I could feel myself getting mad. I needed to get back to class, and I didn’t know why they were trying to scare me. They were standing very close, towering over me. I was only eight, and I wasn’t very tall for eight. I’ve grown a lot in the last three years. And in the last year, I’ve gotten really strong and muscular, but back then, I was small, and they were all tall and big.
“It’s not contagious,” I muttered, my hands wet as I turned off the faucet. And that’s when Faye slapped me on the side of my head. I stumbled as the world got really bright and I saw stars. She’d hit me really hard. For no reason. Without me even speaking directly to her.
I was angry as hell now. I’d been harassed before and it upset me, but never had I grown angry like this. I was in there alone. I hadn’t done a thing to them. They’d pressured me to move into the far part of the bathroom while one of them stood watch at the door. I was like prey to them. Because what? I don’t know.
“Dirty African booty scratcher,” Faye spat. “Filthy diseased Shaka Zulu bitch. Yo’ mama probably got AIDS and yo’ daddy got syphilis, that’s why you came out looking like that.”
Yinka cackled hysterically. I couldn’t believe it. What was wrong with that girl? Who was diseased?! Even at eight years old I knew when something was completely twisted. Shanika looked a little worried, but she didn’t do anything to shut her friend up. The one at the door, whose name I didn’t know, was peeking back into the hallway. The bell rang. Lunch was over. I felt more rage boil in me.
Faye was about to hit me again when I looked her right in the face. I was sweating and shaking, and that’s when I saw it. Right there on Faye’s white pants. A large circle of red. Blood. My mom had explained periods to me earlier that year. So I knew exactly what I was seeing and why Faye was probably so angry. I knew many things in that moment. So I went for the kill.
“I’m filthy?” I growled. “You, YOU’RE the one who is filthy! Look at your pants. You’re bleeding all over them. Phew! Stinking! Filthy akata! Who are you?”
The word was something my mother sometimes called African Americans when she was talking to her friends. Some told me the word meant “cotton picker,” others claimed it meant “bush animal.” Whatever anyone thinks it means, it is a nasty word. At the time, the way those girls were behaving, I was glad to call them “akata.” I’d have loved to see the pain in their faces if they then learned what the word meant. But a word like that, you don’t really need to know what it means. The meaning is all in the way it’s said, the sound of it. It’s ugly. It’s an insult. It’s like a dagger that is a word. She was bleeding, and I’d just drawn more blood.
She looked down and saw the blood on her pants, and a look of horror passed over her face. She was so embarrassed. The other girls looked embarrassed, too, and a disgusted look passed over Yinka’s face. Yinka was just a mean, foul person, turning on everyone in two seconds. In all the years I’d known her, she was always the same. Mean, and loyal to only herself. Faye’s embarrassed face changed then to that look girls get when they are going to destroy something.
I tried to run, but there was nowhere to go. They descended upon me. Slapping me in the face, pulling my hair, shoving me against the wall. Then Faye dragged me to the coat hooks. She was so big that picking me up was easy. I struggled, but the other girls helped, too. They hung me there by my sweater. I couldn’t get down, no matter how hard I tried. They laughed at me, and then they left me there.
I was bruised and achy. My face felt like it was on fire, and my nose was bleeding onto my white sweater. My cheeks were wet and itchy with tears. I was so mad, but I was also ashamed and scared . . . scared of myself. Even back then I knew what I’d said was evil. I was American, too. And their history was connected to mine, even if it was not exactly the same. Faye’s ancestors had made America what it was, built it with their own blood, sweat, and tears, by force. They’d suffered and persevered. She was the product of survival. I knew this better than my mother, who wasn’t born there. And I shouldn’t have made fun of that girl’s shame, either. I knew what it was like to be made fun of and hated because of the way I looked.
But they hurt me. Just because I was African and had a defect. They, too, called me dirty. Why do we people from Africa always call each other dirty? Even I did. And why did they hate me so much? Why? I know why I confuse people. When people are confused, sometimes they get mean and violent. I wonder if this has anything to do with what I saw in the candle. Confusion.
“That’s my story,” Sunny concluded. She let out a long breath, not wanting to look up at the spider or at her friends who now knew something about her that even her mother didn’t know. “You may have heard it before, or not. But this version is mine.”
