Upon fetching Taiye from the airport, Yemisi was struck by how much the girl resembled her mother. She hadn’t seen Taiye in almost seven years. Not since the year her brother died, and Kambirinachi had, for a very brief time, tried to create a life for herself and her twins in London.
Yemisi understood grief, she really did. Still, she detested the way that Kambirinachi seemed to collapse into herself, leaving the girls, only twelve years old at the time, to cling to each other for comfort. Yemisi did what she could, but she had three children of her own to look after, a decaying marriage from which to escape, and a dead brother to mourn.
She noticed that Taiye had her mother’s precise features, down to the slight overbite and elsewhere eyes, but her mannerisms were entirely her father’s. Her lopsided smile, the sluggish way that she held her lanky frame, her in-toed gait, even the way she moved her features—speaking with her eyebrows, wrinkling her nose—all Banji. This did nothing to endear Taiye to Yemisi—the opposite, in fact. It took very little for Taiye to get on Yemisi’s oft-mentioned bad side.
Yemisi started most statements to Taiye with a “Listen, this girl, I don’t know how that mother of yours trained you, but if you don’t want to get on my bad side, you better not …”
Within the first month of living with Yemisi, Taiye knew that she would have to figure out a way to leave. It wasn’t just her aunt’s volatile moods, or her seeming desire to control everything—she would often barge into the bathroom while Taiye bathed to shout that she was using too much water or to check that she wasn’t disgustingly brushing her teeth in the shower. Nor was it the evangelical Nigerian Pentecostal church with which she was heavily involved. Nor the snide and biting comments she made about Taiye’s mother. Nor her insistence that Taiye was rotten and spoiled and therefore had to learn “home training” by picking up after her cousins whenever they visited home.
It was the shock of it all. The abrupt contrast of living with a hollow presence of a mother who had rarely surfaced in lucid spells long enough to remind her daughters of precisely what they were missing, to living with a hectoring overbearing aunt who seemed to save her particularly caustic brand of bitterness just for Taiye. Taiye would later grow to understand that the tender mothering she’d hoped to receive from her aunt was unrealistic, perhaps even unfair. As a teenager, though, it was a struggle to see beyond herself.
A FEW YEARS AWAY FROM HER MOTHER’S INCONSISTENT LOOMING, and the shame that drenched her whenever her twin fell into one of her dark moods, Taiye grew into the sort of woman who loved easily. Not foolishly, just hungrily.
It started in Montpellier, Southern France. With Elodie and Guifré, a couple in their late thirties who ran a culinary program marketed primarily to anglophone international students out of their small fine dining restaurant in the Beaux-Arts neighbourhood.
Several years prior, Elodie had come into a substantial inheritance from a great-aunt. She bought and renovated a small restaurant for her Catalan chef husband Guifré’s birthday. La Dolça Esposa was doing reasonably well, beloved in the neighbourhood for such a new place, but barely turning a profit. So in what Elodie would come to describe as a trait de génie, they started offering cooking classes. They partnered with a language school and had been running the program at a considerable profit for two years before Taiye spotted their flyer on the UCL campus bulletin board, advertising: “Learn French and cook Catalan in Montpellier, France!”
The program cost a little over one thousand pounds more than Taiye could afford with her savings, and she’d decided not to touch the trust account she shared with her sister until they discussed a plan for the money, so she ignored the flyer for a while. But each time she walked past the bulletin board, she noticed that a portion of the leaflet was covered by another poster, advertising for roommates, or sports clubs, or language exchanges. A few weeks more and only the top left corner was visible. Taiye impulsively ripped off the posters that covered it and folded the tattered flyer into her coat pocket.
At home, while emailing the program coordinator, Taiye decided to be honest.
Subject: Inquiry for Funding Opportunities
Taiye Adejide
March 20, 2009, 6:17 AM
To
Dear Margot Sheerin,
My name is Taiye Adejide. I’m a final year student here at UCL, and I’m very interested in enrolling in the Culinary + Language Program in Montpellier. However, I am not currently able to afford the £1,250 room and board fee without resorting to selling my blood. I am wondering if it would be possible for me to earn my keep by working either at the language school or the restaurant.
