Speechless

by Anne Simpson

  Monica’s voice rose, quavering like a little girl’s.

  You’re worried, said Sophie.

  I’m sure it’ll be all right, Monica said, but her words sounded like a question.

  Sophie wanted to tell her aunt about Felix and Simon in Minna, but what good would it do? Her mother would have comforted Sophie, gently drawing her back to an optimistic view, from darkness to light.

  Yes, it’ll be all right, said Sophie, surprising herself. Her voice was firm, solid as a bench on which they could rest. They’ll be all right. You’ll let me know if you hear anything?

  NOW SHE HAD TO HOLD Felix and Simon on one side and her mother and uncle on the other as if her shoulders were braced by a yoke with two buckets hanging down, left and right. She paced again: hall, kitchen, living room, hall. The painting in the living room, the furious stabs of green from the stuck microwave clock in the kitchen. Even though the electricity had come back on, she needed to reset the clock. Painting, clock. The indigo-purple smudge in the painting had grown from an animal into a monster and her pace quickened when she passed it, even though she was carrying the yoke with the buckets and they were both full of water, and the water could spill. She had to be careful. She carried the phone with her; she hadn’t eaten; she felt as though she might fall over. Fear was in her mouth now, and even when she drank water she couldn’t get rid of it. The afternoon gradually dissolved into evening, and evening gradually dissolved into the water she spat into the sink. She ate a small container of peach yogurt from the fridge while sitting with her back against the wall, licked the inside of the container for bits of peach that were stuck there. Her legs would come apart, then her arms. Her ears had already separated from her head. She got up, made another round of the condo.

  As a child, she’d run inside the house to give her grandmother some pansies she’d picked. Purple and yellow pansies. Grandma, Grandma. She bumped into her grandmother and fell over, grazing her knee on the edge of the little table with its glass top and its curving legs. Oh, honey, cried her grandmother, and Clare came and disinfected the cut and bandaged Sophie’s knee. Her grandmother, smelling of talcum powder; her mother smelling of the garden. Sophie dozed on the kitchen floor, dozed on the leather couch, dozed on the guest bed, but fear was in her mouth. Now it was 1:04 when she clicked on the phone, 1:04 in the morning, and still Felix hadn’t called. The pansies were scattered on the floor, across the linoleum, purple, yellow, purple, yellow. Everyone she loved had gone away from her, purple, yellow, purple. It’s stupid, she’d said to Felix, but he and Simon had gone away without thinking of her. They’d simply gone away.

  16

  ____

  CLARE CUT HER LEFT HAND on an edge of exposed metal as she climbed out of the trunk of the car. When she pressed her fingers against it some warm blood spilled over — Binta offered her a rag — and so it took Clare a moment to focus on Thomas and Jacob. But there they were, just a short distance away. Thomas was unbuttoning his shirt, slowly and methodically; he undid the cuffs, took the shirt off, let it fall, as if the shirt had a life now abandoned. It was nothing, there on the dirt, just a pale skin. In the same, careful way, he undid his trousers, unbuttoning them, unzipping his fly, letting down the trousers one leg at a time and stepping out of them. It was too intimate, almost unbearable, for Clare to see her brother undressing, however dim it was in the clearing, yet she couldn’t look away.

  Jacob was quicker, and now he stood, resolutely, in his red and yellow boxer shorts. Yellow lions on a red background. The lions floated in the darkness: they could have been anything. His legs were thin, shaped like table legs, and his chest was not firm and manly, but somehow hollowed out in the centre, perhaps because he was hunching his shoulders. Thomas finished undressing and stood in his white boxer shorts beside Jacob, who was shivering. He stood close, as if to protect him, but as far as Clare could tell, his eyes were on the ground, as if examining his shoes, Jacob’s shoes, and Clare’s sandals, placed before him.

  The pump and pull of Clare’s heart was loud in her ears. She couldn’t bring herself to think what would happen next. She stared at the collection of shoes, just as Thomas himself was doing.

  B.B. began to laugh. He couldn’t seem to stop.

  Danjuma laughed too, uproariously, slapping his thighs. Dance now, he said.

  Yes, dance for us, cried B.B. Come now.

