Butter Honey Pig Bread

by Francesca Ekwuyasi

  “Look at you!” Isabella exclaimed, the smell of cigarettes and alcohol dancing on her breath.

  “You look great!” Taiye said, taking in the looping curls, the black V-neck shirt stretched tight, the jeans cinched high on her waist with a leather belt.

  “So do you!” Isabella exclaimed. Her mannerisms were oversized, her voice loud. Taiye thought she might be drunk.

  “Thank you.”

  “When did you get back?”

  “About two weeks now. How about you?”

  “I’ve been here, o! I was in the UK for, like, two years, at Reading for my master’s, but I’ve been here since.”

  They looked at each other in silence for a moment. A breeze flapped Taiye’s kaftan around her.

  Isabella gestured for Taiye to sit on the empty stool beside her. “Are you here on your own?”

  “No.” Taiye pointed toward the stage, where Habiba and Kareema clutched their purses and swung their hips. From that distance, they looked identical. “You?”

  “My people are dancing as well. I’ll introduce you later. But we have a lot of catching up to do! How far your sister?”

  “She’s in Montreal. She’ll be here later in the year, actually. Around September, I think.”

  “Wow, so you guys are moving back for good?”

  “I am. I’m not sure about Kehinde. She’s coming with her husband, so I guess they’ll decide, I don’t think so sha.”

  “Ah! Kehinde is married!” Isabella clapped. “Eyah, to who?”

  “This guy named Farouq.”

  “Muslim?”

  “I think so. I’m not sure.”

  “Nigerian?”

  “No.”

  “Oyimbo?”

  “I think, partly maybe. I’ve seen pictures, he’s brown.”

  “You haven’t met him?”

  “Nope.”

  “Na wa for una sha, I don’t know sisters that don’t talk like you people.”

  “We’re special like that.” Taiye shrugged. “How about you?”

  “Well,” Isabella stretched out her left hand to display a solitaire engagement ring, a delicate silver band with large round-cut diamond, “I’m engaged!”

  “Congrats! To who?”

  Isabella laughed. “You remember Toki?”

  “Of course I remember Toki!”

  “We went to UNILAG together, been together since third year.”

  “Congratulations, Isa, really, God bless. When is the wedding?”

  “We’re thinking next April, in Dubai.”

  “Good for you.” Taiye wondered whether it was dishonest to express a bit more excitement than she felt.

  “What about you?”

  “What about me?”

  “Ah ahn, how about you, jare? Are you seeing anyone?”

  “No.” Taiye smiled and looked down at her sandalled feet.

  “No one before you came home?” Isabella pressed.

  “No, I haven’t been lucky like you.” It was only a half lie.

  “Na lie! I know you.” Isa raised an eyebrow to suggest something that Taiye couldn’t immediately identify. “I know of you.”

  Taiye sucked her teeth and feigned amusement. “My life is boring. There’s nothing to know.”

  “I know for sure that’s not true.”

  “Whatever. What are you doing for work?” Taiye changed the subject.

  “Senior account manager at Adekunle and West!” Isabella laughed. “It’s very nine-to-five, but let me tell you, the money is good!”

  “Good for you o jare, I’m happy we’re not all aimless and jobless.” “

  How about you?”

  “I don’t really know. I left a bakery job in Halifax, and now I’m trying to find anything.”

  “Wait, what did you study at uni again?”

  “Chemistry, but I’ve ended up mostly working with food, so I went to culinary school to try and make it official.”

  “Culinary school sounds fancy.” Isabella lit a cigarette. She ran a free hand through her curls, twisted her mouth to the side to blow smoke away from Taiye. “What are you going to do in Lagos? Any restaurant connections?”

  “I don’t know yet. If you know anyone that will pay me to cook, hook me up, yeah?”

  Taiye wouldn’t be able to tell you at exactly what point the quality of the air between their bodies changed. Most of the time, with the women she took or followed home, there was an intentional stirring, mostly her doing. There was a way that she gently, sweetly captured their attention and, with a particular use of that gap-toothed smile, shared her intentions. With very little else, she found that the attraction was mutual. But despite her desires, she hadn’t intended anything with Isabella. In fact, all Taiye’s memories of Isabella carried a salty scent of shame and some self-loathing that she had spent many years working to unlearn. Taiye wanted none of that. And yet, it had been what? Twenty minutes? Not even. And there it was, that thing.

