“Already? Yewa!” he called out, his voice filling the room like a trumpet. “Where you dey?”
Silence.
“I told you she’s asleep,” I said. “She’s tired.”
“Well, make sure she eat later,” he said lightheartedly. “I go see you dis evening. Trust me, your fofo go dey fine.”
He turned and walked out of the room, closing and locking the door from the parlor. A bit of my fear went away with him. I listened to his footsteps, then heard the bed creak as it received his body.
Though our situation had gone from bad to worse in the course of one night, I found some solace in the fact that I could make him believe I liked him. I would thank him for any little kindness toward us, I thought. I felt I had a bit of control over how things might turn out. Maybe if we behaved really well, the man would allow us into the parlor to see Fofo. Maybe he would even open the windows or at least leave the door open. My imagination began to run wild with the good things that might happen if we behaved well. I wasn’t thinking of going to Braffe anymore. My desire now was to please this man, and that Fofo would get well.
I WISHED YEWA WOULD give up her pranks and come out when the man left the room. But I didn’t hear her move. I whispered her name into the darkness, but there was no response. I stood there and turned slowly in a full circle, but I couldn’t see a thing. I didn’t know how to begin looking for her without stumbling.
I started feeling for everything in the small room with my feet and hands. My knees came to rest on the mortar in the corner, and I extended my arms and brought them slowly together, hoping to catch Yewa but hugging myself instead, because she wasn’t there. I turned to head toward the next corner, but my thigh hit a pot, which toppled over. I tried to catch it, wedging it with my hip, gritting my teeth, relieved that it didn’t crash to the floor. Though I couldn’t see, I knew immediately that my hands and body were full of soot. I found a spot on the floor for the pot and gently set it down, bottom up, so that we wouldn’t accidentally step in it. “Yewa, Yewa,” I whispered, but again no answer. I went toward the cement bags where I had lain before, but she wasn’t there.
Desperate, I stopped and sat on the bed, wanting to scream her name to the heavens. I took the food containers and placed them at the foot of the bed. The thing farthest from my mind at that point was food. I lay in a fetal position and buried my head in a pillow. I was beginning to lose my sense of time.
I couldn’t lie still and heard only Fofo’s groans. Then I began to hear someone walking quietly around our house. I sat up and listened. The footsteps were too light to be those of our guard. I also knew it wasn’t my sister because I didn’t think she could have gotten out. I began to suspect that we had more than one guard. But the outside didn’t hold my interest for long. It occurred to me that I hadn’t searched under the bed.
I stood up slowly and tiptoed toward the parlor door. Hoping to surprise her, I turned around, lay on the ground, stretched out to my full length, and rolled under the bed, risking my wounded knee, so as not to give her any chance to dodge my contact. I slid out the other side and came to rest against the stack of secondhand roofing sheets. As I got up, a beacon of hope rose in my heart because I realized Yewa might be resting on top of those sheets. Carefully, to avoid cutting my hands on the sharp edges where nails had been pulled, I worked the surface with my fingers. I found only our cutlery basket, the work tools that Fofo and I had used to cement the rooms, and our carton of clothes.
Disappointed, I went to lean on the door, where I had been with her last, before we scrambled for safety. I imagined my sister’s eyes everywhere and longed for her to laugh or tease me. It was the first time in my life I didn’t know where Yewa was, and I felt lost without her. My preoccupation with Fofo’s well-being disappeared because at least he was breathing. Tears ran down my face, and I wished to hell for a ray of light in that darkness.
“Yewa! Yewa!” I finally shouted, and stamped my feet.
“Yes, yes,” she said in a strange fearful voice.
“Wetin dey happen for dere?” the guard said from the other room.
“Ah, nothing, monsieur,” I said, relieved to hear my sister’s voice, and then turned my attention to her: “Where are you?”
I moved away from the door toward the right corner but kicked a plastic crate and stopped. The joy of hearing Yewa’s voice helped me ignore the pain.
“Notting?” the guard said. “You dey talk to me?”
“No, I meant Yewa,” I said, and forced a giggle.
“Just make sure you no wound yourself o. . . . I want sleep; n’jlo na gbòjé.”
“We’re sorry to disturb you, monsieur.”
I climbed over the crate and closed in on the corner, listening intently. When I reached our plastic water vat, which was as high as my chest and wider than my arms were long, I thought she was standing on top of the lid, leaning against the wall. So I tapped the side of the vat and whispered, “Just come down, please.”
But the lid sprang open, and I caught it before it made a sound. She had been hiding inside the vat all along. “I’m here,” she whispered, standing up.
“Just come out, OK?”
I tried to pull her out, but she pushed my hands away. “Leave me alone. You are with them.”
“Me?”
“Yes, yes.”
“No, I’m not.”
“You are.”
“Shh!”
“Don’t lie to me. You were laughing with him right now . . . you like them. You and Fofo Kpee didn’t tell me you were going to sell me. You’re no longer my brother.”
“Come out first, please,” I said, and turned around, offering her my back and leaning into the vat. “Climb on. I’ll explain later. You have to come out so he sees us when he opens the door. Otherwise . . .”
“I don’t want to see anybody.”
I stepped back a bit and kept quiet, partly because I didn’t know what to say anymore and partly because I was afraid of waking the guard. Dealing with my sister in such darkness was like arguing or fighting with a faceless enemy who could strike at any time. I would have given anything to see her face. Maybe my tears would have convinced her of my innocence. Now her defiance came out in her agitated breathing.
“They’ll kill Fofo if you don’t cooperate,” I resumed.
“They won’t. He’s one of them, like you. Leave me alone.”
“Won’t you eat something?”
“Never.”
I couldn’t persuade her, so I resorted to force. But she ducked down, squatting in the vat, locking her knees and elbows and raising her shoulders to her ears so I had no place to hold. I reached in to tickle her to soften her up, then I heard her mouth open with a crack. Her teeth hit my wrist, unable to bite. She started giggling, a rubbery sonority muffled by her body. It was as if she was mocking me or perhaps mocking all child traffickers of this world. I left my sister and went to lie on the bed, falling asleep.
WHEN I WOKE UP, I had a headache and was very hungry. Yawning and stretching, I was surprised to find Yewa snoring beside me. Fofo Kpee’s groan had mellowed. My knee hurt and felt swollen.
I found my way to the toilet pail and urinated, hitting the sides to muffle the sound. Then I picked up a food container and started to eat, stuffing myself with my hands. It was to be a breakfast of akara, bean cake, and ogi, pap. The balls of akara that sat atop the ogi were cold and soggy in parts. I sensed that water had condensed in the container. I was thirsty, so I raised it to my mouth and turned it gently until water droplets trickled onto my tongue. I chewed the akara quickly, the cold fried oil clogging the inside of my mouth. When I came to the last ball, I noticed there was a small plastic bag in the container. I untied it and found four sugar cubes, which I figured were for the ogi. But the ogi had caked over, and there was no way I could mix the sugar into it. So I tossed one of the cubes into my mouth and chewed noisily, then began to eat chunks of ogi.