The Girl with the Louding Voice

by Abi Daré

  Cold is spreading rashes over my body. I am finished. Killed dead. What will I do? Where will I go?

  “Adunni.” Iya is talking with her breath and I am not hearing her well. “Behind the mattress is one door,” I think she is saying. “It is leading to our baffroom. Go there. Quick.”

  When I don’t move, Iya slap her hand on something. “Go. NOW!”

  I push myself up as if something just shock me electric in the back. I can see the door she is showing me, it is the place where she was hanging cloth. How was I blinding to this yesterday?

  The door is still rattling. “Open this door,” Papa is saying. And Iya is answering, “I am getting up from my bed. If you break the door of a old sick woman, thunder will strike you dead.”

  I push the door open, and I am tumbling into a narrow corridor that is smelling like piss. The piss smell is choking me and making me to cough and bringing water to my eyes.

  There is one very big bang, and then Papa’s voice: “Why was it taking you long to open door?”

  Iya is giving a mumble of answer that didn’t make sense.

  At the end of the corridor is another door. I enter, swallowing the vomit in my throat at the shits on the floor, some round and brown, like hard-boil egg, others watery like porridge. All of it is stinking. Flies is perching on the shits, jumping and dancing from one shit to another. To my left, beside the broken toilet with no flushing hand, is a baffing bowl with shit stains everywhere. I plant my feets on the only clean space on the floor and hold my vomit as I listen to Iya and Papa arguing with theirselfs:

  “Where is my daughter?”

  Mumble. Mumble.

  “Did something gum your mouth? I say where is my daughter? Peoples say they see her coming here last night.”

  Mumble. Mumble.

  Papa say, “Kayus, this old woman is having ear and mouth problem. Search this room for me. Check it everywhere. Find Adunni!”

  I hear boom, bam, slap, and I think Kayus and Papa are throwing the belongings in Iya’s room this way and that.

  Papa say, “What is in this nylon? Is it not Adunni’s cloth? Kayus, look it and tell me.”

  I don’t hear what Kayus is saying. I keep shut my eyes, fold myself into myself.

  “Is that a door there?” Papa say. “Open it.”

  Something is tumbling inside the corridor. Feets is making slap-slap again. Papa say, “Kayus, go inside that stinking place and check it that Adunni is not hiding inside. YOU HEAR ME?”

  “Yes, sah,” Kayus say.

  As the door is opening, I am holding my breath and pushing myself until my back is rubbing the shits on the wall. I am just praying the wall will open and swallow me and the shits, all of us together like that.

  Kayus is standing in my front. Looking me. No blink. Like he is seeing the spirit of Mama and Mama’s mama. I am shaking my head, pressing one finger to my lips. My eyes are begging him, my spirit is begging him. Please don’t tell Papa, my eyes are saying, don’t tell Papa.

  “Is she inside that place?” Papa ask from outside. “Kayus?”

  “No, sah,” he say. “Nothing here . . . but the window is open, maybe she is running to the market square.”

  “COME OUT and let us go NOW!” Papa say. “Quick. Morufu and his peoples are waiting. The village chief is waiting!”

  Kayus stay like that a moment, mouth shaking as if he is fighting to not cry. His eyes are wet with tears, but there is a pinch of a sad smile on his lips. And when he press his hand on his chest and nod his head, I know that Kayus is wanting me to run away and, most of all, to not allow them catch me.

  Thank you, I say with no voice. Thank you, my brother.

  “Kayus!” Papa shout. “Come on!”

  Kayus nod his head slow, our last bye-bye.

  Bye-bye, Kayus, my eyes say to him as he is turning hisself around and running outside. Bye-bye, my sweet Kayus.

  I remain standing there for a long, long time, with my hand on my chest, with the tears standing in my eyes.

  CHAPTER 21

  I find Iya sitting on the floor in her room, turning something inside a pot on top a kerosene stove with a long wooden spoon.

  There is a fire dancing under it, and when I enter the room, she low the fire, press her up lip to her nose.

