by Abi Daré
“It shouldn’t be a problem,” she say, shrug her shoulder. “No wahala at all. I’ll come by tomorrow evening. What time would work?”
“By seven, seven thirty, I am finishing all my housework.”
She wide her eyes. “You work from what time till seven?”
“I am waking up around four thirty, five, in the morning,” I say. “I am doing my work, cleaning, sweeping, washing, everything, till seven, seven thirty. But if Big Madam is in the house, then I am working till sometimes eleven or twelve in the midnight.”
“From dawn till midnight? That’s madness.” She talk in her breath, but I hear every word of it.
“See you tomorrow evening.” She wave two fingers in the air, turn herself around.
“Thank you, ma,” I say. “See you.”
At night, I sleep a good sleep. I see Khadija and Mama inside my dream. The two both of them have become a happy bird with wings of rainbow color, flying high in a sky with no cloud.
CHAPTER 33
Fact: There are over 50 million users of the internet in Nigeria. It is predicted that, by the year 2018, over 80 million Nigerians will be using the internet, placing the country in the top fifteen globally for internet usage.
Why are you locking your teeths inside iron gate?”
I ask Ms. Tia this question on the first evening that she is teaching me school. It is six fifteen, and the sun is climbing down from the sky, making the whole place have a orange glowing light. Me and her are sitting in the outside, under the palm tree, the one beside the outside tap, near the kitchen. There is no breeze, the air is stiff, the smell of the onions Kofi is peeling is in the air.
The two both of us are sitting on the floor, me in my uniform, her in her blue jeans-trouser and t-shirt. Today, her t-shirt is white. They write GIRLS RULE on top the front in black biro. She have on a white canvas-shoes on her feets. She so small, sitting beside me, her size make me think of Khadija.
“Gate?” She look up, squeeze her nose. “On my teeth?” She laugh. “My braces?”
“Brazes? That is what you call it?”
“Yes, braces,” she say. “I had crooked teeth when I was growing up. My teeth were growing on top of each other. I looked a bit like a baby shark. They come off in a year. I guess they do look like tiny iron gates.” She use her tongue to climb the braces, feel them one by one. “So I was thinking, we should start with the simple stuff, your tenses.”
She pick up a pencil and exercise book from the floor, take the pencil, and write ADUNNI on top the cover of the exercise book. Her writing style is full of plenty curves, everything joining each other, making me think of the henna Enitan drawed on my hand when I was doing my wedding. “I checked online for a beginner syllabus,” she say. “A syllabus is a plan for how we would work, what I can teach you.”
“See-lah-bus,” I say, talking slow.
“Good pronunciation. Where was I? Yes. I checked online. On my phone.” She lift her leg, dig inside her pocket, bring out her phone. She draw something on her phone with her finger, and light is coming on inside it. She hold it up and I am seeing plenty words like a newspaper.
“I would suggest we start with the intermediate course.” She turn the phone to herself, begins to read from it. “This website has courses that can help. It’s the BBC website.”
I look her, blank.
“I have also found some free-to-learn online courses,” she say. “Some days, I will teach you. Other days, I will give you my phone to just listen and learn.”
“On which line?” I ask.
“The internet,” she say. “That’s what I mean by ‘online.’”
“The inta . . . net.” I see this in The Book of Nigeria Fact, but it only make me think of a cloth with plenty holes inside, of the hairnet on Labake’s head.
“Here.” She take the phone, turn it to myself. “This phone connects me to the internet. Think of it as a place where you can connect with people anywhere in the world and access almost any information. When you connect with your phone or computer to the internet, you are going online. You can shop, make friends, send emails, do loads of stuff online.”
“You can be going to the market on this online?”
She nod. “I buy stuff from shops online. Food, clothes, whatever I need, really.”
“That will be costly,” I say. “Why not go to the real market?”
