“You seem to keep forgetting that you are talking about my brother and my good friend,” Sunny snapped. “These aren’t just two random boys.”
“I know, I know.” She paused and then said, “I don’t know.”
“You don’t know what you’re going to do?”
“No,” Chichi said, growing serious. “I like them both. Wish I had it easy like you. You and Orlu are made for each other.”
“I don’t know about that,” Sunny said quietly.
Chichi smiled and shook her head.
“So you’ve been to see Mr. Mohammed’s wife,” Sunny said.
“Call him Alhaji Mohammed; he made his pilgrimage a few weeks ago,” Chichi said.
“Oh,” Sunny said. “That’s why that other guy was managing the bookstore for so long.”
“I happened to be there the Sunday he returned,” Chichi said. “It was crazy. He was actually giving discounts on books… Well, for a few hours.”
They both laughed. Alhaji Mohammed was a businessman to the bone, hajj or not.
“But yes, I’ve been to see Bola,” Chichi said. “With my mother once, some years ago.”
“What for?”
“We can talk about that some other time.” She looked at Sunny unsmilingly. Then Chichi’s smile came back. “Bola Yusuf. They call her ‘the woman with the breasts down to here.’” She gestured with her hands to mid-waist level. “She is an Owumiri initiate.”
Sunny gasped and stopped. “A Mami Wata worshipper! Is she a Leopard Person, too?”
“Yeah.”
This was the water worshipping group that Chichi had let Chukwu think Sunny was a part of. Sunny touched the comb she wore in her hair. “Should I take this out when I go?”
“Oh no!” Chichi said. “That’ll get you much, much respect. She’ll love you for that. And she’ll love that the lake and river beasts can’t seem to get enough of you, even if it’s because they are Ekwensu’s minions.”
Sunny waited until right before bed to try it. She locked her bedroom door and, on shaky legs, walked to her window. She usually raised the screen just a crack so that her wasp artist could come and go as it pleased. Now she pushed the screen to the top of the windowsill and waited. It didn’t take long. She watched the mosquitos slowly fly in, pushed by their own ambition and the night’s breeze. When she counted five, she shut the screen and brought out her juju knife and worked a Carry Go, a juju that drove away insects with the intent to bite.
She felt the cool invisible juju sack drop into her upheld hand after she did the flourish with her knife, and she sighed with relief. She spoke the words as she watched two of the mosquitos land near the top of her white bedroom wall. She frowned as she watched one of the mosquitos migrate to her and then land on her arm. She smashed it with a hard slap.
Then she stepped to her bedroom mirror and looked at her face. She ignored her flushed cheeks and the tears rolling down them. She looked into her wet eyes and with her mind, she called Anyanwu. She dug deep within herself, and then she tried to bring her forth. Nothing. Sunny sat on her bed as the sobs wracked her body. Images of the river and the menacing Ekwensu flashed through her mind.
She crept under her covers and curled herself as tightly as she could. She still wore her sandals, and she didn’t care. And when she got up in the morning and found an itchy mosquito bite on her arm and two on her left leg, she knew for sure Anyanwu was gone. Who was she now?
16
HEAD OF THE HOUSEHOLD
When she saw her father that evening, she went to him.
It had been a while since they had watched the local news together, but today Sunny needed his company. Anyanwu was still gone, and Sunny felt lost. She’d seen him settling down in his favourite chair to watch the news, a cold bottle of Guinness on the side table, a bowl of groundnuts on his lap. She sat down on the floor beside his chair, and he’d patted her on the shoulder, pointed at the TV, and said, “You heard about this oil spill in the Niger Delta?”
“No,” she said. “I’ve been studying.”
“These idiots are… Just watch, here it is. Turn it up,” her father said. She grabbed the remote control and clicked up the volume on the large flat-screen TV.
A thin old man looked deep into the camera, a microphone held to his face. His voice was reedy, his expression perplexed. “I came here when there was no crude, no spillage, everything was so fine. People were enjoying back then,” he said. “It’s a strange thing to us. How could this occur? Are these oil companies stupid? Ah-ah, don’t they know what true wealth is? How could they? These people aren’t from here.”
