by Okey Ndibe
“Again, I don’t know. Maybe I was trying to save myself. From my past. But I want to know about you. Tell me what they did to you.”
She covered her face with her hands and began to cry. I saw a cut on her left arm, swollen and caked with blood.
“We stood at the Ojuelegba bus stop, looking for customers. That’s where we usually stand. Tina and Lovet stand there every night. Myself only when things are hard. Suddenly, there was a big commotion. People scattered in every direction. Tina and Lovet and myself thought armed robbers were raiding the bus stop again. So we stood still because it’s not good to panic when there’s confusion. We know a woman who ran without looking and landed in the hands of the robbers. They made her eyes see pepper.
“By the time we saw the army people, it was too late to run. At least ten of them surrounded us. One of them pointed his gun at us and shouted, ‘Freeze or you’re dead!’ They slapped us, twap! twap! Stars flew from my eyes. Blood filled my mouth. I was so afraid of losing it that I swallowed it. The soldiers made us jump like frogs to where their trucks were parked. There were three trucks in all, and they arrested seven girls.
“One of the girls kept shouting that she was not a prostitute. The commander of the troops slapped her until she collapsed. Then he stood over her. Smiling, he said, ‘If you are not a prostitute, that means you’re fresh meat. That’s the kind I like. I will make you a prostitute tonight.’’’
Her voice trailed off and her breath came in gasps as she relived the dreadful memory.
“The soldiers put Tina, Lovet and me in one truck. Five soldiers were in the back with us. They smelled of ogogoro and wee wee. They called us bushmeat and boasted how they would show us “army fire.” Until the truck stopped here, we didn’t know where they were taking us.”
She strained against the glare of the sun and looked into my eyes, as if to say that I knew the rest of the story.
Silence enveloped us. Looking out to the waves, I thought about her story and about Iyese. The past seemed to intermix with the present. Iyese’s image, dulled by time, regained clarity. I remembered the emptied look in Iyese’s eyes the day she was raped. My flight from her. Her letters to me, full of hopeless longing and mild reproach. Then her murder on a day arrows of rain pelted the earth.
Tay Tay stared at me, perhaps wondering what I thought about her, now that she had unmasked herself to me. How I judged her in her nakedness. Little did she know that a man such as I could not judge anybody.
“How many of them raped you?” I asked.
She let out a burst of laughter. “How do you expect me to know that? After the first two, I stopped counting. It could have been one soldier tearing my thighs apart. Or all the soldiers in the world. What does it matter? The pain was the same. It was . . . There’s no way to describe it.”
“I am sorry,” I said.
Chapter Twenty-three
I had lived on B. Beach for close to twenty years when the screams of Tay Tay and the others awoke the demons of my past. After that the hallucinations about knives and shadowy men with guns resumed, along with the old insomnia. I kept my ears open at night because I had promised Tay Tay that the next time I heard a woman scream I would walk up to the soldiers and spoil their gruesome party, even at the risk of my life.
For the next two weeks the soldiers kept away; the nights were stirred only by familiar sounds: the roar of the waves, the hiss of nocturnal insects, the voices of people who came to the beach at odd hours of the night to smoke their joints of marijuana or to make love. Then one day in October I read about two unidentified female corpses that were found at Tarkwa Bay and Coconut beaches. Was Tay Tay one of them, I wondered? Had she met the violent, anonymous death I feared was her destiny?
That night, screams pierced the air again, a single woman’s shriek, long and steady. There were male voices, too: barking at her, taunting, hooting, gloating, laughing lecherously. I did not stir but lay crouched against my boulder, unable to revive the rage and resolution that had provoked my pledge to Tay Tay. It was as if I had split into two persons: the man who had promised to stand up to the brutal rapists and the man who now listened to a woman’s terrified screams with a sort of indifference.
