A Strand of Ice

Sisi continued to bang the door, almost pushing and shaking it like the explosive that she was. The crowd murmured, they buzzed the way they did when, at that same door, they grouped to watch Schwarzenegger ripping his enemies with bullets and punches.

Lola the spinster with three daughters joined Sisi. They both pummeled the door until it creaked open. Jide opened the door. He looked shock, genuinely shocked by the audience that was upon him, not to be entertained by his colored tube but by him. If only he knew that he was the prime character in the happening script. But there was no time and luxury for comprehension; Sisi lunged, taking him by surprise. She went for his thick neck, but missed. He slipped back into his room. The door closed. Undeterred, Sisi banged away at the innocent door. This time, having learnt his lesson, it was the window that opened.

“What is going on here?” he asked the crowd. His cheeks jiggled as he spoke, and his mouth hung open in the shape of the last word he said – here. The crowd that was hitherto talkative went silent. His voice, which they associated with a measure of class, congealed their voices.  They did not know what to do or say to him. Neither did they know what to feel as he stood at that window where, in normal days, they would be standing to watch his television.” Can someone explain all this?” he was asking the frozen audience, his jaws quivering.

“That is what is going on, you useless man. See that girl over there? She is the explanation you need,” Sisi said to him, pointing her fingers at Dora who looked awfully exhausted by all these. Her eyes had swollen some more.  She studied her feet and fiddled her sashes. She and her mother were already worn out. They both stood there, still and speechless before Jide. But with her eyes, bloodshot, Dora murdered Jide.

The little girl was pregnant. Jide was responsible. Ibe gave me the lowdown. It happened the day she returned from school, early. The headmaster had flogged and sent her home for not paying her school fees. Bored, she walked the blocks like every other child. Jide’s window was open and the television was on. He invited her inside. Offered her cabin biscuits and Fanta. Whether she was forced or not was not said. But when the time came, her face bore the marks of womanhood, at which her mother, baffled at such Immaculate Conception, probed for answers.

Dora’s case was news and no news. News because it was juicy and juicy was fine, and it involved Dora, an introverted girl who would not break a matchstick. No news because there were similar pregnancies around. In that crowd were teenage mothers and would-be teenage mothers. Dora was not the first and would not be the last. It was therefore the drama and the opportunity to gather and laugh – a much-needed therapeutic break – that had attracted the audience.

*

For the second time Jide was not given the opportunity to process the situation. Sisi slammed the window on his face. He ducked inside. Two men rushed forward from the crowd and grabbed Sisi on both sides. Achu was one of them. His skinny frame concealed in an oversize singlet. Sisi yanked free, Achu tripped and crashed into Jide’s door. The crowd erupted; another therapeutic break!

“I don’t know what you are talking about,” Jide was saying.

At those words, Dora lifted her eyes and looked at Him. He ducked and looked elsewhere, into the ambivalent crowd. Dora continued to stare hard at him. As if to say “look into my eyes and deny it, bastard.” She was trembling in exhaustion. I thought she would collapse or puke, or dash off and disappear. But she stood there, shivering. It was her mother who made the move. She held her daughter by the arm, tugged her, and stomped off.  The audience parted for the actors. They might as well have applauded for the grand performance and exit. Someone was smiling and wiping dirt from Achu’s back.

The crowd began to disperse in small pockets, animated. Ibe who had seen it all and had known it from the beginning led a group of three women, all with their hands folded across their breasts. His shirt slung over his shoulder, he gesticulated all the way.

I looked around and wished Dan was present.

*

The path to the lake was not as dewy as in other mornings. I surmised someone had woken earlier, perhaps before the chanticleers chanted and cheered, and was patient enough to free the grasses from their daily, dew burden. The taller grasses, having been aroused by whoever that forerunner was, were erect, as if in sun salutation. I hummed a random tune, and drew a long breath.

The morning air was surprisingly fresh and free from the usual stench. Across the field of grass, I started to wonder what Jide was up to that morning. I had seen him tiptoeing to the main road with a suitcase. I did not stop to take in the full scene, but had walked on, passing all the closed and half-open doors with the mysteries and quandaries they held.

At the lake, where the path ended and the clearing began, the sight of a startling figure greeted me. From the hair, I knew it was a girl.

I recognized the hair, locked and alert like antlers. And the dress unzipped and dropped to the waist. The sashes, hunched in defeat, cuddled the earth. I picked a safe spot, several feet from her, but close enough to see her in profile. I wondered why she was there, and what she was doing.

The usual ripples ran atop the lake, with ducks sailing in-between water lilies. She stood up and her dress, already halfway down, fell. Nothing underneath. What I saw, her totality bare as the unfolding morning, remained fresh in my memory for years to come. But in that instance, I felt my blood vessels jerking in shock, and my heart beating and jumping to the occasion.

She walked down to the lake, a mere ten steps from where she was. At the lip of the lake she squatted and stirred the water with her right, index finger. I moved closer; she turned. I wanted to ask her a question, but I felt the dryness in my throat.

Her eyes were as red as ripe peppers.

She offered me a smile. I tried to smile back but instead my eyes widened, zooming in on her, on the naked girl before me, wondering what she was thinking. I wanted to ask her what Jide really did. Did she fight him off? Did she tell the whole story? Perhaps she would dip in the lake and wash Jide’s smell off her skin. But would she be able to wash him off her mind?

Our silence filled the morning with words. Those unspoken words would later become my side of Dora’s account, an account I never shared and never forgot.