by Jennifer Juo
As Winston walked back from the grave, he saw a small shrine made of wood and palm leaves they had built to make offerings of kola nuts and food to Simeon’s spirit for many years to come. It was similar to Winston’s own shrine of incense sticks and fruit used to honor his mother and father. The chief, old and infirm, was carried to participate in the funeral. But the old man’s mind was already lost.
Winston knew Simeon would remain very much part of his family’s life. Death was merely a rite of passage into the spirit world, and Simeon’s spirit would remain here, hovering over his family. His family members would remember him, leave leftover food in the pot for him, pour drink on the ground, make offerings of food to his shrine, and continue to refer to him, “Simeon’s spirit said so and so.” The thought comforted Winston, or at least it assuaged his guilt.
***
As he drove home with Donna in the jeep, Winston felt exhausted and emotionally drained. The sun was setting outside. He knew they shouldn’t drive home in the dark, but Donna didn’t seem to care and offered to drive. Along the road, he saw several carcasses of burned cars and a dead animal lying on the side of the road, a dog or goat, he wasn’t sure. But as they got closer, he realized it was a human corpse, mutilated and already rotting in the heat. Suddenly, he felt afraid of the violent, struggling country around him and those who were seemingly trying to help it.
“We can still do something,” Donna said, her eyes fixed on the empty road in front of her. She didn’t seem to notice the dead body lying by the roadside or perhaps she tried not to.
“I’m listening,” Winston said, his nerves frayed by the macabre sight along the road.
“Remember that journalist friend? National Geographic? He’s still planning to come out. Now we’ve got an even better story here, we’ve got farmers pushed off their land, riots, maimed farmers, and the evil axis of multinational agribusiness and foreign aid.”
“Well-said. You’re good at this.” This was the story of Simeon’s life, Winston thought, depressingly.
“If you’re willing to be quoted in the story, it will give it meat,” Donna continued. “A senior scientist working on the project, a whistle blower. That’ll give it credibility. I’m just a student, so you’re who they need.”
“He can quote me on whatever he wants.”
Winston was desperate, and he held onto this idea of Donna’s as his last hope to put things right. But he couldn’t shake the image of the dead, rotting body lying on the side of the road. When he returned home, he was haggard, unshaven, and his wife took him in her arms. Finally, he was speaking to her in the form of emotions, which was a language she could understand. She held him close, and he buried himself in her chest like a newborn. He didn’t want her to let go.
***
The next month in December 1985, Winston and Sylvia went to a barbecue at the golf clubhouse. Winston stood talking to Richard. Sylvia stayed close by his side. Winston noticed Ayo wander into the party, but she did not go to him. Ayo tried to get her attention, but she avoided looking at him. He turned to focus on what Richard was trying to tell him.
“Look, I’m sorry about Simeon’s death too,” Richard said. “But…”
Winston simply stared at him. He knew what his colleague was going to say.
“Don’t do anything rash. Think about the consequences first. Collaborating with a journalist is bloody risky,” Richard continued.
“I haven’t heard from the ADA. It’s been several months now since I sent the report to them. You’d think they would want to learn from their mistakes. Instead, they ignore them.”
“Don’t risk your bloody career over this.”
“You mean to say one African farmer’s death is not worth getting angry about?”
“No. That’s not what I meant. I meant—don’t destroy everything we’ve…you’ve worked for.”
“But just what have we been working for?”
Richard was silent.
“Fifteen years of my life I gave to this, and I have nothing to show for it. Except Cole Agribusiness’ bottom line just got better while Simeon’s only got worse.” Winston’s tone turned bitter.
“Look, I agree this is all bollocks. But it’s not worth sticking your neck out. At least wait until the ADA’s annual visit in a few months. Then you can talk to them face-to-face. They won’t be able to dodge you then,” Richard said, trying to persuade him.
“I’ve waited too long already.”
SYLVIA
Chapter 36
Winston was a changed man. Suddenly, Sylvia saw the emotional, vulnerable side of him, the side she had wanted to find in him for so long. His project had collapsed, and with it, her husband was imploding emotionally. He needed her now, and she wanted to be there for him.
But her daughter was away at school and not a part of this new closeness. Lila had become full of adolescent rage. Every Sunday afternoon at their boarding schools, they had scheduled “letter writing time.” They had to sit in the refectory, where they usually ate their meals, and write letters home. On blue stationary, Lila began to write to her mother. At first, her weekly letters were diary-like summaries of what she did every day—woke up, went to Church, went into the village, and bought sweets. I hope you feel better, Mama. But gradually her letters became the forum, the medium for her questions, her hurtful rage. Dear Mama and Baba—Where did I come from? I have seen so much, yet I know so little. Why is the color of my skin, my hair, not like yours? Why does my father not love me?