  “Where’s Toki?” Taiye heard herself ask.

  Why do you want to know, Taiye? “

  In Abuja.”

  “For work?”

  “Yes, for a few weeks.”

  Taiye nodded and started to get up. “I’m going to see what those girls are up to, but it’s been really good to catch up.”

  “In a rush suddenly?” Isabella tried to mask her disappointment with humour.

  “No, it’s just that they brought me here, it would be rude …” Taiye trailed off.

  “Okay, give me your number. We should plan something,” Isabella cut in with a wave of her cigarette-holding hand and gave Taiye her phone. “You know, I heard gist about you, Taiye.”

  “Yeah? What did you hear?”

  “I heard that in London you were experimenting with …?”

  “Is that a question?”

  Isabella shrugged and arched a meticulously shaped eyebrow.

  “Yeah, I’m gay. Is that what you’re not asking?” Taiye shrugged. So much shrugging and eyebrow-raising between them; Taiye just wanted to talk plainly.

  “Yes,” Isabella replied.

  LATE INTO THE NIGHT, after Habiba and Kareema dropped her off, and she’d tiptoed up the stairs to keep from waking her mother, Taiye undressed and lay beneath thin covers. She was exhausted from all the dancing, but sleep denied her. Her mind spun and spun. Then a beep from her phone alerted her to a message:

  It was so good to see you today, Taiye. I’m sorry about all the personal questions, I didn’t mean to be so somehow. Let me make it up to you. Mumsie is making small chops for an Easter get-together, you should come.

  After Easter Mass and a quiet meal of pepper soup and steamed ofada rice with her mother and great-aunt, Taiye draped her narrow body in an oversized white button-down, tied at the waist, and pulled a tight pair of dark jeans over her hips. She started to apply a deep red stain to her lips but decided against it.

  What are you going for, Taiye?

  She shrugged at her reflection and left.

  Isabella’s mother, Sabirah, still lived just two houses down from Taiye’s childhood home. When Patience, the chubby, wide-eyed maid, led Taiye inside, Isabella was busying herself at the dining table by her mother’s side, swaying her hips in a short lace tunic the colour of butter. They were arranging palm-sized samosas and spring rolls on a white plastic tray.

  “You came!” Isa exclaimed. “Mummy, remember the twins from down the road?”

  Sabirah smiled, faint and shallow. “Of course I remember the twins. Long time no see.”

  She gave Taiye a very brief embrace, so brief in fact that it was merely a matter of lightly touching her warm cheek against Taiye’s and gingerly patting her on the shoulder. Except for a few new fine lines at the corners of her eyes and her plump mouth, Sabirah looked exactly the same as Taiye remembered. Her shoulder-length locs were wrapped in a red silk scarf, and a purple and yellow adire bubu hung elegantly from her slender shoulders.

  “Which one are you?” Her voice was a calm, di
spassionate purr. To Taiye, she’d always seemed bored and vaguely disinterested in anything other than her only child and their house—both of which she kept impeccable.

  “I’m Taiye. Good afternoon, ma. Happy Easter.”

  “Happy Easter. How is your mother?”

  “She’s fine. She’s at home.”

  “It’s been long since you came home abi? When did you get back?”

  “A few weeks ago.”

  “And your sister, she’s back as well?”

  “She will be here in a few months.”

  “Haba so many questions,” Isabella interrupted. “Taiye, do you want anything to drink?”

  “Water is fine, thank you.”

  “Okay, come with me through the kitchen. There are people in the backyard.”

  Taiye trailed her through the old but pristine kitchen to the backyard, large and covered in lush grass. In the centre stood a white canopy. Under it, a feast and a few people, none of whom Taiye recognized at first glance. She followed Isabella to a blue plastic cooler filled with large jagged chunks of ice and bottles of soft drinks, beer, and water.

  “You guys, this is Taiye,” Isabella said to the small crowd of guests. “We’ve been neighbours since we were small.”

