Half of a Yellow Sun (20 page)

   7   

U
gwu lay on a mat
in his mother’s hut, staring at a dead spider squashed on the wall; its body fluids had stained the mud a deeper red. Anulika was measuring out cups of
ukwa
and the crusty aroma of roasted breadfruit seeds hung thick in the room. She was talking. She had been talking for quite a while, and Ugwu’s head ached. His visit home suddenly seemed much longer than a week, perhaps because of the endless gassy churning in his stomach from eating only fruit and nuts. His mother’s food was unpalatable. The vegetables were overcooked, the cornmeal was too lumpy, the soup too watery, and the yam slices coarse from being boiled without a dollop of butter. He could not wait to get back to Nsukka and finally eat a real meal.

“I want to have a baby boy first, because it will place my feet firmly in Onyeka’s house,” Anulika said. She walked over to get a bag in the rafters and Ugwu noticed, again, the new suspicious roundness to her body: the breasts that filled her blouse, the buttocks that rolled with each step. Onyeka must have touched her. Ugwu could not bear to think of the man’s ugly body thrusting into his sister’s. It had all happened too fast; there had been talk of suitors the last time he visited, but she had spoken of Onyeka in such an indifferent way that he did not think she would accept his proposal so quickly. Now even their parents were too swift to talk about Onyeka, his good mechanic job in town, his bicycle, his good behavior, as if he were already a member of the family.
Nobody ever mentioned his stunted height and the pointed teeth that looked like they belonged to a bush rat.

“You know, Onunna from Ezeugwu’s compound had a baby girl first, and her husband’s people went to see a
dibia
to find out why! Of course, Onyeka’s people will not do that to me, they don’t dare, but I want to have a boy first anyway,” Anulika said.

Ugwu sat up. “I have tired of stories of Onyeka. I noticed something when he came by yesterday. He should bathe more often, he smells like rotten oil beans.”

“And you, what do you smell like?” Anulika poured the
ukwa
in the bag and knotted it. “I’ve finished. You better get going before it gets too late.”

Ugwu went out to the yard. His mother was pounding something in a mortar and his father was stooped near her, sharpening a knife against a stone. The scrape of metal against stone set off tiny sparks that flickered briefly before they disappeared.

“Did Anulika wrap the
ukwa
well?” his mother asked.

“She did.” Ugwu raised the bag to show her.

“Greet your master and madam,” his mother said. “Thank them for everything they sent us.”

“Yes, Mother.” He went over and hugged her. “Stay well. Greet Chioke when she returns.”

His father straightened up and wiped the knife blade on his palm before shaking hands. “Go well,
ije oma
. We will send word when Onyeka’s people tell us they are ready to bring palm wine. It will be in a few months’ time.”

“Yes, Father.” Ugwu stood around while his little cousins and siblings, the younger ones naked and the older ones in oversize shirts, said their goodbyes and listed what they wanted him to bring on his next visit. Buy us bread! Buy us meat! Buy us fried fish! Buy us groundnuts!

Anulika escorted him to the main road. He saw a familiar figure
near the grove of
ube
trees and, although he had not seen her since she went to Kano to learn a trade four years ago, he knew immediately that it was Nnesinachi.

“Anulika! Ugwu! Is it you?” Nnesinachi’s voice was as husky as he remembered but she was taller now, and her skin was darker from the fierce sun in the North.

When they hugged, he felt her chest push into his.

“I would barely have recognized you, the North has changed you so,” he said, wondering if she had really pressed herself against him.

“I came back yesterday with my cousins.” She was smiling at him. She had never smiled at him so warmly in the past. Her eyebrows had been shaved and penciled in, one thicker than the other. She turned to Anulika. “Anuli, I was on my way to see you. I hear you are getting married!”

“My sister, it is what I hear too,” Anulika said, and they both laughed.

“Are you going back to Nsukka?” she asked Ugwu.

“Yes. But I will come back soon, for Anulika’s wine-carrying.”

“Go well.” Nnesinachi’s eyes met his briefly, boldly, before she walked on, and he knew he had not imagined it; she really had pressed herself against him when they hugged. He felt a rush of weakness to his legs. He held himself from turning back to look at her, just in case she turned as well, and for a moment he forgot the uncomfortable churning in his stomach.

“Her eyes must have opened in the North. You can’t marry her, so you had better take what she is offering, before she marries,” Anulika said.

“You noticed?”

“How could I not have noticed? Do I look like a sheep?”

Ugwu narrowed his eyes to look at her. “Has Onyeka touched you?”

“Of course Onyeka has touched me.”

Ugwu slowed his pace. He knew she must have slept with Onyeka and yet he did not like her confirming it. When Chinyere, Dr. Okeke’s housegirl, first started to sneak across the hedge to his Boys’ Quarters for hasty thrusts in the dark, he had told Anulika about it during a visit home and they had discussed it. But they had never discussed her; he had always made himself assume that there was nothing to discuss. Anulika was walking ahead of him, unbothered by his sulky slowness, and he hurried up to her, silent, their steps light on the grass where they, as children, had hunted grasshoppers.

“I’m so hungry,” he said, finally.

“You didn’t even eat the yam Mama boiled.”

