by Karen Rispin
I sighed and turned to look out the window. Lining the path beside the road were bulgy, bottle-shaped baobab trees, coconut palms that looked like skinny teenagers with wild hair, and dark green mango trees with thick trunks.
"The biggest mango trees were planted by Arab slave traders," Mom said.
"Why did they plant mango trees?" Traci demanded. "I don't think I want to eat mangoes anymore."
"The mangoes helped to feed the slaves," Mom said. "That was more than a hundred years ago. There were no roads then, only paths. As far as eating mangoes is concerned, I wouldn't worry about it. Just because someone has used one of God's good gifts wrongly doesn't mean it can't be used properly. I muv langoes."
Traci and I laughed, and Mom looked frustrated. I went back to looking out the window. It was creepy thinking of lines of slaves being driven where the road was now.
It was dark by the time we turned off on the bumpy little dirt road to Bilge Water. We were halfway down it when we realized Mr. Barnes wasn't behind us. Dad was awake by now—and looking worried. I knew those Barneses were going to keep Daddy from resting, I thought angrily.
"Kevin, let me drop you off first. You're really tired," Mom said. "I can go back and look for them."
"No, that would just waste time," Daddy said. "They can't be far. They turned off right behind us. I'll drive now."
"Daddy, let Mom drop us off with you. Please?" I interrupted.
"Yes,Daddy, please? Please? Let Mom look for them," said Sandy. Traci just kept her mouth shut. I guess she didn't want to get in on a family fight.
He just ignored us. A few minutes later we were bumping back down the way we came. Daddy was wrong about finding them in a hurry. We went all the way back to the main road without finding them. I was getting madder and madder all the time.
"Where on earth bould they kee," Mom said. She's always worse when she's worried.
Daddy laughed and answered, "Baybe they tould have curned off on a side road."
"Daddeeeee!" yelled Sandy, "Don't! How can you make jokes when you're probably dying, and you don't even care, and you wouldn't let Mom find the stupid Barneses so you can rest," and she burst out crying.
I just sat there with my mouth open. Sandy did care about Daddy.
"Sandy, settle down," Mom broke in. "You know perfectly well your father isn't dying. We talked about that last night. You're just overtired."
I demanded to know when Mom had talked to Sandy.
"Sandy was awake worrying about your father when I got back from taking the man to the hospital," Mom answered. "Now both of you just simmer down and help us look for the Barneses."
So that's what was wrong with Sandy. She and Mom had been up talking half the night, when all the time I thought she couldn't care beans about Daddy. So why didn't she answer me when I called her, if she wasn't asleep?
Daddy never even said anything. We pulled in at a duka where some African men were sitting drinking beer around a lantern and asked if they'd seen the Barneses' car. They pointed down another road. After that it only took a few minutes to find them. They'd fallen behind and taken a wrong turn.
At Bilge Water I didn't even ask if we could run down to the beach first like we usually did. Sandy and I started to unpack the car like mad. I guess we both had the same idea: the more we did, the less Daddy could do.
Traci was just kind of standing around watching.
"Come on, Traci, help!" Sandy said, sounding irritated.
"Mom and Dad always let us go down to the beach first," Traci answered, but she did pick up a sleeping bag and kind of wandered into the house with it.
Daddy was still untying the stuff on top. I tried to drag the trunk full of food into the kitchen, which is separate from the house.
"Anika, use your head," Daddy snapped. "That's way too heavy for you. Joey Barnes and I will get it later." He must have been really tired, because he's not usually so crabby.
I took the cots in. Mom was kind of directing, so I asked her where to put them.
"In the room all you girls will share," she answered.
"All the girls?" I asked, just to make sure I'd heard right.
"You, Sandy, Traci, and Lisa will be sharing that room," she said very slowly and clearly. (You know how parents sound when they're really irritated.)
Oh joy, I thought. I get to share a room with Lisa Barnes.
Sandy was already in the room putting down a load of sleeping bags.
"I wanted to talk to you about Daddy last night, and you wouldn't even answer," I blurted. That wasn't what I'd meant to say, and it sounded bad. I tried again, "I mean, I thought you didn't even care about Daddy."