While she was away, Lila turned and lashed out at Sylvia. She was thirteen years old, almost fourteen. Maybe it was just puberty or maybe the distance gave her the space to come out of her shell, far away from her family. While the miles between them let her grow to hate Sylvia, the distance only made Sylvia love her more. She missed her children so much while they were at school that to receive only these letters of anger was hard to bear. She didn’t show them to Winston. He had enough going on, she thought. He didn’t need to deal with her adolescent rage.
After the first few months at school, Lila and Thomas came back for the Christmas holidays. Their lives were now split in half into two worlds like the Chinese yin-yang symbol—one cold, white; the other hot, black.
Sylvia met them at the airport. Lila looked different. Away from the sun, the brown tan of her skin had faded, revealing a pink-white color underneath, similar to the English girls. But her hair was brown, still brown even after the sunless English sky, not sun-bleached as Sylvia had told her. She realized her daughter had looked at her pink-white skin in the mirror, newly revealed to her in the gray skies of England, and she had hated Sylvia for hiding her true identity. At the airport, Sylvia tried to hug Lila tightly, but she resisted. She had come home to wage war.
For the first few days, neither of them mentioned her letters and their contents. But Sylvia saw Winston’s eyes register the paleness of Lila’s skin, the revelation of her true colors. She heard the migratory birds flying above their house, flying in a V, coming south for the winter like her daughter. In local beliefs, birds were associated with witches. She knew Lila was drawing on their power to wage war.
***
On Saturday, to celebrate the children’s arrival for the holidays, the family went to Lucky Dragon Chinese restaurant for lunch.
As they ate their comfort food, Winston asked the children about their new schools. What subjects did they like? Thomas began talking about the science lab and golf course at his all-boys boarding school run by monks. Sylvia noticed Lila said nothing.
Winston continued asking Thomas more questions about school—what was it like? What did he do on the weekends? But Winston never asked Lila anything. Sylvia could tell she was burning with anger.
Suddenly, Lila exploded, “It’s a prison. The nuns keep us locked up. It’s boring and freezing cold. A stone castle of a prison.”
Sylvia felt guilty, aware that it was because of her that they had been sent to such a place.
Lila continu
ed, blurting out the question she had asked so many times in those letters.
“Baba, why do you favor Thomas over me?”
Sylvia shifted uncomfortably in her seat. Winston looked up at Lila. His face seemed fatigued, vulnerable, easy prey to her witch-like anger.
“You…you,” she began accusingly. Winston just looked at her, a piercing kind of look studying every inch of her face—as if he was seeing her for the very first time.
Lila continued, “I mean…you…ignore me. You only pay attention to Thomas. It’s like…like I barely exist in your mind.”
“I…don’t mean to—” Winston stuttered.
“Why is that? Why did you do this to me?” Lila interrupted him, throwing the full energy of her attack against him. Sylvia was afraid for the both of them. Lila was too strong, full of anger, and he was too weak, full of pain. Sylvia didn’t know who to side with. For years, it had been the other way around: Lila had been the weak one.
“Lila,” Sylvia said. “Calm down. This isn’t the way--”
But she ignored Sylvia, continuing her adolescent rant. “Why do you hate me? You have made my life miserable! I hate you! What kind of father are you?” She started crying and ran from the table.
“I am not your father,” Winston said. He sounded defeated. Lila whipped around and looked at him. Even though she had suspected this her whole life, known it to be the truth, to hear these words out loud from him, it came down hard on her.
Lila ran out the door of the Lucky Dragon onto the dusty streets of Ibadan. Sylvia chased after her daughter, running through crowded market vendors and garbage-filled alleyways between mud-baked walls. Sylvia had a hard time keeping up with Lila, but she didn’t want to lose sight of her, not here in the middle of town.
They came to what was once an ancient temple in the middle of town. The modern temple was crammed in between shops and stalls—a shoemaker’s sandals hung on its outer walls. Sylvia followed Lila into the dusty inner sanctuary lit by a bare electric bulb hung from a wire, its carved doors and sculptures stolen long ago. Sylvia’s eyes adjusted to the semi-darkness, and she looked around the shabby temple. It had once been a labyrinth of chambers and courtyards, carved pillars and doors, a vermilion ceiling, and intricately carved sculptures of monkeys and women. When a lost English explorer had first discovered it years ago, he thought he had found the lost city of Atlantis.
“Lila, I know you’re in here, come out. I want to explain everything to you.” Sylvia called into the musty sanctuary, fearing that snakes might be taking refuge in the corners somewhere.
“It’s a bit late for that,” Lila said, hiding behind some rotting wood pillars.
Sylvia tried to tell her about her biological English father, but Lila put her hands over her ears, shouting out loudly, so she couldn’t hear her mother’s words.
Their family was like this decaying, abandoned shrine. There had been too many secrets. Sylvia’s life had been built upon one layer of secrets after another. There were so many things she wanted to tell her daughter, but now Lila was becoming a teenager, she was deaf to her words. Sylvia regretted all those times as a small child, she had been eager to listen, but Sylvia had remained silent.
