by Keisha Bush
Étienne doesn’t understand. Who will take care of him if Étienne dies too? He has to learn to take care of himself. Étienne opens his hand and Ibrahimah pours the nuts out for him. They sit down on the curb watching traffic and pedestrians pass by.
“They’re good,” Étienne concedes, popping another cashew in his mouth.
Ibrahimah smirks as a man approaches them.
“Talibé! Come! I have zakat for you.”
The boys pop up to their feet, their cans out in front of them. The man drops money into each of their cans, pats Ibrahimah on the head, and walks off with a smile.
“It begins,” Étienne says.
A sense of ease washes over Ibrahimah. He arrived right at the end of Ramadan last year, and all he could think about was returning home to his family; he didn’t think there was ever a good time to be a Talibé, but Ramadan is when all Muslims follow the text of the Quran more purposefully. Like when he behaved extra good and extra nice to his sisters to ensure his mother would give him a Coca after dinner. He wonders if Christians have a time when they have to be extra nice to other people.
“Where do we go today?” Ibrahimah asks.
Étienne squints against the sun as he thinks. “Maybe we go visit Moustapha for lunch and football. When the sun goes down, people will buy fresh dates to break their fast and will give us money. We should be close to a boutique or patisserie.”
Ibrahimah looks into his can. Two big coins sit at the bottom. He needs two more coins for Marabout, but going to Moustapha’s house first sounds like a better idea. They haven’t seen their friend for some time now. A car stops in front of them. Ibrahimah gets back up from the curb and walks over to the driver. The woman hands them five hundred francs each.
“Merci, ta-ta,” they say in unison.
Ibrahimah begins reciting a prayer Étienne taught him.
“Those who spend their money in the cause of God, then do not follow their charity with insult or harm, will receive their recompense from their Lord; they have nothing to fear, nor will they grieve.”
Ibrahimah follows Étienne and cups his hands over his face several times. The woman in the car smiles and bows her head in reverence before driving away. The traffic behind her is patient as they perform their ritual. Ibrahimah can’t help but smile. If only he could keep the money for himself and go find his sisters and take care of them.
“Étienne, do you think my sisters are still alive?”
Étienne looks over at him.
“My mama would know if your sisters are okay.”
“You think Marabout killed my mama and papa?”
Étienne shrugs, with a solemn face. His skin looks burnt beneath the stinging rays of sun. Ibrahimah sighs deep and walks up to another driver beckoning at him to come over. Once Ibrahimah is unable to ignore his hunger pains any longer, they head over to Moustapha’s house to see if anyone is home.
“Why, hello, boys! How are you? Oops!” Moustapha’s mother covers her mouth with her hand. “Pardonnez-moi. Jai oublié que vous ne comprenez pas l’anglais! Bonjour, Étienne et Ibrahimah!”
“Bonjour, madame,” Étienne says.
Ibrahimah looks up at the woman with his eyebrows raised. Her dark, curly hair is pulled back into a ponytail and her shirt is made from Senegalese material but in a style Ibrahimah has never seen before. Her skirt is short and fans out at her knees. Her purple shoes have a very high heel, and make her even taller than before.
“Moustapha, you’re going to have to teach your friends English!” his mother gushes. “Aria!”
“Oui, madame.”
“Baignes les garçons et lavez leurs vêtements. S’il vous plaît. Ils sont tellement sales.”
Ibrahimah looks down at his hands and shirt. He’s not that dirty. But a bath at Moustapha’s house is always a welcome experience.
“My mother has been taking French lessons.” Moustapha snickers. “Now she talks to Aria in proper French, unless she gets stuck.”
Étienne and Moustapha slap hands.
“Namanala trop! Where’ve you been?” Étienne asks.
“Where have you been! We went on holiday. My parents took me to Paris two weeks before school ended. My father had a big conference there. Then we went skiing in Switzerland, but I don’t ski. I prefer snowboarding.”