"How was I supposed to know that's what you wanted to talk about? I thought you didn't care till Mom said you were worried, too. You never even talked about it or anything."
"Neither did you! Why did you think I was trying to keep the Barneses from coming to the coast?"
"I thought you just didn't like Lisa and didn't want to share," she said.
Just then Lisa walked in. We shut up. I didn't know if she'd heard what we said or not. Anyway, she totally ignored us, put down her suitcase, and walked out.
"Do you like her, then?" I asked, kind of sarcastically.
Sandy just rolled her eyes.
"At least they don't expect you to be her best friend," I said. "Come on, let's get the car unloaded."
When we were done unpacking, everybody went down to the beach together. Mom tried to talk Daddy into resting, but he said the walk would help him relax. It was dark out, which made it hard to see the sandy footpath, but I ran ahead anyway. Red dirt crumbled under my feet as I felt my way through the little gully where the path cut through the dirt cliff above the beach. Then I was there.
The white sand gleamed, even in starlight. The ocean roared far off against the outer reef. I glanced out and saw it was low tide. I stepped out of my thongs and ran across the cool, silver sand. An army of tiny ghosts fled in front of my feet, and I knew they were beach crabs. The air stroked my hot, sticky skin, and I did a cartwheel just because it was so great to be there.
Voices came down from the path, and little circles of gold light from the flashlight danced all around. I walked away from them, down across the wet, ridged sand below the high tide mark, and stopped when my feet touched cool, salty water. The black, velvet sky was packed full of stars, and I felt like I could hear them sing if only everybody else would be still. The world was a wide open beautiful space, full of God's glory.
"God, please let Daddy get better," I whispered. I felt really uneasy inside and thought about Lisa. I looked far out where the breakers roared and shone white. I'd had to memorize Proverbs 3:5-6, and it came into my head right then: "Trust the Lord completely; don't ever trust yourself. In everything you do, put God first, and he will direct you and crown your efforts with success."
It was really obvious all of a sudden that I'd been "trusting myself." I'd been trying to make things turn out the way I thought they should by getting the Barneses not to come to the coast. Suddenly I knew God didn't want me to be mean to the Barneses, no matter what—and I felt terrible.
"I'm sorry, God," I whispered. "I'll try to trust you. I'll even try to be nice to Lisa Barnes. Only please let Daddy get better. Please don't let us have to go back to the States."
I could just feel God's love all around me in the wide open starry night. Mom and Daddy and the others were coming toward me across the sand, but I didn't feel like being around anybody, so I took off down the beach.
At Bilge Water the beach is in little coves with big jags of old black coral separating one piece of beach from the next. Without really thinking, I started going across the smoother coral below the tide mark to get to the next beach. Splash!My foot slipped, and I sat down hard in a tide pool. I didn't land on any sea urchins, but it still hurt.
"Anika, was that you? Are you OK?" It was Mom.
"Yes," I called back. I didn't want anybody to see how dumb I'd been
. Walking by tide pools in the dark is not smart. Suddenly, I wondered what else was in the tide pool with me. I mean, I love tide pools. All kinds of neat creatures live there, but they don't much appreciate someone sitting on them. Some of them have pretty powerful ways of disapproving. I'd missed the sea urchin's spines, but what about sting-rays or scorpion fish?
I started to move, but stopped. "Think for once," I muttered to myself. I could have shifted my behind right onto a sea urchin.
"Mom, could you bring a flashlight?" I asked. They probably were going to lecture me on not using my head, but I'm used to that—and it would sure beat being stabbed by sea urchin spines…or worse.
Of course, everybody had to come over at once. Sandy got there first, and shone the flashlight straight into my eyes. I felt incredibly dumb sitting in the water, blinking at the light.
I covered my eyes. "Sandy! Shine it in the water. I want to see where there aren't any sea urchins so I can get out."
I was just climbing out when Mom got there.
"Are you sure you're OK, Anika?" she asked, looking at me carefully. "Whatever possessed you to walk over here in the dark?"
"You could have stepped on a stone fish and died," said Traci, sounding pleased.
