by Sefi Atta
“Pay?”
“Yes, because right now he’s offended, humiliated. He’s a small man psychologically, and nothing you do will pacify him. From my experience, he may probably ask you to pay enough to buy the whole lot.”
“How will I ever do that?”
“How much money do you have now?”
“It’s here in my pocket.”
“Place it on the table, my friend.”
Makinde did.
Rasaki studied the naira notes. He tilted his head to one side and then he smiled. “You got this by duping believers?” Rasaki was a Muslim by birth. The last time he visited a mosque was to marry his only wife, who later divorced him.
“I didn’t dupe anyone,” Makinde answered. “It was an admission fee.”
“Call it whatever you want. You were in the game of chances, and you were master of it. People trusted you and you spat on their faith. I’m not blaming you. They were fucking fanatics and they deserved it. Who knows what Mary looked like? Do you?”
Makinde was getting impatient. Rasaki seemed to have a lot of knowledge, except about how to help him out of paying the taxman.
“What can you do for me?” he asked.
“My friend,” Rasaki said. “Do you play the pools?”
He was an expert. How else would he have survived without a job for years? Playing the pools was not a risk, he said, and only those who played the pools long enough knew this. They studied odds and they beat odds. Those who lost were outsiders, like believers looking for miracles in lots. “Give me your money and I will return it tenfold,” he said.
“How?” Makinde asked.
“Ah-ah? Will I tell you what has taken me decades to learn?”
“Why should I give you what has taken me a month to earn?”
“It’s up to you.”
“My choices are limited.”
“The possibilities are endless.”
“You know a lot. How come you’re not a rich man yourself?”
“I choose not to be.”
“Why?”
“Where else will I be a duke?”
Makinde had to concede; he did not know one person like Rasaki, who, despite his appearance, skinny with a rash on his neck, walked around downtown as if he were royalty. He wore trousers that were long and flared. “Keep-Lagos-Clean,” that fashion was called. His gray hair was cut high on his crown. “Girls-Follow-Me,” that hairstyle was called. His girlfriends were prostitutes, he lived in one room, and people knew his wife had divorced him because he was incapable of fathering children, and yet he was extremely sure of himself.
“I came to you because you’re a man with connections,” Makinde said. “I was hoping for something not so out of the ordinary. A name to slip a bribe perhaps? Let me think about this.”
At home, Makinde considered his options. On the one hand was his lot, and in his hand with the broken finger was the money he hadn’t earned from working. Free money. It seemed to him that Rasaki was right. He had become master of a game, unwittingly. Who from his lot left with a miracle? Who walked out with more money in their pockets, except him? Those who came on crutches hobbled away, those who came blind shuffled off without seeing. He had not heard from the guide woman, but he was certain she had found another place to preach. Not one of the visitors to his lot was a Mercedes owner, the big masters in his country—so masterful they were actually called “master” and “madam” They were as huge as gods. No matter how long he worked, circumstances remained according to their design. Never his. Never his.
He sweated and salivated. He drifted into that most powerful of mental states—totally dissatisfied. He went back to Rasaki with the money. Rasaki promised a return within a week. How did Makinde hear about his money? He kept going to Rasaki’s place and Rasaki was not to be found. He asked about Rasaki’s whereabouts. People said Rasaki had traveled up North. He hovered around the row of collapsing bungalows in which the duke had a room. No Rasaki. The duke had completely disappeared from downtown.
It wasn’t until Bisi returned, full of her mother’s vegetable stews and no longer craving dirt, that he heard from her. She’d heard from her friend at her married women’s fellowship, who’d heard from her husband, who’d heard from his colleague that Rasaki had taken money from someone to play the pools, lost the money, and this person was unlikely to ask for his money back, because this person was in big trouble with the taxmen, and Rasaki knew exactly who to approach to make sure this person ended up ruined, and this person was Makinde.
“Is it true?” Bisi asked him.
“Apparently,” Makinde said.
“In the short time I’ve been away?”
“Yes.”
“How could you?”
“I had little choice.”
“Well, I am disgusted.”
“Why?” he asked, as she would. After all, it was not his fault. She saw the vision on the dirty windscreen. She told people and they came, and stopped him from doing his work, got his name mentioned in the papers and attracted the taxmen’s attention. “This would never have happened,” he said, “but for your vision.”
“On the contrary,” she said, and honestly. “It is you who went wrong, being tempted by a man like Rasaki. We were blessed with that money. You lost it the moment you thought you could multiply it by other means.”
“How else could it have been multiplied?”
“You should have taken it to church.”
“For what?”
“To give as tithes. Your fruit would have been abundant.”
“My dear wife, when has my fruit ever been abundant?”
Bisi had to think. Becoming a father was one blessing, even though Makinde might not want to hear that. She couldn’t think of another.
“I give tithes,” she said. “My prayers are answered.”
“The miracle you prayed for on my lot, was that answered?” “No.”
“Ah, well.”
“It will be! I know it will!”
“Tell me when that happens. Me, I feel as if I’ve been fighting a will stronger than mine. A mischievous will. It wreaks havoc and I’m done fighting it.”
