by Taiye Selasi
• • •
The woman behind them, Auntie Niké, pushed them forward, her ruby red talons digging into their skin. “What is it?” she asked—rather, spat: hostile t sounds, a thick Lagosian accent, matching accent-piece scowl. She’d been pushing and pulling since they got to the airport, both stunned into silence she assumed to be awe, pulling their suitcases, “This way, darrings,” pushing them into the Mercedes, “don’t touch the leather with your fingers, ehn, they’re oily,” as they drove.
Lagos, through the window, was not as he’d pictured, not luscious, the tropics, bright yellow and green. It was gray, urban-gray, the sky smoggy and muted and clogged with tall buildings, a dirty Hong Kong. The highway from the airport was packed with huge lorries and rusting okadas and shiny Mercedes, all honking, one long steady whine of annoyance, the whole city singing the same nasal dirge. The palm trees looked weary. The harbor was gray, the same shade as the sky, full of barges and yachts. As they’d crossed the bridge, leaving the island of Ikeja for the mainland, Lagos Island, he glimpsed a large sign: THIS IS LAGOS. Not Welcome to Lagos, Lagos Welcomes You, but simply THIS IS LAGOS.
“This is Lagos,” Niké spat.
He found her grotesque, this never-heard-of Auntie Niké with her skin chemically bleached to a wan grayish-beige and a tawny-brown wig falling slick to her shoulders, red lipstick and blush bloodying cheekbones and lips. But the black eyes betrayed her—exposing some sorrow, collected and stagnant, rank puddles of grief—when she touched his cheek, pulling, “A pretty boy, ar’t you?” and he wasn’t afraid of her, not then, not yet.
They’d pulled into the gates of their uncle’s apartment, which from the outside didn’t look like much, four or five floors. It was not until they entered the foyer, then the elevator, that they understood the scale of things. The building was his. The whole building, four stories, belonged to the uncle who was waiting in the penthouse, they were told, going up. She pushed them off the elevator, “Leave your luggage for the houseboy,” with the uncontainable joy of a child on Christmas morning, “To the left, ehn, he’s waiting,” down the double-width hallway to doors standing open to opera, full blast.
Indeed, he was. Waiting. This heard-of Uncle Femi who had come, late in the action, out of nowhere, months before: winning solution to the problem of Where the Twins Should Go to High School, what with their father having hoofed it and the prep school fees too high. Alternatives included the very tony public high school that their mother chanced to visit on an unfortunate afternoon, pulling her car into the lot just as a bus of Metco students was off-loading fighting freshmen screaming swears and throwing blows. The most odious of options was to ask (her word, “beg”) that Olu’s high school, Milton Academy, review their eligibility for financial aid, despite the complicating facts that they had paid the full tuition for the three years he had been there and that no one had, say, died. Then out of thin air appeared an uncle in Nigeria with whom they might live, attending international school and avoiding potential indoctrination into a “pathologically criminalized culture” while their mother found her sea legs as a working single parent.
Fola, who had never once mentioned a brother, nor any other family, nor any of her past, had sat them down simply, him and Taiwo, in the kitchen. “I can’t manage at the moment,” she had started, then stopped. She shook her head, closed her eyes, covered her mouth, as if willing the hurt to stay put in her throat. He could feel her tears rising, a tide, up the middle, but stared at her, frozen, unable to speak. He wanted to say, “He’ll come back, Mom. Don’t worry.” He wanted to say, “Dr. Yuki threw him out in his scrubs.” But had promised in the Volvo, if you could maybe not mention—, don’t worry, I won’t, so said nothing at all.
Fola wiped her eyes, took a breath, shook her head again. “Excuse me,” she said.
Kehinde said, “It’s okay.”
Taiwo said, “What can’t you manage?”
“The four of you.” Her eyes and voice flat, “At least not for right now. My b-brother in Lagos, your Uncle Femi, has offered.”
“Offered what?” Taiwo persisted.
“To take you. For now.”
“Take us where?” Taiwo asked, her voice rising. “To Lagos? You’ve never even mentioned a brother before.” Then, “You’re sending us to live with a stranger.” She was laughing. “Is Olu coming also, and Say, or just us?”
Fola shook her head. “He’s a senior in high school.”
