by Uwem Akpan
Desperate, I stopped and sat on the bed, wanting to scream her name to the heavens. I took the food containers and placed them at the foot of the bed. The thing farthest from my mind at that point was food. I lay in a fetal position and buried my head in a pillow. I was beginning to lose my sense of time.
I couldn’t lie still and heard only Fofo’s groans. Then I began to hear someone walking quietly around our house. I sat up and listened. The footsteps were too light to be those of our guard. I also knew it wasn’t my sister because I didn’t think she could have gotten out. I began to suspect that we had more than one guard. But the outside didn’t hold my interest for long. It occurred to me that I hadn’t searched under the bed.
I stood up slowly and tiptoed toward the parlor door. Hoping to surprise her, I turned around, lay on the ground, stretched out to my full length, and rolled under the bed, risking my wounded knee, so as not to give her any chance to dodge my contact. I slid out the other side and came to rest against the stack of secondhand roofing sheets. As I got up, a beacon of hope rose in my heart because I realized Yewa might be resting on top of those sheets. Carefully, to avoid cutting my hands on the sharp edges where nails had been pulled, I worked the surface with my fingers. I found only our cutlery basket, the work tools that Fofo and I had used to cement the rooms, and our carton of clothes.
Disappointed, I went to lean on the door, where I had been with her last, before we scrambled for safety. I imagined my sister’s eyes everywhere and longed for her to laugh or tease me. It was the first time in my life I didn’t know where Yewa was, and I felt lost without her. My preoccupation with Fofo’s well-being disappeared because at least he was breathing. Tears ran down my face, and I wished to hell for a ray of light in that darkness.
“Yewa! Yewa!” I finally shouted, and stamped my feet.
“Yes, yes,” she said in a strange fearful voice.
“Wetin dey happen for dere?” the guard said from the other room.
“Ah, nothing, monsieur,” I said, relieved to hear my sister’s voice, and then turned my attention to her: “Where are you?”
I moved away from the door toward the right corner but kicked a plastic crate and stopped. The joy of hearing Yewa’s voice helped me ignore the pain.
“Notting?” the guard said. “You dey talk to me?”
“No, I meant Yewa,” I said, and forced a giggle.
“Just make sure you no wound yourself o. . . . I want sleep; n’jlo na gbòjé.”
“We’re sorry to disturb you, monsieur.”
I climbed over the crate and closed in on the corner, listening intently. When I reached our plastic water vat, which was as high as my chest and wider than my arms were long, I thought she was standing on top of the lid, leaning against the wall. So I tapped the side of the vat and whispered, “Just come down, please.”
But the lid sprang open, and I caught it before it made a sound. She had been hiding inside the vat all along. “I’m here,” she whispered, standing up.
“Just come out, OK?”
I tried to pull her out, but she pushed my hands away. “Leave me alone. You are with them.”
“Me?”
“Yes, yes.”
“No, I’m not.”
“You are.”
“Shh!”
“Don’t lie to me. You were laughing with him right now . . . you like them. You and Fofo Kpee didn’t tell me you were going to sell me. You’re no longer my brother.”
“Come out first, please,” I said, and turned around, offering her my back and leaning into the vat. “Climb on. I’ll explain later. You have to come out so he sees us when he opens the door. Otherwise . . .”
“I don’t want to see anybody.”
I stepped back a bit and kept quiet, partly because I didn’t know what to say anymore and partly because I was afraid of waking the guard. Dealing with my sister in such darkness was like arguing or fighting with a faceless enemy who could strike at any time. I would have given anything to see her face. Maybe my tears would have convinced her of my innocence. Now her defiance came out in her agitated breathing.
“They’ll kill Fofo if you don’t cooperate,” I resumed.
“They won’t. He’s one of them, like you. Leave me alone.”
“Won’t you eat something?”
“Never.”