As he spoke, oil-drenched riverways, creeks, mangroves, and grassy vegetation were shown. The story cut to a journalist walking through the mucky forest in yellow hip boots as he spoke with a short young intense man, also in hip boots, named Murphy Bassey, head of the local watchdog group Friends of the Delta Organisation. As they walked, they both pinched their noses.
“What’s that smell?” the journalist asked in a nasally voice.
Murphy stepped over a fallen tree and stopped at a large black puddle in the soaked vegetation. “You see this here? It’s not water.” He brought a piece of yellow paper from his pocket, rolled it up, and stuck the end into the black liquid. Then he brought out a box of matches. When he used one to light the wet part of the paper, it burst into violent flames. “Whoo!” he exclaimed, dropping it on a dry patch of vegetation and quickly stamping it out. “See that?” he said as he stamped. “What is that? This place is already mutilated by oil pipelines; now the forest and waters are poisoned.”
“So all it would probably take to set this whole forest and the towns near it on fire is dropping a match in the wrong place,” the journalist said, looking very worried.
“Correct,” Murphy said with a bitter chuckle. “We won’t do that, though.”
“I should hope not. I don’t even think you should have lit that paper just now.”
Murphy nodded, a bit out of breath. “I needed you to see, though. Give it a few days and the very air will be flammable. We have more than one oil spill every day here. In an area that’s already polluted,” Murphy said. “These oil companies are so sloppy in their mining of crude oil. They don’t care. It’s not their home. This new spill happened last night! It is not as big as the Exxon Valdez spill, but it is very, very bad. You see for yourself, do you see anyone here? No one is doing anything about it.”
Sunny sighed as she watched, trying not to think of her own problems. As Anatov said, the world was bigger than her. In some parts, the world was literally dying. Her father held his bowl of groundnuts down for her and she took a few. As she shelled one of them, he offered his bottle of beer. “Need a sip?” he asked.
When she looked up and met his eyes, they both burst out laughing. He took a gulp and put the bottle back on the side table, and Sunny popped a groundnut into her mouth.
The only woman interviewed spoke in Pidgin English and had a shell-shocked look about her. But her words made Sunny’s skin prickle and her head feel light. “I come to see the water las’ night. Wetin my eye see na one big thing wey be like animal as it dey descend into the water from air. Like some masquerade tin’. Ah-ah, mek these people stop wetin dem dey do, o… Because it don begin to attract evil, o!”
The woman’s words hit Sunny hard. She opened her mouth and took a deep breath. A “masquerade thing” descending into the crude oil-soaked water? Was this Ekwensu? Did that Lamb women just tell all of Nigeria that she’d seen Ekwensu? Sunny remembered when she’d encountered Ekwensu last year at the shrine beside the gas station, the oily, greasy smell, like car exhaust. Sunny could imagine Ekwensu tearing open a tanker and then bathing in the freshly spilled crude oil, a substance toxic to the flesh of the earth. If Ekwensu had just forced her way into the mundane world, such a “bath” would probably strengthen her.
Sunny moved closer to her father. He took another deep gulp of his beer and belched loudly. “This is not normal,?
?? he said. “Everything in that creek will be dead by tomorrow, the people are getting poisoned, the whole place could go up in flames. It’s not even on international news.”
Sunny slowly got up, her legs feeling like jelly. “I should finish studying,” she said. Her father grunted, his eyes still on the TV where they were now talking about a murder in Lagos.
The next morning, when she received her daily Leopard newspaper, she didn’t find one mention of the oil spill in the entire paper. Her father was right; this wasn’t normal at all.
17
BOLA YUSUF
“Thank goodness it’s this way,” Sunny said, rubbing a hand over her drying Afro. She absentmindedly took out the Mami Wata comb and used it to pick her hair out a bit. They were walking down a dirt path that ran through the forest that they usually took to get to Anatov’s place.