She had a solution to their problem meanwhile. She was entitled to support from the Married Women’s Crisis Fund. “On condition you join my church family.”
Makinde was truly exhausted. “For God’s sake...”
“It’s stipulated. You want this help or not?”
“It’s not as though I have several options.”
The following Sunday he attended the Abundant Life Tabernacle with Bisi. There Bisi told him: his presence in her church was the miracle she’d prayed for. “I’m so glad you found your way,” she said.
HAILSTONES ON ZAMFARA
On the day I die I will rise up, arms outstretched, magnificent as the mother of the Holy Prophet, then my executioners will be forced to admit, “We were wrong. We should have revered you more.”
I am not guilty. I have always preferred men as I make them up in my head; invisible men. Not the kind some women want, those silly fantasy men in foreign romance books. My men are plain—ugly, even—with facial marks, oily skins, dust in their hair. They look like men from Zamfara. They ride motorcycles, take buses and taxis to their places of work. They walk mostly. They never own cars, otherwise they would have to be rich men, the kind who become senators of the Republic of Nigeria, chairmen of federal banks and such. No, my men have spread-out feet from being barefoot as children. They have palms as brown as tobacco leaves. Under their robes their ribs are prominent. Some have had a hand cut off because they stole to eat. Allah forgives them now that they are cripples. After all, my men pray as Muslims should, five times a day, even though they perform ablution in gutters. Plus they are humble before Him, even if capable of going home to beat their wives to deafness.
Did Our Husband think I was pretending the day I stopped hearing him? Had he forgotten he caused the very condition that made him so angry? I tried to help him understand
. “You call me, I can’t hear. You insult me, I can’t hear. You tell me to get out of your house. How can I leave when I can’t hear?”
“You witch!” he shouted. “I know you’re doing this on purpose!”
“It is not my fault,” I said. “My left ear is damaged from the beating you gave me. Sometimes I hear, sometimes I don’t, even if I face Mecca.”
“I divorce thee!”
“Huh?” I said.
“I divorce thee!”
“You must be asking for food again. I’m off to the market.”
Where else would I go so early that morning? The trouble with Our Husband was that his anger was like lightning. Lightning from drinking too much burukutu, wasting half the profits from his mechanic’s shop on the brew, and not being accountable for his actions afterwards. Lightning loves to show off. “Look at me. See what I do with the night? Let me turn it to day and confuse you.” I came home one day, and he would be calm. I came home the next, and he behaved as though I’d insulted his father’s lineage. Off and on, that was Our Husband, like lightning before thunder comes along and shows who is in control.
He was angry that day because I was not enthusiastic about his announced betrothal, so he boxed my ears. I showed him thunder—the thunder of no secondary education; of being married to him at fourteen; motherhood three times over. To prove my endurance, I even chaperoned his new bride, a girl the same age as my eldest daughter, Fatima. I called her “Junior Wife,” and from then on called him “Our Husband.”
“It pains me,” Junior Wife said to me, the morning after her wedding night.
“It will eventually stop,” I said.
Her eyes were red with tears. She made me so angry. I had raised mine already. I did not want another child around the house.
“I want to go home,” she whined.
“You’re lazy,” I said. “You did not rise early to make Our Husband’s tea. You’re supposed to make his tea from now on.”
She wrapped her headscarf over her mouth. Under the white chiffon her jaw trembled. “You see me crying. You don’t even take pity on me.”
How could I? This was my only home.
“At least you are old,” she said. “You should be like a mother to me.”
Her kohl appeared like a bruise.
“I’m thirty-two years,” I said.
I was orphaned. Mama was long gone. Baba passed away before her, and while he was alive he had three wives. Mama had only one son. I stopped hearing from him after I left home for marriage, and to be his older sister when he was born was an ousting if ever there was one. My brother, who from age two strutted around with his arms akimbo. If you stared at him, he told Baba. If you ate before him, he told Baba. When I pulled his ears for spitting, he told Baba. Mama gave me a good whipping that one time, so that I would not forget what happened to her, after it had happened to me. I loved my brother nevertheless; his ears especially, because they stuck out. And his nose was so long he could pass for a baby elephant. Whenever I bathed him, I poured water over him, picturing him as one, playing in a fountain. That was how I loved him: for what he wasn’t, as I loved Baba. I pictured Baba as Allah. Allah, who was capable of anything. He could be furious, enough to use a horsewhip. He could be strict, enough to demand I did not look at his face. Wise. He alone knew why his daughters needed no secondary education. One day he would be caring, I hoped, and I would gobble up his affection like a delicious cup of sour milk meal, cold as I like it.
Junior Wife ran home that first week. Her parents sent her back with a bundle of kola nuts to appease Our Husband. Her father warned her, before parting, that he would do as Mallam Sanusi did, if she ever came home again. Mallam Sanusi was a legend in Zamfara. His daughter ran away from her husband’s house and Mallam Sanusi returned her. She ran away again, and Mallam Sanusi returned her. The third time she ran home, he cut off her foot so she would never come home again. Mallam Sanusi was a wicked man. Men were not that wicked, which was why Mallam Sanusi became a legend. But that idle threat from her father was enough to make Junior Wife stay put. I asked my daughters not to play with her, Fatima especially, who thought she had found a sister. I told her gently, “You’re supposed to respect her. She is your father’s new wife.” Fatima said, “Then I should marry my father’s friend, so that we can play.” I laughed. Fatima’s mouth was too sharp. “You’re going to finish secondary school before you marry,” I said. “I will suffer anything for that right.”