  Thomas and Jacob were stiff puppets; they moved their feet, but it was not dancing.

  Take each other’s arms and go round, instructed B.B.

  They jigged in a circle. Clare couldn’t watch.

  Look happy, called Danjuma.

  Happy, happy, cawed B.B.

  Pffaaahh, cried Danjuma. He himself was turning in a circle, mimicking them, roaring and flapping his arms. We will show you, he laughed, and caught B.B.’s arm, wheeling and cavorting, hardly noticing Thomas and Jacob, who had slowed to watch them.

  You must leap, Danjuma instructed.

  Danjuma leapt energetically, spreading his arms to show B.B how easy it was. Clare watched the flight of his white trainers through the air.

  B.B. couldn’t leap and he tumbled to the ground, sprawled out. He raised his arm and Danjuma helped him up.

  Always extend courtesy, Danjuma shouted. Women desire you to extend courtesy.

  Always extend — B.B. repeated, chortling with laughter.

  Extend yourself, so! squealed Danjuma, and he pumped his fist up and down in front of his crotch.

  Ha, Mr. Longnose, cried B.B.

  B.B. fell over himself, doubled up with agony as Danjuma circled around him. He put his hands out to B.B. who took them, if only to support himself, whereupon Danjuma began to glide forward.

  Thomas and Jacob moved slowly at first, then more quickly. They walked along the track past the two cars and Clare edged away from where she’d been standing by Thomas’s car, determined to follow.

  Ha, Wahala, they are all leaving us, cried Danjuma. Look, now.

  We cannot have this, can we? B.B. boomed. A woman should not run from us, hey Danjuma?

  Quite right, agreed Danjuma. He moved quickly, slipped his arm around Clare, and pulled her back with him as he retrieved his gun. A woman, a car — we will keep them.

  Clare tried to wrestle away from Danjuma, but he gripped her tight, while B.B. trained a flashlight on the departing figures. White and red and yellow. Even without the flashlight, Clare would have been able to see them. B.B. gave the flashlight to Binta to hold, but she allowed the light to play over the deep tire tracks in the ground, the castle of earth made by the termites, the shadows of the trees. Jacob glanced over his shoulder.

  B.B. shot the ground, and so did Danjuma. Thomas and Jacob jumped wildly at the sound of gunfire, and now they ran along the track, heels kicking up dust.

  Ha, off they run now, going fast fast, cried Danjuma, letting go of Clare.

  The flashlight strayed into the trees, back to the two men, away, flickering, so they vanished and reappeared in its small cone of light, until they were gone.

  We have sent them packing without clothing to cover their backsides! B.B. put his gun aside and flopped himself down on the quilt with the teddy bears and bells. He put his hands behind his head.

  Have no thought of running now, Danjuma told Clare as he sat down on the quilt to roll a joint, gun between his legs.

  Clare didn’t know how angry she was until she saw Danjuma’s hands deftly packing the joint. She went forward, thinking how Thomas and Jacob had been humiliated, had been afraid, and neither B.B. nor Danjuma stopped her from picking up the clothing that Thomas and Jacob had taken off, their shirts and trousers, one sock, another sock. Jacob’s shoes. Thomas had been wearing a suit jacket, of all things. She gathered everything up and took it toward the car, where she stood with her back to Danjuma and B.B. She shook out each article of clothing, folded it. She did this calmly, or with the appearance of calm, and she found that doing it soothed her, quieted her heart.

  When sh
e came to Thomas’s shirt, she checked the pocket, where she found his money clip. She hadn’t expected to find such a thing, and, hurriedly, she slipped it down her bra and went on with her task, concentrating on putting socks together, buttoning up the shirts and folding them. Now Thomas and Jacob would be close to the service station with the Shell sign, she thought. One of the buttons on Thomas’s shirt was missing. Now they would be near the road. She didn’t know how they would manage once they got to the road, two men without their clothes in the middle of nowhere.

  She held his shoes, Thomas’s shoes, in one hand, and her own sandals in the other. She would not cry over his shoes, she told herself, simply because they were polished brogues. No, she would not. She placed them in a corner of the trunk, slipped his socks inside. Putting her sandals on her feet, she put the trunk down and leaned against the car, closing her eyes. They were not dead.

