Dangerous Love (38 page)

On the third day, as he got a little stronger, he heard songs that reminded him of his mother. He wandered through the compound. Everything seemed a little strange to him. His father was nowhere around. One of the compound women told him Blackie had gone to the market. He encountered Tuwo in the backyard, washing his clothes, his underpants, and his socks. Tuwo started to say something to him, but Omovo, unable to confront his eyes, fled back to his room. In the afternoon he ventured out of the compound and went to see Dr Okocha. His workshed was locked. The people around said they hadn't seen him for days. Wandering back through the heat and dust, the noise of blaring record shops, the smell of garbage in the streets, and the sight of old men and women, increased his debilitation. He went back home. He tried to paint, but felt too weak to hold a brush, and the effort of concentrating wearied him. His eyes still hurt and his perception of objects in space had become temporarily distorted. He lay in bed and read and slept till evening came.

He was half asleep when he heard an argument raging between his father and Blackie. He heard his father shouting about Blackie's mysterious absences, heard her defending herself. She said she had gone to the market and couldn't get the best choice of food items which he especially liked and that she had to go back in the evening. She said as she returned she met one of her relatives and went home with her to see her newborn baby. Omovo stayed in the room till the argument burnt itself out. When the house was silent again he ventured into the sitting room. No one was around. He went to the compound front and sat with the compound men, hoping to get some word about Ifeyiwa. He learnt nothing. The compound people, offering their sympathies about his fever, were curiously distant towards him. Tuwo wasn't amongst them.

That night as he lay in bed, weakened by the day's heat which seemed to have stoked his fever, Tuwo appeared to him. Omovo tried to escape his presence. Tuwo kept reappearing, begging his forgiveness. Omovo woke up and found that the lights had been seized. He lay down again, shut his eyes, shivering. Tuwo appeared again. He was completely naked, he had an enormous erection, and before Omovo's gaze he began to make love to Blackie. They both begged his forgiveness as they made love with urgent lustful intensity. And as their enjoyment mounted, as their motions got more frenzied and peaked, so did their pleas. When they had exhausted themselves, when an expression of disgust appeared on both their sweating faces, they found they were stuck, like dogs, and couldn't separate themselves. They tried and they couldn't. Blackie became terrified. Tuwo turned a frightened gaze to Omovo. They both began to beg him to help them separate. Omovo's mother appeared and began to laugh dementedly. Then suddenly his father materialised, with a machete in his hand. The couple started running clumsily around the room. Blackie was bent over, Tuwo behind her. They looked like trapped animals, bound. Omovo's father followed them slowly, with dreadful dignity. He came up to them where they stopped. He lifted up the machete with both hands, a mad and serene expression in his eyes. Tuwo yelled. Before his father cleaved them apart Omovo woke up. The lights had returned. The fan was whirring. Omovo didn't sleep well the rest of that night. He didn't see his father or Blackie in the morning. In spite of feeling weak, his limbs aching, his face still swollen, he decided he had borne enough of being bed-bound.

For the first time in weeks Omovo went early to work. He found that no one else had arrived in the office. It was nine o'clock. He sat at his desk, confused by its new arrangement. His documents were mixed up, some were missing, the files and cards were in utter disarray. He saw errors in allocations, he noticed that the handwriting on letters was completely strange to him. Alarmed by huge mistakes in the counting of chemicals, he went to the warehouse. Everyone looked at him as if he were a ghost. The warehouse manager hadn't arrived at work either. He went to the accounts department. Only two people were in. Joe was nowhere around. He went to the canteen and had breakfast. It was nine thirty when he got back to the office.

The place was cold. The air conditioner had been turned up to its limit. No one looked up when he came in. Simon was eating his tea bread, dipping it in a glass of water, and staring at the semi-nude white woman on the wall calendar. He had a faraway expression in his eyes. The supervisor tapped away intensely on his pocket calculator, as if his life depended on the figures it produced. Chako paused from the scrutiny of his football coupons to snap off a bedraggled piece of kola-nut. Then he blew his nose. He looked very sober. It was clear he had lost a lot of money on the previous week's betting. He looked up at Omovo, looked right through him, inhaled a thumbful of snuff, shook his head vigorously, and sneezed. At that moment the kettle began whistling. The steam kept lifting and dropping its metal flap.

