Love Life is a Zikoko weekly series about love, relationships, situationships, entanglements and everything in between.
Tomide* (29) and Layo* (27) met during their service year in 2022.
On this week’s Love Life, they talk about moving in together as friends, transitioning into a relationship while living under the same roof, and the 50-50 arrangement that nearly broke them.
If you want to share your own Love Life story, fill out this form.
What’s your earliest memory of each other?
Tomide: It was 2022, and we met at our Place of Primary Assignment (PPA) in Ogun State. I had just one more month of my service year left when Layo joined our office. Although I noticed her when she resumed, I observed from a distance for the first few weeks. She didn’t look very friendly; always quiet and alone.
One random afternoon, I saw her sitting alone at the staff canteen and decided to approach her and make conversation. She responded to my jokes, but I could tell she wasn’t interested in talking. So I left and kept my distance for a while.
Layo: I didn’t really notice Tomide at all. I wasn’t paying attention to anyone because I wasn’t in a good headspace when my service year started. I was genuinely upset and bitter that I’d been posted to Ogun State, and I absolutely hated my PPA. The work environment, the people, the location, everything felt wrong.
I was supposed to be in Ibadan serving with two other close friends. We’d planned it all out, but the redeployment process didn’t go as we’d hoped. So I arrived at the PPA feeling gloomy, disappointed, and resentful. I kept to myself most of the time because I was processing all that frustration and disappointment.
On the day in question, I didn’t want to be rude to him, but I just wasn’t in the mood for small talk or to make new friends. After just a few exchanges, he picked up on that and left. I appreciated that he didn’t push it. But that was the first time he crossed my mind.
Did you try to make up for that first encounter?
Layo: I actually felt bad about my behaviour. So when I saw Tomide the following day, I greeted him first. I wanted to make up for my coldness the previous day.
Tomide: I answered her greeting, but I’d already made up my mind not to push for anything more. I wasn’t going to try to be her friend if she didn’t want that or was rude about it.
I see. So, when did things take a turn between you guys?
Tomide: We continued like that for about three weeks. Just saying hello when we ran into each other at work, nothing more than that. Then, on the week I was passing out, my boss and some other staff organised a small send-off for me at the office. Layo didn’t attend. But that’s how she found out I was leaving, and I guess that really marked the beginning of our cordial relationship.
Layo: When I heard about his send-off and realised he was passing out that week, I went to find him. I congratulated him on completing service, and he seemed genuinely interested in keeping the conversation going. We briefly talked about school, and he also tried to give me a few tips on navigating the office. After the whole conversation, he asked for my number, and I didn’t see any harm in giving it to him. I told myself he was leaving anyway.
Surprisingly, we kept in touch for the next couple of months after he left. Even though I’d given him my number with the assumption that he’d just be another random WhatsApp contact, that was far from the case. He’d reach out to say hello, ask me how I was coping, and I’d also reciprocate the effort. But nothing significant happened between us for months.
Fast forward to September 2023. I wanted to relocate to Lagos after my service year ended. The problem was that I didn’t have a place to stay or much money saved up to get my own place. I mentioned this to Tomide, and then he suggested moving in together.
Wait, what?
Tomide: Here’s the thing. I was also seriously considering getting my own place around that same time. I was tired of squatting with friends and not having my own space or stability. I actually had relatives in Lagos, but they lived In the outskirts of town, and we didn’t get along when I stayed with them during my first few months there. They felt the need to watch my activities and report to my parents. I didn’t like that at all.
When Layo mentioned her housing situation and that she needed to find somewhere affordable in Lagos, I suggested we pool our funds to get a two-bedroom apartment we could share. It made complete financial sense for both of us. We could split the rent and each have our own private room.
Curious, was the relationship still platonic at this point? And how did you know you could trust each other as housemates?
Tomide: It was platonic. But we’d gotten really close. I mean, that’s why I could even suggest living together in the first place. We barely went a day without speaking, and we always shared everything. The funny thing is, all these happened virtually. We hadn’t seen each other in person since we said goodbye in Ogun state. But through it all, I knew I was starting to feel something for Layo. It wasn’t fully formed, and I wasn’t quite sure of my feelings, so I kept it to myself.
Layo: It was pretty much the same for me. I had many reservations about the living situation, though. I never really shared this with Tomide, but I was double planning. Two of my friends also wanted to move to Lagos, and we’d all planned to get a place. But as the date grew closer and closer to leaving Ogun, my friends still weren’t certain. I told my aunt about my plan, and she prayed about it. When she told me all was fine, I went for it. She’s a prophetess and very spiritual, so I knew I could trust her words.