  SHE OPENED HER EYES. Binta, standing near her, might have nudged her, or maybe she had only imagined it. B.B. and Danjuma were together on the quilt: Danjuma lay with his legs spread like a boy, with his back to them, and B.B. sitting up, guns and phones beside him. They were sharing the joint that Danjuma had rolled, and the smell of it, the pungent smoke, was almost sweet. It was as if they’d done a good night’s work, thought Clare, since they had the car, and, for extra insurance, they had her. Now they could rest. She put her left hand to her lips and licked the blood, which had congealed along the seam of the cut. She tasted salt and metal in her blood.

  Clare felt a touch. She hadn’t imagined it. Binta opened her hand, and there, in her palm, were the car keys, the keys Clare had seen Jacob turn in the ignition of the Mercedes. A medallion with St. Christopher hung from the key chain, which made sense to her, a crude image on a metal disc. She knew what the medallion looked like, since Jacob had put it on the table at dinner. St. Christopher seemed to be wading through a river with a sack. No, not a sack, a baby with a halo.

  Yes, now she remembered how Binta had tucked the keys to the other car under her bra strap, and somehow she had also managed to snatch the keys to the Mercedes from the dashboard without anyone noticing.

  Clare didn’t move; she watched as Binta’s fingers closed over the keys. She clasped Clare’s wrist, telling her to wait, they had to wait. They simply stayed where they were, brushing away a mosquito now and then, careful not to make any noise. The two of them leaned against the car, half-awake. Clare thought of plush curtains, and gave her head a little shake, remembering where she’d seen the plush curtains. It was in the funeral home in Glasgow. Her father had died, someone was offering tea in a gold-edged cup and saucer. Thomas was with her. He had not accepted tea in a gold-edged cup from the funeral home director, but Clare had. The plush curtains had been pulled across a fake window with frosted glass that looked out on nothing but gave the impression of a living room. The tea in her cup was cold; their father was dead; that was the end of it.

  BINTA’S TOUCH AGAIN, the firmness of her hand. How many minutes had passed? Or had it been hours? She pointed. Both B.B. and Danjuma were sleeping on the quilt. Clare moved around the car on one side, Binta on the other, and then Clare quietly opened the passenger door, got in. There was no movement from the two men. Binta opened the driver’s door, jammed the key in the ignition, and turned it.

  The car jumped forward with a jerk, but Binta had inadvertently turned on the spray for the washing fluid and windshield wipers as well as the headlights, and Clare saw filmy, elongated versions of B.B. and Danjuma rise clownishly out of their sleep. B.B., a blur of lime-green, seemed to be pawing at the air as he lunged forward, but Binta was undaunted, sweeping the car around and nearly hitting them both, driving straight over the quilt and swinging to the right in a sharp curve before straightening the Mercedes to roar away. The bear-like figure of B.B. lurched out of the way, as did the taller, thinner figure of Danjuma, but they were shadowy caricatures of themselves, half-awake, half-asleep, straining to catch, and stop, what could not be caught.

  Binta drove the Mercedes with a mixture of wild cowboy bravado, and deeply serious intent. There was no stopping her. Already she was racing along the track, bumping in and out of the ruts, and the men, who must have been bumbling to get into the other car, were far behind them. The windshield wipers were still flailing back and forth against the glass: clack-a, clack-a, clack. It was comical, even ridiculous, thought Clare, that a mite of a girl should be driving the car with such ease. She was no more than sixteen.

  Where are we going? asked Clare.

  We are running away, replied Binta calmly.

  Clare said nothing more. She waited for the lights to appear behind them.

  Binta laughed lightly. I took the keys to their car. They will not catch us, they will be looking. She rolled down the window and tossed the keys — a good, strong throw.

  Well done, said Clare.

  When they came to the service station, Binta didn’t slow down; she simply charged straight through it, turning the wheel hard to avoid a motorcycle. A man in the shack beneath the Shell sign bounded to his feet and galloped after them.

  I will not stop for him, said Binta. He is a friend to my brother Danjuma.

