How I Ended Up in the Family Photos of a Wedding I Wasn’t Invited To

I blame the aunty in the yellow gele for everything, because if she hadn’t grabbed my wrist outside the event hall on Providence Street in Lekki and said, You’re late o, the couple don enter, oya oya, I would never have found myself sitting at Table 9 of a wedding I had absolutely no invitation to.

I want to be clear about something first: I wasn’t looking for trouble. I was walking from the bus stop to my friend Bukola’s place for a completely different reason, wearing a decent Ankara top because I’d just come from church, and the woman simply mistook me for someone else’s guest.

By the time I opened my mouth to correct her, she had already pulled me through the gate, past two security men who barely glanced at me, and into a hall thumping with a live band playing a cover of Wizkid’s “Essence” so loud the speakers crackled.

I told myself I would explain the mix-up quietly and slip out. That plan lasted exactly as long as it took someone to place a plate of jollof rice, small chops, and a whole grilled chicken thigh in front of me.

Sister, you never chop, said the woman beside me, a heavyset guest in aso ebi the color of ripe mango, patting my hand like we were old friends. Eat, eat, na wedding, nobody go vex.

I ate.

The trouble started properly when the groomsmen began their entrance dance and one of them, a tall man in a well-cut navy suit who I would later learn was named Emeka, danced directly to my table, dropped to one knee in front of me as part of the choreography, and mimed proposing with an invisible ring, to the screaming delight of everyone around us.

I laughed so hard I nearly choked on a piece of chicken. He grinned, winked, and moved on to the next table, and I thought that was the end of it, a funny five seconds I’d tell Bukola about later.

It was not the end of it.

Twenty minutes later, during the toast, the MC, a small energetic man who clearly loved the sound of his own voice, announced that the bride wanted to say a special thank you to “all our aunties and uncles who traveled far to be here,” and asked everyone from out of town to stand and be recognized with a round of applause. My mango-colored aso ebi neighbor grabbed my arm and pulled me up before I could protest.

Where you dey travel from? she whispered urgently, clapping along with the room.

Somewhere far, I said, panicking, and she nodded approvingly as if that settled everything, and I stood there being applauded for a journey I never made, to a wedding I had no ticket to, for a couple whose names I did not yet know.

I found out their names during the cutting of the cake. The groom was called Tobi, the bride Amara, and they looked genuinely, radiantly happy in a way that made my guilt worse, because I was drinking their champagne under false pretenses and had just accepted congratulations for surviving a nonexistent flight from Abuja.

Emeka the dancing groomsman found me again near the drinks table, where I’d gone to hide.

You didn’t dance with me back there, he said, pouring himself a chapman. That’s very rude for someone who traveled all the way from Abuja.

My stomach dropped. You heard that?

The whole hall heard that. You don’t look like someone who just landed from an airport, sha. Your slippers still get bus stop dust on them.

I could have died right there on the polished floor of that event hall. Instead, something in me just gave up trying to maintain the lie, and I told him the truth in a rush, the aunty in yellow, the mistaken invitation, the jollof rice I definitely didn’t pay for, all of it, waiting for him to call security or at least look at me with disgust.

He laughed so hard he had to put his cup down.

Ah ah, you’re a professional wedding crasher and you didn’t even tell me, he said, wiping his eyes. This is the best thing that’s happened at this wedding since the caterer nearly forgot the small chops.

Please don’t tell anyone, I begged. I’ll leave quietly.

You will not leave, he said, suddenly serious, which somehow felt worse than if he’d laughed again. Amara’s family is huge, nobody actually knows everybody. You’ll blend in fine. Besides, he added, grinning, I still owe you that dance.

I don’t know what possessed me, whether it was the two chapmans I’d had by then or the sheer absurdity of the evening, but I let him pull me onto the dance floor when the DJ switched to Davido’s “Unavailable,” and for three minutes I danced at a stranger’s wedding with a groomsman I’d known for less than an hour, both of us laughing at a joke only we understood.

Bukola called me four times during all this, wondering why I hadn’t shown up at her place, and when I finally called back, hiding in the corridor outside the restroom, she didn’t believe a word of my explanation until I sent her a video of the hall.

You mean to tell me, she screamed down the phone, that instead of coming to my house, you’re at a wedding you crashed by accident, eating better food than I have in my fridge?

The jollof was really good, Bukola.

I hate you.

I left before the couple’s exit, slipping out through the same gate the aunty in yellow had pulled me through, my stomach full, my feet aching from unplanned dancing in slippers not meant for it. Emeka walked me to the gate and asked, half joking, half not, if he could get my number, “for research purposes, in case I ever need a wedding crashed professionally again.”

I gave it to him. We’re still talking, three weeks later, and he still calls me “the Abuja aunty” every time he texts, which is somehow the most romantic nickname anyone has ever given me, even though I have never once set foot in Abuja in my life.

Some love stories start with a proper introduction. Mine started with free jollof rice and a lie about a flight I never took.