When she heard nothing for several moments, she looked up. Udide seemed to be staring at her, her fuzzy black mandibles working in and out and her many hairs rippled. She felt a hand touch her shoulder and then squeeze, but she didn’t look back to see whose it was.
When Udide finally spoke, her voice was deep and booming but less harsh. “Yours is part of a long story of humanity,” she said. “Always a treat to my sensitive hairs.” She blew out the burned house smell and stood up and turned around. “Home, one’s house, dwellings doused. In flames, sad games, you’ll all be ashamed. It’ll be the greatest story ever told and only those like me will see it unfold.”
Sunny ventured a look at Orlu, Chichi, and Sasha. It was Sasha’s hand that was on her shoulder.
“Sorry,” she said to him.
“For what?”
“That word.”
He shrugged. “If I’d been in your shoes, I’d have said a lot worse.”
“Step back,” Udide said. She’d moved to the far side of the cave. “To weave one, I’ll need space.”
“The flying grasscutter?” Sunny asked.
“Step back,” Udide repeated.
She held up a leg and pulled webbing to the tip of this leg with another leg. Then she moved both legs away, and the piece of webbing hovered softly in the air. She brought another thread of webbing to that one and then something stranger began to happen. All of the hairs on her body rippled in such a fluid motion that it looked as if she were encased in water. Sunny shuddered and again felt her bladder contract. She could even smell a hint of salt water over the smell of burning houses. Another smell accompanied these two conflicting smells of fire and water. She could not describe it but she knew its origin. The strange smell and the presence of water—Udide was calling on the wilderness.
“Three of you, move away, unless you want to abandon your bodies and cross over,” Udide said. Her voice rumbled and vibrated; rocks fell from the cave’s ceiling this time. “Sunny-Anyanwu, you may stay or move with your friends.”
Sunny stayed. She wanted to see this. She could feel it rising around her now. It was like standing on the rising surf of a large beach. It was rising all around her, gradually. Sunny blinked as her perspective doubled with Anyanwu’s, but her attention was on Udide and what she was weaving. Udide was still black and hairy, but she was also turning red and growing larger. And Sunny could see another version of Udide juxtaposed with the other two; this version of her looked as if she were made of shiny metal.
Udide worked fast, wrapping more webbing around the suspended strand. It took the shape of a white sticky-looking sphere about the size of a tennis ball. Then Udide raised a leg and started spinning. It whirled, slowly at first and then quickly. Then the great spider really began to work. She attached and wove and shaped so quickly now that Sunny’s eye couldn’t follow it. And as Udide worked, Sunny saw some of the spirits around her stop to watch. One looked like the shape of a man, only he was nothing but oily blue light. He stood beside Udide, a hand on a hip. Then he raised his other hand, brought it to his chin, and seemed to blow. His breath was blue, and it wafted right into the thing Udide was weaving.
Another wilderness creatu
re came and did the same thing. And as they each added these ethereal ingredients, Udide’s creature began to shift and take on different colors. It went from being spherical to a blob with many appendages on the sides, top, and bottom. It also began to grow. From tennis-ball sized to the size of a horse and then to the size of a van.
Sunny had since moved back to join her friends, who were all gawking.
One of what Sunny had begun to call colored-spirit people came and blew at the large still-growing mass Udide was weaving, and Udide seemed to get annoyed and shoved it away. For some reason, this made Sunny’s belly cramp with hysterics.
“What is wrong with you?” Chichi whispered, frowning at her. “Are you all right?”
Sunny only shook her head. “Maybe the leftover spider poison is making me giddy, I don’t know.” Her body certainly still ached. But this didn’t stop the laughs that kept bubbling up from within her. When she looked up, she saw Anyanwu’s dimly luminescent form perched upside down on the cave’s ceiling, surrounded by spiders as she watched Udide weave.
“What is so funny?” Sasha asked. When she looked at him, he was smirking.
“This . . . everything,” she whispered.
And that got Sasha snickering, too. Orlu tried his best, but he, too, was clearly tired and overwhelmed and terrified. Soon, his eyes were watering from trying not to laugh. Only Chichi sulked, her arms across her chest.
