The Girl with the Louding Voice(44)

“Don’t be an idiot,” Kofi say, pressing the blender button and noise is filling the kitchen again.

“But can I talk to Big Madam about another matter?” I shout, over the noise. “Where is she?”

He stop pressing the button, look me over his shoulder. “Talk to her about what? Big Madam does not know where Mr. Kola lives.”

“I want to ask her to not be paying my money in Mr. Kola banking account,” I say. “Maybe she can give me and I will keep it under my pillow. How about that one?”

Kofi use a napkin-towel to mop the sweat from his forehead. “Look. Don’t bother. You cannot reason with Big Madam. She is never in a good mood. She only speaks to you when she wants to. You don’t go to her for anything. She comes to you. There is nothing you can do about your salary right now, or about anything, except maybe to find another job. Do you know your way around Lagos? If you got out of the front gate, would you turn left or right to get to the main road?”

“I don’t know Lagos.” I cross my hand in front my chest. “Why can’t I be talking to Big Madam? Is she not a human beings like—” I stop my talking as the door to the kitchen is opening and one woman that is looking like Big Madam is rushing inside like a wave on a ocean edge, loud and crashing. I blink, look her again. It is Big Madam, but all the makeups on her face have wash off. Her face is looking like something rotten; like a bad road with mud-holes, her skin filling with oily pimples in every space. She is wearing another boubou, blue with gold thread running down the middle of it. The gele she was wearing before have come off, and her head is full of short, gray hair, plaited in round-about style. She put two hands on her hips, eyes jumping from me to Kofi, left to right. “What is happening here?”

“I am wanting to talk to you, ma. Serious talk.”

Kofi give me one look. His eye is warning me to keep my mouth shut, but I don’t even do like I am seeing him.

“Mr. Kola say he will keep my money in his banking account,” I say. “But Kofi is telling me—”

“We were just—” Kofi jump inside my words, silent me. “I mean. I was just showing Adunni how to blend peppers, ma’am.” His voice is changing tone, and he is talking as if he is fearing Big Madam will blend him with the blender.

“I asked you to show her around the house,” Big Madam say. “Did you? Has she done any work since she got changed? Is she smart and sensible? Or do I need to get Mr. Kola here first thing tomorrow to take her back to her village?”

“No, ma’am,” Kofi say. “She’s a fast learner. A bit talkative, perhaps feisty, but intelligent. She even managed to iron a few shirts. I taught her.”

“Adunni.” Big Madam look me up and down. Her eye is reminding me of how Papa use to look me. As if I be smelling of shit.

“Yes, ma?”

“Follow me.”

As she turn around and walk outside the kitchen, I follow. We pass the dining room to inside her parlor. The parlor is like all the other parlors in the house, with a round, curving sofa, gold tiles on the floor, long looking-glass on the wall. There is a tee-vee on the wall too, flat like a looking-glass. One man is inside the tee-vee, talking something but no sound is coming out. Big Madam fall inside the sofa, and the cushions make a praa sound.

She pick up the remote-controlling and point it to the tee-vee, off it, and blow out a angry wind from her mouth. There is a glass table next to her, a cup full of orange drink with ice block inside.

“Adunni?” she say as she pick up the cup and drink the drink.

“Yes, ma.”

She swallow, set the cup down like she want to break it, and the ice blocks jump, make a chink sound. “Adunni?” she call again.

“Yes, ma?” I say. Is she having ear problem? Why is she calling me two times?

“Don’t stand and ‘yes, ma’ me,” she say. “When I am talking to you, I expect you to be on your knees.”

I kneel down, put my hand in my back. “Yes, ma.”

“How old are you?”

“You mean me, ma?” I touch my chest.

“No, I mean your ghost,” she say. “Who else will I be talking to? Will I be asking myself how old I am?”

“Fourteen going fifteen years of age, ma.”

“Mr. Kola said your mother died and you ran away from home?”

“Yes, ma.” Thank God Mr. Kola didn’t tell her about Khadija.

“When did you stop schooling?”

“Primary school,” I say. “I was managing nearly almost four years inside primary school before I was stopping. But I like book. And school.”

“Can you read and write?” she ask.

I am nodding my head yes.

She reach down and pull up one handbag with yellow feather, look like somebody kill a fowl, dip the poor thing inside paint, and sell it to Big Madam. She pull out a biro, bite the cover, spit it to the floor, give me the biro with no cover. She pull out a notebook and give me that one too. I collect.

“Now open the two ears God gave you and listen carefully,” she say. “You will write a list of things we need in the house and give it to Abu, my driver. He does the shopping in the house with Kofi on Saturday mornings. Every two weeks, on a Friday, go around the house, note what we need, and write it in that notebook. Do you understand?”