New York, My Village

by Uwem Akpan

  “Well, Thanksgiving is particularly difficult for me and my family, too,” Molly said timidly, and giggled and tripped on a stone and staggered. Jeff steadied her, as we all stopped to make sure she was fine. “I guess I just wanted to say I’ve got Native blood in my lineage,” Molly announced, holding her ankle. “A child in whom the blood of the colonizers and the victims met.”

  “Oh, so sorry we brought this up,” Brad said, and backed up, palming his head with both hands like he had suddenly gone sober. “It was just a private decision we made years ago.”

  “It’s okay,” Molly said.

  “No, I’m sorry my boyfriend is drunk!” Alejandra moaned, covering her mouth. “We should never have brought it up.”

  “No, it’s really fine,” Molly said, and began to limp, pulling us forward. “My folks hit Florida shortly before every Thanksgiving. They stay around Lake Okeechobee, where our Seminole ancestors came from. And I, too, disappear during the holiday, locking myself indoors.”

  We all became quiet, a long, extended minute of silence dedicated to the history of her people. Yet, actually I was very loud inside, like my thoughts were catching fire. And since I had always thought of American Thanksgiving as a feast that united the whole nation in glory and nostalgia, I was demoralized that my best day in America—Thanksgiving—seemed to be my supervisor’s worst, a day she and her parents had to hide from. When I remembered the unforgettable Thanksgiving feast with my neighbors, I felt so empty, like one who had worshipped at the wrong shrine.

  Molly tried to recapture our earlier happiness, without success. The atmosphere was flat like overexposed beer. And when I looked at her face, I could see that her desire to cheer us up did not even touch her own eyes. They were beclouded by a shame I had not seen before: that of a child still struggling with the sordid history of America. I had never seen her so bereft of talkativeness and confidence, not even when we had talked about New Jersey.

  Molly is a minority like the rest of us! I said silently to myself as I wondered why she had kept this from me. Nothing convinced me of the absurdity of race more than this Molly epiphany. I was mad that her white mask, as it were, was more perfect than Tuesday Ita’s acquired skin. I remembered her apologizing to me after I told her about my father’s rape: Such stories really get to me … all this reminds me of the history of … Never mind. Was this what she meant when she said while crying over her New Jersey bloopers, I wish I could tell you why carrying these stereotypes is particularly shameful? Or was this why she wished she could share what she called “my very complex childhood” with me? Today, her behavior was quite different from that of the Native American selfie cop who proudly declared his race.

  MOLLY STOPPED BY my cubicle the following Friday afternoon, before the close of work. The offices were near-empty. We yakked about how daunting it could be shopping for friends and family, with Christmas looming. I said I would begin the slog next week.

  When I told her I would really love to learn about her Native American background, she said Caro had been asking for the same thing on WhatsApp. She spoke quietly, making sure no colleagues were near. She was happy Caro had, upon learning of her ancestry reveal from Alejandra, sent her a copy of the Native American cop selfie. “The gist is, unlike the selfie brother,” she said, folding her arms, “I’m ashamed of myself, of what a part of me did to the other part of me. Maybe your delicious dishes opened me up. Maybe your strong beers. Maybe the sheer bottomless pain in Brad’s confession.”

  “I love Brad.”

  “Perhaps, if I’d revealed my ancestry that could’ve made you feel a little less alienated around here all these months. I grew up hating, self-hating, my minority roots even as I used to follow them home to Lake Okeechobee to hide from Thanksgiving. Though my white looks give me all the privilege, I know the land I live on is both mine and not mine. Sometimes it feels beyond immigrants’ pain, because there’s no home country anywhere to return to or hope to rebuild. It’s like something very strong in me is no longer visible, has been erased, disembodied, gone.”

  She apologized for not sharing this when I told her about Papa or when we talked about New Jersey or when I blasted the diversity workshop plans. She prayed someday she would have the courage of Emily or Father Kiobel.