  She turned the car onto the highway, and the Mercedes immediately collided with someone on a bicycle: there was a clunk, a weight dropped on the hood of the car. It was a man, a man with his face squashed sideways against the windshield, his body having stopped the wipers. The car was still moving, but the man pushed himself up with both hands, as if he were doing pushups, an expression of utter bewilderment on his face. The wipers, freed, batted against his hands. Binta swerved the car to the left, then violently to the right, and the man rolled off.

  Clare turned to see him getting up in the road, where he spat abuse at them.

  Binta didn’t stop. The wipers clacked.

  You might get us killed, Clare said. Not to mention people on bicycles.

  Binta turned off the wipers and turn signal. We should not take the Onitsha Road.

  Could we look for Thomas and Jacob? said Clare.

  We must not delay, said Binta. Even with the keys out of my brothers’ hands, we must go.

  A woman loomed out of the darkness on the side of the road. She was slowly jogging, balancing a load tied up in a sheet on her head.

  Don’t hit this one, said Clare. Which way are you taking us?

  Into the bush.

  Is that a good idea?

  The way ahead was ink black and there were few cars or motorbikes. It was just as well, since Binta’s driving consisted of short bursts of furious speed, then a brief lull in which she encountered an obstacle in the road, and wild speed again. When she came upon three goats in the road, she missed them by inches, careening onto the shoulder and veering into the opposite lane.

  You are afraid of me as to the driving? Binta sang out as she swung back into the right lane. I will go slow slow, she said.

  Clare closed her eyes, but she was being jarred and jostled too much to rest. She thought of Thomas. The light of occasional motorbikes flickered in and out, in and out. Her head bobbled, the car raced.

  She was in Nova Scotia, on the road to the beach. Gavin was singing “O Canada,” because she’d bet him that he didn’t know the words. When he forgot the words to the second verse, he slipped into a Scottish folk song. Give me a boat that can carry two, he sang, lustily. The windows were open in the car and the dust blew in on all of them as they bumped along.

  Dad, yelled Sophie. A heron.

  Gavin slammed on the brakes and backed up so they could see the heron, apparently one-legged, tranced, immobile. Then it flew off.

  CLARE WAS STARING AT raggedy pieces of cloud, white against blue. The raggedy pieces came together, broke apart, as if someone were pulling them. She lay in the back seat of a car, and the car was not moving. A breeze came through the open windows. The edge of cloud curled, spread out, fanned across the blue, and, tissue-like, slipped away from the large, soft cloud. Tree branches finge
red the cloud; they branched and branched into fine filigree, a net of branches that would catch the cloud. It was an acacia tree. She was in Nigeria.

  It came back to her, flashing, how they had put her in the trunk of this very car, made Thomas and Jacob dance, shot the ground under them. She sat up, her stomach knotted and tense, and saw a broad, flat river spread out far below the car, parked under an acacia tree where it was shady. A hill, a river. But no Thomas or Jacob. A shiver went through her. Yea, though I walk through the valley, Jacob had chanted. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow.

  Binta returned to the car with two paper plates of food, put them on top of the car and opened Clare’s door.

  I have plantain, she announced.

  Where are we? asked Clare. Her throat was coated with what felt like sandpaper.

  It is Lokoja.

  Clare could feel stubble and dust under her sandals when she got out of the car, taking the paper plate. Early morning sun, already warm. She ate a piece of the fried plantain, and it turned out to be delicious. A woman on a bicycle wobbled along the shoulder of the road, one arm balancing the load on her head with such difficulty that it seemed she would fall off, but she righted herself and continued. The world was new and shining. It was a miracle to Clare that she was alive in it.

  She walked around the car and opened one of the doors to hide behind as she squatted. Her urine smelled sharp and sour. For some reason, her sandals were decorated with rhinestones in a flower pattern. How silly. And someone had painted her toenails a dark satiny pink, and each toenail was the deep colour of a gemstone. One or two were chipped. She had done that, she recalled, several days before setting out on this journey from Canada, but it was ludicrous, it made her want to laugh. She was clad in the same clothes she had been wearing the night before, a flowered cotton dress, dirty now, like her feet. There was a bloody cut on her hand, and the congealed blood was smeared with dirt. But there was her knapsack in the back seat of the car, and inside, a packet of wet wipes. She wiped her face, her hands, her feet.