Time passed and the bloody orgy ended. I heard the blast of the truck’s exhaust, then the sputter of its engine as it drove away. A part of me desired to search in the dark for the woman left on the sand and try to help her. But another part of me dissented. Why endeavor to save the life of a woman already utterly destroyed? So that, till her dying day, she could endlessly relive and recount the horrors of that night? I did not move.
In the weeks that followed, the soldiers returned with regularity, sometimes with one screaming quarry, other times with more. I read news reports about female corpses found at other beaches, too. The accounts contained police theories of the killer’s psychological portrait and likely motives. One theory was that he had contracted a serious venereal disease from a prostitute. Another, that he had been cheated out of money. Or he could be a religious fanatic waging a moral war against prostitution.
W
I clearly remember the events of that morning when a young woman died on the beach and I was arrested, charged with rape and murder.
The night had been cold and dark as charcoal. I had spent it coiled up against the boulder, like a baby drawing warmth from a mother’s body. Soon after the church bell rang four times, I heard the clatter of a truck pulling to a stop, then the shudder of a turned-off engine. A cold dread enveloped me. My heart thudded in my chest.
The voice of a woman being dragged, pleading, aroused a weak flame of anger inside me, but it quickly died away. Lethargic and weak-willed, I lay still. For two hours the fierce torrent of the woman’s shrieks tore the night in two. After the soldiers’ departure, my dread unthawed. Compelled by shame and guilt I decided to seek out the victim. Guided by her groans, I traced a path to her through the mist. As I approached her the bell at St. Gregory’s Cathedral chimed seven times. I bent over her and asked, “Can you hear me?”
She stopped groaning. There was silence. “Can you?” I said again.
She let out a shriek that stilled the wind. Then, in one wild motion, she bolted up and ran towards the waves, like one hastening to embrace a lover returned from afar. I wanted to shout after her that I was not one of her tormentors, but my tongue was glued to the floor of my mouth. As I watched, her faint figure disappeared in the mist. I heard a choked cry as she collided with the waves: a cross between a belated cry for help and a defiant dare to fate.
It was then that I ran after her, following the path she had cleared through the mist. I ran until a wave hit me. I reeled, then lowered myself into the cold water. I swam blindly, thrusting this way and that, drawn by her voice. Time seemed to stand still. I was already exhausted when I heard her cough just behind me. I lunged in the direction of the cough, then grabbed one of her legs. She kicked out with her free leg and hit my face. The stab of pain spread in widening circles inside my head. Dazed and out of breath, I was unable to swim properly for a while, but could only rise and fall with the rhythm of the waves. The woman’s yelps grew fainter as the waves drew her further and further away. Eventually she became one with the mist, invisible. Too tired to go after her, I began to swim in the direction of the shore.
I was almost there when I saw a tall figure wading in. I recognized Lanky the lifeguard.
“Don’t bother,” I muttered to him. “Death’s will is strong.”
He paid me no heed but ploughed on into the ocean. A short while later he began to shout instructions, to which the drowning woman responded with weak moans. Soon their voices ceased. Had the two of them met the same fate, overwhelmed by the ocean’s power? I wondered. But in a moment Lanky appeared at the edge of the shore. The next wave deposited the woman’s body at his feet. He pulled her out of the reach of the waves, then stood astride her and began to pre
ss on her belly. Faint snorty sounds came from her, followed by horrible gargles. I moved closer and observed the lifeguard at his work of resuscitation. I knew his efforts were in vain.
The sun broke through the mist and bathed the scene in pale light. The dying woman turned her head ever so slightly towards me. Her eyes were red, as if daubed in blood, but the expression on her face was turning into something radiant and peaceful. A smile.
I turned and walked away, ashamed of myself for yet another failure, another turning away from responsibility. What was my life but a succession of silences, evasions, abdications? I saw the panorama of my past projected as if on a large screen spread before my mind’s eye. My mother. My father. My grandmother. Iyese. Tay Tay. Iyese again. And again.
Later, I saw from a distance that people had begun to gather around Lanky and the corpse. I could not resist the urge to return to the scene.
