition, or any of the other pieces he had been juggling for months.

He was thinking about a small, serious-faced baby he had only seen in a photograph. About the weight of her in his arms, which he had never felt. About her mother’s eyes, watching him carefully, deciding whether he was worthy of the gift he had already been given.

He would have to earn it. Every day, for the rest of his life. That was the truth his mother had spoken without saying directly.

Dayo stood up and walked toward his room, the house settling into quiet around him. Tomorrow would bring new challenges, new decisions, new versions of the same question he had finally found the courage to ask tonight.

But for now, he let himself feel it. All of it. The weight and the wonder, the fear and the hope, the responsibility and the strange, terrifying joy of discovering that he was someone’s father.

And somewhere in that mix of emotions, something began to settle. Not resolve, there was too much still unresolved for that. But settle. Like a foundation being laid, piece by piece, preparing for whatever would be built upon it.

He closed his eyes, and for the first time in what felt like forever, sleep came quickly.

Not because the problems were solved.

But because he was finally facing them.