I couldn’t persuade her, so I resorted to force. But she ducked down, squatting in the vat, locking her knees and elbows and raising her shoulders to her ears so I had no place to hold. I reached in to tickle her to soften her up, then I heard her mouth open with a crack. Her teeth hit my wrist, unable to bite. She started giggling, a rubbery sonority muffled by her body. It was as if she was mocking me or perhaps mocking all child traffickers of this world. I left my sister and went to lie on the bed, falling asleep.
WHEN I WOKE UP, I had a headache and was very hungry. Yawning and stretching, I was surprised to find Yewa snoring beside me. Fofo Kpee’s groan had mellowed. My knee hurt and felt swollen.
I found my way to the toilet pail and urinated, hitting the sides to muffle the sound. Then I picked up a food container and started to eat, stuffing myself with my hands. It was to be a breakfast of akara, bean cake, and ogi, pap. The balls of akara that sat atop the ogi were cold and soggy in parts. I sensed that water had condensed in the container. I was thirsty, so I raised it to my mouth and turned it gently until water droplets trickled onto my tongue. I chewed the akara quickly, the cold fried oil clogging the inside of my mouth. When I came to the last ball, I noticed there was a small plastic bag in the container. I untied it and found four sugar cubes, which I figured were for the ogi. But the ogi had caked over, and there was no way I could mix the sugar into it. So I tossed one of the cubes into my mouth and chewed noisily, then began to eat chunks of ogi.
When I finished, my headache was gone. But I wasn’t satisfied, and my mouth was parched. I was tempted to take some of Yewa’s portion, but as I put down my empty container, I discovered other containers. My heart jumped. There were two more containers of food and two bottles of water. I knew immediately that the guard had come into the room while we were sleeping. I drank quickly, holding up the bottle so the water gurgled into my mouth.
“Who dey drink water like dat?” the guard said from the parlor. “You want choke? Is dat you, boy?”
I paused and said, “Yes, monsieur.”
“Why you ask your sister to sleep for water container?”
“I didn’t put her there.”
“Who put her dere? No mess wid me o!”
“I swear I did not put her there.”
“Ecoutez, tomorrow morning, we want take your fofo go hospital. He get high fever. And make you warn dat gal say make she no sleep for dat container again. We no want anoder high fever patient o. . . . How come you no eat your breakfast? Dis night you get notting.”
“I have eaten it. . . . The food is nice. Thanks.”
“Just finish your breakfast and lunch. And make sure your sister follow eat. Oderwise, I go come put de fear of Gabon into her.”
“Yes, monsieur.”
It dawned on me that it was night and that it was the guard who brought Yewa to our bed. In one gulp, I finished off the bottle of water, then I sorted out the food and shook her awake.
She climbed out of bed and disappeared into the darkness, stumbled and fell down hard. Her scream shredded the silence. It seemed like a flash of light because it let me know precisely where she was. The guard came in, quick and furious, sweeping the room with his huge flashlight. Yewa lost her voice and tried to run back to me for refuge, but the man seized her by her dress.
“Qu’est-ce que c’est?” he asked, dragging her toward the bed. “Sit and tait-toi! Comprends? Shut up.”
“Yes, monsieur,” Yewa said, sitting down.
“Eat de food din din!” he commanded her.
The light was close to Yewa’s face. She shut her eyes and shielded her head, as if she expected to be hit. There was a dash o
f dried blood on her elbow, I guessed because of the crash.
“I say manger . . . begin,” the man shouted.
“Yewa, please, eat,” I said, opening up the lunch of spaghetti and stew for her.
“No feed her o!” the man warned me, and turned to her: “Did your broder tell you no sleep for dat container, huh?” My sister nodded yes. “Respond-moi!”
“I’m sorry.”
“Ajuka vi, you want sleep for container, you no want chop food, I go kill you today.”
“Please, no kill her,” Fofo said suddenly from the parlor, his voice weak and his speech slurred. My heart skipped on hearing Fofo’s voice.
“Silence, silence, yeye man!” the guard scolded him. “Never talk to dem . . . jamais.”
Yewa was shaken and ate her food hurriedly between sobs. She ate with both hands and slurped and sucked the dripping stew. She didn’t pause to chew but swallowed as soon as she could. The lower part of her face was gleaming with oil, and the front of her dress was soiled. The man, looking satisfied, nodded and left the room.