Sunny was laughing so hard that when the large hovering mass that Udide was weaving plopped to the floor, she wasn’t afraid. She took a deep breath and tried not to think about the fact that she was deep in a cave beneath the city of Lagos with a spider the size of a house who was weaving some mass of webbing that was starting to wriggle.
She turned away from everything and looked down the dark cave. That helped quell her giggles. The marbles she’d dropped lit the cavernous cave well enough, but their light didn’t reach down the tunnel for even a few yards. It was as if the light bent toward Udide. Sunny inhaled and then exhaled and inhaled again. She could feel each place where the spiders had bitten her to inject venom and then the antidote. Those spots felt itchy and were probably red and swollen. But she was otherwise okay.
“What a life I have,” she whispered.
To her left, she could see about thirty large spiders on the cave wall scrambling into the darkness. To where, she had no idea and didn’t care one way or another.
All four of them bounced as Udide lifted the great web-wrapped mass and then let it fall to the ground again. They coughed and scrambled together, grabbing each other as the cloud of dust rushed over them. Everything was light blue as the blue marbles that sat on the ground between them, and Udide and her creation glowed brighter in the settling dust.
“Oh my God, it’s exactly how I imagined,” Orlu said. “Thryonomys volante, wow.”
“You imagined this?” Sasha asked, pointing at it.
“Disgusting,” Chichi said.
The mass was undulating. The blue marble light only lit part of it. There was something inside. Unt, unt, unt, the thing inside grunted. It sounded like a giant pig. Udide scurried around the mass three times, laying three of her legs on it after each rotation. Then she plucked a hair from her back and stuck it into the mass like a pin, using two of her legs. The mass calmed, and Udide let out a great billow of her smoky stench, which made Sunny’s eyes water. Then Udide stepped back and waited.
“One of us has to release it,” Orlu said after several moments.
They all looked at Sunny. She shook her head. “I . . .”
“Because we’ll all die if we get close to it,” Chichi said. “We can’t survive the wilderness.”
“It is safe now,” Udide said. “Just like Osisi is safe for you all; I have pulled down the veil of the wilderness. The creature is mortal and alive.”
“Then you go,” Sunny said to Orlu. “You’re the one who likes animals so much.”
“Yeah,” Sasha agreed. “Which one of us knew its scientific name?”
“Okay,” Orlu said.
“We can’t all go?” Chichi asked.
“No, only one at first,” Orlu said. He crept forward and slowly walked across the great cave. It took him nearly five minutes to get halfway across. He stopped, his hands clenching and unclenching. Then he started moving them quickly in the air.
“What is that?” Sunny shouted.
“It’s . . .” He worked his hands some more. “Never mind. I’m okay.”
“He’s undoing jujus,” Chichi said.
“It’s protected itself,” Orlu shouted. “And . . . well, I think it’s joking with me. But not in a good way. If any of you had been in my shoes, you’d be on the floor itching and screaming right now from the stings of Seven Stinger Mosquitoes.”
“Damn!” Sasha said. “I used that juju once in the Leopard Library of Chicago because this guy shoved me aside to get a book we both wanted. The man hollered like crazy.”
“It’s not even out of its cocoon, and it’s already showing it’s got a sick sense of humor,” Orlu shouted. “This is why it’s best for only one person to approach it.” When he reached the cocoon, he paused and stared at Udide. “I know exactly what he’s feeling,” Sunny muttered. There was nothing like having Udide’s undivided attention.
Orlu was too far for them to hear anything, but he was clearly speaking to Udide. Then he stepped up to the cocoon and brought out his juju knife. Sunny could hear the cutting from where she was, sort of an unzipping sound.
“Oh my God,” Sunny whispered when she saw the shiny gray-brown head pop out of and then rip through the cut Orlu had made. Its big head was round, it had round fluffy-furred ears and large round blue eyes. It had some sort of black markings on its forehead, but she couldn’t see them from where she was. It didn’t look much like the grasscutters she was familiar with, large groundhoglike rodents related to porcupines. It sniffed around with its great nose. It sniffed Orlu, who stood very still. Then it looked at Udide, started, and retreated back into its cocoon.
