by Uwem Akpan
Her honesty had entered my heart. Her fight against these two was now mine. I was ready to endure any humiliation to actualize our dream without even understanding American publishing. I was ready to be the experiment, the badge of virtue, in Jack’s words.
“WHAT’S ON YOUR MIND, EKONG?” she said.
“I was thinking … is it possible to meet the owner of Andrew & Thompson?” I said. “Please, I hope you don’t feel I’m leapfrogging over your head. I just want to thank him personally for having me here.”
“I understand. But just to put it in context, nobody here has ever asked to meet him before. I hope you won’t be too upset if Liam says no. He’s a very nice but timid person.”
“No, I won’t take it personally.”
“Right now I don’t think he’s in town. He has companies all over the place and is on the boards of lots of charities. Who knows, he might make an exception. I’ll shoot him an email. Fingers crossed.”
“Thanks.”
Then she said her parents had just invited her home for the weekend and had suggested she bring me along. “It would mean so much to them to meet you, you know,” she said. “You’re smiling. Is that a yes?” I laughed soulfully. “Ekong, this is the first laugh I’ve heard from you since Tuesday, so this is good, yes? And, if you can’t make it now, we can do it in the fall. Look, no parkway is more beautiful than our renowned Merritt Parkway in October!” But I had to claim I had other plans, because of my itches. I would not want a visitor scratching like mad in my house, and in any case I would be too restless waiting to hear from the CityMD.
THE CITYMD DID NOT CALL. I was so tense I could not edit a word.
By lunchtime, I was so restless I went to the nearest McDonald’s and ate three Quarter Double Pounder combo meals with two vanilla Frosties and a Southwest Buttermilk Crispy Chicken Salad. When I was still not satisfied, I knew I was in trouble. I lost the desire to go to the square in the evening but instead went in the opposite direction, along the piers on Twelfth Avenue, saying my finger rosary, begging the Blessed Virgin to help me in my mission in NYC and to keep the Humane Society away from me. I wandered for miles before clambering up to my room, hoping the exhaustion would deepen my sleep.
Ke mmo-o? No chance.
Friday morning, I was so anxious of my test result, I cut work and told Molly and Emily I would be at the New York Public Library researching the war. Molly informed me we had lost out on Mistress. She said the only silver lining was that her friend and former colleague Paul Maher from Farrar, Straus and Giroux, where she had the best years of her career before Andrew & Thompson, would edit the book.
Worse, during my breakfast at Blue Fin, my right earlobe felt heavy. When I touched it, it was numb. I had never had a numb ear before. It began to feel warm. I touched it but the temperature was the same as my cheek’s. But when the itch hit, I gently abandoned my eggs Benedict, barely touched, paid my bill, and left. An ear was not something you wanted to scratch at all. Touching it gingerly, I found the itch had birthed a welt. It was wet. If I did not touch it for a while, it felt like it was dripping, the itch spreading along with the moisture.
Back home, the mirrors revealed the thing was actually down in the middle of my ear. I pressed out some of the anti-itch ointment into a bowl and sprayed the anti-itch into it till a layer of foam stood on the ointment like on a mocha or beer, and, using my fingers, I mixed them together. I thought it would create an anti-itch overdose to completely douse the fire in my ear. But when I applied the concoction, the itch fought back, the discomfort consuming my whole head. So I applied it also to my neck, my face, and even mixed it into my crew cut like a relaxer.
When I wanted to put on my cologne because the new mix did not smell good, the voices in my head—which I had thought would disappear after Tuesday’s traumatic meeting—said, Ekong, what if the cologne actually weakens the powers of your concoction? Can’t you afford to smell like shit for a day, to save your ear? Are you trying to bleach one ear? Mixing too many things may actually hurt your skin forever. As our people say, giving a monkey water is one thing. Getting the cup back is another.
THE ICY FEEL OF THE CONCOCTION finally lessened my discomfort, thank God. But, unlike an ordinary itch, the thing started playing games with my mind. Sometimes a dulled pulse spread out into the whole ear, setting off distant bombs, and I got the impression my earlobe was mushrooming into a heavy lopsided thing that required me to hold my head in a certain way to strike a balance. Then I felt it was giving me a headache, but headaches did not feel like that, with a heaviness tiptoeing into my inner ear. I refused to touch the welt.
