Lagoon

  “I do.”

  “You might have liked the United States more,” she said. “They’ve got more stuff. And if your spaceship is broken, they can probably fix it better.”

  “Our ship is not broken.”

  “My mother says the waters are all dirty and dead because of the oil companies,” Kola said. “Will you all be all right in there?”

  Ayodele laughed in a knowing way that made a thousand more questions germinate in Kola’s head. “Yes,” Ayodele said.

  “Can you die?”

  “Maybe. Probably not.”

  “Na wao,” Kola whispered with awe. She leaned against the sofa, now only a foot from Ayodele. This was the most interesting person/thing /whatever she’d ever met. “So, how old are you?”

  Philomena came running down the stairs. “Kola! Get away from her! . . . Get up here! Fred!”

  His fear for his sister, and of the strange woman who looked like his aunt in Asaba, finally exploded, and Fred went running to Philomena, the only person other than his parents who could get his sister Kola to behave. Kola reluctantly left Ayodele’s side. “We just wanted to ask some questions,” Kola said, when she reached Philo.

  “I’d never hurt them,” Ayodele said.

  Philomena pushed Kola up the stairs. “Why would I believe anything you say? I don’t even know what you look like, let alone what you will do to us.” She rudely sucked her teeth and over her shoulder muttered, “Nonsense.”

  “Maybe you should try asking me, then,” Ayodele said flatly.

  Philomena was halfway up the stairs. “Stay away from the children.”

  “School will bring you more success than marriage,” Ayodele said, raising her voice.

  Philomena turned and glared at Ayodele.

  “I know what your boyfriend is planning and I know why you told him about me,” Ayodele said. “In the end, only you can make yourself happy. Finish school. Forget him.”

  Philomena dug her nails into the wooden banister. Then she ran up the stairs.

  CHAPTER 14

  THE BLACK NEXUS

  No matter how carefully Jacobs walked, his heels made too much noise. Click, click, click. The hallway of the abandoned secondary school amplified the sound. It was afternoon and the sun shone brightly outside, and he was wearing his favorite long black dress and high heels. They’d parked right beside the building and quickly run inside. Right now was a terrible time to draw attention to himself, but he couldn’t show up to this meeting speaking the Pidgin English he spoke with the guys, nor could he arrive dressed like a “guy.” He needed to present this new development to his friends as himself. He needed to show he was serious and unafraid.

  “Walk faster,” Jacobs instructed, wincing at the sound of his footsteps as they picked up speed.

  “It’s been such a weird day,” said Fisayo, her heels clicking just as loudly. “Everything being closed, all the checkpoints . . . the wahala at Bar Beach. My God, Jacobs, I don’t know what I saw last night, but whatever’s going on is not over.”

  “Trust me, I know,” he said, putting a strong arm around his sister’s shoulder and giving her a squeeze of reassurance. He was glad she was okay. He’d hated leaving her to walk Bar Beach looking for work alone. Usually he stayed around to at least make sure she was okay, but last night he had eaten some bad soup and thus had a bad case of indigestion. And look what had happened to her.

  Worse yet, she’d probably want to return to Bar Beach when they finished here. She’d go home, change, and get herself ready and arrive at Bar Beach in the evening. Right now was the best time to pick up the safest johns. Late-afternoon johns were looking for a girl to spend an evening with, and this usually included fine treatment and a meal. Evening johns were crueler and looking for something less companionable.

  Jacobs needed to spend more time with his younger sister. In the last month, he hadn’t even had the time to stop by her apartment. Not that she’d have been home. Fisayo was rarely home. After all the crazy events in Lagos, today was the first chance he’d gotten to see her.

  He’d met with Moziz, Tolu, and Troy earlier, so he’d only briefly heard Fisayo’s bizarre story about what she’d seen on Bar Beach when the boom hit. And that conversation was via mobile phone. He’d said nothing about the footage Moziz had shown him and the others, or the plan to kidnap the alien. Not yet.

  “Yes, I think things are going to get weirder, too,” he said. “That’s why I don’t want you on the streets.”