“And Sadie?!” Taiwo shouted. “She’s your favorite, is that it?”
Sadie had appeared at the door to the kitchen in pajamas, almost silent. Only Kehinde looked up. “No one came to find me,” Sadie mumbled, softly, sweetly.
“It’s okay,” Kehinde whispered. “Come here. We’re all here.”
“We are not all here,” Taiwo said, standing, voice trembling. “He left us with her, and she’s kicking us out.” She looked at their mother, who looked out the window. Kehinde followed her gaze to the edge of Route 9.
“He took it, he took the statue,” Fola mumbled, distracted.
“He would have never let you do this!” Taiwo raged, and stormed out.
Kehinde looked at Sadie and smiled warmly. “Don’t worry.”
Fola looked at Kehinde and shrugged. “What do I do?”
“Don’t worry,” he repeated. “It’s okay, Mom. Don’t worry. That was kind of your brother. To offer, I mean.”
He’d pictured this brother as a male form of Fola, so an older form of Olu. A Yoruba Daddy Warbucks. Instead, from his position on the fourth-floor parlor threshold, with eyes and feet frozen, refusing to move, he made out a figure, neither balding nor strapping, sprawled loosely on a leopard-skin waterbed, slim. The absurdity of the picture—of Femi there waiting as shahs await ladies-in-waiting with grapes ripe for peeling in an outfit befitting Fela Kuti at the height of the 1970s (it was 1994), in that room with its thicket of palm trees in vases and zebra-skin rugs on the white marble floor—was lost on him, Kehinde, for his shock at the portrait looming, gloomy, above the mantel, looking down on the bed.
He had never seen the subject—a woman, a young woman, a breathtaking woman—before in his life and quite literally could not take his eyes off her eyes, which were his eyes, and Taiwo’s eyes. “Who . . . ? Who is that?” Taiwo was trembling, reaching instinctively for Kehinde. He squeezed her hand, feeling her shock and her fear. She took a step inward and pressed up against him. Neither stopped staring, nor moved to go in.
The figure was stirring, sitting up on the bed, twisting his torso to consider the portrait himself. A loud high-pitched laugh, without mirth, without warmth, broke the silence. He clapped with delight. “You don’t know?” He spoke with an accent very much like their mother’s (the strongest taste “England,” faint notes of “equator”) and softly, even gently, as one who has learned that in a land of shouters the soft-spoken man is king. “Niké, who is that?” He turned to his wife, who was clutching their shoulders like handlebars. “Mmm?” His eyes fell on Kehinde, who, feeling the shadow, extracted his own from the portrait and looked.
The uncle was watching him, standing up, smiling, his eyes hardened, blackened, at odds with the smile, to a hostile effect, as one luring a child left alone in a shopping mall, hard, sparkling black. Standing, he was striking, less attractive than eye-catching, lithe as a woman with long slender limbs, ramrod straight with lean muscle, at ease, like a dancer, but not at all beautiful, not in the face. The face was all angles and thick-lidded eyes too wide open and red-rimmed, a dull shade of brown, upturned nose, low-set mouth, the proportions the problem, thin cheeks far too narrow for features this wide. Almost ugly, thought Kehinde, though he used the word sparingly, and reverently, like beautiful, equally awed. It was a precious thing, ugliness, in humans, in nature; he noticed this, always, in airports, on trains: that for the most part most people looked fine (if unremarkable) with inoffensive features plac
ed well, or well enough. He found he had to look to find ugliness, natural ugliness, no less than natural beauty, and trickier still, that no sooner had he found it and quietly thought a thing ugly than he found there in the ugliness a beauty of a kind. He’d stare at a face as at those Magic Eye stereograms where three-dimensional images emerge out of two-, and the beauty would rise out of nowhere, a distortion, after which he couldn’t recognize the ugliness again. He stared at his uncle, then, squinting, trying to freeze it, the mismatch of features and wanness of skin, but it happened as it always did. The optical illusion. Jimmy Baldwin morphing into Miles Davis.
“And you. What are you staring at? You like it? My outfit?”
Kehinde, realizing he was staring, blinked twice.