I listened to Lanky tell the dead woman’s story. His gusto saddened me. For neither he nor his audience understood the dreadful and devious workings of power. They did not realize that for those who suffer in this life, the grave can possess a dark allure.
PART THREE
Malaise
Chapter Twenty-four
I had begun reading the story after I returned from work on a Friday evening. Engrossed in its twists and turns I did not stop to eat supper until, in the dead of the night, I read its last strange sentence—and by then a grumbly stomach had become the least of my worries.
I remembered the words of the sorceress I had visited last year in a desperate bid to unearth my biological roots. Like my other efforts, the visit had been a dismal failure—until this story illuminated my past in a way that made my heart tremble. Did the gods wish to punish me for casting a backward glance? For trying to crack open the kernel of forbidden mysteries? There was no immediate answer to these questions: Bande prison was closed to visitors at weekends.
Early in the morning I rolled out of bed and reached for the phone. My adoptive mother picked up after the first ring. Her “hello” was the slur of somebody startled from sleep.
“It’s Femi,” I announced without salutation.
“Is everything all right? Are you okay? You’re not in any trouble, are you?” Four months ago, when she learned about my plan to move out to my own flat, she had cried and cajoled, afraid that something would go wrong: I would not eat well enough, or be able to keep the flat clean.
“Everything is fine. Well, most things,” I mumbled. “I called to ask you a few questions.” Pausing to choose my words cautiously, I heard the quickened rise and fall of her breath. “Did you adopt me from the Langa Orphanage?”
Her reply bore the marks of irritation. “Your father and I went out to a function at the Niger Club last night. Why do you wake me up from sleep to ask a question I have answered before?”
“I’m sorry,” I said formally. “But I really want to be clear.”
“Yes, from there! Could I now return to sleep?”
“Does the name Iyese mean anything to you? Or Emilia?”
Silence.
“Was my mother named Iyese or Emilia?”
A short spell of silence. In the background, I heard my adoptive father’s sleepy voice ask, “Is he starting up with that crap again?” She hushed him. Then, in a hurt tone, she said, “I see I’m no longer a mother to you.”
“I meant my biological mother.”
“I have told you that I don’t have those details.” She sounded impatient.
“Was she a prostitute?”
Silence.
“Was she murdered?”
She gave a long sigh of exasperation. “I really must go back to sleep.” Then I heard the click of the receiver as she hung up. For a few seconds I stared in disgust at the phone in my hand, buzzing with a dial tone.
I went to the wardrobe and rummaged in several trouser pockets until I found the marijuana cigarette I had been saving. Then I groped my way to the door and went outside. The morning was still grey and overcast. I struck a match and, with my left palm, shielded its flickering flame from the breeze while I lit the joint. I drew hungrily, letting the smoke slip down my throat and spread deeply inside me. Exhaling slowly, I was rocked by a sharp nausea. With a flick of the finger I tossed the burning roll onto the dewy grass. A wisp of smoke curled up from it and rose into the air.
I lay back in bed, my thoughts a series of disconnected waves. The only thing clear in my mind was the certainty that I could not bear to see Bukuru in person. A face-to-face would involve too much pain on my part; perhaps too much shame on his. Any further communication with him would be by letter, a less personal device. Without waiting for the outlines of the thought to be filled in, I fetched some sheets of paper. In a shaky hand, I began to scribble a letter I planned to send through Dr. Mandi.
Monday morning came, but rather than driving to Dr. Mandi’s office as I had planned, I found myself heading for Bande prison.
A very different journey from the first. The curiosity I had felt during the earlier visit had given way to a heaviness of spirit. I was grateful for the solitariness of the rough road, the absence of other traffic. My emotions, still very much in a flux, needed a wide empty space within which to sort themselves out.
