What It Means When a Man Falls from the Sky(19)
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When Ogechi had taken her first baby, a pillowy thing made of cotton tufts, to her mother, the older woman had guffawed, blowing out so much air she should have fainted. She’d then taken the molded form from Ogechi, gripped it under its armpits, and pulled it in half.
“This thing will grow fat and useless,” she’d said. “You need something with strong limbs that can plow and haul and scrub. Soft children with hard lives go mad or die young. Bring me a child with edges and I will bless it and you can raise it however you like.”
When Ogechi had instead brought her mother a paper child woven from the prettiest wrapping paper she’d been able to scavenge, her mother, laughing the whole time, had plunged it into the mop bucket until it softened and fell apart. Ogechi had slapped her and her mother had slapped her back, and slapped her again and again till their neighbors heard the commotion and pulled the two women apart. Ogechi ran away that night and vowed never to return to her mother’s house.
—
At her stop, Ogechi alighted and picked her way through the crowded street until she reached Mama Said Hair Emporium, where she worked. Mama also owned the store next door, an eatery to some, but to others, like Ogechi, a place where the owner would bless the babies of motherless girls. For a fee. And Ogechi still owed that fee for the yarn child who was now unraveled.
When she stepped into the Emporium, the other assistant hairdressers noticed her empty arms and snickered. They’d warned her about the yarn, hadn’t they? Ogechi refused to let the sting of tears in her eyes manifest and grabbed the closest broom.
Soon, clients trickled in, and the other girls washed and prepped their hair for Mama while Ogechi swept up the hair shed from scalps and wigs and weaves. Mama arrived just as the first customer had begun to lose patience and soothed her with compliments. She noted Ogechi’s empty arms with a resigned shake of her head and went to work, curling, sewing, perming until the women were satisfied or in too much of a hurry to care.
Shortly after three, the two younger assistants left together, avoiding eye contact with Ogechi but smirking as if they knew what came next. Mama dismissed the remaining customer and stroked a display wig, waiting.
“Mama, I—”
“Where is the money?”
It was a routine Mama refused to skip. She knew perfectly well that Ogechi didn’t have any money. Ogechi lived in one of Mama’s buildings, where she paid in rent almost all of the meager salary she earned, and ate only once a day, at Mama’s next-door eatery.
“I don’t have it.”
“Well, what will you give me instead?”
Ogechi knew better than to suggest something.
“Mama, what do you want?”
“I want just a bit more of your joy, Ogechi.”
The woman had already taken most of her empathy, so that she found herself spitting in the palms of beggars. She’d started on joy the last time, agreeing to bless the yarn baby only if Ogechi siphoned a bit, just a dab, to her. All that empathy and joy and who knows what else Mama took from her and the other desperate girls who visited her back room kept her blessing active long past when it should have faded. Ogechi tried to think of it as an even trade, a little bit of her life for her child’s life. Anything but go back to her own mother and her practical demands.
“Yes, Mama, you can have it.”
Mama touched Ogechi’s shoulder and she felt a little bit sad, but nothing she wouldn’t shake off in a few days. It was a fair trade.
“Why don’t you finish up in here while I check on the food?”
Mama had not been gone for three minutes when a young woman walked in. She was stunning, with long natural hair and delicate fingers and skin as smooth and clear as fine chocolate. And in her hands was something that Ogechi wouldn’t have believed existed if she hadn’t seen it with her own eyes. The baby was porcelain, with a smooth glazed face wearing a precious smirk. It wore a frilly white dress and frilly socks and soft-soled shoes that would never touch the ground. Only a very wealthy and lucky woman would be able to keep such a delicate thing unbroken for the full year it would take before the child became flesh.
“We are looking for this Mama woman. Is this her place?”
Ogechi collected herself enough to direct the girl next door, then fell into a fit of jealous tears. Such a baby would never be hers. Even the raffia children of that morning seemed like dirty sponges meant to soak up misfortune when compared with the china child to whom misfortune would never stick. If Ogechi’s mother had seen the child, she would have laughed at how ridiculous such a baby would be, what constant coddling she would need. It would never occur to her that mud daughters needed coddling, too.
Where would Ogechi get her hands on such beautiful material? The only things here were the glossy magazines that advertised the latest styles; empty product bottles, which Mama would fill with scented water and try to sell; and hair. Hair everywhere, short, long, fake, real, obsidian black, delusional blond, bright, bright red. Ogechi upended the bag she’d swept the hair into and it landed in a pile studded with debris. She grabbed a handful and shook off the dirt. Would she dare?
After plugging one of the sinks, she poured in half a cup of Mama’s most expensive shampoo. When the basin was filled with water and frothy with foam, she plunged the hair into it and began to scrub. She filled the sink twice more until the water was clear. Then she soaked the bundle in the matching conditioner, rinsed, and toweled it dry. Next, she gathered up the silky strands and began to wind them.