Kwei Quartey - Wife of the Gods

“Where you get am, dis watch?”

Daramani looked at him straight and steady in the eye. Too steady. “My friend gimme to make keep am fo’ him.”

Dawson felt Daramani’s voice vibrate like a taut rubber band. “You lie.”

“Oh, no, my brodda, I no lie.”

Dawson flipped the watch over. It was engraved with someone’s name and the inscription “M.D.”

Dawson put the watch in his trouser pocket. “I dey make you one more chance. Where you steal am?”

“I tell you I no steal it, brodda.”

Dawson kicked a stool out of the way as he closed in on Daramani so quickly the man barely had time to shriek and recoil. Dawson’s long fingers encircled his neck, and he slammed Daramani up against the wall.

“Where you steal am?”

Dawson shook him like a doll and rattled his head against the wall.

Daramani screamed. “Abeg, abeg! Dawson, stop, please.”

“Tell me now or you go for jail.”

“Den where you go get good weed from?” Daramani said, eyes dancing and flashing with mischief. “Deh best weed, remember? And who go tell you where all dese bleddy fockin’ criminal dey for Accra?”

Daramani grinned even as Dawson increased the grip on his throat. A smile crept to Dawson’s face, and Daramani giggled.

“Steal anything more, I go kill you,” Dawson said. “Understand?”

“Oh, chaley, no can kill me. You love me toooo much.”

“I no love you , I dey love your weed.”

He tried to keep a straight face, but at the very moment Daramani snorted, Dawson burst out laughing. He released Daramani from his grip.

“I go find dat person wey you dey steal dis watch and give am back,” Dawson said, patting his pocket.

Daramani, chastened, was rubbing his neck. “Okay, my brodda. Sorry. I swear, never again. Ei , you break my neck, Dawson.”

“Next time I go take your head with it.”

Daramani began to giggle again.

D AWSON HEARD CONVERSATION COMINGfrom the kitchen, and he knew Christine and Hosiah were already home. He was much less excited about the third voice-that of Gifty, his mother-in-law. Squashing his inner groan and making yet another failed attempt to persuade himself that she was really not so bad, he called out, “Hello!”

“Hi, Dark,” Christine said in reply.

Hosiah came running out of the kitchen. “Daddy, Daddy!”

He stopped where he was, and Dawson smiled as the boy prepared to perform the customary welcoming exercise.

“Okay,” Dawson said. “Ready?”

The boy leaned forward in the on-your-mark position, one leg forward and the other back. “Yah, Daddy, I’m ready.”

“Set… go !”

Hosiah exploded into a run, his little feet pounding the floor with miniaturized power. Close to Dawson, he launched himself as high and far as he could into his father’s waiting arms.

“Oh, that was a good one!” Dawson said.

“Yes!” Hosiah said, laughing. “I jumped higher than yesterday, didn’t I, Daddy?”

“You certainly did. Getting better and better at it.”

But in fact Hosiah was breathing more heavily than a boy of his age should for such a short burst of energy. Dawson kissed his son’s perfectly round head. He had bright, shining eyes and a smile that could soften even the hardest heart.

In the kitchen, Christine and Gifty were at the table sharing a beer. Dawson put Hosiah down.

“Hi, sweetheart,” he said, kissing Christine on the cheek. He smiled the best he could at Gifty. “Hello, Mama.”

He kissed her with barely a touch of the lips.

“Hosiah had a nice day at Granny’s, didn’t you, Hosiah?” Gifty said without so much as returning the greeting.

“Yes, Granny.”

“Where did Granny take you?”

“To the new zoo!” Hosiah said.

Dawson’s jaw tensed, a tic matching the stab of irritation. He had planned to take his son to the brand-new and improved zoo this weekend, and Gifty knew that. She simply had to be one up on him.

“Really?” Dawson said. “And what did you see at the zoo?”

“Chimpanzees and monkeys and birds. And there was a leopard and a turtle this big.” He spread his arms wide.

“Tortoise, Hosiah,” Gifty corrected him in a tone that irked Dawson from his spine to his toes. He glanced at his wife, who was thirty-two, and at his mother-in-law, who was sixty, and wondered how they could look so alike yet be so dissimilar in character. Christine had inherited her mother’s rich, dark skin, smooth and flawless as the petals of a black orchid. Her forehead was high, as were her lovely cheekbones, her nose straight yet flared, and her lips were rich. She never wore makeup except for the odd social gathering, and she had never relaxed her hair the way many Ghanaian women did to make it “straight.”

Hosiah went back to playing on the floor with a model fire engine while Dawson looked in the fridge for something to drink.

“No more Malta?” he said, poking around.

Malta Guinness, Dawson’s favorite drink, was nonalcoholic and made with malt, hops, barley, and too much sugar.

“Oh, Malta,” Christine said. “I knew there was something I forgot. Sorry, Dark. I’ll get some tomorrow.”

“No worries.”

He settled for a ginger ale as a distant second choice and sat down to drink noisily from the bottle. He knew that got on Gifty’s nerves, so he did it deliberately and with gusto. She sent him one of her sharp looks, which he ignored.

“How was work?” Christine asked him.

He didn’t want to talk about Ketanu with Gifty present, so he simply shrugged and gave the standard male answer, “Same ol’ thing.”

“Time for your bath, Hosiah,” Christine said, clapping her hands briskly. “Go and get your clothes off and call Mama when you’re ready.”

“Okay. Can I have a bubble bath with plenty bubbles?”

“Yes, but we won’t spend too long, all right?”

“Okay.”

Hosiah scampered out of the kitchen.

“Did he get tired walking around the zoo?” Dawson asked Gifty.

“He-”

“Because if I’d been there, I’d’ve carried him on my shoulders when he got out of breath.”

“He was fine,” Gifty said with a tense smile. “You know I wouldn’t do anything to harm him.”

“Not what I’m saying,” Darko returned. “I’m saying as his condition gets worse, we have to be careful.”

“I realize that. Darko, I care about Hosiah as much as you.”

“Of course, Mama,” Christine came in just before Dawson could. “No one denies that.”

“Thank you, love,” Gifty said, looking satisfied. “So now, here is my question: How are the savings going for the operation?”

Darko shook his head. “It’s a lot of money.”

“And meanwhile he’s getting worse,” Gifty said pointedly.

“We realize that,” Dawson said icily.

“I just want to know what you’re doing,” she said without flinching, “besides sitting around waiting. Waiting never gets you very far, you know?”

Dawson gritted his teeth and tapped his bottle on the table a couple of times. He looked at Christine for inspiration, anything to stop him from wringing her mother’s neck.

“Mama-” Christine started.

“I’m not trying to cause trouble,” Gifty said quickly. “I sincerely want to help, and I mean that from the bottom of my heart. I’ve been thinking about it a lot, and I have a suggestion I’d like the two of you to seriously consider.”

Dawson looked at her sideways, skeptical and suspicious.

“What’s that, Mama?” Christine said.

“I think we should take Hosiah to my healer.”

“What healer?” Dawson said sharply.