Then I got a real headache because I kept turning that ear downward and shaking my head, as though to expel water from the inner ear. After leaving a voice mail for the CityMD, I put a little plaster on it and lay down.
But when my phone beeped, it was a text from Jack saying he and Emily just wanted to say hello, because they were passing by the library on their way from lunch. I felt violated seeing his name on my phone. A searing, blinding rage slowly took over my whole body. I hated him so much it had totally anesthetized my itch.
When I did not answer, Emily called to say she was worried because Cecilia had not returned her calls, emails, or texts.
“What are we going to do now?” I exclaimed.
Sounding more and more perplexed, she said she did not know how to interpret Cecilia’s behavior. I kept my anxieties to myself. Chad Twiss, the so-called super-agent, had already made a horrible impression on me. Now I asked myself: Was it better to reject the book outright like Chad had rejected Trails of Tuskegee, or to suddenly disappear on it like Cecilia had just done?
When Emily said she had heard about our Nigerian restaurant from Angela and suggested we should hit it the next day followed by Newsies on Broadway, I apologized that it was a bad weekend. I wished I could have told her her boyfriend was pure afid-ebot.
CHAPTER 9
Like the tuke-tuke buses of Benin City
AFTER LEAVING ANOTHER VOICE MAIL FOR THE CITYMD that Saturday, I did not know what to do with myself. I could not eat. I was not even tempted to booze. When I made a decision to go to the Bronx, Usen gave me directions and asked what I wanted for dinner. “Stewed beans and boiled Nigerian yam!” I announced. They laughed at my emphasis on Nigerian, explaining, yes, they had exactly the kind of yam I needed.
After enacting the ritual of covering my body with my custom concoction, for whatever protection it was worth, I rode my first subway. I texted Caro that I was going to the Bronx just for information’s sake; I knew she would not reply because of the war histories that stood between Usen’s family and hers. The train was crowded, like everyone in Manhattan was escaping somewhere for the weekend. And then suddenly the train rode out of the underground and was on street level and then climbed onto the raised tracks. I looked out and smiled at the view before I knew I was smiling.
It was different from the Manhattan I knew. Here there were single-story houses instead of a forest of skyscrapers. The distinct structures of churches caught my attention, in contradistinction from the Actors’ Chapel. My spirit opened up in ways that let me know I never realized how Manhattan had shuttered or shaped it. I felt freer, like I was slacking off all the humiliation of this week.
I saw a lot of people having fun down there, as the train scythed through neighborhoods. Some were barbecuing outside; some were playing baseball and soccer in parks and even in empty parking lots; some were returning from shopping, carrying heavy plastic bags; some were streaming into eateries and movie theaters. Each time the train stopped and the doors opened, my ears were pummeled by loud music. For me, already the Bronx was bass that thumped and changed your heartbeat like the tuke-tuke buses of Benin City. It was like one big endless neighborhood party. Apart from Bini and Urhobo and Isoko towns, I had never seen so many people moving about with so much swag. It was my abiding image of this borough.
I loved the Bronx.
The dive
rsity of people was equally stunning as in Manhattan. But it was intense in a whole different way; the colorful tribes of America were more differentiated. Unlike in the mad rush of our Times Square, here you could see the patterns of color, and the overlap, the blur, was not as powerful. Where the intensity of Times Square was sometimes like a photo so zoomed in it lost focus, here, riding this train, I felt I could take in more, see the colors coming apart in the groups of people moving before me. And when I came into an open space, I looked around frenetically in every direction, to see as far as possible before the buildings blocked things out again. I would have loved to ask the Americans around me whether there was a word to aptly describe what I was seeing, some word that would describe this place and this place alone. But they all looked too serious, avoiding each other’s eyes.
