me to remain here?” I ask.
“For your strength,” he replies.
SHEEP
After I tire of tossing and turning, I decide to go to Ayoola’s room. When we were young, we often slept together, and it always had the effect of calming us both. Together, we were safe.
She is wearing a long cotton tee and hugging a brown teddy bear. Her knees are bent toward her stomach and she does not stir as I slip into bed beside her. This is no surprise. Ayoola wakes up only when her body has tired of sleeping. She does not dream, she does not snore. She lapses into a coma that even the likes of Muhtar cannot fathom.
I envy her for this. My body is exhausted, but my mind is working overtime, remembering and plotting and second-guessing. I am more haunted by her actions than she is. We may have escaped punishment, but our hands are no less bloody. We lie in our bed, in relative comfort even as Femi’s body is succumbing to the water and the fish. I am tempted to shake Ayoola awake, but what good would it do? Even if I succeeded in rousing her, she would tell me that it would all be fine and promptly go back to sleep.
Instead I count—sheep, ducks, chickens, cows, goats, bush rats and corpses. I count them to oblivion.
FATHER
Ayoola had a guest. It was the summer holidays, and he had come in the hope of making her his girlfriend before school resumed. I think his name was Ola. I remember he was gangly, with a birthmark that discolored half his face. I remember he could not keep his eyes off Ayoola.
Father received him well. He was offered drinks and snacks. He was coaxed into talking about himself. He was even shown the knife. As far as Ola was concerned, our father was a generous, attentive host. Even Mum and Ayoola had been fooled by the performance—they were both smiling. But I was on the edge of my seat, my fingernails dug into the upholstery.
Ola knew better than to tell the father of the girl he wanted to date that he was interested in her, but you could see it in the way he kept glancing at Ayoola, how he angled his body toward her, how he constantly said her name.
“This boy is a smooth talker o!” Father announced with a chuckle, after Ola had made some well-meaning comment about helping the homeless to find work. “I’m sure you are popular with the ladies.”
“Yes, sir. No, sir,” he stammered, caught off guard.
“You like my daughters, eh? They are lovely, eh?” Ola blushed. His eyes darted to Ayoola again. Father’s jaw clenched. I looked around me, but Ayoola and my mother had not noticed. I remember wishing I had taught Ayoola some type of code. I coughed.
“Pèlé,” Mother told me in her soothing voice. I coughed again. “Go and drink water.” I coughed once more. Nothing.
Ayoola, follow me , I mouthed, my eyes wide.
“No, thanks.”
“Follow me now,” I hissed. She crossed her arms and looked back at Ola. She was enjoying his attention too much to mind me. Father turned his head in my direction and smiled. Then I followed his eyes to the cane.
The cane lay ten inches above the TV on a specially crafted ledge. And there it stayed all day, every day. My eyes were constantly drawn to it. To the uninitiated, it must have looked like a work of art—a nod to history and culture. It was thick, smooth and marked with intricate carvings.
The visit passed slowly until Father decided it was over, guiding Ola to the door, telling him to come again and wishing him luck. Then he walked across the silent living room and reached for the cane.
“Ayoola, come here.” She looked up, saw the cane and trembled. Mother trembled. I trembled. “Are you deaf? I said come here!”
“But I did not ask him to come,” she whined, instantly understanding what the matter was. “I didn’t invite him.”
“Please, sir, please,” I whispered. I was already crying. “Please.”
“Ayoola.” She stepped forward. She had started crying too. “Strip.”
She removed her dress, button by button. She did not hurry, she fumbled, she cried. But he was patient.
“Nítorí Ọl ọ́run, Kehinde, please. Nítorí Ọl ọ́run.” Because of God, Mother begged. Because of God. Ayoola’s dress fell in a pool at her feet. She was wearing a white training bra and white panties. Even though I was older, I still had no use for a bra.