Omovo hovered around his desk, feeling curiously displaced. The mood of the office had changed. Omovo felt a shiver go through him. The supervisor sighed and then put away the calculator. He seemed satisfied with his manipulation of the figures. Turning in his chair, his features now set in his mask of new authority, he said to Omovo:

‘What happened to your face?'

It was only then that the others acknowledged his presence in the room. They looked up and studied the disjointedness of his features.

Chako said: ‘Or were you caught stealing?'

‘Maybe he was in the wrong place at the right time,' came Simon.

‘Abi you painted the right picture of the wrong woman?'

‘Or maybe he refused to pay a prostitute and she punched him?' came Simon again.

‘Hey, Simon!' the supervisor shouted in mock disbelief. ‘So you sabi how prostitutes dey punch, eh?'

They laughed.

‘Maybe he got a friend to do it?'

‘Why?'

‘After all he didn't come to work for three days. You never know the tricks of these young boys of nowadays.'

The supervisor directed the next statement at him. ‘You better have a good excuse.'

‘I was attacked at night.'

They all burst out laughing again.

‘By women?'

‘Thieves?'

‘Did you try it on a neighbour's wife?'

‘Or did you go around with your notebook, drawing people unnecessarily?'

‘Did you stay up too late?'

‘Or did you get drunk and forget yourself?'

‘I was attacked,' Omovo said firmly.

‘It shows,' was Simon's verdict.

‘It doesn't,' said the supervisor.

‘And then I came down with a fever,' continued Omovo.

‘A fever?' said an unbelieving Simon.

‘He actually came down,' added the supervisor.

‘Down to earth,' said Chako.

‘I couldn't move for two days.'

‘Two days!'

‘Two whole days!'

‘Yes.'

‘And on the third day?' mocked the supervisor.

‘I began to recover.'

‘You recovered.'

‘I began to.'

‘He began to,' said Simon.

‘Yes.'

‘I see,' said the supervisor.

‘We see.'

‘You better go in and see the manager.'

‘Yes. You better go and see him.'

‘Not without my permission,' shouted Chako.

Omovo looked round at them, his heart beating fast. He felt rage simmering within him. Rage and defiance. He was about to say something insulting to the entire office when the main door opened. The manager's nephew, who had failed his certificate examinations three times in a row, hurried into the room. He bustled towards the kettle and began tinkering with the cups. In the silence Omovo understood why the office mood had changed. The manager's nephew was young, he looked fresh. He wore black trousers, a white shirt, and a red tie. He looked as if he was full of ready obedience. They nodded at one another.

Omovo turned and, without knocking, stormed into the manager's office. Chako tried to stop him, but was too late. Omovo went in and shut the door behind him. The manager looked up once, his face expressionless, and proceeded to finish his cup of coffee, nibbling on a biscuit. Omovo approached his desk and stood there silently gazing at the manager.

After a few seconds Omovo discerned a certain pungent smell in the office. He wrinkled his nose. He knew. The manager, squirming in his seat, knew that he knew. The silence remained. Omovo brought out his handkerchief, covered his nose, and took two steps backwards.

‘That's why I have a secretary,' the manager said, eventually.

The smell grew worse, as if it too were positing a new law of corporate physics: that hot air rises to the top. Omovo refused to speak for a while. He held his breath, released it, and then breathed in measured shallowness. He looked round the manager's office. He studied the table. He noticed the framed picture of his young wife, his gilded nameplate, his thick brown wallet, and thousands of documents. On the wall behind him, next to large portraits of the Head of State and the Director of the company, was a photograph of him in England. He was with other English officials of the company. He was in the background and distinguishable only because he was a lone black face amongst white ones. The rest of the walls had many scenes of Western capitals.

‘Sit down, Omovo,' the manager said after a long silence.

