Homecoming of the gods

by Frank Achebe

  The flood, which had turned out to be more than a flood, had eliminated that surprise. Now he had a different surprise. He ran through the school, which had now been cleared calling out Yanda and Omila, the boy that had once carried his drunken father home in a wheelbarrow.

  # # #

  Yanda had picked up her three boys, when all in a sudden and in the commotion and the running over slippery ground, her ankle had slipped off the joint. Fissures were appearing in the ground and fountains were springing up violently.

  As she collected her last boy from a classroom, the roof fell and hedged her in from her broken ankle. She was shaking with pain as she screamed to her boys: ‘Run! Go! Omila, take your brothers and get—

  But they were not moving an inch. She saw it in their eyes that they were not ready to step an inch out of her sight. The other two slipped into her arms while Omila found a corner and prayed the Breastplate of St Patrick with frantic lips.

  It could have been an eternity but she heard someone calling her name in the distance. It could have come from the Other Side.

  She wouldn’t walk again, not with her left leg. But Othí had given her reasons to be grateful.

  # # #

  The boulevard was jam-packed with people trying to make their way through the rising water. The rest were headed towards the bridge. Zach was among the later. There could have been the whole world around him but the only picture in his mind was the bridge.

  It did look like the end of the world, like some apocalyptic drama.

  Not far from him, two men were holding Ben Capital who was crying in a very womanly way that he wanted to die. Behind him, Kuniā tried to keep together a number of stray children together.

  Underneath him, the water level continued its rise.

  By now, more people were branching off the jam-packed boulevard and into the farms and were heading to the bridge. In no time, it would be jam-packed as well.

  Zach’s lips were moving in prayers. Only God could save them now, not from the flood but through it.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven: Judgement! Judgement! Judgement!

  Rev. Iňaō could have been the proudest man in the whole world. His prophecy had finally ‘come to pass’. He was sure the same thing was happening all over the world. The flood would pass and the sinners would pass with it. Only the righteous would survive the apocalypse. In fact, he could even hear the trumpet sounding.

  I am quite familiar with that ‘I-told-you’ feeling. If it happened, one’s trust in one’s prophetic vision and powers grows stronger. If it fails to happen, one revaluates one’s position on the matter. The answer is and always will be: ‘I will get back to you on this.’

  My dear readers, when a whole town disappears under a river that was not known to have ever flooded two weeks after a prophet, a self-proclaimed messiah had made his appearance, one must ask questions. It will be immoral to take things at face value or to take the easy way out. The easy way out of course, will include conspiracy theories and end-of-the-word bullshit. Or in the cases of most people, to reduce the event to mere accident or natural disasters. But just as there are no natural deaths, there are also no natural disasters. You have to indulge my curiosity and my superstitiousness. One ought to ask questions. One ought to seek out the ‘inner dialectics’ of what is presented to his senses. No fact constitutes truth in itself. One must grapple with the facts to the point of despair at least, for the sake of truth.

  But this excursus aside, let me return to Brim. Brim did not know where to look for his brother as the disaster in its final lap. Their home was on a row of single rooms like one of those found in slums. On the door was written: PLEASE KNOCK ON THE FLOOR, OUR DOOR IS FRAGILE. Upon his arrival, its roof had gone off. He checked the safe where his brother deposited their savings and it was gone. It was indication that the money-loving boy had fled.

  # # #

  Nurse B arrived her home quite on time before any explosions and fountains. Her sister was waiting for her with more catastrophic news.

  ‘I’m sorry sister.’ She apologised.

  ‘For what?’

  ‘I…I….’

  ‘Grab something. Your books. Place them in a backpack. We are leaving immediately.’

  ‘But I….’

  ‘Don’t bother. I will carry you on my back.’

  ‘Sister B, you have to listen to me!’ She finally got her attention.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘A letter came in last night. Evening actually. You never came back.’

  ‘What about it? It’s from the board. Forget it. We will have time for all that.’

  ‘It’s not from the board.’

  ‘Alright then, pack the letter. When we leave town, you can give me.’

  ‘I’m sorry I read it.’

  ‘Why would you do that?’

  ‘I was curios.’

  ‘Whatever. Move your big head and let’s get out of here.’

  ‘He’s alive.’

  ‘Who is alive?’

  ‘Steven.’

  Nurse B could have fainted if she could. Her heart could have crumbled into a dead mass if it could.

  ‘Can I get you the letter?’

  ‘No, no. tell me what did he say?’ She could not possibly stand it.

  # # #

  “Dear Blessing, My name is Steven Sarno. Your memories of me are ten years old and that is enough time for age to grey the most colourful photo.

