About the Author 8 page

There was a lot of wind. It hurled the hoots of an owl against the night, an unmistakable refrain amid a cacophony of insects and the sough of coconut foliage. Suddenly the wind choked and broke off, the trees, which had been pushed in one direction, jerking back past their normal postures. A coconut trunk snapped and crashed, and the night creatures hushed for a while.

Fofo locked the door with a chain and a big padlock. He didn’t allow Yewa to sit in her usual place, on the tank, since she wasn’t fully awake. Instead she was sandwiched between us. I guided my sister’s feet with mine so they would stay on the footrests. There wasn’t much room. Fofo didn’t rev the bike as he normally did. Like the escapees from Sodom and Gomorrah, I didn’t look back but straight ahead. Our headlight was dim, and we traveled very slowly because of all the potholes. The soft whir of the Nanfang broke up the silent night, steady and consoling. Fofo knew the road well, since he used it every day, and went from one side to the other, effortlessly avoiding the potholes. The road took us away from the ocean, toward the cluster of homes nearest our place. The houses looked deserted in the moonlight, and in front of them, the long empty tables and stalls where villagers sold their wares during the day looked like the skeletons of prehistoric animals.

After a while, I glanced back and saw two bright dots of light behind us. They were very far away and seemed to be moving all over the road, as if two children were playing with flashlights. Fofo looked into the side mirror, then back, and the bike wobbled. When he steadied the Nanfang, he sped up a bit.

“Let’s go fast,” said my sister, who was now wide-awake.

“Road no good,” Fofo said. “You get eyes? Soit patient till we reach Cotonou-Ouidah Road.”

“Where are we going?” my sister said.

“Home,” I said.

“Braffe?” she said, giggling. She tried to see my face but couldn’t, because our sitting arrangement was tight.

We rode through a small town. Some shops were still open and solitary silhouettes of people darted here and there. There was a smell of burned flesh in the air. At the far end of the town, a bonfire blazed by the roadside, lacerating the moonlight’s beauty. On reaching it, I noticed that the flames were billowing from a pile of tires in front of an eatery. Three goats or sheep were being roasted over the flames, and two men, all muscles and sweat, clad only in underwear, stoked and turned the animals with long stakes.

“Pascal, did you bring my things?” Yewa shouted to be heard. “I want to show my books to our parents and grandparents. . . .”

“Your books dey here,” shouted Fofo, tapping on the bag. “I go buy you new dress for Braffe.”

“You will?”

“Mówe, yes.”

I looked back again. The two lights were closer, and from the way the beams jumped up and down, it became clear that those riders didn’t care about the bad road. Though Fofo tried to speed up, they kept gaining on us.

Now, they split up, one to either side. I became afraid and pressed closer to my sister. I looked back often, and each time my sight was gouged by the lights. My stomach swelled with the urge to pee. The thought of many Big Guys coming after us overwhelmed me.

Fofo didn’t stop or say anything. The bike on the right was now running neck and neck with us. Fofo sped up, but the other rider was more aggressive. He tried to overtake us and cut in front us, but Fofo dodged to the left. The bike on the other side almost hit our number plate and was forced to slow down. Each rider had one passenger.

One bike passed us and forced Fofo off the smooth track of the bad road, and now we were heaving into one pothole after another.

“Stop, quick quick . . . arretez,” the passenger said.

We slowed down.

“D’accord, I dey stop,” Fofo said, putting one foot on the ground and rolling to the edge of the road; he kept the engine idling. “Abeg, no harm us,” he pleaded.

“Shame on you!” the passenger yelled from across the road, getting off the bike, slowly and confidently, while the rider sat there with the engine running. “Why you dey run?” the passenger snarled, then pulled a cell phone from his pocket and started assuring the person at the other end that things were under control. Then he said to Fofo, “You no know say we dey watch you? You no know you done reach point of no return for dis deal?”

“I dey sorry,” Fofo said.

“Sorry? Turn off your lights, stupid man!” someone on the other bike commanded him, and Fofo obeyed. I turned quickly because I thought the voice sounded familiar, but I couldn’t see his face.

This straight stretch of road was canyoned by tall lush bushes, an outcrop of jungle on the seacoast. The bushes on the left blocked the light of the moon and cast a gloomy shadow on the lower reaches of the road’s right side, while above all was bathed in moonlight.

Fofo whispered to us, “No come down, you hear?”

“Yes,” we whispered back.

“Hold de machine well well.”

It was as if the people on the other two bikes were so desperate to manhandle us that they forgot to ride up to where we were. Instead they jumped off their machines and bounded toward us. My eyes still smarted from the headlights as the giant silhouettes hurtled in our direction. Suddenly, Fofo kicked his Nanfang into gear, and we took off. I felt someone’s eager hand on my back and ducked before he could grab my shirt. Fofo hit his high beam and accelerated.