  “Bar Beach is closed anyway,” she shrugged. “My regular guys won’t even know where to find me.”

  The executive members of the Black Nexus, Rome and Seven, stood up when Jacobs and his sister entered the empty classroom. Rome was immaculate, as always. Tall, lean, and as statuesque as a runway model, he wore dark blue skinny jeans and a loose white blouse. His tiny gold hoop earrings perfectly accented his closely cut hair. Even without makeup, he passed as a beautiful woman. Though he never outright said he was one, most people on campus just assumed. Seven was only an inch shorter than Rome. She had the curves of Osun the Yoruba goddess, a shiny bald head, and eyes so expressive she barely had to speak.

  The two were the presidents of one of the only LGBT student organizations in Nigeria, the Black Nexus. Though most of its members were out or semi-out, the group still only met secretly once a month, in the dead of night. This was not one of those meetings. It was the afternoon, and this meeting’s purpose was more specific.

  “Hi there,” Rome said, giving them each a hug.

  “It’s good to see you,” Seven added, her voice low and husky. The hug she gave Fisayo lasted much longer than the one she gave Jacobs. Fisayo shyly stepped back. She was in no way attracted to women, yet Seven always made her want to giggle like a schoolgirl.

  Seven didn’t have to invite Jacobs and Fisayo to have a seat. They could read it in her eyes. Seven and Rome sat on desks across from them.

  “Okay, man, what’s so important that you dragged us out when Lagos is on lockdown?” Seven said, leaning forward. Her eyes added, And it better be a good reason.

  “It’s a good reason,” Jacobs said, bringing out his mobile phone. “Come close. It’s better if we all see it at the same time.”

  Jacobs had a nice phone, so the footage was even clearer than it had been on Moziz’s cheap disposable one. Jacobs had watched it at least fifty times, and it still blew his mind. She was a young woman, then she seemed to turn inside herself to become a smoky, metallic-looking cloud, then she turned inside out again to become a completely different woman who was old and bent. She’d even spoken with an ancient-sounding voice. And Jacobs knew the man the shape-shifting thing was talking to; he was the bishop of his mother’s diocese. His mother had gotten Jacobs to attend service with her once, three years earlier.

  That day, Father Oke happened to be giving a sermon on the “evils and filth of homosexuality.” Jacobs had had to sit there beside his mother in his suit and tie, itchy and miserable with embarrassment and sweat as the bishop equated homosexual activity with bestiality. Afterward, the bishop had come up to him and said that Jacobs’s mother had told him all about Jacobs’s . . . habits. Jacobs experienced a moment of complete panic.

  He had seen Father Oke slapping the hell out of those he disapproved of and calling them “the foulest devil.” And when the bishop slapped, he slapped you hard. The receivers of the front or back of his hand were usually women but, once in a while, he slapped a man, too. Jacobs knew that if the bishop “slap delivered” him, he’d punch the bishop in the face. But he also knew that, if he did, the bishop would never forgive him; he would out Jacobs and run him out of the city, or worse.

  To his relief, the bishop only shook his hand and congratulated Jacobs for taking the first step toward “healing his soul in the name of Jesus.” But Jacobs felt so humiliated that he couldn’t bring himself to tell the bi
shop (or his mother) that he wasn’t gay at all. He just liked wearing women’s clothes.

  He loved the colors, the feel, the material, the creativity, and, oooh, the fit. A year later, he joined the Black Nexus because they were the only people who accepted his ways. If anyone needed the help of the Lord, it was his sister Fisayo, who was too smart and sweet to be out hustling her body.

  “Whaaaat?” Rome whispered, bringing his face close to the high-definition images on Jacobs’s mobile phone.

  “Play it again,” Seven said, grinning. “Is this for real? Even if it’s not, that’s a person changing into another person! Would’ve been better if it changed from a woman to a man but this will do. We could have some fun sending this around.”

  Fisayo was quiet, biting her nails.