  Ten years ago, intending on a surprise for a woman that I loved, I took a bus journey to Noiā from Third from which I only recently came back. Her name was Blessing but she let us call her B. I wanted to get her a new typewriter. I cannot now say exactly what happened and how I got to spend eight years in a federal building. I cannot say I was innocent.

  There was a drive-by shooting after which they robbed the shop and the shoppers of whom I was one. They had used the drive-by as a decoy for the main event. I could not stand it. The typewriter had cost me all I had. I went after the robbers. There was a fight. Then double manslaughter. The court gave me twelve years.

  Truthfully, I could have self-destructed and I did try to self-destruct. I was mad at myself and even madder at the world. But after the first year, I realized that I needed someone to save me from myself. There was none. All I had were memories of the times I’d shared with her. After all, some things never change. Those memories were the only lesson that I needed to know that we cannot repeat the past but we can redeem it. They were the best years of my life. I had said a lot of things to her about the sort of life I want to share with her. God knows I can still become that man. But even if not, those dreams were enough to keep me from the dead end.

  I may have outgrown the child that I was then but I paid for it in full. I had my redemption and I managed, for good behaviour, to serve only eight of the twelve years. It has been a year since I left. I suppose you are married now and with your own children. I would be surprised if you were not for you are a good woman. I cannot ask for anything and I am not asking for anything. I merely want to thank you for saving my life.

  I would not be angry if you’d forgotten me. But if you remember me, then I am fortunate for the chance to express my gratitude. If not then, I cannot say I know the world, not anymore. I cannot say I wish to know that world anymore. I wish you all the best of what you have in a life now.”

  # # #

  Their walk to the bridge and beyond the woods to the expressway was in silence except for her intermittent sobs and absentmindedness. The weight of her sister on her back amounted to nothing. The world around her disappeared into the one of she was once a prisoner. If she had any unease over the world that was now behind her, she had none for the one before.

  Now as they sat by the expressway and waited on Zach and the others in silence, she reflected on the story of Lazarus. For many others, it would have meant nothing but it was the score of her life. And in that moment, it meant everything.

  As the ten-year old dreams reappeared, she fe
lt reborn. Life, for all its promise was just about to begin. But more than just life, it was her life. Moreover, it no longer mattered its promise.

  For so many years, she had lied to herself about the reality of her situation. For the years that her hope turned to despair, she he had tried to convince herself that there was nothing to it. She was an inch from convincing herself that she was a cynic after all and that was why she was keeping her heart to herself. No, rather to her sister. However, she wouldn’t let her sister perceive that one sentiment for the crippled girl’s pride, she would never have wanted to be a burden to anyone. The little girl, who never wanted to be anybody’s victim, would have felt betrayed for all of that sacrifice instead of grateful for it.

  All of that furnished her with premises for her escape from reality. All of that left her with guilt feelings over the fact that in her escape, she’d betrayed him. But she knew she was forgiven.

  She was almost succeeding in lying herself out of it all until Zach came around and reminded her of where she truly was.

  How best do I describe it? If you asked me, I’d tell you that she had shared that prison cell with him for those nine years. Its bars for them were made, not of iron, but of hope.

  # # #

  Brim could have traversed the town in search of his now-missing brother and he was ready to do just that. But it was too senseless and I wouldn’t let him on the grounds that Money could take care of himself and that I would fulfil my promise now that he had fulfilled his. I had to drag him with me until he had to accept the fact that it was too much to risk.

  What can I say about Money? It’s been years and we have not seen or heard from him.

  What do my guts tell me about the boy, of whom Brim speaks painfully, thankfully and hopefully too? Well, my guts tell me that he lays buried with many others under the now cool but once angry waters. I trust my guts. However, I cannot ask you to do the same.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight: Over the Bridge In A Stride

  As expected, when Zach arrived the bridge with Kuniā and a number of children behind him, it was jam-packed. He had to wait until it had emptied its load onto the other side. On his own side, the water had risen knee-high. The tide in the canyon under the bridge was now sweeping against the bottom of the bridge as it galloped its way in the rage of a swollen bladder.

  Zach stood and helped many others cross the bridge till he was the only one left.

  Kuniā and a few men stood at the other end of the bridge waiting for him. But he would not step onto the bridge. His legs shook causing the water around them to ripple violently. With robotic strides, he approached the bridge. As he’d seen in his nightmare and for his vertigo, he stooped, held the rails and began crawling.

  # # #

  Time halted. Everything seemed normal again—to Zach. It was only him on the bridge. On the other side was his wife, his mother, Biyar, the hunter, Ekeó, Pûjó, and his father among a few others whose faces were very familiar to him. They were calling out to him in frantic tones of voices.

  He looked on with surprise. Nothing seemed to be wrong with the bridge nor with him. They had no reasons to be in such alarm. But apparently, they did, for the sound of rushing waters interrupted his surprise. He looked up the canyon-like valley to see that a very high wave was hopping towards him.