She laugh. “I don’t have the time to go to the proper Lagos markets. When I do go, my crappy Yoruba doesn’t make things easy, plus I am pretty useless at haggling. ‘Haggling’ means asking the seller to sell stuff below the asking price. Anyway, I am crap at it, so I always end up feeling frustrated and leaving.”
“Maybe I can follow you one day,” I say. “In Ikati, I was always buying things for my mama at low price, more low than the market womens are selling it, because we didn’t always have the money. I can show you how to do this haggling, or what you call it?” I smile. “I want to help you a little, just like you are helping me now.”
“That’d be so wonderful,” she say, smiling back. “Thank you.”
“How did you and your husband meet each other?” I ask. “Was it in this Nigeria? Or in the Abroad?”
“I actually met my husband online,” she say. “On Facebook. We dated for a year, long-distance, not the easiest thing. We got married about eighteen months ago in Barbados.”
“Is Facebook inside the online too?”
“Let me show you.” She press something on her phone and show me. I see the white and blue color of the Facebook, see small pictures of Ms. Tia, plenty photos of many peoples but nobody in all the pictures is facing their book. “It is a social networking site,” she say. “People from all over the world can find each other on it at the click of a button. Say I want to find— Oh, here we go, Katie just sent me a message.” She press a picture of the girl face. “That’s Katie, my friend. We used to share a flat.”
The Katie friend is laughing with all her teeths. Her skin is pale like chicken skin, after you have peel all the feathers. Her nose is the shape of question mark, long with a quick curving at the tip of it. Her hair look like a waterfall, the red of blood, pouring from her head to her shoulders. “She is not from the Nigeria?”
“She’s British,” Ms. Tia say.
I think on what she say a moment. Then I say, “Your friend collect our free. But we collect it back on October 1st, 1960.”
“The British government did,” Ms. Tia say with a small smile. “Not Katie or any individual.”
“One day, I collect my own free back from Big Madam,” I say.
“You will,” Ms. Tia say. “One day.”
I look the Katie picture again. “I didn’t know that peoples like you can be living in the Abroad because when I am watching news in the tee-vee with Big Madam, I am only seeing peoples that look like Katie.”
“What, you only see white people when you watch the news?” She force a quiet laugh. “That’s not— I mean there are loads of black people on TV in England and in— Actually,” she sigh, low her voice, make it somehow sad, “you have a point. There aren’t enough black people anchoring the news . . . or in parliament . . . or in top positions. Not enough.”
I didn’t too sure I understand what Ms. Tia is talking about, or why she is calling her Abroad peoples white and black when colors are for crayons and pencils and things. I know that not everybody is having the same color of skin in Nigeria, even me and Kayus and Born-boy didn’t have same skin color, but nobody is calling anybody black or white, everybody is just calling us by our name: Adunni. Kayus. Born-boy. That’s all.
I look Ms. Tia, wanting to ask her if it matter much that a person is one color or another color in the UK of the Abroad, but she is pinching her lips with her teeths and still looking sad, so I keep my words to myself and tell her another fact: “Mr. Mungo Park was discovered Riv
er Niger.”
“What?” she say.
“Is another fact,” I say. “In The Book of Nigeria Fact. Mr. Mungo Park, a man from the British, was traveling to Nigeria and just discovered the River Niger. But he is not from the Nigeria. How he can discover a river that been in the Nigeria for since? Somebody from Nigeria must have show Mr. Mungo Park the river, point him the way to the place. Who is the person? Why didn’t they put the person’s name inside The Book of Nigeria Fact?”
“Maybe because . . .” Ms. Tia pinch her lip with her teeths, think. “I am not sure, actually. It is something to think about.”
“Like Kofi,” I say. “He cook all the food since nearly five years, but everybody is blinding to him. When the visitor come and eat Kofi’s fried rice, they are always saying well done to Big Madam, that the rice is very sweet, and Big Madam is always smiling, saying thank you. Why she cannot say it is Kofi that make the food? She is taking the thank you for another person work.”