  Taiye tried to be friendly, to seem interested, but she was distracted. In the daylight, on the celebration of Christ’s resurrection, Taiye thought she might un-feel whatever it was that had passed between her and Isabella the night before. But she thought wrong. The thing remained; it had marinated in its own fervour (the fervour of an unresolved childhood crush) and become more potent: a childhood crush calcified by rejection into some sort of hallowed wanting. Taiye knew that she should leave. Instead, she took a beer out of the cooler and made small talk.

  Despite having spent all the sunlight and a healthy portion of the evening at Isabella’s get-together, or perhaps because of that, Taiye’s memory of most of that afternoon blurred almost as soon as she left. Isabella followed her out and walked her the five minutes home. She seemed to be vibrating in the night breeze, her face shifting in and out of the air in front of her. They were both considerably intoxicated—Isabella by the numerous drinks she’d thrown back, and Taiye by Isabella’s focused attention. So when Isabella invited herself up to Taiye’s room, Taiye let her. But when they got up there, she panicked and blurted something about needing some cold water.

  By the time Taiye had returned from the kitchen with a plastic jug of water and two small tumblers, Isabella’s lace dress was a crumpled pile of soft fabric at her feet. She smiled in a way that swallowed Taiye into a tingle. The air between their bodies—Isa in dark cotton underwear and Taiye fully clothed—bristled electric. Isabella traversed the space that separated them in four languid steps; Taiye counted. Isa kissed a soft line along Taiye’s earlobe, across her cheek, to the corner of her mouth, the whole time humming a melody that had haunted Taiye for a long time. A melody that Taiye forgets almost the moment after she hears it.

  Isabella looked Taiye square in the face before leaning in for her lips.

  Taiye, who’d known this was coming, pulled away. “What are you doing, Isa?”

  “I’m trying to kiss you.” Isabella was matter-of-fact about it; she was not shy, not accustomed to being rejected.

  “What about Toki?”

  “What about him?”

  “You’re engaged.”

  “Like he’s not fucking around,” she scoffed.

  “Listen, I’m not trying to be part of some kind of revenge plot.”

  “Chill jare, it’s not like that.”

  “Then what’s it like?”

  “Are you not attracted to me?”

  “You’re drunk.”

  “I am. Are you not attracted to me?” Raised eyebrows.

  “It doesn’t matter. I don’t fuck my friends.” Shrug.

  “We’re not really friends, though, are we?” Again with the raised eyebrows.

  “I’d like to be.” Shrug.

  “I wouldn’t.” Isabella’s pupils were dark discs in honey-brown irises. Her mouth curved in a smile, but her eyes stayed mute as she continued. “But if you say no, I’ll put my dress on and leave.”

  So much silence passed.

  Taiye didn’t say no.

  She was an adaptable lover, quick to intuit her partner’s preferences and unabashedly inquisitive whenever desires weren’t entirely clear. With Isabella, Taiye took the lead. Isa was pliable, eager, vocal. They were both inebriated well past the point of inhibition.

  “Try not to be too loud, my mumsie is asleep,” Taiye said against the soft skin of Isabella’s throat.

  “Oh,” Isabella cooed, “you must think really highly of yourself.”

  “No, that’s not what … I just mean … actually, well, yeah.”

  On to kissing, fingers thrusting firmly, tongue lapping, a bite here, sucking, gasping; Isabella came quickly, hard, several times. Then, with her face still resting on the warmth of Isabella’s thighs, Taiye drew her own wetness and made herself come.

  THE TRUTH WAS, Taiye would have been happy with just a kiss. She realized this, alone again in her bed, moments before drifting into sleep.

  Now the affair had lasted longer than either of them could have predicted. Taiye told herself that she didn’t want to see Isabella anymore, but follow-through had proven difficult. Her resolve around these matters had always been easy to sway. Just the day before Taiye picked up Kehinde from the airport, Isabella had showed up at the gate of their house in her fiancé’s red Honda.

  “I’m just here to gist small,” she’d said. “Also, I brought suya.”

  She’d offered up the newspaper-wrapped roasted meat, and then started to undress as soon as Taiye shut her bedroom door. And Taiye, with a plastic bottle of cold zobo hibiscus tea in one hand and two tumblers cradled in the crook of her elbow, had stood there, defenceless.

