But both men’s eyes were fixed on my face. Fofo’s face was solemn, pained, and the other face had a frozen smile that seemed to need my reaction to thaw into a full one. I didn’t know where to look. My throat felt like sandpaper, and my lungs burned as if they had no air. The room seemed to shrink, and I dug my fingers into our mattress. I tried to smile to hide my feelings, but I didn’t know whether my face cooperated or not.
“Yes, he would like to travel today,” Yewa answered for me.
Fofo looked at her sharply. Big Guy broke into a full smile. I breathed again, my forehead moist with sweat.
“Your fofo like Gabon, oui?” Big Guy asked her, as if to score an added point against Fofo, having won the standoff.
She nodded. “Yes.”
Big Guy began to tickle her, making her snicker as if she had water in her throat. He explained that we would soon begin school in Port-Gentil. He said schools in Gabon were as beautiful as schools in France, that we would catch up with classes as soon as we got there. Though he tried to be friendly, plying us with sweets and rubbing our heads and dancing to entertain us, there was something hollow about his performance that day. He wasn’t wearing his immigration uniform, but the stiffness I had seen in him when he came with our godparents hung over him. After a while, even Yewa didn’t like his exaggerated excitement anymore. Though she kept answering his questions, she did so with single-word answers, as if she had intentionally struck a compromise between Fofo’s discomfort and Big Guy’s need to fill up his awkward visit with chatter.
Then Big Guy resorted to laughing a big laugh, as if the whole world had suddenly become funny. Yewa only smiled at him, without a sound. He laughed until his frame buckled over, and he sat on the floor; he laughed until he began to sound unnatural. He made funny faces and rolled his tongue to keep Yewa’s interest. It was as if Big Guy was learning to be a clown, like Fofo, while Fofo was learning to be serious, like Big Guy. It was a badly acted play, and we sat there, a captive audience. Though he turned on the boom box and Lagbaja’s “Konko Below” battered the room, Fofo lay there, unmoving, like a fallen statue.
After a while, Big Guy yawned and went to sit with Fofo Kpee. Fofo sat up abruptly, as if he needed to protect himself. Big Guy put his arm around his neck.
“Smiley, mon ami, you dey take tings too serious.”
“I done make up my mind,” Fofo said, his face tight like a rock, his pinched lips like its eroded precipice. “Efó!”
“Non, abeg, no talk comme ça o,” Big Guy said. “I only dey joke yesterday. . . . I mean, if you no want work for our NGO anymore, it’s OK. Be fair to yourself, au moins. We no reach point of no return yet, so you still fit change your mind. But, no rush your decision.”
Fofo looked at him without saying anything for a while. “Peutêtre, we should suspend de plan for now.”
“You’re bound to feel like dis at de beginning. Moi aussi, I no like de plan at de beginning. It be like say you dey exploit de young, but actually you dey help dem. Dem go get plenty chance abroad. Already, we dey give dem food tree times daily . . . clothes, shoes, books . . . are dese bad tings for dem?”
“Maybe.”
“You no get liva o . . . coward, huh?”
“Show me person who no go fear?”
“Mais pourquoi? Why?” Big Guy patted him on the back. “Abeg, courage, oui?”
“Hén, what? Leave me alone. . . . I no want teach dem new lesson.”
“Ah no o. We still get at-sea orientation for dem o. Na last lesson.”
Big Guy looked up at the space between the walls and the roof and nodded, smiling as if he had just noticed the change. “I see, I see. You done change de place, huh. . . . Even de windows dey open.”
“Na my place. N’gan bayi onú de jlo mi. Or you want make I suffocate my children for my house?”
“Ecoute, if I be you,” Big Guy said, winking at us and pulling Fofo so close that they almost fell over, “I go just dey follow de plan and dey teach dese children. No dash deir hope for notting o.” The bedsprings squeaked, and they regained their balance. Fofo smiled a sad smile but didn’t answer him. “You just dey fear fear, Kpee.” Big Guy stood up. “Make we go talk outside.”
“Talk?”
“I get small matter I want tell you. Make we go.”
“Impossible,” Fofo said calmly, his elbows on his thighs, his fists together supporting his chin. “I go pay you back. I dey make some money wid Nanfang. Just gimme time, na mi tán.”
“Dis ting no be about money but helping our children. We can even give you plus argent. Come outside. Remember, na you be our point man for dis area?”
“Take de Nanfang, abeg.”
“No way,” he said, and shrugged a big shrug. “Keep de machine. Dat na wicked ting. We no go take your daily bread. You go destroy yourself if you negotiate like dis.”
Since he wouldn’t leave Fofo in peace, our uncle followed him outside.
“No come out o, mes amis,” Big Guy said to us in a voice that betrayed a grain of anxiety. “Remain inside.” We nodded. He opened the door for Fofo and closed it behind him as if our house were his.
Once their footsteps waned, we rushed to the window and watched them through the worn blinds. They walked until they reached the road and stopped. Fofo was facing us. We couldn’t hear them. The plantations and sea loomed behind the road, and sometimes it looked as if the plantations were on the sea or as if the people on the road were walking on water, like Jesus.
The two men argued loudly, raising their hands. Sometimes people who knew them startled them with greetings, and you could see them stop momentarily, flash empty smiles, then go back to business as if to make up for lost time. Fofo kept shaking his head, as if he were saying a big no to whatever his friend was saying. And each time I saw the no shape in his mouth, I felt like clapping for him. It became very predictable, and naturally I started shaking my head too, and my mouth formed many silent nos. I held tight to the window frame. I was praying for Fofo to stand firm.
Then Big Guy seized Fofo by the shoulders and shook him until Fofo spun and broke free, staggered and regained his balance. He didn’t move away from Big Guy but stood his ground.
“He’s going to beat up Fofo Kpee,” Yewa whispered. “Big Guy is mean. Is he a bully?”
“I don’t know.”
“Big Guy is a bad man.” Her voice began to crack with emotion. “I won’t dance with him anymore. And he won’t follow us to Gabon! I’ll report him to Mama and Papa.”
“Shhh, don’t cry now, OK? Fofo is strong.”
Suddenly, four police officers showed up and surrounded Fofo; they came in twos from either direction, as if they had expected Fofo to try to escape. They wielded koboko whips, and their waists bulged with pistols and batons. All of them were screaming at Fofo, with Big Guy getting more and more manic. Fofo Kpee’s mouth was shut, and he stood very still, like a man in the presence of unfriendly dogs. After watching the scene for a while, I knew that Big Guy was determined to get Fofo to agree with him. But Fofo folded his hands in front of him and shook his head periodically, very slowly. Whenever they looked in our direction, I ducked and dunked Yewa’s head under the window too.