  We were the only ones left in the offices now, but it was like the place was screaming with vivid memories of my American experience. Molly was glowering, biting her lower lip. The fear that ringed her eyes after she stumbled and revealed her identity the other night was gone. Today I could see in her eyes my own pluck as I squashed Jeff and Brad’s initial animosity, my defiance at that editorial meeting, my grit in Father Orrin’s sacristy, my mulishness in boarding the train in New Jersey, my canniness in Jack’s office, my prudence in planning a confrontation with Emily. And yet in this moment, too, my heart was also calm like the proverbial eye of the storm. It knew that, k’akpaniko, no matter how long, no matter where my friend Molly Simmons went, no matter her flaws, she would fight to bring minorities along, if only to complete her essence, to make the fullness of America visible.

  MOLLY SUDDENLY REMEMBERED she had a letter for me in her office. Laughing a fake dramatic laugh to dispel the heavy mood, she dashed in and out with a white envelope. She apologized she kept it to ensure I got it since I did not usually get mail here.

  “Seems someone is getting romance in the Big Apple, ha!” she said, her mischief at full bloom.

  “Are you jealous?” I said, collecting the letter.

  “Iyo, nope … iyaaa uweiiii.”

  “Iya, it seems someone is learning Annang straight from Annangland, ha!”

  “And how cool is that?”

  She gave me a peck on the cheek; I hugged her. But as she was leaving the building, she pointed at the envelope and sniggered and said Caro was really missing me. I knew Ikot Ituno-Ekanem might hear about the letter even before I opened it. I did not recognize the bold writing on the envelope. Everything was capitalized. Yet the postage date was the day before, city NYC. No sender’s name, no return address. At first I thought perhaps it was from Greg Lucci, but his writing was fragile, not bold.

  When I turned it over, there was a big red X over the flap. The X was made up of little red heart stickers—which explained Molly’s comment about romance. I opened it and “Your niece, Ujai” was written at the bottom of the letter.

  To Best Uncle Ever, Uncle Ekong,

  I and my friends know you’re in this city. We know immigration didn’t deport or hurt you. We’re happy because that means you’re not banned from America. But it’s not your fault that everyone lied to me, including my grandparents. They even lied to Bishop Salomone, a whole representative of Jesus. But when the bishop visits us, all my friends agree I must tell him the whole truth so I can really be worthy of Holy Communion. During our Thanksgiving party, I overheard Uncle Hughes boasting to someone how they lied to me you’d gone home, in case you still had bedbugs. But I think he also forced Daddy to leave you out of the party because he paid for it, just as he had paid for repainting our house and bought us the beautiful ekpo-ntokeyen masks. He thought you and Father Kiobel turned the village against his new color and then told Bishop Salomone that he’s a bad person. He doesn’t know Daddy ratted him to the bishop. But we know they’re lying against you, which is why my friends say you must visit our school next time you’re in NYC so that others would stop calling us Team Liars. And if you publish any books about dog valley cemeteries, we want copies in our hands as proof. You must finally put Ikot Ituno-Ekanem on the internet! We’ve edited this letter nonstop because we want you to really really understand our stuff. Our white friends really want you to know they, too, are part of our group. We’re not bigots. We all recite the Father Orrin Pledge. We’re good Americans. We love our country. When my parents wanted to bring Uncle Hughes to school in your place, I cried nonstop to my grandparents though they lied to me. Finally, Daddy listened but is still mad at me. It wasn’t fair to leave you out of our Than
ksgiving party … secretly, I felt really pissed like our Native American friend says they feel on Thanksgiving though he doesn’t admit it in class when the teacher asks how the holidays went! If he whispers in your ears about the wars America waged on them God knows when, I tell you, they’re worse than our Biafran War. He says 50 million of them were killed for their lands and natural resources from Canada to Argentina. He’s OK with sharing this with you because you understand stuff. He says that’s how they were forced to become a minority or to disappear.

