by Yasmin Angoe
It is hard to maneuver across the stones in the heels, but I manage. No one speaks, not even Paul, as we follow him up the steps and into the auction house. The air-conditioning is refreshing. I am immediately cold as the sheen of sweat on my skin freezes.
The guards guide us to various locations within the house, our elbows firmly within their grasps. There are curious glances all around, as buyers appraise the stock. I avert my eyes, not wanting to make contact. My life is no longer my own. The eyes roving my body make me feel like the algae slime that floats in stagnant water.
Thoughts of algae cause me to stumble, and my guard grabs me sharply, annoyed that he has stumbled too. His mouth sets in a firm line. He wants to hit me. I can tell from the way he fists his free hand, but he cannot touch the merchandise. So instead, he glowers at me. It is a threat from him to me.
Don’t. Fuck. Up. Again.
25
AFTER
Sasha’s words sent lightning bolts through Nena, and her response came before any of them could adequately register the insult, much less think of a comeback.
“What did you just call her?”
The blonde shifted nervously from one foot to the other. She gave Nena a guarded look. “What are you talking about?”
Nena’s eyes narrowed. She spoke slowly enough to make the rest of them fidget uncomfortably, even Georgia, whose lips twisted in concern. “Do you know what Curious George is?”
Georgia, Kit, and the other two girls looked on, watching this game of tennis with trepidation. Georgia had seen Nena in action, and Nena couldn’t imagine what was running through her mind. She probably thought Nena was going to snap the girl’s neck like she had the big thug’s.
“A cartoon?” Sasha drawled questioningly. She gave Nena the teenage are you stupid? look, not noticing how her friends backed away a few steps, abandoning her to her fate.
Nena cocked her head, looking even more menacing than she had before. Sasha took a reflexive step back, and her wide baby blues were what reminded Nena with whom she was dealing. No, she wasn’t going to kill the girl for being stupid or a racist. She was going to school her.
“You call her that, or anything else improper, again, you’ll deal with me. You understand?”
Sasha’s face flushed a deep crimson, which only made her very blonde hair look blonder. “What did I say?”
“Let your mates explain it to you. They seem to understand the negative association a Black girl with the type of animal your cartoon, and your racist remark, refers to.”
Sasha’s mouth opened and closed like a fish. She gawked, swallowed hard, voice now at a higher octave. “Racist! I’m not . . . I’m not . . . my best friend is Chinese!”
“Korean,” Kit and Georgia corrected in unison. Georgia’s hand flew to her mouth, covering it.
Kit gritted her teeth. How many times did the girl have to remind Sasha where she was from? Nena wondered.
“I didn’t . . . ,” Sasha sputtered, blinking rapidly. “I meant—”
“Yes, we know what you meant. You won’t mean it again, now will you?” Nena swept her gaze casually over the other girls. None of them moved, and Sasha continued blinking, her mouth opening and closing with nothing coming out, much to Nena’s satisfaction.
“Well, off with you, ladies,” she urged when no one seemed to be taking their leave. “Driver’s waiting and all.”
Kit and the other two mumbled goodbyes and were full of ma’ams as they tugged a still-stunned Sasha away toward her ride. However, a few yards away, Sasha regained her ability to speak.
“Did you hear how that weirdo lady talked to me?” she asked in a shrill voice. “That bitch!”
Kit snatched her elbow, ushering Sasha away before she stepped in any more shit than she already had.
Georgia watched Nena watching the girls’ retreating figures. Georgia gave a resigned sigh. “I’m sorry about that. Sasha’s—”
“A privileged, rude, racist Barbie doll?” Nena said helpfully.
“I was going to say ‘different,’” Georgia finished.
“Which would be wholly inaccurate. Don’t make excuses for the girl.” Nena gave her full attention to Georgia’s troubled expression. “Why does your schoolmate dislike you so much?”