Alternatively, would it be possible for me to pay in instalments? I would be more than happy to take up a part-time job in Montpellier and pay the remainder of the fee during my time there.
I look forward to hearing back from you.
Sincerely,
Taiye Adejide
Though she feared her blood-selling joke might be too much, she sent the email anyway.
Three months after graduation, Taiye was on a train from London to Paris, where she would switch trains to Montpellier.
TWO OTHER STUDENTS HAD ALSO MADE ARRANGEMENTS to work for their housing in Montpellier. One of them was a curly-haired brown boy named Bobby. He was from the US, but in order to avoid having to defend his country’s sociopolitical decisions, he travelled with a red maple leaf patch pinned to his backpack. This, however, put him in the unfortunate situation of having to defend another country’s sociopolitical decisions, one with which he was much less familiar. It made for many awkward conversations and, often, bashful confessions.
Taiye met Bobby on his first morning in Montpellier, in the large kitchen of Elodie and Guifré’s three-bedroom house. She was sitting cross-legged on the kitchen counter, in a white T-shirt and jeans ripped at the knees, writing in a notebook that was cradled in the triangular space between her thighs. She looked up when he walked in.
Her face opened in a beguiling smile. “I’m Taiye.” She reached out for a handshake. “You must be Bobby. Elodie told me you’d be coming.”
He returned her smile, nodded his head, shook her hand, and knew that he wanted to tell her everything.
“What brought you here?” Taiye asked him.
Bobby answered her, slowly, in the months they lived together. Taiye learned that he was from Coney Island. And that after doing the thing they say you’re supposed to do when your single mother loves you sacrificially and suffers to bring you up—excel at school, get a scholarship to university (SUNY Albany), excel there too, and land a junior analyst position at Kohlbrach Ingram Investments; after nearly eight years with the firm, two promotions, a house for his mother, a condo for himself—he married a woman who didn’t love him. He was well aware of this fact but, ever the pragmatist, believed that she would stay because he could provide. He was too naive to realize that she could take his provisions without staying with him, until she left with more than half of everything he’d worked for.
That’s when the panic attacks started, and then the loss of appetite. Bobby told Taiye that he knew that if he didn’t leave, he wouldn’t survive. So he transferred a hefty portion of his savings to his mother, rented out his condo, and took nothing but a backpack full of clothes, some cash, credit cards, and a camera. Then he flew to Ho Chi Minh City. From there to Cambodia, Thailand, Laos, and China. He stayed in each place for no less than three weeks, and when he found an opportunity to teach English in Zhuhai, China, he stayed for four months. There, he met a translator who’d just returned from holiday and wouldn’t stop gushing about how much she adored her time in Montpellier. So the next month he booked the cheapest ticket he could find and headed out.
“And now I’m here,” Bobby said to Taiye. “What brought you here?”
Taiye laughed for a long time. And then she told him.
Kehinde
I’VE LIVED IN MONTREAL SINCE I WAS EIGHTEEN.
This is the first time I’ve been home since I left. I was hurt and I needed to stay away. At first, I didn’t tell my sister that I’d been looking at universities in Canada when she was working on her applications to schools in the UK. It certainly would have been easier if I’d done the same, owing to our dual citizenship, but I wanted to go elsewhere, away from her. Of course, I wanted to hurt her with this news. And I did. Her face collapsed when I told her.
“But you’ll need a student visa. And won’t it be more expensive? Are you sure?” she’d asked.
Yes, I needed a student visa. It meant that Taiye was gone for about a year before my visa was approved. Yes, it was significantly more expensive. So I applied for every grant, scholarship, and on-campus job I could find on the university website. Yes, I was sure.
And now.
And now I just want to know what Taiye’s life has looked like since we went our separate ways as teenagers. Because—I’m not proud of this—I punished her every day after Sister Bisi snatched me from Uncle Ernest’s grasp. I punished her with long silences; I barely looked her in the face.