  We don’t argue with him or cut in. We just allow him to talk. We listen. When the teacher mentions climate change in science class, he whispers in your ear so much of their blood was shed it changed the climate of America forever. When he says their dead weren’t even buried, we become ashamed they were treated worse than our dead dogs of the Biafran War. I know my parents no longer talk to you. Don’t worry I don’t have bugs again. We’ve won our bedbugs war. I sleep well now. I no longer need to see a shrink. But I can’t forget the days when we were so desperate and I agreed with Mommy to spray me with antibug spray, to avoid shipping bugs to school. It’s no fun to be sprayed after a hot shower. You become cold like ice, then a bit oily, then completely dry like your pores suddenly drank up everything. But it’s less painful than if your racist classmates found a bug on you. They’d say you brought it from Africa and bully you to death. It’s better for my friends to find a bite, which I didn’t even allow my friends to … But they’d never mock me. They hugged me every morning, knowing I was traumatized. We’re really close. I told them the embassy called Mommy a whore and Daddy a pimp and bullied you to prove we Annangs exist. But I’m teaching my friends all the hip-hop moves of the Tiv guy who made everyone laugh in that prison of an embassy. I miss you big. Greet Keith, Molly, and Emily. When you go home, hug AuntieCaro for me. If you’re still unsure of the bugs, do everything not to bring them to our dear village. Please, apologize to Father Kiobel we’ve not finished our long letter to the church yet. All my friends must agree on every word. I and Igwat will see you when we visit. Maybe Keith will come with us. You’ll lead us through that beautiful valley, till the river changes color with the Harmattan.

  ***Please, don’t reply so our teacher doesn’t give it to Mommy and Daddy.

  I sat back in my chair without knowing what to do, except to weep. It was like Ujai was confiding in me from another life. I read it again and again. It was written in blue ink on lined paper. With no breaks, no paragraphs, it overwhelmed me like the Cross River overflowing its banks.

  Yet I was filled with hope that our children all over the world, irrespective of all the things that divide us, shall discover a language, a tenderness, a friendship with which to negotiate this increasingly complex world, this world we had so thoroughly messed up. I was filled with hope that these American children, especially those with recent roots outside these shores like Ujai and Igwat, would reach back as far as possible for the wisdom of balance, for the immigrant gifts that had always been the strength of this country. I hoped, too, in this reaching back, they would help their parents’ countries to fix the dysfunction that drove them here in the first place. I hoped they would not turn around to hurt their people like Tuesday Ita.

  Inspired by Ujai and friends, I vowed to write to Bishop Salomone. I vowed to even ask him to petition the compassionate, soccer-loving Pope Francis to send Dr. Martin Luther King’s books to his native Argentina with its horrible racist history—instead of just presenting one to the U.S. Congress as he did last year when he visited America. If Ojukwu could listen to a Pope and free the kidnapped Europeans he had put on death row, we could reach the human heart anywhere. Like Mohammed Dib, I believed hope “enclosed in inaccessible places” was still hope.

  ALAS, SUDDENLY I HAD the unshakable suspicion that bathing with anti-bedbug sprays was the crazy bath her parents fought over the night I had asked to move into their home. This. Was. The. Secret. This was what I thought I had demanded of the landlord in that angry voice mail. This was why Jeff had the two huge bags of empty sprays, and just as he had warned even in his drunkenness, now I could see clearly this was unhealthy.

  That night, my dreams were heavy with a thousand replies to Ujai and her friends. But beyond prayers, I was powerless. It reminded me of Joseph Conrad’s “Youth”: “You fight, work, sweat, nearly kill yourself, sometimes do kill yourself, trying to accomplish something—and you can’t. Not from any fault of yours. You simply can do nothing, neither great nor little—not a thing in the world …”

  CHAPTER 34

  Riskier than cooking for them

  SUNDAY AFTERNOON, ON MY WAY BACK FROM THE HIGH Line, I saw a poster on the adjacent building announcing it would be exterminated in four days. I turned down the Tiwa Savage song I was enjoying and studied the poster carefully. I never knew there were posters like this, and I thought I knew everything about the bugs. It was a bad case because the building had sealed furniture trash in front of it.

