The Death of Vivek Oji(26)

“Oh my God, yes, of course. I just . . . I didn’t know the children were friends.”

“I don’t think they liked the girl very much when they were younger—Juju, that’s her name, yes? Well. They’re all as thick as thieves now.” Kavita could almost hear Rhatha shrug over the phone. “Children and their politics. Who can understand it?”

Kavita laughed and got off the phone as quickly as possible, so she could call her friend.

Maja picked up almost immediately. “Yes, the children have been coming here,” she told Kavita, holding her phone to her ear with her shoulder as she rolled white stockings off her legs. “Rhatha’s girls, Vivek, even Ruby’s girl, Elizabeth. They all go to Juju’s room to watch movies and play music and whatever else they get up to.”

“It’s strange that they’re suddenly so close,” Kavita said, and Maja laughed.

“It’s cute,” she said. “It’s just like when they were little.”

“You don’t think they’re . . . you know, up to something in there?”

Maja paused as she unhooked the clasp of her uniform skirt. “Really, Kavita? Like what?”

“I don’t know! Smoking or something. Drinking?”

Maja exhaled. She tried to be patient with Kavita, she really did, considering the fact that Vivek was clearly having some kind of breakdown, but there were lines. “So you think they’d just be doing all that in our houses and none of us would notice? Because we’re what, that negligent with the children?”

“Ah, no, that’s not what I meant.”

“Kavita, stop being so neurotic, for goodness’ sake. The children are fine. They’re on holiday, and they’re staying indoors instead of being out there with all this wahala going on. Did you hear about the attack down on Ezekiel Street?”

“What? There was an attack?”

“Yes, the day before yesterday. The clinic there—armed robbers, they’re saying.”

“During that riot?”

“Mm-hmm. They broke the electric signboard, someone threw a stone at it, and later that night those robbers came back and attacked the clinic.”

“Jesus. What’s there to steal from a clinic?”

“Ask me. They think all these barren women overpay because they’re so desperate for children. I don’t know why they think there’d be any money there. Most of these patients just end up owing the doctors anyway.” She paused, then, more quietly: “I heard they raped some of the nurses.”

“My God, Maja.”

“Ruby was telling me about it. I’m tired of this country, Kavita. Brutality everywhere. I’m thinking of taking Juju and going.”

“I thought you said Charles hid your passports.”

Maja shrugged, even though Kavita couldn’t see her, and started unbuttoning her shirt. “And so? I will find them somehow. Or go to the embassy and make a complaint. What am I staying here for, after the way Charles has treated me? Let me swallow my pride and ask my parents for help.”

“Will you go back to the Philippines?”

“I don’t even know.” Maja leaned against the wall, her shirt falling open. She was alone in her and Charles’s bedroom. They had told Juju he was away on a business trip, and he was, handling it all from a hotel in Onitsha. Maja wasn’t sure if he had taken his other family along with him. “Where else would we go?” Her voice was deflated.

“I’m so sorry, Maja,” said Kavita. She knew that Maja wouldn’t leave Charles, not really. She was too afraid of him, too in love with him, too stubborn to admit that her marriage wasn’t what she kept telling her parents it was. Charles knew it, too. He’d spent years whispering into Maja’s ear that she would never make it on her own, just her and Juju, that they needed him, that her daughter needed a father.

“Where are you going to go?” he’d said. “You know the kind of shame it will bring to your family if you don’t have a husband. It’s better you stay here and make it work, adapt to our customs. Welcome my second wife when she comes. Behave with some dignity and don’t embarrass me. It will be good for Juju to have a little brother in the house.” When Maja tried to argue back, he smiled patiently and twisted her wrist till it bruised. “I will give you some time,” he said. “I believe a family should live together. You hear? But I will give you some time.”

Maja wished she was like Tammy, whose husband had done the same thing, gone and taken a second wife, except that Tammy had given him sons already. The man thought Tammy would ignore it, because he was rich and she and their children lived in a gorgeous house with lavish grounds. Instead, he’d come home one day to find the house empty and his children gone. Tammy took them back to Scotland and that was the end of it. She didn’t even shout. The other Nigerwives told that story with pride, but Maja knew her story wasn’t going to end like that. Charles had already warned her that he would come and find her wherever she went, so if she wanted to run, she had better leave his daughter behind. Maja didn’t quite understand why Juju meant so little, yet so much to him. Like property.

“I have to go,” she said to Kavita. “I have to make dinner for all these visitors.”

“Send them back to their houses,” laughed Kavita. “As if they don’t have food there.”