Udide brought a leg up and kicked the back of the cocoon, and the flying grasscutter grunted loudly like a pig and shot out. It came running right at Sunny, Chichi, and Sasha; its huge blue eyes wide with fear and shock. They all turned to run. Then Sunny heard Orlu’s voice right beside her ear. “Get down!” And because she was so used to trusting her friends, Sunny dropped to the ground, landing on top of Chichi. Sasha dropped right beside them.
Foooo! The flying grasscutter lived right up to its name as it took off low enough over their heads that they could feel and hear its wake. Sunny looked up just in time to see it whip and snap its long furry tail as it zoomed toward the cave ceiling and then disappeared.
“Just wait,” Orlu’s voice said. When she looked back, he was standing there, his juju knife to his neck. He was using voice-throwing juju and specifying it to just the three of them.
“There!” Sasha said, pointing at the entrance to the cave that led into darkness.
The flying grasscutter stood with its backside pressed to the wall as it looked into the cave.
“It wants to run, but it’s too scared,” Chichi said. She laughed.
From afar, the great creature looked forlorn and kind of cute as it grunted and pressed itself to the wall. It was basically a newborn. What a place to wake up to—a giant spider and a dark cave full of smaller spiders. “I’d be scared, too,” Sunny muttered.
“Don’t let it flee,” Orlu’s voice said. He was walking to them. “If it flies into the cave, it’ll escape and we won’t be able to catch it, trust me. They are intelligent. It’s made by Udide, so it’ll understand any language. Talk to it or . . . something . . . softly. But hurry.”
They walked over to the grasscutter. It stared at them, its nostrils flaring widely. The marble light was dim here, but it reflected its eyes and in that moment, Sunny knew she could gaze int
o them for hours. They were like jewels and they were kind, too. But there was something else about the creature’s face as a whole that made her want to slow down. It wasn’t just cute, it was sneaky and sly. This was verified when she felt the ground pulled from beneath her feet. She fell awkwardly.
Chichi also tripped and fell as a tree root came up from the ground right in front of her foot. She cursed in Efik as she stumbled. Sasha looked at them, then he chuckled. “Just go,” Chichi said. “If you haven’t fallen, then maybe the damn animal likes you.” She tried to get up, but the root wrapped more tightly around her foot. Sunny knew not to bother and just sat there.
“’Sup,” Sasha said to it. “I think I’ve got wha’chu need, dude.” He brought his backpack around. He looked back. “Orlu,” he said, as Orlu came up beside Chichi and Sunny. Sasha motioned him to come. “See if it lets you.”
“Are you guys okay?” Orlu asked Chichi and Sunny.
“Yeah,” Sunny said. “I think it just likes Sasha.”
Orlu looked and then took a few steps forward. When nothing happened, he kept going and was soon standing beside Sasha. The flying grasscutter looked at them both with narrowed eyes. It took a tentative step back, but that was all. Sasha opened his backpack and Orlu looked inside. When Orlu laughed, the flying grasscutter didn’t flee as Sunny had been sure it would. Instead, it moved forward to see what was in the backpack.
“Sasha, you’re a genius.” Orlu said.
“It dawned on me this morning,” he said.
When he brought out the first handful of grass, the flying grasscutter lapped it from his hands with a giant blue tongue. It chewed and as it experienced its first taste of “foodular” pleasure, its entire body shivered with joy. Sasha fed it some more grass.
“Come,” Orlu said to Sunny and Chichi. Slowly they got up and came toward the beast. It eyed them suspiciously but inflicted no more juju on them. Sasha handed the backpack to Sunny. “Give it some grass.”
It didn’t hesitate to take the handfuls she offered it. She watched as it ate, noticing that it wasn’t just gray brown. When Anyanwu appeared beside her, so dim that Sunny suspected only she saw her, the grasscutter paused in its chewing. It sniffed at Anyanwu and then humphed and continued chewing. Its brown fur was tipped with white filaments that looked like thick spiderwebbing. Sunny frowned and took a chance and stepped closer. It watched her as she reached forth and touched its furry cheek. She’d been wondering what it felt like. Was it sticky like spiderwebbing? No. It was soft. So very soft.