After we came back from London, Taiye and I went to the same secondary school our mother had attended, Queen’s College. We were boarders for less than one term before our mother came to collect us—she couldn’t bear us being so far away. I liked Queen’s College—the overcrowded dormitories, the classrooms, the fact that Taiye and I were in different houses, me in Emotan, Taiye in Dan Fodio, like our mother had been. All of it gave me space away from our twinness, from the tension of having to keep myself from spewing all my festering feelings at her. It was a large enough school that, at first, not everyone knew we were twins. We weren’t in the same class, so when I met my new classmates, I could just be Kehinde, and not one of the twins. Without seeing Taiye’s face melt into panic whenever a teacher called upon her, I didn’t feel that instinctual pull to speak for her like I used to. She had to learn to speak for herself. By the time my classmates found out we were twins they could already distinguish me from her by my personality and my softening body. Even though I was purging often, my body kept widening.
At school I was bubbly. Even after our mother made us become day students, school was my escape from the house and everything it had witnessed. I wanted friends of my own, a life of my own. I was easy to be friends with because I kept it all shallow, light, fun.
“How come you’re so, like, nice and friendly and your sister is such a snob?” a girl asked once during biology class.
I didn’t defend Taiye. I didn’t say, “She’s not a snob. She’s just painfully shy.” I just shrugged.
Another time, I was standing in line to buy snacks from the tuck shop at break time, chatting with the girl ahead of me, when someone from the end of the line shouted, “Ahn ahn this girl, why are you always looking at Isa like you’re a leleh?” This was Queen’s College slang for lesbian.
I looked to see who she was talking to: Taiye.
My sister stood frozen and stuttering, her eyes searching for me. They found me, and I knew what she was asking, but I looked away. Taiye was gone when I looked back.
There were many such instances of carelessness, too many. They piled up to form a sizable wound. The thing is, Taiye never stopped searching for me. Every time I witnessed other teenager girls inflicting casual cruelty upon her, her eyes always sought me out, always landed on my own. That is how it was until we graduated, and she left.
And now, after all this time, we’re home together again.
And all that staying away, I can’t say it was worth it. I can’t really name precisely what I was staying away from. It feels like a loss.
It’s a familiar feeling but much less potent than the one that overtook me that first year in Montreal. There was a lead-heavy and crushing thing that bloomed inside of me then.
It started in the winter, a wretched season. Sharp winds sliced through my insufficient layers, and I was sure all the blood would freeze in my fingers and toes. My skin itched from dryness, and I couldn’t seem to get warm enough. To whatever degree my body suffered, my mind was hit tenfold. Something shifted, something cracked. There were many many instances when, walking along the frost-covered sidewalks, I considered throwing myself into the rush of oncoming traffic. I didn’t really want to die; I was just tired, and so cold, and so lonely.
At the dining hall, in my quest to feel anything else, I swung between ignoring my appetite entirely and, in a dizzying haze of hunger, eating plates and plates of bland cafeteria food. I made a habit of it, and I continued my habit of purging as much of it as I could manage. That habit was hard to kick; it lasted for some time.
By summer I realized I’d outgrown the T-shirts, jeans, and dresses I’d brought from home. I’d grown bigger than ever before, and I hated it.
I’d always hated my body. Well, not always …
I’d hated my body for a long time, hated all the ways I felt it had betrayed me.
I spent the summer cloaked in shame, seething with jealousy. I envied other women’s bodies. I envied fat women who draped their luscious curves without any embarrassment, thighs quaking as they walked. I envied thin women lounging effortlessly in T-shirts and shorts, nothing pinching or pudging, just smooth skin over smooth muscle over delicate bones. I envied anyone who didn’t hate their body. People who ate without hesitation or pre-emptive shame at how all those calories would stretch their flesh.
It was about beauty, yes, but it was also about belonging. People treat you with kindness and an invitation to belong if they like the way you look, and every time I looked in the mirror, I saw someone who was almost as beautiful as Taiye, nearly as lucky, but never quite meeting the mark. Body too soft in all the wrong ways—and marked by an invisible unerasable ugliness.
