“All right, then,” Papa said suddenly, putting the pictures away, “Big Guy, begin dey pack up. We still get two places to go. It’s a long night.”
“No, four places . . . seven children,” Big Guy corrected him, and started packing up the food and returning everything to the car.
My heart started to sink as they packed away the food. I had nursed the secret wish that they would leave the buffet for us. I had thought about pouring out the ogbono soup that filled our biggest pot, to accommodate the food. I had also thought about converting our aluminum bathing bucket into a temporary pot. Instead of letting anything go to waste, we could have poured everything into these two containers and stirred. As Fofo used to say whenever anyone was eating too many things at the same time, “Dem all dey enter de same stomach.” I could warm the food two or three times a day.
Yet I calmed myself down when Mama hugged me and said she would miss us, and Papa advised us to be studious and said that this evening was the beginning of good things to come. As Big Guy drove them away, I thought about the good work our parents were doing all over Africa.
I began to feel guilty for being greedy and wanting to keep all the food, when they needed to feed other children. I was ready to cooperate with Papa and Mama, to be as cheerful about our prospects as Antoinette was. I didn’t like the trouble Paul was giving our benefactors and hoped that he wouldn’t vomit at their next stop. I didn’t understand that it was natural for someone from the desert to react that way to the sea, and I was upset that he had embarrassed our parents. I thought even Yewa, the youngest of us children, comported herself better than he did.
That night, it wasn’t too strange when Fofo Kpee started calling us Pascal and Mary. The next day, he came to our school and changed our names in the school register to Pascal and Mary Ahouagnivo. And, remembering how much Mama loved the names, we became impatient with our schoolmates who kept using our old ones. Yewa bit the ear of one girl who taunted her with her old name, and, though the teacher thrashed my sister with koboko, the point had been made.
THE NEXT DAY, AFTER Big Guy came with a photographer to take our pictures for our passports, Fofo brought in people to change our wooden doors and windows to metal. He said because of our changing lifestyle and his Nanfang, it was important that our home be as secure as possible.
The workers painted the metal doors and windows tar black, and they stood out in our gray cement-plastered walls like the eyes of black pea beans. He bought huge padlocks and dog chains and added the padlock keys to his Nanfang key bunch. But the new keys were too long and threatened to tear holes in his trouser pockets, so he threaded them on a chain that he wore around his neck like a metallic talisman.
One Saturday, he stayed home instead of carrying people across the border, and dug a pit behind our house and extracted clayey sand. With water and a bit of cement, he and I mixed it, put it on a tray, then began to seal the space between our roof and the walls of the parlor. He stood on a chair inside, and I passed up the tray of the mix to him again and again while Yewa played outside, molding mini clay people. Our activity startled the lizards, geckos, and rats, and they kept scrambling out of their resting places and fleeing outside until I was no longer surprised. Fofo whistled and hummed songs most of the time. After each round of filling, we went outside, and Fofo got on a chair and worked on the outer wall, kneading the mud with his knuckles and smoothing it with wet palms.
“Fofo, why are you leaving those openings?” I asked when I saw that he had left an opening on each wall.
“Because I no want kill anybody wid heat,” he said. “E hun miawo hugan.”
“Heat? What about the windows?”
“No need to open window wid de holes. You dey ask beaucoup de questions, son . . . even de holes too big. Abeg, give me mix.”
I passed him the mix, and he reduced each opening to the size of a man’s foot. Standing on the floor inside, we couldn’t see the outside through the holes, not just because they were too high but because they were close to the roof. It was impossible for sunlight to come into the room through them.
“But, Fofo, when are we going to use the roofing sheets? Are you going to change the roof soon?”
Yewa came into the parlor and stood silently behind us, but we didn’t pay her any attention. My uncle’s fast and furious pace dictated the work, and our conversation seemed to only whet his appetite for speed.
“Don’t worry, de sheets are for our ohò yóyó,” Fofo Kpee said.
“New house?” I asked.
“Papa and Mama want build new house for us . . . cement house. Real ohò dagbe.”
“When are we going to see Papa and Mama?” Yewa cut in.
We stopped talking and turned to her for a while. She had come to show us her creations, which had fallen and broken. She carried the mess close to her heart, in open palms, like shattered pieces of a jewel. She said it was supposed to be a rider and a passenger on a Nanfang.
“In a few days we dey go Braffe . . . ,” Fofo Kpee said.
“No, I mean Papa and Mama of Gabon,” Yewa insisted. “I wanted to give this toy to Mama when she comes.”
“No worry, Mary,” said Fofo Kpee. “Yi bayi dogó, and no let dem break again. . . . Mama and Papa of Gabon reviennent soon.”
WHEN WE FINISHED, FOFO swept the parlor and gathered the wet mix that had fallen near the walls. I swept everything outside. Then Fofo sent me to buy huge quantities of amala and ewedu from the market. But when I came back and we sat down and began eating, Yewa refused to join us.
“I want Gabon food!” she announced, and stood up from the bed, her face twisted in defiance. Before anyone could respond, she walked to the threshold and slumped in annoyance. She started sobbing because she had hit her head on the new metal door frame. She sat there, in the open doorway, back to us, facing the ocean.
“Gabon food?” Fofo said, looking at me, scratching his head with his pinky because the rest of the fingers were soaked with ewedu. “Wetin be Gabon food, Mary?”
“Mama brought Gabon food,” Yewa cried. “I want Mama, I want Coke, I want macaroni. I am tired of ewedu and amala.”
“But de woman also bring pepper soup and akasa and crab soup,” Fofo argued. “Dem be Gabon food too?”
“She brought those ones for you and Big Guy,” Yewa said.
“Not true . . . Antoinette ate them too,” I said. “I ate them too.”
“Kai, we now get rich people problem,” Fofo said. “Auparavant, before now you dey eat everyting I give you, like a good goat. Now you want select?”
“Fofo Kpee, she’s not hungry,” I said, cupping amala into my fingers.
“I want Gabon food,” Yewa said, and shuffled her legs on the ground.
I continued to eat, paying no attention to her. But when I looked up at Fofo, I could see he was listening to her. “No way!” I said, wriggling deeper into the bed. “I’m not going anywhere!” I said this because I knew that if Fofo agreed with her, I would have to run back to the market to get the food for her. “You spoiled girl, get up from there,” I shouted. “Look at your head like Gabon food!”
“You’re stupid!” Yewa told me.