Junior Wife cried. She said she had always dreamed of finishing secondary school; she was particularly good at multiplication. She was always feeling sorry for herself, and if I was ever like that, I did not care to be reminded by her sad presence. Plus, she was lax with personal hygiene. Sometimes I passed her and I could smell stale urine on her. “Didn’t your mother teach you how to douche?” I once asked. That was when she began rolling her eyes at me. What, she imagined I was jealous? I was glad her father forced her to stay. From then on Our Husband left me alone at night. I told her to relax when he got on top of her, think of his manhood as a cucumber. I would be fair to her, I promised, so long as she performed her wifely duties and relieved me of mine. Then I gave her extra advice. “Get fat as fast as I did, and he will surely marry someone else.”
Our Husband was partial to bones; the bones of girls in particular. To get such bones, he could spend fifty years’ savings on a dowry; a hundred years’ savings even. In Zamfara, men split young bones on their wedding nights. By the time their brides were as old as me, their wombs were rotten.
Junior Wife came to me. “I’m pregnant.”
“That’s very good,” I said.
“I vomited all morning.”
“It’s a girl, then.”
“Why?” she asked.
“If it’s a boy you would vomit all day.”
She rolled her eyes. “I don’t believe in that.”
“Ask your mother. Didn’t she teach you anything before you left?”
“It’s not a girl. I know.”
I had not thought of that. I was so happy Our Husband left me alone at night I was lulled into a stupid state. I was even singing while I cooked. A boy? What would happen to the rest of Fatima’s secondary education? I was staring at Junior Wife’s face. She had such a haughty expression. Pregnancy had made her stronger, as if she’d found a new companion I could not separate her from.
She actually refused to bed Our Husband. “I have my limits,” she said. “You were naive when this happened to you. You didn’t know how to trick him. I’ve told him that if he touches me, his son will be miscarried instantly.”
He was dumb enough to swallow that fib? Ah, yes, of course, he knew how to find a young girl’s passage, but he didn’t care what was going on in her passage.
“I should cook you a meal,” I said. “To celebrate.”
I wanted my hands to be busy. I did not want to hear about the possibility of a son.
“Many thanks,” Junior Wife said, “but I only eat what I myself have cooked from now on. My mother taught me that, at least.”
What a cheek for her to assume I would be so malicious as to poison her.
As she grew bigger, the changes began in Zamfara. The state government was building Sharia courts, appointing Alkalis to preside over them. A contractor laid the foundation for a court in our town center. The earth cracked during the dry season, sandstorms came and went, hailstones followed and dented the finished aluminum roof of the court. I thought it was a divine sign. That was the first time I heard that the Quran forbade women and men from traveling in the same buses, girls and boys from attending the same schools. Fatima and other final-year girls were transferred to an afternoon session. The boys had the morning sessions. By the afternoons, most teachers were tired and went home anyway, because the girl students were not many. Fatima’s school marks remained high throughout. She even won a trip to a television station, after writing an essay about Heaven. She came back with her eyes so big: “Mama, I met Miriam Mali
ki. She reads the news on television. She says I could train with the station after I leave school.”
I looked at my beautiful daughter, jumping up and down. Would anyone care what knowledge she had in her head? And if she ever were on television, how would I see her? “We don’t own a television,” I said, to be the first to disappoint her.
But she would not stop talking about her Miriam Maliki. Oh, Miriam Maliki had such a pretty smile. Oh, Miriam Maliki wore gold bangles and covered her hair to read the news, because her husband’s family disapproved of her exposing herself. And oh, Miriam Maliki had been on Hajj to Mecca.
I thought, what a dimwit of a woman. To care about work when she came from a home with money. She could afford a trip to Mecca? And back? That was typical of the rich; nothing better to worry about. I thought I would tell her off, this Miriam Maliki, if ever I saw her. She had let women like me down.
Then before the end of school term Fatima’s favorite teacher, her English teacher, was fined for braiding her hair with extensions. Allah—I don’t tell a lie. The Alkali presiding over the poor woman’s case warned her that she would spend time in jail if she didn’t stop being fashionable. Hair perms were not allowed anymore. Hair dye was not allowed, except dark brown and black. We heard of a thief in another town who had his hand cut off by a surgeon at the general hospital. The nurses there buried the hand instead of throwing it away. Our Husband came home complaining that people who drank burukutu were being flogged publicly. We got word of the student in another school far from Fatima’s. She too was to be flogged, because she was pregnant. Thirteen years old, and she said a madman had raped her. Unfortunately, the Alkali told her, as she was a woman, her testimony was not so important.
Our Husband came to my room at night. His breath reeked of burukutu. He fell over me and I gasped in the dark. “Spread,”he said, fumbling between my thighs.