I called our mother often. We talked about nothing, but she was kind.
I hid my number and called Taiye often as well, never saying anything, just listening to her asking, “Hello? Hello? Who is this? Are you okay?”
Sometimes she would stay on the phone saying nothing as well, just breathing quietly on the other end until I hung up.
This is how I knew that she was lonely, too.
FROM MY SMALL SUITCASE ON THE FLOOR BESIDE MY BED, I fetch Taiye’s box of letters. Except for my travel documents, some photographs, and jewellery, it’s the only other thing I had in my carry-on.
Letter no. 1
September 29, 2005
Aunty Yemisi’s flat
Dear Kehinde,
I tried calling you this morning, but you didn’t pick up, so I’m just going to write what I was calling to tell you.
The flat has changed a lot since we were last here.
There are half-empty boxes everywhere, even though they’ve been living here for long. I don’t think Aunty Yemisi likes me, she’s very somehow. It’s as if she’s angry all the time and she’s just waiting for me to annoy her so that she can pounce.
I’ve been trying to do everything she asks before she even asks, but she’s just too much!
They go to church like three times a week! And the Nigerian aunties there only know how to be sending somebody up and down as if I came here to do housegirl.
I’ve just been staying at the campus library longer and longer so that I’m not in her house annoying her with my breathing.
Anyway, London feels like Lagos sometimes because there’s so many Nigerians here. I like my classes and—
Oh God, she’s calling me now, I have to go.
Love,
Taiye
Letter no. 3
October 29, 2005
Our first birthday apart. I hope you’re having a better time than I am. Still not answering my calls, not sure what to do. Mumsie called to sing to me. It made me cry. She said you were out with friends.
I miss you,
Taiye
Letter no. 4
November 11, 2005
Campus Library
Kehinde,
See me see wa
hala o!
This woman locked me out last night, and she hid the spare key. I rang the doorbell, but she never answered. I ended up sitting on the cold stoop for like four hours before Sade came home from wherever she was.
You know what’s funny? She didn’t even ask why I was locked out; she didn’t seem surprised at all. Aunty Yemisi didn’t talk to me at all today, surprise surprise.
Before Sade left for work, she came into my room and put a key on my bedside table. She asked me not to tell her mumsie and only use it for emergencies like last night.
I think she’s pregnant. Her mother is going to lose her mind. Anyway, Sade sent me some job postings around campus and one roommate advertisement. She’s trying to be subtle, but I get it. I’m grateful sha.
Honestly, I feel bad for her. Her mother is a fucking tyrant. She’s only sweet to Dapo and Jide, and they don’t even live here anymore. They still come every Sunday for supper. It’s the only time she’s in a good mood.
I’m too tired to tell you all the rubbish, but I’ll try calling again tomorrow.
Love,
Taiye
Letter no. 15
February 18, 2006
Asylum Rd., Peckham
Kehinde,
So are you avoiding my calls or something?
I called Mumsie yesterday and asked to talk to you, but she said you weren’t at home.
I’m worried about Mumsie. Have you spoken to her recently?
I’ve been working so much and saving and doing exams, but I’ve moved out!
I live in a basement room in a house with five other people in Peckham. The house is old and a bit horrible. Cockroaches live in most of the cupboards, and mice live in the walls and floorboards. But you know what’s not here?! A wicked aunty who doesn’t know how to treat somebody!
As for school, I don’t know why I’m studying chemistry, I swear. But I did well on the exams, so that’s that.
That’s pretty much my life: school, work, Mass—I’ve started going regularly, just because it’s familiar. I’ve tried to make some friends, and I’ve met some all right people. But when we’re in a group having a conversation and I have something to add, I feel sooo nervous, and then when I have the courage to say something, the topic has already changed! So, I don’t even know. This one girl, Shanti, asked me if I’m shy or just a snob! I wanted to shout that I’m not a snob, people talk so quickly and jump from topic to topic, and they all talk so loud! So even when I say something, they don’t seem to hear me. Whatever sha, it’s all good; I tried to make pepper soup last night, it wasn’t bad.
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