  “Your whole body is stinking the whole place,” she say. “Go and baff. Throw away that smelling dress you are wearing. You have another dress?”

  I look my belongings in one corner by the floor, my mama’s Bible perching on the ankara dress. “They will come back,” I say, watching my cloths. “They saw all my belongings. I cannot use that place to baff. It is full of shit.”

  She start a laugh that end in a cough. Sound like somebody flushing toilet. “Nobody with sense is using that place to baff,” she say. “That place is for shitting. You shit and go. Every month, we clean it room by room. Next week, room number eight will clean it. Go behind the house, beside the well. Baff there.

  “I am cooking yam,” she add with a smile, as if me and her just finish talking and laughing about yam. As if my heart didn’t just nearly collapse finish because of Papa.

  “Hunger is not doing me,” I say. “Are you check it sure that my papa and Kayus, they have go?”

  “Since when?” she say. “They must be reaching Ikati by now. One of the small boys that is helping me in this compound is watching the village border for me. The boy can run very fast. If he sees your papa or brother coming, he will come and tell us.”

  Iya remove the cover from the pot, dip the spoon inside, and turn it around. I think it is yam porridge she is cooking. It is smelling like pepper and crayfish and palm oil yam, but it is looking like orange shit. Vomit climb my throat, but I push it back.

  “I send another small boy to call Kola for me and tell him to come,” she say. “Go now, Adunni. Go and wash yourself of all themess.”

  “What if Papa come back as I am baffing?”

  “Stand there and be asking me foolish questions,” she say as she slap the spoon of yam porridge on her palm and lick it for taste. “If your papa come back again and find you just standing there, I will not put my mouth in your matter. There is a room and bucket next to the well. Go quick.”

  I pick my ankara dress, pant, and brassiere from the floor and leave her front.

  The well, a circle of gray wall deep inside the ground and full of water, is behind the building. I throw the bucket inside, draw my water, and enter the baffroom: a square place with cold cement floor, slippery like someone pour raw egg on it. Just like the baffroom in Morufu house, there is green grass climbing up, up the wall to the iron roof.

  I off my cloth and begin to pour the water on my head. The cold water is shocking me electric and I am scrubbing my whole body with my palms and the water is mixing with my tears. Scrubbing and crying and scrubbing and crying until it feel as if I will peel my skin and be pouring blood if I don’t stop.

  When I finish, my skin is breathing in and out from too much scrubbing sore. I wear my brassiere and pant on my wet body like that because I don’t have cloth to be drying the water. By the time I go back to Iya, she is eating the yam porridge from the bowl, her fingers full of orange yam, as if she dip her hand inside orange paint.

  “You want food now?” she ask, licking her fingers. “It is new yam, new harvest.”

  “No, ma,” I say. “My stomach is turning me.”

  “Rest your mind, Kola is coming,” she say. “He is living in Idanra town, which is not far from here, but he is driving a motorcar and is having one of those telephone things that you are carrying around with you. What you call it?”

  “Mobile of telephone,” I say. “Morufu is having one. In English-speaking, to mobile means to be letting a thing go up and down by itself.”

  “That is it,” Iya say. Her eyes are shining, as if she is prouding of this h
er brother and this his mobile of telephone.

  * * *

  I am fighting sleep from my eyes when somebody start to knock again. But it is not angry knock, not like Papa own.

  “Open it,” Iya say. “It must be Kola. My brother.”

  I open it. There is one man standing there. He look lanky, with a face like a burned something. There is marks on his face too; two straight lines from under each of his eyes to his jaws area, as if somebody vex and draw number eleven on each of his cheeks with thick black paint.

  “Morning, sah,” I say, kneeling down.

  He bend his neck to the left, eye me up and down, and clear his throat as if he about to start singing a very loud song.

  “Is my sister inside?” he ask.

  “Come in, sah.” I step to one side for him to enter. “Welcome, sah.”

  He greet Iya with a quick nod of his head, and she pray for him and thank him for the Milo and Lipton Tea he was sending her last month. He ask if she is taking her medicine, and she say yes, three times of the day, even though I didn’t see her taking any medicine yesternight or this morning.