“We boil our yam with butter.”

“We boil our yam with
boh-tah
. Look at your mouth. When they send you back to the village, what will you do? Where will you find
boh-tah
to use to boil your yam?”

“They won’t send me back to the village.”

She looked at him from the corners of her eyes, up and down. “You have forgotten where you come from, and now you have become so foolish you think you are a Big Man.”

Master was in the living room when Ugwu came in and greeted him.

“How are your people?” Master asked.

“They are well, sah. They send greetings.”

“Very good.”

“My sister Anulika will be getting married soon.”

“I see.” Master was focused on tuning the radio.

Ugwu could hear Olanna and Baby singing in the bathroom.

Baby’s
London
, in her tiny unformed voice, sounded like
bonbon
. The bathroom door was open.

“Good evening, mah,” Ugwu said.

“Oh, Ugwu, I didn’t hear you come in!” Olanna said. She was bent over the tub, giving Baby a bath. “Welcome,
nno
. Are your people well?”

“Yes, mah. They send greetings. My mother said she cannot thank you enough for the wrappers.”

“How is her leg?”

“It no longer aches. She gave me
ukwa
for you.”

“Eh! She must have known what I am craving now.” She turned to look at him, her hands covered in bath foam. “You look well. See your fat cheeks!”

“Yes, mah,” Ugwu said, although it was a lie. He always lost weight when he visited home.

“Ugwu!” Baby called. “Ugwu, come and see!” She was pressing a squawking plastic duck in her hand.

“Baby, you can greet Ugwu after your bath,” Olanna said.

“Anulika will be getting married soon, mah. My father said I should let you and Master know. They do not have a date yet, but they will be very happy if you come.”

“Anulika? Is she not a little young? About sixteen-seventeen?”

“Her mates have started to marry.”

Olanna turned back to the tub. “Of course we will come.”

“Ugwu!” Baby said again.

“Shall I warm Baby’s porridge, mah?”

“Yes. And please make her milk.”

“Yes, mah.” He would linger for a moment and then ask her if all had gone well in the week he was away, and she would tell him which friends had come, who had brought what, if they had finished the stew he had put in containers in the freezer.

“Your master and I have decided that Arize should come here to have her baby in September,” Olanna said.

“That is good, mah,” Ugwu said. “I hope the baby will resemble Aunty Arize and not Uncle Nnakwanze.”

Olanna laughed. “I hope so too. We will start cleaning the room in time. I want it to be spotless for her.”

“It will be spotless, mah, don’t worry.” Ugwu liked Aunty Arize. He remembered her wine-carrying ceremony in Umunnachi about three years ago, how plump and bubbly she had been and how he had drunk so much palm wine that he had nearly dropped the infant Baby.

“I’m going to Kano on Monday to pick her up and take her shopping in Lagos,” Olanna said. “I’ll take Baby. We’ll pack that blue dress Arize made for her.”

“The pink one is better, mah. The blue one is too tight.”

“That’s true.” Olanna picked up a plastic duck and threw it back into the tub, and Baby squealed and submerged it in the water.

“Nkem!
” Master called out. “
O mego!
It has happened!”

Olanna hurried to the living room, Ugwu close behind.

Master was standing by the radio. The television was on but the volume was off so that the dancing people looked as if they were swaying drunkenly. “There’s been a coup,” Master said, and gestured to the radio. “Major Nzeogwu is speaking from Kaduna.”

The voice on the radio was youthful, eager, confident.

Olanna ran to the telephone. “What is happening in Lagos? Did they say what is happening in Lagos?”

“Your parents are fine,
nkem
. Civilians are safe.”

Olanna was dialing. “Operator? Operator?” She put the phone down and picked it up again. “It isn’t going through.”

Master gently took the phone from her. “I’m sure they are fine. The lines will come back up soon. It’s just for security.”

On the radio, the voice had become firmer.

“Mummy Ola!” Baby called from the bathroom. “Mummy Ola!”

Ugwu went back to the bathroom and dried Baby with a towel and then hugged her, blew against her neck. She smelled deliciously of Pears baby soap.

“Baby chicken!” he said, tickling her. Her braids were wet, the ends tightened in a curly kink, and Ugwu smoothed them and marveled again at how much she looked like her father; his people would say that Master had spit this child out.

“More tickles!” Baby said, laughing. Her chubby face was slick with moisture.

“Baby baby chicken,” Ugwu murmured, in the singsong way that always amused her.

Baby laughed and, from the living room, Ugwu heard Olanna say, “Oh, God, what did he say? What did he say?”

He was serving Baby’s porridge when the deputy president spoke briefly on the radio, the voice understated, as if he were exhausted from the effort of saying, “The government is handing over to the military.”

There were more announcements later—the prime minister was missing, Nigeria was now a federal military government, the premiers of the North and West were missing—but Ugwu was not sure who spoke and on what station because Master sat next to the radio, turning the knob quickly, stopping, listening, turning, stopping. He had removed his glasses and looked more vulnerable with his eyes sunken deep in his face. He did not put them back on until the guests arrived. There were more today than usual, and Ugwu brought dining chairs to the living room to seat them all. Their voices were urgent and excited, each person barely waiting for the last to finish speaking.