Orlu sucked his teeth. “If it were back in Leopard Knocks, we’d find a way to get there.”
“Tired of having to ‘find a way,’” she muttered. “Just want to be normal, like everyone else.”
“It’s not far now,” Orlu said.
They were walking side by side, shaded by the thickening trees. Sunny suddenly felt glad that it was the middle of the day. Who knew what was lurking in the bush. She giggled nervously to herself.
“What?” Orlu asked.
“I… I was just thinking, what could be worse than the river beast?”
“Sunny, there are crazy dangerous beasts like that in these forests, too.”
Sunny quickly reached into her pocket for her juju knife. She fretfully babbled, “What… what kind of beasts? Are they big? Hidden like the lake beast? Do you think the lake beast would–”
“Put that away,” Orlu said, chuckling. “The worst things around here and in Night Runner Forest come out at night, just after dusk. Relax.”
When she still wouldn’t put her knife away, he took her hand, and every hair on Sunny’s arms and neck stood up. They walked in shy silence for the next five minutes, watching the trees or their feet. Then they came to a clearing in the trees. A large black solid steel gate stood here, with an image painted on each of the two doors. On the left was a painting of Mami Wata herself. She was more the Uhamiri version that Sunny didn’t see very often. Instead of the long straight hair and Indian features of the more popular image of Mami Wata, the traditional Uhamiri version had skin black like a beetle’s wings and long bushy dreadlocks that floated behind her like powerful-looking brown vines. She was grinning with white teeth and holding her long fin against her human torso.
On the other door of the gate was the contrasting image of a brown-skinned man with thick matted hair wearing chains around his ankles and wrists. Sunny frowned. The man had to be onye ara, a person suffering from madness.
“Bola’s a Mami Wata priestess,” Orlu said, seeming to read the question in Sunny’s mind. “So she’s a healer.”
“Of what? Like malaria or…”
“No, stuff Lamb doctors can’t address. You know, people suffering from being ogbanjes and women who can’t have children no matter what the doctors do… and”—he pointed at the gate—“madness. A lot of Leopard People are struck with it. Maybe from some juju misfiring or someone being bitten by something in our forests, whatever. But Bola’s also a really strong oracle. Her predictions and visions are never wrong, when she has them.”
She can do all that and she married a bookstore owner? Sunny wondered. But then again, these were Leopard People. A bookstore owner was probably like marrying a brain surgeon.
Orlu knocked on the gate, and a minute later a tall woman wearing a long blue skirt and a white blouse peeked out. “Good afternoon,” she said. She looked right at Sunny with such intense eyes that Sunny took a step back. Orlu nudged Sunny with his elbow.
“Good afternoon,” Sunny said. “We’re… I’m here to…”
“I know. She’s expecting you,” the woman said. “Remove your shoes and come in.”
Sunny slipped off her sandals and, upon stepping past the gate, she felt it. First in the ground beneath her feet that went from warm to cool and almost damp. Then there was the rush of humidity; it was almost as if her skin’s pores opened up and began to drink. She’d stepped onto sacred ground… or something. She opened her mouth and inhaled. When she looked at Orlu, he was frowning and picking his shirt from his skin.
In the centre of the compound was a moderately sized white house. The ground around the house was neatly packed red dirt, tall wild bushes growing against the compound wall. They were led around to the back where they entered a room with wooden benches. It must have been some sort of waiting area, for several women and men, some young, some old, sat on the wooden rickety benches in various states of anxiety and misery. One woman wearing a dirty orange-yellow wrapper and matching top was crying into the shoulder of another woman dressed in a yellow blouse and jeans. A man in a sweatsuit jumped up and then sat down when they walked in. Another man dressed like a rapper was talking to himself, pulling at his skinny jeans and biting his nails.
One man even bore a striking resemblance to the madman in the painting on the entrance gate’s door. He sat on the floor in the middle of the room, his long, unruly, matted hair flopped over his shoulder. He wore nothing but raggedy brown pants and a torn, dirty black T-shirt. He even had shackles on his wrists and bare feet.