While Yewa ate, I used some of the water from her bottle to wash off the blood from her elbow and wiped it with the bedsheet. When she finished the food, she asked for more. I handed her my container of spaghetti and stew, and she ate without slowing down. Afraid the food would choke her, I told her to take it easy, to no avail. I couldn’t tell whether she was afraid the guard might be watching her, or whether his tyranny had awakened in her an insatiable hunger.
Immediately after she finished, she said she needed to use the toilet. I guided her to the pail, and soon the stink of her shit thickened the stuffiness in the room. When she finished, I tore a large piece of newspaper, crumpled it, and gave it to her to clean up with.
I offered her her portion of akara and ogi, but she said she was full, so I quickly ate it.
“REVEILLEZ, REVEILLEZ!” the guard screamed into our ears the following morning. “You too dey sleep.”
I blocked the glare of the flashlight with my hands and stood up. He told us Fofo had been hospitalized and then put the jug of water he was carrying on the floor. He set down the flashlight so its beam poured up into the roof in a wide V. He wore a native long-sleeve shirt, blue with bright red flowers. A hulk of a man, he was as tall as Big Guy but heavier. His hair was big and as black as our godfather’s. His tight trousers accentuated his bulk because his thighs looked swollen, like those of local wrestlers. He moved away from the light and came toward our bed to lean on the roofing sheets.
Lit, the room looked much smaller than I remembered, and the silver padlocks on the windows and door gleamed.
“You container rat, núdùdú lo˙ yón na wé ya?” he taunted Yewa.
“Yes, I like the food,” she said.
“Wetin be your Gabon name?”
“Me?” my sister said, and looked at me as if for direction.
“Mary,” I said. “I am Pascal, she’s Mary.”
“E yón. You be good children. I no promise I go dey nice to you if you behave well well?”
“You did,” I said.
By now he was sweating profusely. He started unbuttoning his beautiful shirt and blew twice at his chest and kept wiping his brow with his hands. I thought he was going to drink the water he had brought, to cool himself. But he didn’t touch the jug. Instead he stood up and moved around the room like a teacher pacing in front of his class. I exchanged glances with my sister and braced for another orientation session.
My eyes, already used to the extremes of total darkness and bright flashes of light, hovered over the flowers on his shirt like butterflies dancing around bougainvilleas. In the dark part of the room, where he moved, the flowers on his shirt weren’t as bright, and I wished he would walk back into the light.
“Fofo and Big Guy give you lessons?” he said, turning around.
“Yes, monsieur,” we said.
“D’accord, Mary, how many fofos et tantines Gabonaises as tu?”
“I have three uncles and two aunties,” she said.
“Names?”
“Vincent, Marcus, and Pierre, and Cecile and Michelle.”
“Good, good gal . . . Pascal, talk about your grandfader, din din.”
“My grandpa Matthew died two years ago,” I said. “Auntie Cecile cried for two days. Grandma Martha refused to talk to anyone. . . .”
“Excellent, boy, excellent,” he said. “Now I go teach you nouvelles leçons?”
He paused and looked expectantly at us.
“Yes, monsieur,” we said.
“We dey almost ready for de voyage,” he said, “and Fofo done prepare you well well. Pour example, I dey sweat like hell here, but you done adjust to de heat finish. Na only God know why your yeye uncle come fear and want abscond.” He brought out a piece of paper from his pocket and studied the content carefully and said, “No wahala . . . repetez après moi: ‘We were rescued from the water by a caring crew. . . . ’”
“We were rescued from the water by a caring crew,” we said.
“ ‘We were more than these, but some are dead.’”
“We were more than these, but some are dead.”
“ ‘We were tossed into the sea, and many of us died.’”
“We were tossed into the sea, and many of us died.”
“ ‘We had been at sea for three days before the sailors told us we were at risk.’”
“We had been at sea for three days before the sailors told us we were at risk.”