Georgia blinked, her eyes taking on a shine Nena didn’t care for. She worried the girl would cry, and she wasn’t equipped to handle chattering teens, much less crying ones.
Georgia asked, “Is there ever a reason?”
“Sometimes.”
Georgia lifted her shoulders. “The other students think I’m a snitch because my dad’s an assistant US attorney. Even though Sasha’s is a judge, and most of their parents are, like, uptight businesspeople. But I’m not,” Georgia said emphatically. “I would never betray a trust.”
“Georgia,” Nena began, her tone softening, “your name is the first thing your parents give you, besides life. Don’t ever let anyone take that away from you. So when someone calls you a name you don’t like, like Curious George, for example, stand up for yourself. Don’t accept it just because you don’t want to make a fuss.”
Georgia’s body deflated, and she looked away, unable to withstand Nena’s scrutiny. “It’s that obvious, huh? That I’m hard up for friends.” She laughed dryly. “I’m a joke.”
She refused to make eye contact, and Nena knew it was because she was crying.
Nena thought back to her school days in England and a boy who had tormented her. “When I was younger, the kids at my school used to call me ‘gorilla,’ ‘bush girl,’ and ‘African booty scratcher,’” Nena said softly. “I was new there, and the school was like this, not very diverse and also extremely minted.”
“Minted?”
“Rich. Sorry. Anyway, I was not rich before attending the school. The kids were cruel. One boy, Silas, was like your Sasha.”
Georgia quickly thumbed away the tears before they fell. She swallowed. “What did you do?”
“My big sis stood up for me. Made them stop. And then she told me the same thing I told you. Later, my mum made me an awful dinner. She’s a horrific cook.”
Georgia couldn’t smile. “I don’t have a big sister. And my mom is . . . well, there was a car accident.” Her voice hitched.
“I understand.” It was time to go, because Nena wasn’t prepared for this deep a conversation in a school’s parking lot. She’d made contact and returned the ID. What next? She was a dispatcher, not James Bond. She needed to know what Georgia’s father knew (if anything) about the Tribe. But how exactly?
Nena opened the passenger-side door of her car and rifled through the armrest until she found what she needed, an old receipt and a pen. She scribbled something and handed it to Georgia, who blinked back the tears that refused to go away so she could focus on the ten numbers scratched on the scrap.
“Man,” she mumbled, squinting. “Your handwriting is pretty shitty.”
Nena closed the passenger door. “You’re a cheeky one, aren’t you? Perhaps you and the blonde should be friends after all. Two rude little girls.”
“You could have just asked for my phone and typed your number in. It’s what people do now.”
Nena stared at the insolent child, growling, “I like . . . to write.”
Georgia laughed. “Oookay. Anyway, thanks again for bringing my ID and for totally freaking Sasha out.”
Nena rounded the front of her car for the driver’s side. She gave a slight wave at Cortland’s approaching 1970 electric-blue Chevelle, not yet ready to face him after the shooting.
Georgia looked as if she wanted to say more. Nena stalled, waiting.
“Maybe you can come for dinner or something sometime?” Georgia asked hopefully.
“Perhaps,” Nena answered, slipping into her car. “Put my number in your phone, yeah?”
As she pulled away, glancing at Cortland standing with Georgia and Georgia excitedly showing him her ID, she hoped Georgia would ask to see her again . . . for reconnaissance, sur
e. But also, because Nena liked the little lift she felt when she thought about being around the Baxters again.
26
BEFORE
After my guard parades me around the party of potential owners of actual humans, I am reunited with the other girls. The younger girls are giggling and drinking from small plastic cups. How can they be so happy? Do they not realize this “party” is no more than an auction block masked in fanciness and revelry?
“They gave us punch,” Mary announces, her teeth stained pink from the red liquid. “It’s the most delicious thing I have tasted. So sweet. How many sugarcanes do you think they used for this?”
“Bush girl,” Constance scoffs, glowering at Mary. “Don’t be simple, as if we live in trees and do not know about granulated sugar.”