I see
Layo: Anyway, that’s how we ended up moving in together. Tomide did most of the heavy lifting. He found the place, met the agent and even tried to set up the space a little. I only paid my part of the rent, moved in, and we became flatmates.
For the first few months, we were just friends sharing a space. We had our separate rooms, separate routines and so on. There were days when we had shared activities like cooking and watching movies, but not all the time.
Tomide: By early 2024, things had shifted between us. We’d been living together for several months and spending significant amounts of time in each other’s company. The feelings I’d refused to confront from the start had bubbled to the top. Our neighbours and the people in our building already assumed we were a couple based on how we interacted. Plus, neither of us was seeing anyone else at the time, so I knew I had a chance. I decided to just go for it and ask her out properly.
Layo: When he asked, I had this brief moment of “finally!” in my head. I didn’t know what took him so long. I’d also developed feelings for him over time, but it’s not my style to ask boys out. So I wasn’t going to jump the gun.
Surprisingly, even though I thought I wanted a relationship with him, I wasn’t quick to say yes. I suddenly had reservations that I didn’t have before.
What reservations?
Layo: Our living situation. Things were normal when we were just two friends who were also flatmates. We respected each other’s boundaries. We did our own thing and didn’t always feel the need for shared activities. There were times when I was away with friends for the weekend, and other times when I just needed to change my environment. None of these was an issue, but I worried it would be different once we became romantically involved.
Tomide: Those were really valid concerns, but at the end of the day, I convinced Layo that we were in this for the long haul. And if that was the case, doesn’t it make sense that we already had the opportunity to spend time together and know each other in the true sense of it? Both the good, the ugly and the in-between. She eventually agreed, and we became official about three weeks after I asked.
Sweet. What were the early days of the relationship like?
Layo: Really nice and genuinely enjoyable. We went out together on actual dates, explored different parts of Lagos, and tried new restaurants and spots. We did many shared activities together. It wasn’t like we weren’t already doing that before, but this time around it was different. For example, when we were just friends, we’d still go to our separate rooms even after we finished cooking together. We couldn’t enter each other’s rooms without permission. But all that changed once we started dating.
Tomide: The early days felt really easy and natural. Like Layo said, we already knew each other so intimately from living together for months. There was some level of familiarity, but also the excitement of this new romantic dimension to our relationship. But cracks started showing pretty quickly.
Oh
Tomide: We both didn’t know how to communicate properly during conflicts. When we’d have a disagreement or argument, instead of talking it through, we’d both go completely silent on each other.
Layo: The silent treatment between us would last for days on end, sometimes stretching into weeks. It was absolutely terrible and toxic because we’d be in the same house, pass each other multiple times a day, see each other in the kitchen or living room, but completely ignore each other’s existence. Not speaking a single word or acknowledging each other’s presence. It was childish and unhealthy, but neither of us knew how to break the cycle or initiate a real conversation.
Tomide: But the silent treatment aside, what really threatened our relationship was the money issue.
What do you mean?
Tomide: Specifically, my insistence on maintaining a 50-50 split for household expenses even after we started dating.
Layo: Once we officially started dating and became a couple, I became less consistent and diligent about splitting costs down the middle. In my mind, since we were now in a romantic relationship, not just platonic flatmates, Tomide should naturally take on most of the expenses and financial responsibilities. I guess I also felt this way because he earned way more money. Apart from his 9-5, he also had all these international side gigs that never stopped coming.
Tomide: I didn’t like that shift at all because that wasn’t remotely close to what we’d explicitly agreed to when we decided to become flatmates. It wasn’t an issue whatsoever during those first several months, when we were just friends living together platonicly. We both contributed equally and consistently to everything. Rent, utilities, and even down to cooking. We used to cook separately, but whenever we wanted to do joint cooking, we both contributed our bit. But once we put a romantic label on our relationship, Layo completely pulled back from that financial arrangement and started expecting me to cover most of the costs.
Layo: I don’t think that’s a completely honest assessment. I didn’t pull back completely; I was just not as consistent as I used to. And it wasn’t entirely my fault. My office owed salaries, and I’d already switched jobs twice. Tomide knew all these when we were flatmates and would sometimes ask me to forego some expenses. If he could do that as a friend, I expected he’d do the same now that we were dating and thinking of a long-term future together.
But Tomide would always ask me for my share of expenses. Always. For absolutely everything, no matter how small. He’d meticulously calculate everything and ask me to send my half. It felt so transactional and unromantic. It made me feel like I was living with a roommate who happened to be sleeping with me, not like I was in an actual loving relationship.