  Jacobs replayed it. “My boy Moziz got this from his girlfriend Philo,” he said. “It’s real. No Photoshop or anything.” He turned off his phone. “Philo says that this woman . . . man . . . whatever is an alien who is at the house of the people she works for.” He thought about mentioning the kidnapping plan but held off. He needed to get out of his parents’ house, and he needed money for tuition when the university reopened. Kidnapping an alien would solve all of that. Yet . . .

  “Hey! We should go see her. Get her on our side,” Rome said. “The Black Nexus can come out of secrecy for this. Who better to understand than a shape-shifter?”

  “My exact thought!” Seven agreed, breathless with excitement. “This is what we’ve been waiting for, o.”

  Fisayo raised an index finger and frowned. “Wait . . . wait just a minute,” she whispered. “Last night, I saw . . .” She looked at Jacobs. “Did you tell them?”

  Jacobs shook his head. “Thought it would be better if you did.”

  Fisayo got up. “I was on the beach talking to a guy when I heard the loud booming noise.”

  “The one they are all talking about on the news?” Rome asked. “You were there?”

  Fisayo nodded. “Everyone was looking around, all scared. The guy I was with ran off to check his car. A lot of windows shattered from the noise.”

  “That man left you alone?” Seven said, looking disgusted. “Anuofia!”

  “He wasn’t gone for long,” Fisayo replied uncomfortably. “Anyway, before he returned, I was just standing there looking at the water. It looked . . . It was moving strangely. The waves had kind of lost their rhythm and the water was rising. I saw what I am sure was one of the creatures come out of the water! It looked like smoke at first, like smoke that bubbled out of the sea.” She paused, bothered by her own recollection. “Then it was a woman. That same woman in the video. She dove back in the water and seconds later I saw a huge wave go after these three people on the beach, one woman and two men, I think. I couldn’t see them that well. They ran, but the water . . .”

  Fisayo frowned and pressed her lips together. When she spoke again, it was in a whisper. “There . . . there weren’t any other waves, just that one. It splashed over them and pulled back into the sea . . . with them. They were gone! Stolen. If you’re saying this woman-thing is an alien, then that must have been what took them! They’re taking people! Maybe eating them or something!” Tears squeezed from her eyes. “Like in that old American movie . . . I forget the name. When are aliens ever not evil?”

  “E.T.?” Rome said.

  Jacobs put his arm around Fisayo. “Relax. It’s—”

  “No,” she said, throwing his arm off. She sat down on one of the desks and began to sob. Jacobs put his arm back around her and looked at Seven and Rome.

  “She’s just upset and tired,” he said.

  “No I’m not; I know what I saw.”

  “Well, how do you know they didn’t bring them back?” Seven said carefully.

  “I heard that noise and I saw those people get taken. That’s all I needed to see.”

  “Maybe some of the people in that room were the taken people,” Jacobs said.

  “I don’t think so,” Fisayo said. “I saw them get snatched; you don’t just return from something like that, o. That video is just . . .”

  “Let me see it again,” said Rome, waving Fisayo’s words away.

  All of them watched the footage, even Fisayo. After it finished, none of them said a word, yet in their minds, they saw plenty. Jacobs saw an end to living with parents who refused to accept him. His sister Fisayo saw all of Lagos in flames. Seven saw infinite possibilities and a people from outer space that could make the world embrace and love everyone. Rome saw the rise of Rome.

  “Let’s get the Black Nexus together tomorrow,” Rome said. “We’ve been hiding for too long. Tell me you don’t feel it. This is it. This is revolution.”

  Jacobs did feel it. And if there were more of these aliens, then the Black Nexus could definitely come out of hiding, whether they came out to meet the one at the girl’s house or some other one. Jacobs could see it clearly. He could be a part of the money-making kidnapping scheme and the Black Nexus revolution. He’d have his cake and eat it, too.