  Suddenly I felt completely vulnerable, naked, because I had trashed all my weapons. I did not sleep well and in the morning my head felt like I had light-headedness, though I did not. Afraid bugs in the adjacent building could somehow find their way to my apartment, I went proactive: I sneaked back to Washington Heights that evening. This time I bought a ton of just the anti-bedbug powder because this was more durable than the sprays. When the seller asked if the bugs were back, I joked I was merely stockpiling for all of Manhattan.

  I poured the powder all over my apartment floor, window ledge, blinds, bed cabinet, even the bed edges. Everywhere was matted in eerie grainy white, like ufok nduongo, a native memorial shrine, and when I walked in, snicks of dust snapped at my heels. The heater kept it dry and unwilling to settle, like dust. I sneezed so frequently I went to bed in a mask. I left a clean rag in a plastic bag by the door, to wipe my shoes before I went out.

  Now my only real problem with NYC was the plummeting temperature, because no matter the number of sweaters I wore under my coat, I was still cold outside. Unlike in my tropical Nigeria, I soon realized the brightness of the sun did not mean heat. Yet I was shocked how wastefully hot my apartment was, despite my initial concerns about the gaps in the windows. When I developed migraines and dizziness some mornings, I cracked the windows and slept better. Sometimes you got the impression that, the way these old heat radiators were groaning, even if you left your windows totally open they could keep out New York’s worst cold.

  However, one night, awoken by their crackle, I went to use the restroom. As I stood there urinating in the semi-darkness, my penis felt strange in my hand. I switched on the lights, trembling and wobbling my aim. I had been bitten in four places, a straight line across the tomato smoothness of the cap, a semi-ring of high welt hills, the distances between them modulated by tight valleys. Their volcanic eruptions, bloodshot and vicious, melted down the sides and would soon meet in the valleys. The trauma shrank my balls into one tight sack, a dried wrinkled passion fruit.

  With the powder everywhere, I could not figure out when or how they got ahold of my dick. “Iyo, Ekong Otis Udousoro, there’s no way you’re confiding this one to your neighbors!” I whispered as I gingerly pulled my pajama trousers back up to cover my shame. “No, this is riskier than cooking for them or revealing a fake rail religion!” Afraid the bugs might be in my pajamas, or the babies or eggs between the plies of the toilet roll, I cast off the trousers.

  But, as I bent down to inspect my bed, a bug parachuted in from on high. At first I thought it was falling from my head and subjected my hair to the roughest ruffle possible. Nothing dropped. When another bug dropped on the pillow, I looked up; they were rallying and gyrating on the ceiling, as though staging an elaborate uta victory dance. A few of them patrolled an invisible circumference, to protect the dancers. They had taken over the bedroom. I moved to the kitchen, like a man avoiding direct confrontation with the devil. I was trembling. I was too afraid to behold the ceiling. It felt as though they were roari
ng back to forcefully reclaim this little space of mine, like Dr. Zapata’s fear of rebounded racism in America.

  I SHUDDERED as my dick’s situation dredged up images of those of the victims in Trails of Tuskegee. I wanted to cry like Emily at that meeting when America first went wrong for me, that first moment I knew that in spite of my humanity I did not belong. Today I could not guarantee our landlord would make the entire block, like a country, safe for everyone. I could not stand eleven more nights in NYC. I just have to return to Nigeria this evening, I swore to myself, hoping to finish the last twenty stories of my anthology in Ikot Ituno-Ekanem.

  Caro’s phone was busy. Unable to sit down, I paced the length of my lodgings. The powder was disturbed when I moved too fast. When I coughed twice and a dog issued a low sleepy yelp, I put on my mask, to avoid coughing. Walking past the mirror, I noticed my eyes were bloodshot, like things bit by bugs. Yet, my mind was on the ceiling, to checkmate their next move. In the living room, when something moved in the chandelier, I backed away and hit the switch. The bulbs were dotted with black, as if birds were frozen in the filaments of lighting. Awakened by the glare and heat, they began to fall off like lazy raindrops through a flimsy cloud of white dust. They cut into my carpet of powder, dying instantly, bodies in shallow graves. I switched off the chandelier, for there seemed to be no point in killing them. Dead or alive, they had taken over the living room, too.