And then, precipitously, I began to see too much graffiti. I could not work out in my head how someone got to spray-painting that high wall or that bridge. And then it was weird that though the layout was more open than where I lived, there was so much trash on the streets. And, because of Molly’s negative comments about the Bronx before I came to America, my mind could not abandon the fear of crime; the more we burrowed into the Bronx, the more I wondered about my safety. I studied the people around me more closely than I would in Manhattan, though I posted the coolest of demeanors, with my earphones blasting 2face, Omawumi, and BoA.
As the train began to empty out, I became afraid and moved to the end that was vacant. I texted my village people to tell them where I was, and they said I was on the right track. Of course, I did not tell them my feelings, good or bad, about their Bronx.
WHEN I STEPPED OUT of the train, a stuffy heat wanted to beat me back inside. I crossed two streets. Usen and family were in front of their building to receive me. Ujai spotted me first and sprinted forward, her flip-flops clapping behind her as she dodged this person or that group. She seemed to have run forever before flinging herself into my embrace.
“How are you, Ujai?” I said.
“I’m fine,” she said. “But I’ve got three quick things to tell you.”
“Hey, Miss America.”
“Uncle, you’re not listening.”
“Okay, I’m listening.”
“First off, you’re my best uncle, okay?”
“Yay, thanks.”
“Two, you don’t smell good at all. You stink.”
“I’m sorry, it’s a medication cream.”
“In America, we don’t accept body odor. I think you should sue that pharmacy or hospital! And, three, you’re not going back to that place with bad neighbors! You’re going to work from here every morning.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
I started leading her toward the others.
“Daddy is so pissed you’re the only Black person at your workplace,” she said.
“I’ve got two dear friends,” I said.
“What are their names?”
“Molly and Emily.”
“Yay, Keith, Molly, and Emily are your new friends. But, Uncle, I believe folks from the same village should live together, especially in a foreign land. And I mean a real village, not East Village, which my parents love to visit in your Manhattan—where there are no fruit trees, no moon, no stars, no masqueraders, no village chief, no nothing … no, seriously, I want to bathe in that river in Ikot Ituno-Ekanem, which they’re always talking about.”
“These days kids learn in the swimming pools of Uyo.”
“Nope, now that the Biafran War is over—as you said—I want to be right there when the river changes color. It sounds like so much fun running with your school friends after a soccer game, past the church, through the Stations of the Cross, then scrambling down the valley and splashing into our refreshing river. They talk about battling the raw force of the currents when they were my age. I want to swim at a tangent to make it to a targeted spot. I want to pick the cashew fruits myself from the slanted fields of the valley. I want to twist and pull and snap the nuts from the sweeter, softer, bigger end of the ripe fruits. I want to cut open the nutshell myself, even if the acid burns my fingers. Yep, I want to use it as a kid’s tattoo, as Mommy and Daddy once did. I want the nuts that fresh, not the stuff Daddy buys from Aldi or Stop & Shop, all fried up or roasted with God knows what chemical on it. When the winds come through the valley in the late evenings, I want to stand on the lip of the valley to smell the jasmine from the queen-of-the-night trees. And I really, really want to learn how to stealthily shin up the mango trees without stirring up the wrath of tailor ants, and if I do, how to pinch my nostrils and use my arms to lock up my ears so they don’t get in—how to endure without crashing to the ground—oh, they say if you call the names of the dead dogs in the valley, the valley will answer you …”
We cut short our chat so I could greet everyone. When Igwat, the toddler in the baby carriage, was not satisfied with a simple hug and started crying and reaching out, I threw him thrice into the air and then carried him back to the house.
It was a huge dull red-brick apartment building with tens of floors. There were four identical buildings and, though they dominated the neighborhood, a poor man’s skyline, they stood apart, wild intimidating territorial beasts. In my eyes they were the ugliest things I had ever seen, and even the doors were painted with the same dull brick color, as though to completely destroy your sense of beauty. The stuffy smell became worse than the reek of my concoction. It smelled like camel piss.
Anxious about how nasty the smell of Usen’s place would be, how I would survive dinner, we rode the elevator up to the eleventh-floor apartment. Yet, when we stepped out, the first thing my eyes instinctively surveyed was the stairwell and what kind of banisters it had. They were newer, round, smooth, and without rust, definitely not the kind of thing that could aid your back when the devil struck.