They were right behind us. The gap between us was as narrow as the space between our beds back home. I resented the fact that my back was their closest target and kept pressing into my sister and holding tighter to the machine. I stiffened my body; the gusts of wind lapping my clothes felt like hundreds of fingers trying to grab me. Yet my back was getting warm, as if their headlights would roast me.

We pulled away from them, Fofo crouching a bit, his head pushed forward like that of a dog in flight. And, since our bike was still new, whenever it hit a pothole, the impact was like the muffled sound of two cymbals clashing. My sister had her right cheek pressed firmly against Fofo’s back as if to listen to his heart. I leaned forward beyond Yewa and tied my hands around Fofo’s stomach so we wouldn’t fall off, even if the bike got into the deepest pothole or jumped the highest bump.

“Hold tight!” Fofo shouted, his voice shredded by the wind, just before the Nanfang hit a big pothole. The machine went up, then landed hard and heaved, but we hung on. “You dey OK?” Fofo said.

“Yes,” I said, though my right foot had just lost its flip-flop.

I repositioned myself and my sister. My bare foot felt better on the rest; it had more grip. My fingers were sweaty, so I retied my hands around Fofo’s stomach and put my chin on Yewa’s head. It felt better to have the glare of the headlights a bit farther from my back. But when I tried to discard the other flip-flop, I lost my footing. My left leg dangled, and I fought to regain my balance but couldn’t. The effort pulled the bike to one side. Fofo threw his body the other way to compensate and held it there momentarily.

“We’re falling!” Yewa said, like in a dream.

My fingers slipped from Fofo’s, and I was now holding on to my sister and bleating like a ram. Once my knee touched the ground, the machine crashed.

When I came to, I had a headache and was lying facedown, my body on the road, my head in the grass. My knee was bleeding, but the cut wasn’t deep. Yewa stood in the shrubs screaming and fighting off a man who held her wrists in one hand. The other three descended on Fofo with sticks. The blows rained on him until he fell, his hands wrapped around his head, which was almost in between his legs. He writhed and took the beating without a sound, except for an occasional groan. Yewa and I did the crying.

I was the last to be rounded up; a man grabbed my hands and cuffed them behind me with huge rough hands. I didn’t resist, hoping that they wouldn’t kill Fofo.

“If you shout again, we go kill dis magomago man!” one of the men warned us.

“Please, don’t kill him,” I said, sobbing.

“You children thought you could skip school without telling anybody,” the familiar voice said behind me.

It was Monsieur Abraham, our games master. I turned and looked him straight in the face. In the moonlight, he was smiling, his white teeth gleaming. He wore a T-shirt and a track suit, as if he were coaching us in soccer.

Disappointment filled my heart. I remembered the glucose he used to give us those first days when we couldn’t sleep well at night and got to school tired. I felt stupid for being duped and falling into such a well-orchestrated plot.

“Please, monsieur, don’t kill him,” I begged Monsieur Abraham, as Yewa continued to wail. “We won’t run again.”

“Really?” he said.

“We shall go to Gabon, I promise.”

“Of course.”

“Monsieur, we’ll do anything you want in Gabon.”

“Maybe you begin by telling this princess to shut up.”

“Yewa, they won’t kill him,” I explained, and freed one hand to place on her mouth. But she wasn’t looking at me. Her sight was trained on Fofo. “He’s not dead,” I said. “He’ll be OK.”

As I spoke to my sister, Fofo Kpee tried to get up but fell. They didn’t allow us near him. His face was bloody and one eye was swollen. His clothes were torn, his pockets empty, cefa and naira notes scattered everywhere, like donations littering an important shrine. One man was fidgeting with his phone, and when he couldn’t make a call he cussed his network.

The men started preparing to leave, picking up the money and turning the bikes around, in the direction we had come from. Two men bundled Fofo atop one bike, and Yewa and I were sandwiched between two men on the other. We began the journey back to the house from which we thought we had escaped.

* * *

WHEN WE GOT HOME it was still dark. Monsieur Abraham collected the keys from Fofo’s neck and opened the door and shoved us inside. They threw Fofo on the floor.

“You’re never permitted to speak to the children again!” our games master said, as Fofo writhed and twisted, unable to get up. They didn’t let us touch him, so we sat on our bed like orphans at a parent’s wake while two men searched the inner room with flashlights and another searched around outside the house. We couldn’t see Fofo well, so we listened eagerly for his heavy breathing.

When they had finished the search and reorganized the inner room to their liking, they moved our bed and carton of clothes there.

“Get in there!” Monsieur Abraham said, not looking us in the eye. “You’ll stay there till further notice. One of us shall stay here to make sure no one tries to run away again.”

“Yes, monsieur,” I said. “We won’t disappoint you again.”

“Fofo Kpee, Fofo Kpee,” my sister cried, and pointed at the body on the floor as I dragged her into the room.

“Little one,” the teacher said, “if you behave well, he’ll be OK.”