“Be still,” Mamie says. “Let her enjoy.”
Constance sucks her teeth and sips her own cup of sugary sweetness.
My guard hands me a cup, then stalks off to join his comrades huddled a few feet away. I sniff the drink, checking for anything odd. Only a sweet and fruity smell makes it up my nose, and I take a tentative sip, concurring with Mary. It is the most delicious thing I have ever tasted, better than Coca-Cola or orange Fanta, which are now my second and third favorites.
“I wonder if they will allow us to eat,” Constance says, looking forlornly at the overflowing trays of roasted meats and seafood, fruits, vegetables, and bread. The food looks like TV food, no creamy peanut butter soup or banku, which has no taste, so it must be accompanied with fried fish, a spiced spinach or palm-nut stew, or shito pepper sauce. Where is the rice?
“If they serve food like this wherever we go, then it cannot be that bad, eh?” Mamie whispers to Constance and me. Instead of answering, I down the rest of my punch, then plot how to get more.
As time passes, one by one, the guards return and escort their assigned girls away. They do this when a customer approaches them. Each girl shoots a look back at the rest of us as she is led away. I cannot help wondering if this is goodbye. Or if we will see each other again.
Sometime later, my guard approaches. Mamie and I are the only two left.
“Come,” he tells me. Mamie stares ahead forlornly. Paul’s words come back to me. You will not return to the Compound. For her sake, I hope she does fetch a price. Words I never thought would cross my mind.
The back patio has a secluded gazebo. In it, a stocky obroni, a White man, waits in a wicker chair. There is a lit firepit in front of him, flames lapping at the air. My guard directs me to the opposite chair. I sit stiffly at the edge of the seat. Being away from the house and other girls is unnerving. The way this man observes me is unnerving. It is difficult to tell in the lighting, but his closely cropped hair is ginger or maybe blond. His eyes are small, hard. Thin lips and a prominent nose with a bulbous tip.
The guard remains near but far enough to allow a little privacy. Why all these formalities? If they mean to sell us, then do it quickly! But I rein in the bloom of anger and watch the White man watch me.
“Bonjour. Al-lo.”
I understood his French the first time, but my gut tells me not to let on. Better they do not know the depths of my knowledge.
“Wo din de sɛn?” he asks in butchered Twi. What is your name?
“Aninyeh.” The only reason I answer is that I cannot pretend I do not understand.
In English, and louder, he asks, “Can she speak? English?”
My guard shrugs. He does not care for this man any more than I do. It is the only commonality he and I share.
“A little,” I say hesitantly, pinching my thumb and index finger together to show him how little, although I am fluent in English too.
He is pleased. He points to himself. “I am Monsieur Robach. I live in France. You know France?”
I pinch my fingers together again. My father has been—had been—there to study abroad. I pored over all the history books I could find about it as I learned the language.
“I like you very much, Aninyeh,” Monsieur Robach says. His eyes intensify, no longer looking at me politely but more like I am one of those trays of roasted meats or a specimen. “You are a beautiful girl. Very pretty. Paul says you’re special, of good lineage.”
I say nothing to this.
“I would like to take you to my home in France. It is lovely there, and I think we shall get along very well. Don’t you?”
I say nothing to this either.
“I think you will like my home. It will be your new one.”
His home will never be mine, and I do not believe for one moment he thinks it will be.
When he has had his fill of me, he coughs once. The intensity in his eyes evaporates, much to my relief. He looks away from me, at my guard, nodding at him. “Tell Paul I approve of her and the quoted price. I will wire the money immediately.”
The guard does a quick bow. “Very good, sir.”
I do not need prompting to stand because I am already on my feet, ready to leave. I walk away briskly, not wanting to be around the man one moment longer, knowing they now consider me his property. What does this mean for me? What manner of servitude, degradation, or worse will he subject me to? All at once I begin to second-guess my desire to leave the Compound. I am marching into an unknown world, moving away from a devil I know to one of which I have no idea.