  CHAPTER 15

  ALCOHOL, MY NYASH

  The drive to Agu’s barracks should have taken a mere half hour, but extreme Lagos traffic stretched it to two. Agu couldn’t believe it was already four o’clock. Everyone was trying to get somewhere, be it a church, a bar, home, or out of Lagos. Then there was the exodus of people from Lagos Island, Ikoyi, and Victoria Island to the parts of the city that had the least chance of flooding if the water rose too high. Almost all the lanes in both directions were packed with people moving inland, which was in the opposite direction to the one in which Adaora and Agu were going. In the one lane they had, they were forced to constantly swerve around people using it to bypass the traffic heading out of the city. By the time they arrived at the building for Lagos military personnel, they were exhausted, sweaty, hungry, and nervous.

  Adaora turned the engine off and sat back.

  “You don’t have to go in with me,” Agu said.

  “Oh, I’m going,” Adaora told him. She smiled and held up her notebook. “I brought my notes, too.”

  Agu sighed and shut his eyes. “How will I face the man after punching him into unconsciousness?”

  Adaora frowned. “He was going to rape someone.”

  “You don’t know the army.” He rubbed the side of his forehead that didn’t have a Band-Aid on it. “Adaora, is this really happening?”

  Adaora slowly took his hand from his forehead. It was rough, and there were tan scars on two of his knuckles. She wondered if they were from fighting. He did say he’d been in a lot of fights. “You don’t want to start that cut bleeding again,” she said quietly. She looked into his dark brown eyes. “Thank you for stepping in front of my husband.”

  Agu smiled tiredly. “I was already beaten up. I had nothing to lose.”

  Adaora laughed, still holding his hand. “Is that the only reason?”

  He grasped hers now. “Thank you for cleaning the cut on my face,” he said. He leaned forward and she did not lean away. It was a sweet kiss. So sweet that neither of them noticed the car that slowly drove by on Agu’s side.

  Chris’s window was open as he passed. He’d been following them on a hunch since they’d left the house, and now his suspicions had been proven. He gazed at his wife as she proved to him what he’d suspected for over two years. Somehow he managed to stay quiet and keep driving instead of jumping from the car, dragging his wife out, and beating her senseless right there in the street. This time, his rage would certainly have overpowered any black magic she might have practiced on him. But instead, he decided to wait, to tell Father Oke about what he had seen. Chris was sure Father Oke would agree—Adaora needed harsh punishment. Witches needed to be vanquished and cheating wives needed to be beaten down. So Chris drove on. And when Adaora pulled away from Agu, the road beside them was empty.

  “Oh my God,
what have I done?” Adaora gasped. She grabbed the handle and opened the door.

  “I’m sorry,” Agu said quickly. “I shouldn’t have done that.”

  Adaora paused, the door half open, as dread washed over her. “I’m a married woman.” She was crying now. She hated how the tears came but she couldn’t help it. She wasn’t an adulterer. Even during the worst moments, it had never crossed her mind to cheat on Chris.

  Agu reached out and touched her face. She slapped his hand away and sniffed. “Don’t.” She pushed the door wider but didn’t leave. “In less than twenty-four hours my life has fallen apart,” she whispered.

  “It’s the alien’s fault,” Agu said softly.

  Adaora tried but couldn’t keep the smile from her lips. She shut the door again. “Maybe my husband is right,” she said. “Maybe I am a witch.”

  When Agu took her hand, she didn’t snatch her arm away.

  “Your husband is a fool,” he said. “You’re stronger than this. Got your notes?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then come on,” he said, opening his door.

  * * * *

  Lance Corporal Benson was a large, middle-aged hulk of a man in need of a vacation. He wanted time away from his wife, away from his three young children, and away from his job. And then there was the madness yesterday. He didn’t know why smoking weed always made him get crazy, but it did. The first time he’d tried it, he’d run wild in the streets for five hours, harassing women and talking shit to anyone who’d listen. Then he’d passed out and wound up in the hospital with an IV in his arm. Yesterday, he’d smoked with some of the younger privates. He’d been bored and annoyed with his life. He needed excitement. He hadn’t meant to attack that girl. He felt horrible about it . . . and not just because the left side of his head was swollen and his belly felt like it had been crushed with a hundred-pound weight. Thankfully, the medics said his ribs were merely bruised, praise Allah.