“Snowboarding? What’s that?” Ibrahimah asks.
“It’s like skiing but both your feet are on one board, like skateboarding.”
Ibrahimah is mystified.
“I’ll show you how to skateboard later,” Moustapha says.
Ibrahimah has no idea what these things are, but he is always interested to discover new things at his friend’s house. Upstairs, the warm water envelops his scrawny legs and he leans back in the tub and exhales. His feet are not raw like the last time, since he’s been wearing his shoes. Aria hands him a bright-yellow toy.
“Do you know what this is?” Aria asks.
“No.”
“It’s a duck,” Étienne interjects.
“Do you know what sounds a duck makes?”
Both Étienne and Ibrahimah are silent.
“Quack-quack!” Aria blurts, sending Ibrahimah into a fit of giggles.
Ibrahimah lets the duck go and it buoys across his chest to the other end of the porcelain tub. He picks it up and squeezes it. The duck sprays water at Étienne. Ibrahimah remembers that day he couldn’t find his sisters and friend Moussa on the beach, the high tide crashing against the dune. The fear he felt right before he saw Ahmed looming before his eyes. He begins to cry. Maybe if he hadn’t lost his sisters that evening, he would still be in his village and his parents would be alive.
“Ibrahimah, my chou-chou, what’s wrong? Did I hurt you?” Aria looks at him.
“Marabout killed my mama!” he erupts.
“Don’t cry, cousin.”
“Is this true?” Aria asks Étienne, the duck now floating unattended through the water.
“We don’t know. Marabout says Ibrahimah’s mama and papa are dead and Ibrahimah will never leave Marabout. He has never said that to any Talibé before.”
Aria strokes Ibrahimah’s back and shushes him quiet.
“I know you all are from the south. Do you know your village?”
“Saloulou,” Étienne says.
“I’ll see what I can find out. Ibrahimah, don’t cry. If your parents have passed, then they are in heaven with Allah. But let’s find out if that is true before you mourn their deaths. Okay?”
Ibrahimah looks into Aria’s eyes; she reminds him so much of his mama. She leans over and kisses him on his forehead.
Bathed, with clean clothes, a full belly, and a new outlook on his future, Ibrahimah sits on the edge of the sofa in the living room, dangling his feet.
“My mother says I should teach you English.”
“Yes, teach me English. Then I’ll be fancy like you, Moustapha,” Ibrahimah says.
Ibrahimah thinks of all the Americans he will be able to speak to in English; so many of them walk away when he approaches them. If he knew English, they would have to stop and listen, which should make them give him more money.
“Teach me now!”
Étienne has stopped watching the television and is looking at Moustapha, ready.
“Okay. The first word I will teach you is ‘hello.’ ”
Ibrahimah looks at him, waiting.
“Repeat the word.”
“What word?”
“Hello. Say, ‘Hello.’ ”
“Ello,” Ibrahimah says.
“No. Hhhhello.”
“Ello.”
“No, no. The h says hhha. You have to breathe heavy.”
“Hhhhello.”
“Yes! Hello means bonjour in French or nangadef in Wolof.”
“
Okay, another word.”
“Uhmm, bonjour is ‘good morning.’ ”
“Good morning,” Ibrahimah and Étienne both say together.
“Bonne nuit is ‘good night.’ ”
“Good morning. Good night. What about l’argent? How do I say it in English?
“Money.”
“Moneee moneee moneee moneee. Je veux beaucoup moneee!”
Étienne and Moustapha laugh. Bugs Bunny runs across the screen with Elmer Fudd chasing after him with a shotgun.
The rest of the afternoon is spent learning as many words as he and Étienne can remember. They can watch cartoons another day. Learning English is too important. The sun is setting by the time they leave Moustapha’s house, and the two boys practice their new English vernacular while they walk down the street.
“Ow much moneee you give me?” Ibrahimah asks Étienne.
“One undred.”
“A big coin?” Ibrahimah replies.