“ ‘We were heading for Côte d’Ivoire before the mishap.’”
“We were heading for Côte d’Ivoire before the mishap.”
Satisfied, he asked me to stand up and go get him two cups. I went over to the cutlery basket and pulled two out.
“Make we do someting interesting,” he said. “Dis na just some water and salt. Don’t be afraid. Ready?”
“Yes,” we said.
He carefully poured the water from the jug into the cups. He took a sip from each cup and licked his lips with his tongue as if it were a tasty drink. He offered the cups to us and we drank the salty thing.
“At-sea Orientation be de name. . . . Dis in case drinking water come finish for vessel . . . at least you go survive for one day.”
“Yes, monsieur.”
“Also in case dem dey toss you overboard . . .”
“Overboard?” I said, surprised.
“Just for short time . . . but maybe dem go give you life jacket or big plank which many of you go hold for inside water. We dey do dat sometimes if navy—bad-bad government people—come harass us for sea at night, OK? Dem dey tie de plank to ship, so no fear. Just to hide you for water while dem dey search our ship. You no go sink. . . . We no want risk anyting.”
“It’s good to be prepared,” I said.
“For de few days we get here, you go take de salt water twice a day. I go bring de water wid de manger et fresh water, OK?”
“Yes, monsieur.”
He started to leave the room but stopped and said, “Ah, one more ting—new plan. In three days, we dey bring oder children to live here wid you. We go take everyting out of dis room. We need space. You go show dem how to be good children.”
“Yes, monsieur.”
“Any question? Ou bien, wetin you need?”
Yewa and I exchanged glances.
“Please, do you know Antoinette and Paul?” I said. “Are they coming to stay with us?”
“Are dese de children Fofo promised Big Guy?” he said excitedly, searching our faces. “Tell me de trud.”
“No,” I said, happy that our uncle changed his mind before he brought my other siblings into this evil plot.
“So who be dese?” he said.
“Big Guy knows them,” Yewa said. “Mama and Papa brought them to our place a long time ago.”
The man sighed, and his body settled into the ease of disappointment. “Well, if Big Guy know dem, trust me, dem done reach Gabon déjà. . . . No, you no know dis group qui arrive ici . . . but i
ls sont des bon kids . . . eager to travel.”
“So when are we traveling?” I asked.
“Immediately de children arrive. Dis na your batch.”
“What about Fofo Kpee?” my sister asked.
“Fofo Kpee?” the man said ruefully, as if he didn’t know whom we were talking about. “What about him?”
“We will see him before we go?” I said.
“Ah, I go tell you about Fofo tomorrow,” he said, and quickly switched off his flashlight before I could see his face. He left the room.
Late into that night, I didn’t sleep. Everything was quiet outside. I kept thinking about what the guard would tell us the following day. I wanted to know how Fofo was doing in the hospital, and, if he was feeling bad about our trip, to tell him it was OK. It was clear to me now that he had sealed the inner room to house children until they could be shipped to Gabon. I remembered how Big Guy looked at our house when they brought the Nanfang and said it was OK for the meantime. Now I understood that Fofo and Big Guy were planning to build some bigger depot with the roofing sheets and cement.
I woke up with a start that night to the sound of a bike riding into our compound. Another one rode in and stopped, and there were brisk footsteps that got louder as they came around the house, toward the back. Slowly I stood up and looked into the darkness, then went and put my ear to the window. My breath quickened as I imagined them surrounding the house. I thought they were going to ship us to Gabon that night, and I resigned myself to my fate.
When they went past the window, I stole across the room to the back door. They went to work immediately. I heard thuds hitting the ground; I suspected they were digging. The rhythm was uneven and faster than what one man could have managed alone, so I guessed there were at least two diggers. They worked fast and hard in silence. Their tools sometimes crashed into hard objects. It sounded like they were digging beyond where we normally cooked outside, beside the bathroom. The spray of sand hitting the grass and leaves was unmistakable.
“Deep enough?” someone said after a while.
“Too shallow,” Big Guy said. “Bring your spade; continue.”