“Don’t you speak?” Auntie Niké, behind him, shook him roughly by the shoulder, but Femi was laughing, “Ehn, let the boy be.” He walked toward Taiwo, ignoring Kehinde for the moment. “And this one, and this one,” he repeated. “It’s her.” He stopped in front of Taiwo and took her chin, gently, the touch less aggressive than the look in his eyes, fingers cold, almost freezing, Kehinde felt. Taiwo shivered. Femi laughed. “Look, she’s frightened.”
“Don’t touch her,” Kehinde said.
A very soft sound, equally surprising to all of them.
Niké dug her nails in and sucked her teeth, “Ah-ah! How dare you address an elder in that manner?! Ki lo de ke—” but again Femi stopped her, erupting with glee.
“Omokehindegbegbon speaks! That’s your name. Omokehindegbegbon. Kehinde for short. Do you know what it means? ‘The child that came last becomes the elder.’” To Niké, “God, look at them. They’re perfect. She’s perfect. She’s her.”
At which all of them looked as on cue at the mantel, whence the woman in the portrait looked sullenly back.
Indeed, she was. Taiwo. A lighter-skinned Taiwo in ten, fifteen years, thinner lips, straighter hair. Femi aimed a silver remote at the face like a gun, whispered “Pow!” and the music went off. Kehinde half-expected the woman to fall, mortally wounded, slumping out from her frame to the floor. Or half-wished. As he stared at her, something else happened, the inverse illusion: an ugliness emerged. He found the woman ugly, overwhelmingly ugly; knew ugly things would happen on account of her face; and he hated her, her appearance, her milky-white pallor, he hated this woman, neither African nor white, who belonged to no People, no past he had heard of, who sat on the wall, cold with death, cut from ice, the only member of their family they had ever vaguely looked like, this pale, hateful beauty entrenched in wrought brass.
Femi said, presently, “That woman is your grandmother,” pronouncing that woman with pointed distaste. “The wife of my father Kayo Savage, your grandfather. The mother of Fola, your mother, their child.” He gestured to the painting, his voice growing softer and tighter, a raspy sound pushed through his teeth. “It was always in the bedroom just over his bed, always watching him fucking my mother, his whore. Somayina his wife. Folasadé his daughter. Babafemi his bastard. Olabimbo his whore.” He spread his arms, beaming, eyes bloodshot and shining, and laughed. “There you have it. The Savage family tree.”
Niké sucked her teeth. “Femi, please, oh—”
“Be quiet. I’m telling them a story. It’s clear they don’t know. One should know where one comes from, don’t you think? It’s important. They should know about our family, how we all came to be.” He laughed again, loudly, looking sharply at Taiwo. “And now here you are,” then at Kehinde, “my twins. You know what we Yoruba say about ibeji. You bring us good luck and great fortune, you twins. And you know what my name means, yes? Femi means ‘love me.’ I want you to love me, ibeji, you hear?” He bent down and kissed them now, slowly, on their foreheads, his hands and lips freezing. “I love you so much.” He looked at his wife. “Woman, what are you looking at?” Niké sucked her teeth. “Show our twins to their rooms.”
• • •
Would that he looked like his father, he’s thinking, while Sadie frowns, pitying. The silence abates. His ears sort of pop, and he hears himself saying, “I love your face, Sadie.”
“You can have it,” she says.
“Did you like it? The card?” He is blushing, embarrassed, aware that she, Sadie, must think him insane.
But she giggles, flushing deeply. “I loved it, I really loved it. You made me so . . . pretty.” She smiles, at her hands.
“I’m sorry. You were saying. About a bad part? What’s the bad part? You’re here, both my sisters. I’d call this part great.” He shifts his chair studiously to the left to face Sadie, as one does when one means now I’m listening; proceed. He is aware of his sister, of Taiwo, beside him, to his right, but can’t look at her, not quite, not yet. Sadie starts to say something, glancing at Taiwo. Eyes trained on Sadie, he doesn’t look right. Instead, he follows Sadie’s eyes following Taiwo, who’s left her chair, mute, for the back of the room.
“No!” he gasps, standing to stop her, “Wait. Taiwo.” Too late, and too softly. She reaches the wall. She stares at the paintings, her back to him, silent, her questions a hollow, a hole in his lungs. Loss of breath. “They’re not done yet . . .” a weak exhalation. She doesn’t stop staring, and Sadie stands up.