How was I going to start once I entered Bukuru’s cell? Give him the letter straight away? Let him read it, or read it to him? Perhaps just try to talk, saving the letter to give to him when I left? But would he talk? Under my accusing eyes, might he not clam up and back away? As for me, how much more of my past could I bear to disinter?
The prison superintendent was at a meeting. His secretary welcomed me with a warmth I found sadly ironic, then ran off to fetch a warder to escort me. She returned with a stocky man whose eyes shone evilly.
“Corporal Joshua will take you to the cell,” she said.
Joshua pitched groundnuts into his mouth, chewing with wide movements of the jaw, like a camel.
“You doctors no get fear,” he said outside the superintendent’s office, the smell of roasted nut thick on his breath. “You no fear to enter cell and talk with a madman. I strong, but I no fit talk to crazeman. That one pass me.”
Confronted with Bukuru in the pathetic flesh, I was struck dumb by sensations I had no words to express. I avoided his eyes, afraid that engaging them would reveal to me a truth I half wished not to learn.
At length he asked, “Did Dr. Mandi send you my story?”
“Yes,” I said.
“Did you find time to read it?”
“I read it over the weekend. That’s why I’ve come to see you.” His eyes glowed with the hunger of curiosity.
“It was dispiriting,” I said.
“It wasn’t easy for me to write.”
“Your story ends where mine begins. That’s why I have come today. To tell you my own story.”
“Your own story?” he echoed.
“I told you and Dr. Mandi that I was one of life’s underdogs. Remember?”
“Oh,” he said.
“Since twelve, I have been looking for a lost part of myself. For the door through which I came into the world. For the man and woman whose blood mingled to mold me. Simple things others took for granted. Until I read your story, I had no idea at all. I have come because I believe you may know the answers. But I should tell you my own story first.”
I handed him my letter. He furrowed his brows in bewilderment, then began to read.
It was only ten years ago that I found out that I was an adopted child. It all began with a fight with my younger sister. When the fight was over, my life had changed. That’s what drew me to the smiling corpse: it reminded me of the mystery of life. My life. I wanted to discover why somebody would die a hard death wearing a happy face.
For ten years I have experienced a recurrent dream in which a couple appear to me, sometimes sad, somet
imes happy. Hardly ever in a hurry, they spend a long time with me, playing the games of my choice. When I ask, first the man, then the woman, “Are you my father?” “Are you my mother?”—then they vanish. The man disappears instantly, but the woman always hesitates. When I wake up the tears of my dream are still running down my face.
My life has been a stream cut off from its source, a story without a beginning. You know me as Femi Adero, but I was born with a different name. I was only a few months old when I was adopted into the Adero family. A physician by the name of John Adero became my father. His wife, Margaret Adero—a teacher—became my mother. They gave me the new name that I still bear today. Growing up, I never suspected there were things about my past buried in an unmarked grave and covered with the earth of my new history.
I never knew until I was twelve that I had been adopted.
A little over a year ago I received a Christmas card from my then girlfriend, Sheri. My heart fluttered as I slit open the envelope. The card bore a printed message: merry christmas to a special person. Inside I found a folded blue sheet and spread it out. Then, over and over, I read the short letter, hoping—no, praying—that its words would somehow peel from the page and fly away. Instead they sank deep into my mind, hurting me with a pain fiercer than fire. They still echo inside my head:
Separation is pain. I know how both of us had looked forward to spending our lives together as husband and wife after graduating from university. You also know that I am my parents’ only child, that I am very close to them. I discussed our plans with my parents. Unfortunately, they are adamantly opposed to a suitor for me whose biological roots are uncertain. You must remember I told you how obsessive they are about their daughter pairing up with somebody with, quote and unquote, good genes. It tears my heart to leave you. I truly loved you. But I think it is best to draw back (but remain friends) since I do not see myself going against the wishes of my parents . . .
How could she so casually write words she must know would deeply wound me? And why wait three years into our relationship? The timing was particularly cruel. I was close to graduating, and looked forward to taking a job with the Daily Chronicle.