Étienne nods.
“Say it in English,” Ibrahimah corrects him.
“Yes,” Étienne says, in English.
“You are funny,” Ibrahimah says, laughing.
Étienne rolls his eyes and chuckles.
“We go Moustapha tomorrow for more English,” Étienne says in his newfound language.
“Yes,” Ibrahimah replies, his mind drifting off to the land of American treasure and abundance.
Fatou walks into her grandfather’s living room eating a biscuit. The entire family, including Maimouna, has been spending a lot of time with their elder since the incident with Marabout Ahmed almost two months ago, now.
“You can’t eat that, it’s Ramadan,” Aisha says accusingly.
A music video of Coumba Gawlo plays quietly on the small television while the two younger girls lie stretched out on the sofa.
“Yes, I can, I have my menses,” Fatou says, chewing the biscuit extra slow in Aisha’s face.
“Papa!” Aisha calls out, running from the room, the grumbling of her hunger pains echoing throughout the house.
Binta laughs and motions for Fatou to give her a biscuit. She has not reached puberty yet, and no one in the family expects her to fast if she does not want to.
“Not fasting today?” Fatou asks, giving her youngest sister a cookie.
“No, seeing you eat is too hard, but I fasted for five days with no problem. I think Aisha will cheat.”
“She’s still a baby. She will cheat for sure, and I plan to catch her,” Fatou says with a devious twinkle in her eye.
Binta laughs.
“If you don’t practice the years before, the first year you are required is really hard. I practiced since I was eight, and by the time I was ten I could fast the entire month. When my menses arrived, at twelve years old, it was a breeze for me.”
“Why don’t girls have to fast during their menses?”
“Mama said all women are expected to eat during their menses; it’s too dangerous if we did not. We could get sick, maybe even die.”
“Oh no!”
“I know. In the Quran, Mohammed says women are to eat, so there is no question about it. This biscuit is good. Want another?”
“Yes,” Binta says with a smile.
The two girls migrate into the next room, where their father sits in discussion with their ninety-year-old grandfather.
“I’ve lived a long life,” Papa Yoro says.
Aisha sits at her father’s feet, leaning up against his leg. Fatou and Binta sit down at the base of their grandfather’s bed.
“But Papa, is there nothing I can do? He lied.”
“The tradition is older than everyone in our village. He will have to answer to Allah. The moment he walked away with Ibrahimah you granted him legal custody of the child.”
“What does that mean?” Aisha blurts out, looking up at her father.
Idrissa pats her on the head, his eyes glistening.
“Child, it means that if your parents went to Dakar today to get Ibrahimah, they could be arrested. Marabout could file kidnapping charges. He is now Ibrahimah’s legal guardian.”
“But Ibrahimah is my brother. We can’t kidnap our own family member.”
“Aisha, you and your sisters should go find your cousins. I’ll be along soon. This is an adult conversation,” Idrissa says, frowning.
Papa Yoro coughs into a handkerchief.
“She might as well stay; she needs to learn the traditions of our culture. The Talibé tradition dates back hundreds of years, young girl. Neither you nor I are bigger than tradition. That marabout will have to answer to God for his lies, but we do not have the power or authority to pass judgment or sentence on a marabout. He stands between man and God.”
Idrissa’s father is overtaken with another fit of coughing. He points to a cup on the side of his bed, and Aisha pops up to hand it to him.
“Is there anything I can get you, Father?” Idrissa asks the older man.
Papa Yoro shakes his head.
“You know, I sent your older brother to a daara when he was just a boy, before you were born. He worked on a farm, back before so many marabouts moved their daaras to the cities.”
“I didn’t know that. He’s never talked about it.”
“The work was hard, I know, but it made him into the man he is today. He spent three years there.”
“But, Father, Marabout Ahmed has threatened to keep Ibrahimah until he turns fifteen. That’s nine years! How can a man lose his son for a decade? Why am I being bound to a man who is obviously not a man of God?”