“She will call you,” the woman who’d led them in said. “Sit.” Then she left.
Orlu and Sunny took a spot on the bench, squeezing between the crying woman and the mumbling man dressed like a rapper. After a few moments, Sunny realised he was actually speaking Arabic to himself.
“Glad I called and told my mum I’d be home late,” Sunny said.
“Yeah, but we could be here all night,” he said. “I’ve heard of–”
The door opened. “Anyanwu!” the little girl standing in the doorway called. “Who is Anyanwu?”
Sunny froze. She stood up and the little girl turned to her. The girl was about six years old, but she stood as if she belonged there and it was normal for her to order adults around. She even carried a clipboard. “Are you she?”
“Well, I’m Sunny, but my–”
“Yes or no?” the girl asked, holding up a pen.
“Y-yes.”
“Come this way, then.”
Sunny looked back at Orlu, who hadn’t gotten up. “Come on,” she whispered. “I’m not going by myself.”
He got up and the little girl didn’t stop him from following. She showed them down a narrow hallway with ocean-blue walls, and Sunny felt her eyes begin to water. She brought out the handkerchief in her pocket just in time to catch her sneeze.
“Sorry,” the little girl said. “There’s Catch ’Em in the walls. Eze Bola has had a few problems with imposters. People who are allergic always get sneezy here.”
She wanted to ask the girl what constituted an “imposter” because maybe she was one now, but instead she asked, “What does Catch ’Em do to imposters?” She blew her nose.
The little girl giggled mischievously. “You don’t want to know.”
The girl led them to a large room with graceful high ceilings, white walls, wooden floors, and nothing in it but five white wooden chairs. They were arranged in a circle with blue cushions on the backs and seats. Bola Yusuf sat in one of the chairs, one leg crossed over the other.
Upon seeing her, Orlu stopped.
The little girl professionally grasped her clipboard. “Come on,” she said, walking in. She motioned towards the chairs. “Have a seat, please.”
Sunny followed her halfway across the room and then turned back to Orlu. “Come on,” she whispered.
Orlu shook his head. He looked scared, sweat beading on his forehead.
Sunny bit her lip and frowned. “Geez, how old are you?! They’re only boobs!”
It seemed to take all his effort to put one foot in front of the next. When he reached Sunny, she grabbed his hand and dragged him with her to Bola.
>
Bola was a thin middle-aged woman with long brown braids, three dark lines engraved on each cheek, and a large white oval painted across her forehead. She sat calmly in her chair wearing nothing but a flowing white skirt that reached her ankles. Her long skinny breasts did indeed hang well below her waist, touching her lap. She wore several blue and white bead necklaces that rested on her chest.
“You all look like students, and students can be stupid,” she said in a hard voice. “So no photographs while you are in my compound. The last time someone did this, they angered Mami Wata and died in an accident upon leaving.”
“We… we’re students, but we’re not here to study you,” Sunny said.
“Good. Temitope, leave us now.”
“Yes, ma,” the little girl said, then she walked out.
“What is wrong with you?” Bola suddenly asked Orlu. He was sitting stiff as a piece of wood and looking at anything but Bola. “Haven’t you ever seen a woman’s breasts before? Weren’t you ever a baby?” She lifted and swung them from side to side. Orlu looked as if he was going to pass out, and Bola laughed a loud raucous laugh. Before Sunny could control herself, she burst out laughing, too. She clapped her hands over her mouth and looked apologetically at Orlu. Then another giggle wracked her body, and her eyes began to water from the strain of holding it in.
“Look, boy, I am the servant of Mami Wata, goddess of the water, and as black Americans like to say, this is how we roll,” she said. She looked at Sunny. “Did I say that right? You’d know better than me.” She winked.
“Yeah,” Sunny said.
“Relax, Orlu. Okay?”
Orlu only nodded, looking at the ground.
“I’m glad you brought him with you.” She paused, narrowing her eyes at Sunny. “My husband has spoken of you. Can you read the Nsibidi book he sold you yet?”