“Because she’s not thinking about it,” Ms. Tia say. “Maybe because she’s paid Kofi a salary. It doesn’t mean it’s the right thing to do. I’ll just log out of Facebook.”
“This Facebook thing,” I say. “I can find anybody I am looking for inside it?”
She nod her head yes. “Most times.”
I think of Bamidele, whether I can find him inside this place. “Can you find somebody they are calling Bamidele?”
“Bamidele?” She press her phone, shake her head. “Adunni, there are too many people called Bamidele on here. What’s his surname?”
“I didn’t sure,” I say.
“I am not sure,” she say.
“You say what?”
“I am correcting you. It is ‘I am not sure,’ not ‘I didn’t sure.’”
“Ah,” I say.
“Right. So, our first lesson is to get you to understand your tenses. Thankfully, you have a very good understanding of English, can even manage some complex words, but your tenses need work. Are you ready for this?”
“Yes,” I say, “very ready.”
“Here,” she say, eyes bouncing with a twinkle. “Take the notepad and pencil. Let’s get started.”
CHAPTER 34
Fact: Nigerians did not need a visa to travel to the United Kingdom until 1984.
Honest, honest, English is just a language of confusions.
Sometimes, I am not even understanding the different in what Ms. Tia is teaching me and what I already know. In my mind, I am speaking the correct English, but Ms. Tia, she is always saying I am not saying the right thing. Even though it take a lot of begging for her to help me at first, she now seem so happy to be teaching me, and every day, by seven thirty, she arrive like happy childrens, bouncing on her two feets, holding exercise book and pencil, wanting to teach me. It is tiring me sometimes, her teachings and corrections, but I know that the more better I am learning, the more better the chance for me to enter the school.
But sometimes, we just talk and talk.
Yesterday, I tell her more about me. That I was running away because my papa was wanting to sell me to Morufu because of community rent, and how I was meeting Mr. Kola, and how he was bringing me to Big Madam’s house. I tell her about Mama, and how I am missing her, and when I start to cry, Ms. Tia rub her hand on my back around and around and say, “You’ll be fine, Adunni, you’ll be just fine.” But how she know I will be just fine? All she need to do is enter a aeloplane and she will see her own mama in Port Harcourt. But me, which aeloplane can take me to heaven?
My mama is nothing but a sweet memory of hope, a bitter memory of pain, sometimes a flower, other times a flashing light in the sky. I didn’t tell Ms Tia that I ever marry Morufu or about all the things he did to me in the room after he drink Fire-Cracker. I didn’t tell her about what happen to Khadija. I didn’t tell her because I have keep it inside one box in my mind, lock the box, and throw the key inside river of my soul. Maybe one day, I will swim inside the river, find the key.
She tell me more things about herself too. That she and her papa are “incredibly close,” but she and her mama been always fighting because her mama was “too demanding” when she was growing up. She say her mama didn’t let her to have many friends when she was growing up, and so now she don’t know how to keep many friends. She say too that they didn’t teach her how to speak Yoruba because they are mix of Edo and Ijaw, and now she feels one kind of shame that she cannot speak Yoruba because she wants to be talking with her husband’s family in Yoruba, so I tell her I can be teaching her and she smile and say, “That’d be amazing!”
Then she tell me she is wanting childrens. Well, she is wanting, but her husband is didn’t too serious about the wanting of the baby like her, but now they are starting to try for the baby. When she say this, her eyes fill up with tears, and I sense that she feel a release inside of her spirit, as if she take off a load that she been carrying about for a long time. When I ask her why she change her mind to be wanting childrens, she bring out her phone and press the internet thing and give me.
“Listen to that,” she say. “It’s a lesson in oral English. Listen and pronounce.”