"Wow, look at all the sea urchins," David said and grabbed the flashlight to shine it around at the water. The whole area was covered in sea urchins.
"Well, if you managed not to get any spines in you, your guardian angel was sure on duty tonight," Daddy said.
"Neat," said Alex, and reached for an urchin. A couple of people started to yell, but it was too late. He jerked his hand back, but he'd already been poked. Luckily the spines hadn't broken off in his hand.
You could tell he wanted to cry. Sea urchin spines really hurt. He didn't cry, though. He just stood there sucking his finger. I felt sorry for him.
"Here, I'll show you," I said. "You just have to be real careful, and get ahold of one spine to pick them up."
I picked up an urchin that was sitting in the flashlight beam, then set it very gently on my palm. Sea urchins come in different styles. Some have three-inch-long, tiger-striped spines, or short, pale purple spines. But this one was an ordinary black one. It walked across my palm with its spines and dropped back into the water.
"Anika, that's enough of that," said Daddy. "Let's get back onto the sand before someone else gets spines in them."
We were all back on the sand when Alex joined us, triumphantly carrying a sea urchin on his palm. I couldn't figure out how he'd been able to see the urchin without the flashlight shining right on it.
"Gross! Mom, make him put it back," Lisa screeched.
He did, too, which was actually good. It would just die and stink if he took it up to the house.
Back at the house, I had to take a shower to get the salt off from when I'd fallen in the tide pool. When I got back to the room, it looked peaceful. Sandy and Traci had stuck their cots next to each other and were talking. Lisa was sitting on one of the regular beds opening her suitcase.
Lisa suddenly said, "Yuk!" and put her hands over her face.
"What's the matter?" I asked. After all, I had promised God I'd be nice to Lisa.
She never even answered, so I walked over to see. Lisa's pajamas were stiff with gooey green stuff. It took me a second to realize it was shampoo. Mom always made us put our shampoo bottles in plastic bags, but Lisa hadn't done that with hers and the top had come off.
She turned her back on me. I could tell she was crying.
"Lisa, it's OK," I said. "Do you want me to get your mom?"
"No!" She practically yelled it.
"OK, OK, I won't." I paused a second to think. "I know, I'll lend you some pj's, and Ali can get the shampoo out of your clothes tomorrow."
Ali was the worker who took care of Bilge Water for the owners. He was mostly a fisherman, but he cut the grass when he felt like it and cleaned the house after somebody was there. We paid him extra to do clothes and dishes.
Still facing the wall, Lisa said very fiercely, "No! Even if I am stuck here, nobody's going to make me be a slave driver."
"What are you talking about?" I was really puzzled. "Nobody said anything about slaves."
"You all think you're so great, being missionaries, but you make the Africans work for you like slaves. I hate it here!" and she started really crying.
Up until now, Traci and Sandy had been ignoring Lisa completely, but that was too much for Traci.
Traci interrupted, "I suppose you think not having a worker makes you better?" Her voice sounded really mad. "You're so smart with your cool clothes from California that you think you're too good to have a worker. Well, I hope you know that because of you, Mbaika has no job and no money to send her kids to school. I hope that makes you feel really righteous."
Traci really liked Mbaika. She used to be the Stewarts' worker. When they went on furlough, though, Mbaika started working for another family. So when the Stewarts got back, they'd gotten a new worker. Traci used to visit with Mbaika a lot. Then the other family had retired, and the Barneses had gotten their house. I never even thought about whom Mbaika would work for. I guess Traci thought Mbaika would work for the Barneses.
"Oh, come on, Traci," I interrupted. "She probably doesn't even know who Mbaika is."
"Well, she shouldn't spend all her time crying in her room, then," said Traci.
"Leave her alone," I said. "Here Lisa, I'll help you sort out the stuff with shampoo on it."
Lisa was still facing the wall and crying, only not so loud now. When she didn't budge, I started sorting through her stuff. She had the cutest clothes. Anyway, I took the dirty clothes to Mom and put my spare pj's on Lisa's bed. Lisa still wouldn't turn around. I finally went to bed.