“Now what?” she calls down to Taiwo, who ignores her. Interest piqued, Sadie leaves her chair, goes to look.
He is watching himself springing into authoritative action, making comments and gestures that make them step back, turning the canvases over so the faces aren’t showing—while standing, immobile, unable to move. He is telling them, “No! They’re not done yet! They’re nothing!”—while watching them, silent, unable to speak. The thing that he does, that he hates himself for doing, the mute-and-immobile act, locked off in space. Why does this happen? he’d asked Dr. Shipman. Can you stop it? Can you fix me? I’m a coward, I’m a punk. I stand in the chamber behind the glass walls, I can see all the people there passing me by, but can’t get to them, can’t speak to them, can’t tell them I’m in here; I can’t break the glass, and they can’t hear me shout.
“Protection,” said the doctor.
“Protection from what?”
“From your fear, from your hurt, from your anguish, your rage.”
“I’m not angry,” said Kehinde.
“You are, and you should be. Allow it, your anger. Permit it to be.”
“But it’s not. I’m not angry.”
“You aren’t? With your mother? Your father? Your uncle? Your sister? Yourself?”
“Not my sister,” he’d say, but too sharply, too quickly.
The bushy white eyebrows uplifting, “You’re not?” And after a moment, “Then why did you say it?” That same wretched question, again and again. Half a year facing and painting a garden, and still he can’t answer it. Why the word whore?
He hadn’t felt angry. He hadn’t felt anguish. They were lying in comfort at the Bowery Hotel, he in town for his opening down the street at Sperone, she spending the weekend indoors, on the lam. Someone had seen her and the dean of her law school entwined in some kind of revealing embrace and had snapped a phone photo to send to the papers, specifically the paper at which the wife worked. Such that now, Taiwo said, she was stared at on campus; she’d stopped attending classes and intended to withdraw. Could she stay, for the weekend, eating popcorn in sweatpants and not seeing reporters wherever she went? Of course she could, longer, he’d pay for a hotel room; better yet, she could come back to London with him. No, just the weekend, she said. As per usual. She always said no to his money, his help. Of late he’d stopped offering, afraid that by pushing he’d seem to be bribing or buying her off. Just the one weekend. Alone with her brother. It was all that she needed, she said.
Here they were.
In night clothes. Near sleeping. New York out the window a low lilting chorus of laughter and cars horns, the suite looking incongruously (if comfortingly) like a roo
m in a house on Nantucket: beige, florals and all. Friday night. Quiet. Then:
“K . . . ,” she said faintly.
“Yes?” he said, turning to face her. She didn’t turn. She was lying on her back with her feet by his pillow, his feet by her head (how they always shared beds). She was looking at the ceiling, not turning to face him. He wiggled his toe by her forehead. She laughed.
“I’m serious,” she said.
“About what?” He was laughing. She still didn’t look at him. “You only said K.”
“But that’s what I say when I’m about to be serious. You know what I’m asking. You still haven’t said.” Now he was quiet, his eyes on the ceiling. He could feel her peering down at him, over her toes. After a few seconds she set down her head, and they both lay in silence. “Just tell me,” she said.
“What do you want me to say?” he said softly, but knew what, and knew that she knew that he knew. She wanted to know what he thought about the pictures, her name in the papers slipped under their door, his twin sister, his Taiwo, embroiled in a “scandal,” embroiled in the World, and not the world in their heads but the real one, capital W, where people were ruthless, where stories were written about them, not by, where real men and real women had motives and bodies (and sex, which no longer existed in the world that they shared). He understood the question but didn’t have an answer. The girl in the photos was not one he knew, not his sister, his Taiwo; she was someone else, older, and harder, than the girl he had left in New York. To answer her question he’d have to face that one, the question of why he had left after school, won the Fulbright to Mali, waited tables in Paris, started showing in London, and never came home. She, too, got a scholarship to study in England, two years she had lived there, in Oxford, not far, but he never suggested she visit in Mali, nor the next year in Paris, never said he was there. She left, started law school; he never came to see her. Two years in East London and rarely flew home. “You’re busy becoming a world-famous artist,” she’d tell him, “don’t worry.”