Papa Yoro sighs heavily.
“You want me to say what you want to hear, and I cannot. Your brother could disown you from his inheritance and without land to farm, how will you care for your wife and children? Without your community where will you go? Who will protect you?”
“Yes, I’m well aware the firstborn inherits all lands and wealth, but if my brother is taken with this demon, how can I protect my family? I am a man and yet my hands are tied by the old ways. It is not right.”
“Everyone has their struggles in this life. You are asking for it to be easy on you because you believe you are right. Yet, everyone else believes they are right also. Take this as a lesson to grow wiser, my son. I will be gone very soon and you will have just your brother left. Ibrahimah will be okay. You have to be strong enough for your family.”
Idrissa spends the rest of the afternoon failing to convince his father to take his side in the matter. At dinnertime they go home and the girls set the table for the feast Maimouna has been preparing all afternoon.
“Mama, you don’t look so well,” Aisha says, looking up from her food.
Idrissa looks at Maimouna and notices her eyes are glassy and her body is hunched over the platter of food that she has yet to touch.
“My love, are you okay?”
Fatou and Binta look up from the food and echo the sentiments of their sister and father.
“I feel hot,” Maimouna says, pulling her shawl off her shoulders.
Idrissa gets up and goes to help her to her feet. When he touches her, he pulls his hand away in shock.
“Maimouna! You’re burning up.”
“Am I?” she says, her body swaying into his arms.
“Fatou, get your mother some ice water. Binta bring me a towel.”
Idrissa leads Maimouna into their bedroom and lays her down onto the bed.
“Maybe you have grippe. I don’t know,” Idrissa says.
“Grippe?” Maimouna mumbles.
“Mama has the flu!” Binta announces when Fatou returns to the bedroom.
“Papa?” Fatou asks, standing in the doorway with a cup of cold water.
“Well, I’m not sure. I will have to go find the doctor. Your mother’s temperature is extremely
high. It’s either grippe or malaria; I don’t see how she could fall ill so quickly with anything else.”
Maimouna mumbles something indecipherable.
“What?” Idrissa asks.
“Muhhhhhh,” Maimouna groans, clutching her stomach as it spasms violently.
“I’ll be back,” Idrissa announces as he rushes out of the house, leaving the girls with their mother.
Maimouna leans over the side of the bed and vomits onto the floor.
“Get a bucket of water and towels,” Fatou instructs her sisters as she goes over to her mother.
Maimouna holds her hand up to keep Fatou back as her body heaves again, expelling from her system any remnants of food and liquid from the day. When she is finished, she curls up into a ball and falls asleep.
When Idrissa returns, he arrives with his brother and the doctor and the men go directly into the bedroom. The girls sit in the living room; having put the food away and already cleaned up the mess beside their parents’ bed, leaving just the faint scent of Maimouna’s sickness lingering in the air.
The doctor prefers to let Maimouna sleep, since rest is the best remedy for many illnesses. He leaves a tea for her to drink when she wakes and instructs Idrissa to buy acetaminophen for her fever.
In the morning, Idrissa wakes Fatou before leaving for work.
“Keep an eye on your mother. If it gets bad again like last night go find your aunt; she’ll know what to do.”
Fatou goes into her parents’ room and climbs into bed with her sleeping mother. Maimouna sleeps fitfully and when she rises two hours later, she jostles Fatou awake.
“My love, what’s wrong?” she asks her daughter.
“You’re sick, Mama. Papa told me to watch you.”
Maimouna tilts her head to the side in confusion.
“What do you mean sick? I feel fine.”
Fatou sits up in bed, fully awake now. She reaches out and touches her mother’s face, and finds Maimouna’s skin feels normal.
“Mama, you had a terrible fever last night; the doctor had to come. Papa thought it was malaria or grippe. You don’t remember?”
Maimouna remembers cooking dinner and then the family gathering together to eat, but then after that her memory goes dark.