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Chapter Five
The next morning I woke up just as it was starting to get light out. I knew that the edge of the ocean early in the morning is the finest place in the world. It's best if you're alone, so I put my clothes on quietly and snuck out. All I saw of Lisa was the top of her head sticking out of her sleeping bag.
It was a cool, quiet, secret morning. There were still stars showing, but out on the edge of the sky—over the ocean—there was a pink and gold glow. All the colors of the reefs and tide pools were silvery.
Twice a day the water is deeper at the ocean. That's called high tide. That morning, the tide was on the way out. Already I could hear the breakers roaring far off against the outer reef. Near the beach the water lay still and quiet, reflecting the sky like a huge magic mirror.
I walked across the packed, cool sand and stepped carefully into the water. The ocean water made a tickly line, like a bracelet, around my ankles.
This water touches India, I thought and waded deeper very slowly so I wouldn't ripple the surface. Salt water lapped the back of my knee, and the sand felt rough under my feet. Gold light and warmth washed over my body, and I looked up. The sun had painted a glittering gold road from the edge of the world to me.
Then I noticed a shape in the sun road. I squinted and looked again. A fisherman was poling his dugout canoe back to the beach. He looked like a black cutout against the bright water.
"Jambo," I called as he got close to the beach.
"Jambo, memsahib," he called back.
I ran toward him through the shallow water, making the glittering splashes go as high as I could. It was fun to see what fishermen had caught.
In the bottom of his canoe were two big stingrays. They looked like grey leather saddle pads with eyes. He also had some parrot fish strung on a string, like a bunch of neon-colored slimy beads.
"Do you want to buy fish?" he asked me in Swahili.
I said I didn't, but maybe my mother would. Parrot fish are really good to eat. Maybe Ali will cook us samaki masala, I thought, licking my lips. That's practically the best food there is: spicy deep-fried fish chunks.
"Where is your house?" he asked.
After I'd told him,
I headed off down the beach. How could I ever go back to the States and leave all this? Daddy just had to get better. I prayed for Daddy and then for Lisa. God was all around me in the shining morning, and his love made me feel brave.
When I got back for breakfast, Lisa wasn't there. I walked in just in time to hear Mrs. Barnes ask in a squeaky, worried voice, "Where could that girl have gotten to?"
"I wouldn't worry too much. She's probably just gone on a walk like Anika often does," Mom said. "Oh, here's Anika now."
"Anika, did you see Lisa on the beach?" Daddy asked.
I said, "No."Mrs. Barnes looked even more worried, so I added, "She probably just went the other way."
"Well, if you all'd be so kind as to tell us which way you went, Joey and I'll go the other way and look for her," she drawled. "But you just sit down and eat yourself a good breakfast first."
I said, "Yes, Mrs. Barnes," and started peeling a tiny, fat thumb banana. Its firm sweetness filled my mouth. Mmm, I thought, you can only get really good ones at the coast.
Mrs. Barnes came around the table and patted my back, "Now, now, don't you go Mrs. Barnesing me. I'm your very own Aunt Elsie, and don't you forget it."
I felt like squirming, but I managed not to.
"Did Lisa say anything to you girls about where she was going?" Daddy asked.
"She didn't say anything to us at all except that she thought we were slave drivers," Traci said. I could tell she was still mad from last night.
"Now that's too bad. You'll have to be patient with Lisa until she gets adjusted," boomed Mr. Barnes.
"She said you think it's wrong to have workers. Is that true?" I blurted, then wished I hadn't. I mean, it wasn't very polite.
Traci joined in and made it seem even ruder, "How about Mbaika? What's she supposed to do? Wait to eat till you get adjusted?"
"Ha, ha, ha!" Mr. Barnes boomed. "Think you've got me cornered do you? Well, I don't know who this Mbakila, or whatever, is, but we do think that we should do our own dirty work."
"Well, Mbaika used to be the Langs' worker," said Traci. She was going to tell him who Mbaika was whether he wanted to know or not. "She was going to work for you when they left, only you wouldn't hire her. Now she doesn't have any money to send her kids to school or anything." Traci flipped her hair back and glared at him.
