She pulled out wipes and a strip of bandage. “May I?”
He nodded.
Tenna cleaned the cut with steady hands. She didn’t ask what happened. She didn’t ask where he slept. She didn’t ask his name. Questions could feel like debts.
When she finished, she stood.
“I’m Tenna,” she said. “I have to go inside.”
He watched her a moment longer than necessary.
“Kofi,” he said finally. “Kofi Mensah.”
Tenna gave a small, tired smile and turned away.
Inside the church, she sang louder than usual—not because she was happier, but because something in her needed to anchor itself.
The following Sunday, Kofi was there again.
This time, Tenna brought an extra wrap of rice and stew. The week after, a clean shirt folded carefully in a plastic bag. Each time he accepted with quiet dignity. He never asked for money. Never asked for more.
They spoke in fragments—about heat, about how Accra changed when it rained, about how silence could be heavier than noise.
Kofi listened more than he spoke. When he did speak, it was with a precision that surprised her.
“You work hard,” he said once after she mentioned scrubbing stairs until her knees burned.
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