The air conditioner droned softly. The smell had gradually diluted.

‘So what do you want?'

Still standing, Omovo said: ‘I want to know if I have been sacked.'

The manager smiled for the first time. ‘No, not at all. As a matter of fact your salary has been increased.' He paused. ‘But you have been transferred to our Mile Twelve Branch.'

‘The department is very kind,' Omovo said, changing stance.

‘What do you mean?'

‘What I said.'

‘Listen, you failed to turn up for work for three whole days. You had no sick leave, nothing.'

‘I was ill. I had been beaten up.'

The manager continued as if he hadn't heard anything. ‘I could easily have recommended your being sacked. But I am a considerate man and our department is nothing if not accommodating. We are giving you the benefit of the doubt. We are giving you a chance to change your bad habits.'

‘Meanwhile you give your nephew the benefit of employment.'

The manager looked at him, anger flashing for a moment in his eyes. ‘These things happen, you know.'

‘Sure. But what if I refuse your offer?'

‘I'm afraid we'd have to lay you off. Millions out there are waiting for a job like yours.'

‘Well, I'm not accepting the transfer. It's spiteful. You know I could never make Mile Twelve from Alaba even if I woke up at five o'clock.'

‘Excellent. You have spoken your mind. All is well taken. As I said, the department is accommodating. Put in your letter of resignation with immediate effect, claim your salary and allowances and go. Good luck to you. I have work to do, if you don't mind.'

The manager picked up a file, indicating that the meeting was over. Omovo glared at him, then said in a voice of controlled rage:

‘I can see right through your pretence at good office relations. I'm not impressed. You don't have to try and frustrate me any further. You're very civilised, very decent. You're shit. Time will wash you away.'

The manager threw down the file and exploded. ‘You're mad, Omovo. God punish you for what you have just said. Take your money and get out. We don't want people like you anyway!'

Omovo smiled, and left.

I

He collected his month's salary along with a pro rata payment for his leave allowance, his overtime and his Christmas bonus for that year. It came to quite a substantial amount. He had never held so much money in his hands before.

He went back to the office. No one spoke to him and he addressed no one. He went through his desk, taking out things, his notepads, his felt tips, the various objects he had accumulated which would be of help to his painting. He put them in a plastic bag. The manager's nephew stayed away. Simon left the office. The supervisor went off for an early lunch. Chako sat stolidly considering his football coupons. When Omovo had finished clearing his desk he left a note to his successor about the errors in the records. As he was about to leave Omovo suddenly felt sad. He felt that sad sickening feeling of being sacked, of uncertainty, of the faces he was leaving behind and might never see again, even of failure. He felt a twinge of loss at the little things about the office, the air conditioner always on high, the coolness of the place when no one was around, the serenity of drawing there after work when he was supposed to be doing overtime. He also felt, in advance, the loss of special relationships, the overheard gossip, the resentments that had become redundant, the parts of him that only the office brought out, the parts that die with the leaving.

But in spite of the difficult shedding of a skin that couldn't grow with him, he had to leave. His shoes grated as he went down the corridor. The walls were yellow, freshly painted, clean. The corridor was empty. When the doors were opened he felt the cool air from the offices. A fine excitement, an almost defiant joy, grew within him at escaping from the grinding wheels of the company. He felt free. His mind was clear. He had decided never to work in an organisation again, never to be a cog in a wheel. He had sworn to set his sails to the fortunes of art. How was he to know what cruel and difficult seas his ship would travel?

As he passed the last of the offices, the door opened and one of the sales representatives stuck out his head. He was heavily bearded and rather fat. He saw Omovo and said urgently: ‘Omovo! Make two coffees for me and my girlfriend! Quick! And when you've finished get us some meat pies. We're starving.'

Omovo took a few steps backwards, a mischievous smile on his lips. Through the open door he saw the sales rep's girlfriend. She was very thin, wore a long silk gown, and was all pasted up with eye-shadow, rouge, and lipstick. Her skin had been unnaturally bleached with skin-lightening creams. She was peering at her bony face in a small mirror.