  Afterward, Taiye said, “We need to stop.”

  “Okay,” Isabella replied, and licked a dusting of spice mix off her fingers. “I understand … I don’t even do this. Like I’m not a lesbian, or whatever.” She exhaled loudly and lifted her sweaty face to the ceiling. Eyes closed, she said, “There’s just … I don’t know. I like being with you, Taiye …” She shook her head slowly, having heard this from “straight” women many times before.

  She hadn’t heard from Isabella since. It was a good thing.

  It’s a good thing, Taiye.

  Oh, the struggle to be better than oneself.

  “Coca-Cola, I won’t call her,” Taiye said to the cat purring softly in her lap.

  “Who aren’t you calling?”

  Taiye jumped, and the cat flew out of her lap.

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean to frighten you,” Farouq said as he walked into the kitchen.

  Kehinde

  TAIYE AND I USED TO BE ONE CELL, one zygote. Isn’t that wild? I sometimes wonder if we knew each other before birth, if we were sisters, or the same person who grew tired of herself and shed the parts she didn’t want. Perhaps I am the unwanted bits, the chaff, and Taiye the wheat.

  She is sitting cross-legged on the floor by the fridge. She doesn’t see me yet, though I am just by the kitchen door. Farouq is leaning his back against the counter, his arms supporting him so that his elbows jut out behind him; he doesn’t see me either.

  Their voices are low. I can’t properly hear what they’re saying, but Taiye has this look on her face as if she’s about to crack open and pour everywhere. She’s shaking her head slowly, and Farouq is nodding.

  I’m curious, I feel left out, but I don’t want to interrupt, so I go back up to my room. I don’t understand this jealousy that has crept inside me; I am not usually possessive. Maybe it’s the heat.

  I married Farouq at city hall with five friends as witnesses. Afterward we went dancing at this tiny Haitian bar I love in the Gay Village to celebrate. I was several tequila shots and a tab of Molly deep, dancing on a mirrored floor with strobing pink li
ghts and a bass so intense I felt my insides vibrate in time to the music. I looked up from the bottom of another shot glass, and Taiye was dancing right in front of me, beckoning me to join her. She was wearing the same black halter dress as I was, had the same waist-length box braids. But I was sure it was her. Even in the dimly lit club, I could make out the scar on her chin. And the way she moved. Taiye moves differently from me. She’s not afraid to be seen.

  I walked toward her on the dance floor, I tried to take her hand, but in an instant, she was gone, and I was left pawing at my reflection on a mirrored wall.

  All this space between us now is dense, heavy. I know that it’s not normal for sisters. It hasn’t always been like this. Even though I was seething before, I don’t think it’s supposed to be like this, not anymore.

  I suppose this is as good a time as any to tell you about the bad thing, the first thing that split us.

  It started after our father’s death, with Aunty Funke and the man she brought, Uncle Ernest. Aunty Funke was one of our father’s distant cousins—it is only after many steps and ladders that their connection becomes clear. She came for our father’s funeral and stayed long after we’d put him in the ground at Ikoyi Cemetery. She claimed that she remained to “help with the children, because a mother should not be on her own at a time like this.” After many weeks of her ignoring us, hosting prayer meetings in the living room, and ordering Sister Bisi around, Uncle Ernest came to join her. He arrived with the rainy season, so we were confined to the three storeys of the house.

  The day he arrived, Taiye stopped sleeping my bedroom with me; though we had separate rooms, we shared mine at night. She told me and Sister Bisi that she hated him, but she didn’t know why. She would climb into my bed and hold my hand until I fell asleep. Then she would tiptoe down the hallway and curl herself at the foot of our mother’s bed.

  Aunty Funke and Uncle Ernest slept in one of the guest rooms on the ground floor. Every day after school, I saw Uncle Ernest sitting on a stool outside the black wrought-iron gates of our compound with the gateman. A big smile eating up half his broad face, he often asked, “Ibeji, you’ve come back already? Didn’t you just leave now now?”

  I laughed, but Taiye never responded. She always struggled out of his attempts at hugs and ran inside, away from him, dragging me behind her. She said it was the way he looked at us. I didn’t see it, even after Taiye whispered into my ear one evening, “I don’t like the way he makes his eyes.”