  When he scratch his throat again, I am thinking maybe he is needing water.

  “Did you send for me?” he ask Iya, sounding as if he is vexing, as if Iya is always troubling him. “I don’t have any money for you yet.”

  “I don’t care for your money,” she say, “but you must help me for this one. The girl that open the door just now is Adunni. Remember Idowu, the woman selling puff-puff in Ikati? Adunni is her daughter.”

  “Ah.” Mr. Kola turn to my side, nod his head yes. “I remember when she was bringing food for you. Sorry about your mother’s passing.”

  “Thank you, sah,” I say.

  “She needs our help,” Iya say. Then she is telling him all the story about Khadija and how my papa is looking for me and how he will be coming back. “Can you find her job like all those girls you use to help? Adunni is very good girl. She is even knowing book. She is speaking good, good English.”

  Mr. Kola sniff his nose. “Iya, I can help her, but not today. Today is too short notice. I know she is in trouble, but if she can wait maybe one week, I can find—”

  “One week is too far,” Iya say. “She must go today. This morning. Her papa will come back to find her here. I know it. I cannot let anything bad happen to Adunni. I make a promise to her mother years back, I will keep that promise till I die.”

  My eyes pinch again with tears when Iya say this, and I press my hands together, bring it to my lips and say a prayer of thank you for her.

  “I hear you,” Mr. Kola say. “But there is nobody that can give her a job because . . .” He stop his talking, as if he is just thinking another thing. “There is one girl that is supposed to be starting work for me in Lagos today,” he say. “Maybe I can put Adunni instead. She seems to be what my boss is looking for. The right age. Can she travel to somewhere far like Lagos?”

  Lagos, the big, shining city? The Lagos of plenty aeloplane and motorcars and moneys? The Lagos that me and my friend Enitan, we was talking about all the time? And dreaming of going when we have small moneys?

  My heart is turning of excitement and sadness. I am feeling much sadness because I was wanting to go to Lagos to see what it is looking like and learn about the place, not because I am running away. But the man is waiting for my answer, and Papa and Morufu can come back anytime now.

  “I can travel any far you want, sah,” I say. “I am a good girl, sah.”

  “Let me make the call,” he say.

  He put his hand inside his pocket and bring out the mobile of telephone. He press the thing one, two, three numbers and put it to his ears. He is talking, moving his head up and down, left and right.

  “Hello? Big Madam? Morning, ma. This is Mr. Kola-the-Agent calling. Sorry I am waking you up this early morning. There is a small, important problem. The girl I was bringing today is developing typhoid fever. Too sick to travel long journey. I have another girl. Good one. Her name is Adunni. Yes. Same price. Small girl, yes. Did I ever disappoint you, ma? Of course, yes. She has passed all the medical tests. Thank you.” He press the number on the mobile thing again and put it inside his pocket.

  “All is done,” he say. “Pack your things. We are going to Lagos.”

  I didn’t sure whether to be laughing or crying. My throat is closing as I am kneeling and thanking Iya and putting my belongings into another nylon bag that Iya give me.

  “Kola, thank you,” Iya say, clapping. “Adunni’s mother’s spirit is thanking you.”

  Mr. Kola nod his head, dip his hand inside his pocket, and bring out two dirty notes of money and a key. He squeeze the moneys and put it inside Iya’s hand. “Things are hard. The country is not smiling. Manage this till next month.” He turn to me, make a beckon with the key in his hand. “Let’s go.”

  I hold my bag tight, but I don’t move my feets. I stand there, blinking, looking the man because what if the man be a bad man? What if he will do me bad things in the Lagos?

  “Iya?” I say, wanting to ask her if she really know this man well, even though he is her brother, but the words are hiding somewhere inside my brain and I am looking for them, but they are hiding too far so I just stand there, looking the man, blinking.

  “Adunni,” Iya say, sounding like she will slap her stick on my head any moment now if I don’t move my feets. “You better go with him before your peoples are coming back.”