  He stooped and grabbed the bridge and just as he had seen in the nightmare, the nuts that held it began to fling off their bolts in wide angles. The bridge itself began to creak. As he moved on it, it receded in the opposite direction. The shouts from the other end kept increasing both in its frantic tone and in its loudness.

  Zach looked down the approaching tide to see that it was in the shape of a horse being ridden by a huge and gigantic woman. She was speaking though her mouth was not moving.

  Zach held on as the woman finally approached and as the tide washed away the bridge and him with it.

  # # #

  Zach was sweating, though the rains did not make that obvious, when he woke back to reality, he had not even gone a quarter of the bridge when he looked to see that the nuts that held the bridge were flying at wide directions. There were people on the other side calling out to him.

  There was no distinction between reality and nightmare and Zach knew that. Anything could happen.

  There were no approaching tides this time but the bridge was breaking as the nuts fly in wide angles.

  There was not an extra reflection, or hesitation to what followed in an instant that could have been a millionth of a second. Not a bit of it. Zach stood and without any thought to it, started down the bridge in steady strides until he was on the other side.

  Upon his arrival, not a thing had happened to him. The bridge fell into the canyon like it had been waiting to do so.

  # # #

  At the expressway sat Nurse B with her sister, Othí who had no place to go with his family, Silas among many destitute others. They were waiting for him and Kuniā, the last to finish the journey. ‘We never walk alone. We could not have left without you.’

  ‘What if I’d died?’

  ‘Well, you didn’t so that scenario is totally out of the question.’

  ‘Besides we knew you wouldn’t.’

  ‘What happens next?’

  ‘We hitchhike to our destinations.’

  The news had spread and many motorists on the expressway were helping people find their way to safety.

  Much of the journey home for Zach and the others was in silence. They thought about their lives, and all about it that had changed in a day.

  They had promised to meet up when they’d settled with their new lives.

  Nurse B was too excited to tell her story. She promised Zach a surprise when they meet again. ‘I already know the story.’ Zach assured her.

  For the hunter, and his boys and his wife, it was a new journey to a new life with new promises.

  Silas had Kuniā with him and an excitement for the life that he claimed he loved. His mother would explode with joy at her sight. Not all was lost after all. They had about four stray children with them for their journey. Two of those children found their parents while the other two found new lives.

  There was however, a thought that appeared in the calm that put tears on Zach’s eyes: his wife. He’d come to believe that she was dead or very close to it.

  But he was wrong.

  Ruth was in the hospital but not in any complications. If she was certain of anything, it was that her husband would come back amidst the news. She had waited and waited and waited, not without losing an iota of her hope. Anyone could have accused her of anything but none of that mattered. She had heard Zach talk about the child and of the names he’d want for it according to its gender. There had been no hesitation to the fulfilment of his wishes when it happened to be a girl. She had named her after her father’s wishes, to her grandmother’s second name: Beauty.

  As to the phone call, Zach’s father could not remember ever haven spoken with him since he left. Nothing happened to the telephone after all. They had enough money for the bills.

  # # #

  All this was a long time ago but all those faces are ever before me: from the vegetable boy’s to Mwāi’s to those other boys’ who had followed him on that adventure to Wonderland, to the hunter’s wife as she watched her children grow to Zach as he held his daughter standing on the edge of eternity. In those faces, I see a reflection of the Face of God. For it, I am consoled.

  For the sake of their stories, which I find myself most privileged and honoured to tell, I am reminded of a saying that has never stopped to haunt me in my own nightmares: IT IS BEAUTY THAT WILL SAVE THE WORLD. Like some sacred memories taken out of a childhood dream, I have tucked them away in the corner of my heart for the evil day when it comes.

  THE END.

  The day ran to the river

  for a baptism

  But there were no priests

  & there were no rites

  At the passage

  …
r />   & the face ran to the mask

  & the sword to the scabbard

  & the midwife closed her eyes to the pregnant clouds

  & the hero departed without a song

  Leaving us to the captivity

  Of dogs and demons

  …

  & the ram colluded with the tether

  & the tether with the post

  & the post with the earth

  & the earth…

  & the moon dragged us to the

  Snow-blanketed mountains

  & left us…

  With wishes, wizards and were-wolfs

  & a new day came

  Sang us a song

  Foretold its own demise

  & left us on this shore

  …

  & the prodigal breath

  Ran to the winds

  & the winds to the stranded seas

  & the sea to the earth…

  & the earth…

  …

  A star came out of the east

  Weathered our skin for their hide

  & then the journey began

  & the journey continued

  & the journey ended

  Now my breath paws the air

  Unclutches itself with a goodbye

  Thrutches itself through the flute

  To make its passage to an eternal exile…