The Girl with the Louding Voice(41)

Kofi jump out from somewhere, holding a wooden spoon. “Sorry, ma’am. I didn’t hear you over the blender noise in the kitchen. I was just— Do you need something?”

“What is for dinner?” she ask. “Did you get the oranges from Balogun market? How about the yams? Is Big Daddy’s fresh fish on the fire?”

Kofi is nodding his head yes and shaking his head no at same time. “The fish is in the grill. The oranges were not fresh, but I got them anyway. I am cooking white rice and fish stew for dinner. Would you like some broccoli on the side? Steamed or stir-fried?”

“Steamed. Get Adunni her uniform,” she say. “Show her to her room.”

When she say that, I stand to my feets. “I am here, ma,” I say. “Where is Mr. Kola?”

“Once she gets changed, show her around the house,” Big Madam say. She is not looking me. She is just talking to Kofi. As if I didn’t just talk.

“Squeeze five oranges for me and bring it upstairs,” she say. “There are a pile of clothes in the laundry room that need ironing. I doubt she can operate an iron. Show her. If she burns my clothes, your next month’s salary will pay for it. Is that understood?”

“Perfectly understood, ma’am,” Kofi say.

“Good,” she say. “Tell Abu to bring three bundles of the burgundy French lace from the boot. Put them in the reception for me. Caroline will be sending her driver to pick them up. I do not want to be disturbed.” She turn around, enter inside another glass door, and close it.

“Is all okay with her?” I ask Kofi, my eyes on the glass door. “Why didn’t she talk to me?”

“You don’t want her to be speaking to you,” Kofi say, talking whisper. “Wait here. Let me turn off the gas cooker and show you around. By the time Big Madam comes back downstairs, she expects you to already be working.”

When Kofi leave my front, I catch my face in the looking-glass. My hair is looking like a bad farm: New, thick hairs are growing over the lines of the plaiting like stubborn weeds on a garden path. All the red beads Enitan put on it so long ago have fall off. My eyes are wide and big and shocking, and my skin, which was smooth and bright and fair, is now the color of spoiling tea with no milk.





CHAPTER 25

Big Madam’s house is having rooms here and there, left and right.

The room for shitting is different from room for baffing. Room for hanging cloth is different from room for sleeping in bed. There is room for shoes-keeping, for car parking in the outside, for keeping makeups in the upstairs. All the rooms are having space and gold tiles on floor. We didn’t enter inside Big Madam’s bedroom, but Kofi say she is having a round bed and another baffroom inside. In the downstairs, there are two parlors. One for visiting people and the other is for Big Madam only. “No one sits in here unless Big Madam asks you to,” Kofi say as he is closing the door in front of the second parlor. There is a looking-glass on the wall in every room. “Big Madam is quite vain,” Kofi say. “Always looking at herself in the mirror.”

There is another room just for eating food with a long table and like fifteen chairs. The chair is gold, the table a long gold slate on top four glass legs. There is a light case with about one hundred bulbs hanging in middle of the ceiling, glass flowerpots full of pink and red and smelling fresh flowers in the every corners of the room.

“Dining room,” Kofi call it. “Big Daddy and Big Madam eat here when they are on good terms, which is a rare occurrence these days. Follow me. Yes, this small room here is the library.” He open another door and we are inside a room with books sitting inside a dark brown wooden case. So many books are climbing up the case to the ceiling. There is a sofa with correct cushion in one corner, and table and chair next to it, a gold standing fan with three blades beside it. The whole place is smelling of dust, but I am not minding it. My heart is swelling as I am looking it all. Is like I am inside one kind heaven of books and educations.

“You like books?” Kofi ask.

“I want to be reading every day,” I say, feeling a pinch of happiness as I am remembering what Kike say to me about feeding my mind with reading of books. I bend my neck, trying to read the title name of some of the books:

Things Fall Apart

Collins English Dic-tion-ary

Africa Bible Com-men-ta-ry

A His-tory of Nigeria

1000 Prayer Points to Secure Your Marriage

The Book of Nigerian Facts: From Past to Present, 5th edition, 2014

“Who is owning all this books?” I ask as my eye is cutting around the wonder of the whole room.

“Big Daddy,” Kofi say. “He used to love reading many years ago. But that was before he lost his job and turned to alcohol. Now the library is hardly ever used. I am only showing it to you because you will need to dust it often.”

“Who is this Big Daddy?” I ask. “Is he Big Madam’s husband?”

“Yes,” Kofi say, whisper. “Unrepentant alcoholic. Chronic gambler. He keeps getting into debt and making his wife bail him out. Shame of a man, if you ask me. Real shame. He is away on business, should be back later today. And when I say ‘business,’ I mean woman business.”

“You mean how?”

Kofi round his eye. “He is a womanizer. He has girlfriends. Plenty of them.” He turn his mouth down, as if he is tasting something bitter so sudden, then he ask, “How old are you, Adunni?”