“Please, tell Big Guy we are sorry,” I said. “Tell Monsieur and Madame Ahouagnivo we are sorry.”

“I think they’d be happy to know that,” he said. “It’s not nice to betray friends. Not nice.”

He locked us in the inner room. It was darker than we thought. We were restless and disoriented because they had moved things around. I felt like I was going to bump into something. With one hand I held on to Yewa’s dress to keep track of her; I used the other to shield my wounded knee. We stayed near the door, trying to hear Fofo. Now, the bikes outside revved up and departed, their noise momentarily drowning out Fofo’s breathing.

We heard the front door close and footsteps approach the door to our room. We backed away, stumbling over things, and I lost Yewa in the darkness. I reached the wall and squatted, then lay atop the pile of cement bags, hoping to blend in. There was a jangle of keys. When the door opened, our room brightened, and fresh air came in.

A man’s profile filled the doorway as if trying to deny us the little light we were getting now. A giant of a man, he didn’t attempt to enter the room. From the position of his hands, I could see he was carrying things. Uncertain what he might do to us, I peered around, trying to find my sister.

“Where you dey?” he called out, his voice full of menace. I said nothing. “No joke wid me o. I warn you.”

“I am h-here,” I stammered, getting up and standing with the bed between me and him.

“Come, take dis,” he said. “Where you dey?”

“I’m sorry, I’m here.”

“You must cooperate, d’accord?”

I inched around the bed, feeling my way toward him, craning to see Fofo, to no avail.

“Mangez . . . your food,” he said, and pushed something warm and heavy against me.

“Thanks,” I said, grabbing two plastic containers.

“You must finish everyting we give you. . . .”

“Yes, monsieur. We will.”

“Bon garçon,” he said, lightening up at my false enthusiasm. “If you behave well, I go dey nice to you. If not, you go see for yourself. I no be bad man. Also, me I be fader; I get my own children. I no want sell anoder man children. I just dey do my work o.”

The food inside the containers was warm, and the lids were so tight that I couldn’t smell what it was. I put them on the bed and then turned to the big man.

“What of Fofo?” I said.

“I done bring am food too.”

“We can feed him, please. He’s very sick.”

“Impossible, no, just forget am for now. . . . And dis na your toilet.” He pushed something else against me. “Faites attention. Some water dey inside.”

“God bless you, monsieur!” I said, and collected it from him. It was a big plastic pail filled quarter way with water. There was a stack of old newspapers on the lid.

“Use it well o,” he laughed. “And make you put the paper in de pail. I go come get dem tomorrow.”

“Yes, monsieur.”

“Everyting go dey fine. I like de way you dey behave, old boy. I no care wheder dem sell you or not. As I talk before, I just dey do my job.”

“Thank you, monsieur.”

“You no fear anyting. You get courage pass your fofo. If you behave well, I go treat you well, you know. . . . Where your sister?”

“Yewa,” I called out, and looked around the darkness. “Maybe she’s asleep,” I lied.

“Already? Yewa!” he called out, his voice filling the room like a trumpet. “Where you dey?”

Silence.

“I told you she’s asleep,” I said. “She’s tired.”

“Well, make sure she eat later,” he said lightheartedly. “I go see you dis evening. Trust me, your fofo go dey fine.”

He turned and walked out of the room, closing and locking the door from the parlor. A bit of my fear went away with him. I listened to his footsteps, then heard the bed creak as it received his body.

Though our situation had gone from bad to worse in the course of one night, I found some solace in the fact that I could make him believe I liked him. I would thank him for any little kindness toward us, I thought. I felt I had a bit of control over how things might turn out. Maybe if we behaved really well, the man would allow us into the parlor to see Fofo. Maybe he would even open the windows or at least leave the door open. My imagination began to run wild with the good things that might happen if we behaved well. I wasn’t thinking of going to Braffe anymore. My desire now was to please this man, and that Fofo would get well.

* * *

I WISHED YEWA WOULD give up her pranks and come out when the man left the room. But I didn’t hear her move. I whispered her name into the darkness, but there was no response. I stood there and turned slowly in a full circle, but I couldn’t see a thing. I didn’t know how to begin looking for her without stumbling.

I started feeling for everything in the small room with my feet and hands. My knees came to rest on the mortar in the corner, and I extended my arms and brought them slowly together, hoping to catch Yewa but hugging myself instead, because she wasn’t there. I turned to head toward the next corner, but my thigh hit a pot, which toppled over. I tried to catch it, wedging it with my hip, gritting my teeth, relieved that it didn’t crash to the floor. Though I couldn’t see, I knew immediately that my hands and body were full of soot. I found a spot on the floor for the pot and gently set it down, bottom up, so that we wouldn’t accidentally step in it. “Yewa, Yewa,” I whispered, but again no answer. I went toward the cement bags where I had lain before, but she wasn’t there.

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 of 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 loÙ 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. . . .”

Date: 2015-02-28; view: 679