***
The next day, Winston left for the bush before dawn. It was better to let them cool off apart, Sylvia thought. Lila got up late, around eleven in the morning, and all through breakfast she said nothing. Sylvia tried to put her arm out to her, to comfort her, but the girl shrugged her away. Her daughter sat at the breakfast table like a guest, a stranger in her own home. Patience served her freshly cut pineapple and toast with homemade guava jam.
When Lila was finished, she got up from table, tossing her batik napkin on her chair carelessly. Sylvia watched her walk out the door, heading to the clubhouse pool where all the other teenagers congregated during the holidays. Since returning from boarding school, it was as if Lila wanted to spend the minimum amount of obligatory time with her family. She hated them, Sylvia thought. Lila was entitled to that, Sylvia could only blame herself.
The tables were turned now. She wanted to spend every minute with her children. She had missed them so much while they were away, but they wanted nothing to do with her now. What had happened to all those years when they were young? She had squandered that time, Sylvia realized, in her lover’s arms.
Winston was not himself lately, which was why he must have just spat out the truth, not caring if it hurt or not. After years of strained relations, how could the two of them—father and daughter—ever repair their relationship? As for Lila, she hid in her room, counting the days until she could return to her other world, the cold one, without them.
WINSTON
Chapter 37
Winston was running now. He kept driving his jeep with no sense of purpose. Lila’s outburst had been more than he could bear. She was right, though, he knew. He had somehow mistreated her when all he had ever wanted to do was save her. But he had failed to be a father to her. Winston hadn’t wanted to be like his own father, but he had become him.
Winston found himself driving toward what was left of Simeon’s village. Nothing made sense to him anymore. He was running on raw emotion now, all his usual restraint and rationality gone. He had let too many people down. As he approached the remains of the village, Winston parked his jeep. He told his armed guard to wait for him. He wanted some time alone. He walked around the burned huts, Simeon’s half-built cement house, and the blackened fields. He stopped in front of what was once the chief’s house, the painted colors of the wall now blackened by soot. In the distance, he could make out a man standing with the menacing silhouette of a machete hanging from his hand. The land now belonged to Cole Agribusiness, and Winston knew he was trespassing. He quickly started running back toward his jeep. But another man with a machete appeared out of the forest and blocked him. He recognized the hardened face of Oluwa who now worked at the plantation. Winston could hear his own heart thrashing about wildly in his rib cage. Oluwa wore a green Cole Agribusiness cap with the maize insignia. There was only one direction to go now—into the forest. He started running into the jungle, even though he knew it was a trap.
Oluwa and his henchman chased Winston through the sacred forest toward the mud palace, the shrine Simeon’s village once used for harvest rituals. Winston ran inside the ruins of the old mud palace, in between the narrow walls of red earth, columns, courtyards, and tall, kapok trees. He saw an empty palm trunk once serving as a beehive, an ancient weapon against outsiders. Bees, familiar with the odor of the family, only became angry around strangers.
Winston looked back and saw the men closing in on him. He ran past what looked like shrines to ancestors—phallic-shaped mounds stained with blood of sacrificed animals. Out of breath, Winston came to a courtyard full of overgrown banana trees. He knew he was finished. There was nowhere else to run. The machete men caught up with him and hit him in the face. Winston lay on the dirt ground, looking up at them.
“You’re trespassing, sah,” Oluwa said.
“I will go and get de boss. Tie him up,” the other man said.
Winston waited in the old earthen palace for about an hour, tied at his feet and ankles by some rough rope. His throat felt parched, his clothes were drenched with sweat. He didn’t want to think about what his fate would be this time.
He was surprised to see Jim McCormack walk into the banana tree courtyard.
“Winston, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know it was you. They just said there was trespasser,” Jim said. Then he turned to his henchman. “Untie him, please.”
Winston stood up, untied now. “I see Oluwa has worked out well as your foreman.”
“He has actually. I’ve promoted him,” Jim said. “Listen, let’s go back to my office and we’ll get you cleaned up and have a nice cold beer. There’s something actually I want to chat with you about,” Jim said.
“You can say whatever you want to me here,” Winston said, declining Jim’s material comforts.
“I’m sorry, I don’t understand.” Winston was confused. Did the man want to discuss his philosophy of life? His henchman had just beaten and tied him up, it was all too bizarre.
“I mean, like everyone else, don’t you want to get out of this place?” Jim said. “I can get you American citizenship. For your whole family. A suburban house, even. A brand new car in the garage with keys in it. A nice job with Cole in Chicago. What do you think? Consider it a bonus for all the good work you’ve done for Cole and the ADA.”
Winston couldn’t believe what he had just heard and he shook his head. He wondered if Jim knew about Donna’s journalist who was finally due to arrive next week. Donna had applied for his visa for “personal reasons,” citing his visit as pleasure, not business. If the journalist, with Winston’s help, exposed the dysfunctional role of Cole Agribusiness in Africa, he knew Cole could potentially lose millions of dollars in supplier contracts with the ADA and other aid organizations involved in agriculture development.