Did you guys try to have a conversation about this? And didn’t you think this would happen after you moved from flatmates to lovers?
Layo: I did, which was why I had reservations when he first asked me out. I knew there was a chance of something like this happening, but Tomide was super convincing about how we were in this for the long term and how it was to our advantage to really get to know each other well.
The absolute worst situation happened when we needed to renew our apartment rent in 2024. When the time came to pay, I didn’t have my full 50% available. I was short on funds, but I gave him about 35% and promised to pay the rest. But then, immediately after Tomide paid, he started asking me repeatedly for the balance. He’d bring it up in conversation and send reminders. I honestly felt like I’d gotten to my breaking point. A part of me just wanted to refund him and break up.
Tomide: I agree that I went about it the wrong way. I thought if I wasn’t persistent, she wouldn’t feel the need to repay what she owed.
But the thing is, I’m a man of my words and I always expect people around me to be the same. Layo and I had clear arrangements around these things when we started living together, and I didn’t think that being in a relationship meant going back on our words. It would have been different if we had a conversation when we started dating and reworked our agreement, but there wasn’t anything like that.
Don’t you think you have yourself to blame for that?
Tomide: To some level, I take the blame. And this isn’t just about Layo. It’s something I face in other relationships. Once I come to an agreement with someone, I always expect them to keep to it because that’s exactly what I’d do. But I’m learning that things aren’t always that way, and sometimes, you need to be willing to bend a little for peace to reign.
Layo eventually paid the money back, but I felt really bad afterwards. It was almost like I only started taking her situation into account after I got my money. How she’d been owed salaries, how her pay wasn’t that great, how she’d changed jobs and hadn’t really found her footing. I felt terrible because this was someone I claimed to love going through a hard time, but I was too blind to notice. And it wasn’t just that; she wasn’t wrong to expect that, as her partner, I should be able to make life easier for her as long as it was within my power.
Layo: We barely spoke for almost two months after that. Living in the same house but existing in completely separate worlds. It was one of the lowest points in our relationship.
How did you guys resolve it, given that you both had a habit of resorting to the silent treatment?
Tomide: We eventually realised we couldn’t keep going like that. Beneath it all, we loved and genuinely cared about each other. And I was starting to think that we could actually lose what we had. The illusion of staying in the same house probably didn’t make it immediately clear, but once realised, we had to sit down and actually talk.
Layo: It was an incredibly difficult conversation, but absolutely necessary for us to move forward. I explained in detail how the splitting thing made me feel emotionally, and how it made me feel like he wasn’t really taking care of me the way I thought a boyfriend should. And he explained his perspective thoroughly about financial responsibility, not wanting to be taken advantage of, and the importance of both partners contributing equally to a shared life.
Right. And you guys have been able to move forward?
Tomide: Honestly, things are still not perfect yet between us. We’re still actively learning how to navigate this complex dynamic. I’m personally learning to make concessions and compromises, learning to accept that it can’t always be exactly 50-50 split down the middle in a romantic relationship. Sometimes I need to be more flexible and willing to cover costs without immediately calculating who owes what. But at the same time, I also need her to genuinely understand and respect that financial partnership and shared responsibility genuinely matter deeply to me.
Layo: And I’m learning to be more financially responsible and consistent about contributing to our shared household, even though it’s honestly not my ideal vision or fantasy of how a romantic relationship should work financially. As much as I genuinely don’t like the arrangement, I have to admit that it’s giving me an unfiltered picture of what our future together might realistically look like if we end up getting married.
Fair enough. What’s the best thing about being with each other?
Tomide: Layo is honest and straightforward in all her interactions with me. She’s not pretending or putting on an act. I also really appreciate that we can live together in close quarters and still give each other the space and breathing room we need when we need it. We’ve learned when to engage and when to back off.
Layo: Tomide is incredibly consistent and reliable as a partner. When he says he’s going to do something, he actually follows through without needing reminders or prodding. Financial issues and disagreements aside, he’s genuinely someone I can count on and depend on, someone I could see myself building a real life with.
On a scale of 1 to 10, how would you rate your love life?
Tomide: I’d give it a 7. I’m genuinely optimistic and hopeful about where we’re headed. I believe we can work through the minor issues.
Layo: I’d also say 7. There’s a strong foundation between us built on friendship and shared experiences. But there’s also a significant amount of work we still need to do on ourselves and on the relationship.
*Names have been changed to protect the identity of the subjects.
If you want to share your own Love Life story, fill out this form.