WHEN OFONIME OPENED the door into their apartment, I was shocked at how beautiful it was. I felt like I had finally arrived in the American home of my dreams, what I had had in mind when I thought of living in Manhattan. This was a First World arrangement, and quickly I closed the door behind me, to banish the ugly exterior of the building from my mind. The air was fresh and clean, with a whiff of jasmine. The living room was bigger than I had imagined. I loved the seats and couch, the patterns on the marble floor, the rug, and the juxtaposition of colors. On the wall, the set of delicate ekpo-ntokeyen carved masks playing their bright colors against each other surprised me and took my mind right back to Ito Road in Ikot Ekpene, where this stuff was made.
I was jealous of their apartment.
“’Jen Annang, I knew you’d love my humble abode,” Usen said, nudging me. “I may not live in the rich Bronx, but my place makes me rich!”
“Gwoden, you were right,” I said, though I knew it would still be too crowded for me to live here. “You’ve set it up really well. Congrats! Caro would love your kitchen, too.”
“Thanks,” Ofonime said, and wanted to relieve me of Igwat, but the kid squealed and dug deeper into my rib cage.
“See, we all want you to stay,” Ujai said.
My admiration for his home meant a lot to Usen. He told me it was the combination of the privileges of being a super and what the family had personally put into the place, with the permission of the landlord. He said he could not afford to come to America and live ntere-ntere, as we say. “Congrats, too, on your beautiful house in the village,” he said, shaking my hand.
That was the day he opened up about the super business. That was when he explained that the rent stabilization law meant Lucci’s rent had not increased more than two percent or so for all those years he had had my apartment. I learned how New York landlords in cahoots with supers schemed to get rid of tenants who had stayed too long, so that they could post a higher rent for the new ones. He warned me he could tell right away Lucci must be at loggerheads with the owner. He said the old man probably gave me many keys, the original one from the landlord and others he had put in—really to keep the lan
dlord out. I remained silent because I trusted Lucci.
Soon Ofonime began to blend fresh Cameroon pepper and onions for the stew. I moved into the kitchen to get the fullness of the scent, a boost of smell therapy from another life. I offered to help but she said she had already poked and seasoned the fish steaks with a plaster of assorted spices before I arrived. As the black-eyed peas bubbled on the stove, their strong smell filled the apartment. Usen left to buy drinks, while Ujai dragged me to the balcony so we could wave to him on the ground. The leaves were a deep green, struggling under the pangs of the last throttles of summer. But the fields and parks were dry and a little brown from summer usage, like the fall was approaching the trees from the earth. When Usen crossed the road, he turned and looked up and waved at us. We waved back.
Seeing that Igwat had dozed off in my arms, Ujai took me to their bedroom to lay him in a cot. Before I knew it, she had sprayed her dad’s cologne on me, laughing mischievously.
CHAPTER 10
It melted on my tongue like butter
THE SMELL OF THE BEANS WAS BROKEN, TEMPERED, WHEN the cook finally poured the blend into the hot palm oil to make the stew. By the time she stirred and the meek scent of boiled yam in the next pot rose to the fore, I became hungry and nostalgic. The yam was peeled and cut in low wide cylindricals. While downing a glass of cold water to settle the growls of my stomach, I got a text from Molly asking if I could accompany her Tuesday afternoon to an award ceremony, the Uramodese Prize. “It’ll be fun!” she wrote.
I looked forward to meeting folks from other publishing houses, and the agents—the group that fascinated me the most, a group we did not yet have in Nigeria. So far, I knew of only the agent of Trails, Cecilia Myers, and Jack’s friend, Chad Twiss. I was already angry I might meet Chad, but I wanted to personally let Cecilia know how much I loved the book she was championing. Silently, I swore to attend this function whether I heard from the CityMD or not. Even if the itches totally cut off my ears or disfigured my head and shins like those of the Tuskegee victims, there would be no stopping me. This prize event would make up for all the tours of New York Molly had promised me but had not yet acted on.