  The man sniff up his nose, turn around, say, “I will be in the car. If I don’t see you after five minutes, I move.”

  “Pray for me,” I say to Iya, bending to where she is sitting on the floor so she can touch my head.

  “Good things will meet you in Lagos,” she say, pointing a hand to my head. “Your mama’s spirit is with you. Go quick.”

  It is after Mr. Kola on the engines of his car and forward it on the road that the load of everything gather itself and fall on my head, breaking my spirit.

  I am leaving Ikati.

  This is what I been wanting all my life, to leave this place and see what the world outside is looking like, but not like this. Not with a bad name following me. Not like a person that the whole village is looking for because they think she have kill a woman. Not with one half of my heart with Kayus and the other half with Khadija.

  I hang my head down, feeling a thick, heavy cloth as it is covering me. The thick cloth of shame, of sorrow, of heart pain.

  CHAPTER 22

  Lagos is far like we are driving to the end of the Nigeria. It been three hours or so since we leave Agan village, and we are still on the express motorway.

  Sleep is catching me, but the road is having potholes every five minutes of driving and Mr. Kola’s blue Mazda car is just doing like electric is shocking it every time we fall inside the pothole. All the jerking is slapping the sleep from my eyes. Sometimes, I am even fearing the car will just division into two and Mr. Kola will gum to one half and I will gum to the other half.

  Because of it, I am keeping my eyes on the window and looking outside. The express motorway is having womens, mens, and childrens selling bread, Coca-Cola and Fanta, dried bush meat hanging upside down on a stick, newspapers, fruits, water in a nylon bag. My stomach is vexing with hunger, but I am not asking Mr. Kola to stop for me to be buying food because Mr. Kola is stronging his face and holding the wheel-steering with his two hands tight as if he is afraid the wheel-steering will just fly away. There is a angry line on his front head, a rough folding of his skin.

  We been driving in silent since morning, and when I am tired of keeping shut, I ask him a question.

  “When will we reach this Lagos?” I ask as I use my palm to cover my eyes from the sun. It is not yet midday, but the heat is much, feel as if the sun is spitting fire from the sky. Everywhere is burning, even the rubber of the car chair is frying my buttocks, and sometime
s I am sitting on my palms to be keeping my buttocks cool. When he didn’t answer me, I ask him again.

  “Soon,” he say, looking up in the car looking-glass and cutting to another lane in the road.

  “What will be happening to me?”

  “You work,” he say. “That reminds me. Adunni, listen. I have a medical result in my boot. My doctor friend made it for me. Big Madam wants to be sure you are not carrying sickness.” He slide his eyes to me. “Are you carrying sickness?”

  “No, sah.”

  “Good. I will write your name on the medical result and show it to Big Madam. If she asks you if we went to the doctor, you must say yes, we went to Idanra clinic, okay? If you say no, no more work for you.”

  “I will say yes,” I say, shifting in my seat, not understanding why Mr. Kola is lying. If he is lying about doctor, what else he be lying about? Did I really think it well before I was running to leave Ikati and follow this man? I look him, the flesh of his jaws moving up and down as if he is eating the air, and sigh. If he is telling lies to me, nothing I can do about it. I cannot be going back to Ikati or running to anywhere now.

  “You will stay with me in this work?” I ask.

  “No. I will visit you every three months.”

  “I will be going to school in this work?” I ask.

  He look me one kind, clear his throat. “If you are behaving and Big Madam likes you, she may put you in school.”

  “If my papa comes back to find me, will Iya tell them where we are going?”

  “Iya will die than to betray your mother,” he say. “She is a stubborn woman and is not afraid to die. Look, your papa can never find you again, not by Iya. Not by me. Not except you go back to Ikati by yourself. Do you want to go back?”

  I shake my head in a quick no, even though my heart is paining me that I cannot never be going back to Ikati. “Who is this Big Madam?” I ask, rubbing my chest, the pain in my heart. “Why are you calling her that?”