The guard leads me to a back bedroom where three other girls wait. The guards stand vigil at the closed door. Another is outside the window. I can see his shadow pacing back and forth. This room has a lavish bed, and the movie Spider-Man plays on a large TV. Though the movie is a couple of years old, it still holds the girls’ rapt attention.
The girls tell me Yaa and Ester have already left with their sponsors as soon as all the funding went through. There were no goodbyes.
“Do you know where they’re going?” I ask, sitting with a plate piled high with the glorious food we saw in the other room. The other girls work through their own mountains of food.
“Spain and Luxembourg. I’m going to Germany,” Mary answers.
I turn to Constance with my eyebrows raised.
“America,” she answers in a husky voice.
My eyes go to Mamie questioningly. Constance slowly shakes her head. Mamie quietly chews her food as she stares intently at Spider-Man and Mary Jane kissing while he hangs upside down.
“I have not seen this one before,” Mamie says softly. “Must be nice.”
She looks at me with the slightest flicker of hope dancing in her eyes. “To be kissed like that?”
I cannot hold her gaze. Her look is one that will haunt me.
We watch the movie with a heaviness upon us. We are thinking the same thought but cannot bring ourselves to say it aloud.
If Mamie does not fetch a price, Spider-Man will be the very last movie she watches.
27
AFTER
Miami was in the midst of one of its pop-up tropical rain showers. Nena nestled in a swinging chaise longue beneath the security of her gazebo so she could enjoy the shower without getting wet.
She was soothed by the mundane neighborhood sounds—kids playing ball at the park, cheers from a Little League football game, the occasional bump and rattle of some car’s bass. She could pick out the banter between Keigel’s soldiers as they walked their rounds, making sure all was well in their little piece of the world. People would complain the neighborhood was never quiet, but Nena loved that it reminded her of the bustle of N’nkakuwe. Twi and Ewe were replaced with English, but the motions were still the same. Children playing, adults adulting, life moving on as it should.
The high fence walls surrounding the stucco cottage provided ample privacy and seclusion in her backyard oasis. Exotic trees, elephant-ear plants, and vibrant flowers fit for botanical gardens grew lush under her care when she was home and were well tended by the sprinkler system when she was on a job. Her serenity fountain with its gentle gurgles as water wound between white and brown rocks, dappled light, and bright-o
range koi offered a peace Nena could never find beyond those walls. Here was where she could be most at ease.
Successive beeps alerted her to an incoming call on the secured laptop, and she slipped in the earpiece.
“Good evening,” she said. Her body automatically straightened at the video image of her longtime mentor and trainer.
“Evening.” The many years training and working Dispatch had kept Witt lean and fit. Only the increasing gray of his speckled goatee indicated he was older. Nena was never quite sure just how old—younger than Dad, maybe by ten years? Or less? They didn’t ask those types of questions.
She waited for him to begin, had been waiting for his initial contact since her botched job, but he’d bided his time, likely waiting to see what the Council would decree he should do with her.
When she couldn’t stand his speculative observation any longer, she blurted, “Say it.” Witt was the only one who could beat Nena at the waiting game. With him, she was always the sixteen-year-old trainee.
“This is the second time you detoured from the plan. Now I’m tasked with ensuring you’re still an asset to the team.”
“Sir, I absolutely am. The ‘detour’ you refer to—”
Anger flashed in his eyes. “Was not sanctioned. There were no directives to dispatch Smith.”
She watched her team lead rub his eyes. She hated disappointing him. Her respect for him was second only to her respect for Noble.
“Do you trust me?” Witt asked. “Are you still a member of Dispatch?”
“Without question.” None of what she’d done was about Witt or the team or the Tribe.
“Then tell me what is going on. The thing with the Cuban and the girl in his room . . . I get it, okay? The Council gave it a pass. But Dennis Smith was not the mark, yet he’s the one dead.”