I don’t like those oral English-speaking lesson. I am not hearing the people when they are talking. Their voice is fast, fast, like something is chasing them with cane and making them to talk with no stopping to breathe, but because Ms. Tia is always looking me, I am forcing myself to be saying what the phone is saying. Like yesterday, it was teaching me how to say one word: “cutlery.”
I say: “Kotee-leer-ree.”
The phone say: “Kutluh-ree.”
Ms. Tia say: “Kutluh-ree.”
I say: “How is my own differenting from your own?”
Ms. Tia say: “How is mine different from yours, Adunni. ‘Different.’ Not ‘differenting.’”
Then she teach me the different in her own different and my own differenting.
That is how we are doing. We will start talking, then I will say something, she will twist her nose, begin to teach me, and then we just forget the thing we are talking about before.
But this evening, before we start our English lesson, I sit down on the floor beside her, say, “Ms. Tia? Mind I ask you something?”
“Yep,” Ms. Tia say. “Ask me anything.”
“Mind I ask you again why you change your mind about wanting childrens?” I say.
She sigh, pick a stone by her feets, throw it into the grass, then pinch her bottom lip with her teeths, bite it hard, and blink, blink, blink. “I told you how my mother was a tough woman,” she say. “She still is, but the sickness has softened her a bit, made her weak. My mother demanded perfection in every way. Over everything. As a child, I didn’t have friends. Every moment was spent studying. She wanted me to be an accountant. I hate numbers. She also wanted me to get married at twenty-two and have children immediately because she wanted to be a grandmother before a certain age. She insisted I move back to Port Harcourt after my studies, but I met Ken and moved to Lagos instead. My mother had a manual for how my life would go and I rebelled—got stubborn—at every decision she made for me. She made me so unhappy that I couldn’t imagine having a child and doing what she did to me to my own child. I didn’t think I would be a good mother. I didn’t even want to bring children into this world. I mean, look at the state of things! I was happy to voluntarily reduce our population to save our planet, so I spent a year traveling—before I met Ken—campaigning against population growth.”
She pause a little, steady her voice. “But when my mother got sick last year and was diagnosed as terminal, meaning she would not ever get better, I started to see her, to see things, in a slightly different light. Maybe the sickness softened her, but many times, she would cry and hold my hands, as if trying to say sorry for how things were with us. As I went back and forth to see her in Port Harcourt, especially over the last few months, I bega
n to wish I had a baby to take along with me, to give my mother a reason to fight to live. I’ll be honest and say that it was always just a quick thought, never a strong enough urge to make me discuss with Ken or to change my mind. But the day we met”—she peep me, smile—“you said something about your father being a bit mean, but that did not stop you from loving him. You said you’d take your time to find a good man at the right time so that your children will enjoy what you didn’t. You made me realize that I could be a good mother. That I could choose not to be like my mother. You don’t know this, but what you said that day, it struck a chord inside of me. Made me dig up a long-buried desire.”
She face me, tears shining in her eyes. “And now, I know it is what I want. I cannot stop thinking about it, about having a little boy or girl, just one, because I still believe in my environmental causes.” She laugh soft. “I will raise my child in a loving, balanced home, and hope she can become as smart, intelligent, and amusing as you are.”
“You will be a good mama someday,” I say, blinking back my own tears, “like my own mama was. Ms. Tia, you are not like your mama. You are a good person.”
She take my hand, hold it tight, say nothing.
“What did the doctor think?” I ask. “About you changing your mind?” I take to calling her husband “the doctor” since she tell me about him. She doesn’t mind it.
“At first he wasn’t keen,” she say. “He got upset, said I was backing out of the plan. But we didn’t have an agreement as such. When we met, he said he didn’t want kids and I was cool with it, so we got married.” She smile a shy one, then say, “He’s come round now, we’re trying. I know it will happen.”
“Very soon,” I say.
She nod, give me my exercise book and biro. “Can we now get on with our work for today?”
* * *
Six nights have passed, and now I am in my room, reading the paper Ms. Tia give me.