Chris Abani - GraceLand

Elvis paid. As he handed the King his ticket, something in his eyes caused him to shrink back.

“What?”

“Why do you think we walk here?”

“To save money?”

“Because?”

“You wanted to …”

“Yes.”

“I’m sorry.”

The King nodded and stalked into the cinema. Elvis followed, but lost him in the sudden darkness. Minutes later, the King turned up and sat next to Elvis. Without saying a word, he handed him a cold Fanta and a bag of sweets. Elvis took them silently. He sighed when the film started. It looked like it was going to be long and boring, but since it was important to the King, Elvis decided to try and get into the mood.

He wasn’t wrong: it was long. But he was utterly mesmerized, forgotten Fanta sweating in his palm, mouth slightly open, eyes glued to the screen.

When they got out, the sun had dipped over the horizon and lamps chased the darkness in thin lines and pinpricks of light. Elvis stood outside the cinema blinking. He couldn’t seem to adjust to this world outside.

“Did you enjoy dat?” the King asked.

“Yes, sir,” Elvis said. “I loved it.”

They walked in silence for a while. Then the King noticed a small bar tacked onto the corner of a building.

“Drink?”

“Sure,” Elvis replied, following the King inside.

The bored barkeep looked up.

“What you want?”

“Two beers,” Elvis said.

The barkeep walked over and dumped the two bottles down, opening them with such force the caps flew across the room.

“Easy,” the King said.

The barkeep just kissed his teeth and walked back to the corner, where he was watching a streaky black-and-white television with the attention of a lobotomy patient.

“What are you watching?” Elvis asked.

“De Price Is Right.”

“What?” the King asked.

Elvis shrugged and picked up his beer.

“So tell me what you like most.”

“About the film?”

The King nodded and reached for his beer.

“Well, it reminded me of my grandmother.”

“How so?”

“Just the way she would tell stories. In a way that let the characters enter your skin, you know?”

The King laughed.

“What?”

“‘I only watch action films,’” the King mocked.

Elvis laughed too.

“What did you learn most from de film?”

“There was the opening line. ‘People are important.’”

“Good, good,” the King chortled happily, like a man who had just converted a jihad-bent Muslim to Christianity.

“You know people are important. Dat is de message of my theater group.”

“When am I going to see you perform?”

“Soon come.”

“So how will this be an alternative to Redemption’s world?”

“Easy, Elvis. Rome was not built on all roads, okay? It takes time. Have patience.”

They sat drinking in silence for a while. Outside, the foot traffic was thinning out. No one else had come into the bar, though opposite it, Elvis could see, several temporary snack stalls had opened and were doing a great trade in cigarettes sold by the stick, fried yams, roast corn and suya. By one of the fires, a group of children huddled around a slender girl playing a wooden flute. There was something disturbing in her melody that called to Elvis, like a buried memory that would not yield itself and yet wouldn’t stop nagging.

“Anything else you like about dis film we just see?” the King asked.

Elvis remembered the scene at the end where so many different people stood at a street kiosk in Budapest writing postcards. In that scene, he could see himself.

“Nothing,” he said. “Let’s go.”

“Well, hello, Pilgrim.”

“Hey, Redemption,” Elvis replied, sitting down next to him.

“Ciga?” Redemption asked, holding out the pack and a book of matches.

“Sure.”

Elvis lit up and inhaled deeply, letting the smoke out reluctantly in a thin blue stream. Silently he passed the pack back to Redemption. They sat on a bench behind Madam Caro’s buka, less than a foot from a sheer fifty-foot drop into the swamp below. To the left, a tired sun threw halfhearted reflections on the green water. Sunny Ade was belting out a song on the loudspeaker hanging precariously above their heads.

“So have you heard?”

“Heard what?” Elvis asked, reaching for Redemption’s glass and taking a swig of beer.

“You know you should be careful drinking from oder people’s cup. You can be poison like dat. Even juju can be done to you.”

“Heard what?” Elvis repeated.

“Dat I have moved into Maroko.”

“This Maroko?”

“Dis Maroko.”

“But why?”

“My landlord raised de rent again. Anyway, I thought you would be happy, no? I mean, I have two-bedroom house over dere,” Redemption said, pointing vaguely behind them. “Nice, nice place, and I was going to ask you to live with me, but you have dirty attitude, so now you can forget it, man.”

“Why should I be happy? Did I win a prize?”

“Ahah, Elvis! Are we not friends? I want to help you leave dat your father.”

Elvis smoked quietly. The King’s warnings about Redemption played through his head. While he was tempted to beg for a second chance, he didn’t want to live with Redemption’s criminal side. It was too dangerous. What was it Oye used to say? If one finger is smeared with palm oil, it soon stains the others. With surprise he realized that he had not thought of Oye, or his mother, for so long. Was he getting too sucked into life in Lagos? He wondered how Oye was. She had declined Sunday’s offer to come to Lagos with them. With a guilty pang, he reached into his backpack and touched his mother’s journal. He hadn’t read it in a while, hadn’t even shown it to Redemption. Why was that? he thought. Still, to be away from his father and stepmother would have been wonderful.

With a sigh he got up and walked into the bar, returning to Redemption and the bench with two sweating bottles of beer.

“Now you are talking!” Redemption said, reaching for the fresh bottle. “Is dis your way of begging for forgiveness?” he continued, emptying the contents of the bottle into his beer mug.

“For what?” Elvis replied, lighting another cigarette.

“‘For what?’” Redemption chuckled. Realizing Elvis was serious, a frown crossed his face.

“What is wrong?” he demanded.

“Nothing,” Elvis replied.

“Sure?”

“Sure.”

They drank in silence, occasionally swatting at a mosquito or fly. Elvis reached into his backpack and took out his mother’s journal.

“What’s dat?”

“My mother’s journal,” Elvis replied.

“You mean like a diary?”

“Yes.”

“Why are you carrying it about?”

“It reminds me of her.”

Redemption nodded. “Let me see,” he said.

Elvis passed the book and Redemption rifled through the pages.

“She liked to cook,” he said, handing it back.

Elvis took it and returned it to his backpack, thinking it was funny Redemption should have said that, because he couldn’t remember his mother ever having cooked. Showing the journal to Redemption made him feel like he had a secret worthy of sharing, like Redemption’s passport and visa. They lapsed into another silence, watching the sun sink beyond the horizon as night rolled across the water like black velvet. A few generators thudded around them, and Elvis absently wondered why anyone who could afford a generator would live in Maroko. To their left, through a skirt of trees, was the road, and across the lagoon from it, on the distant shore, were lights.

“Is that Ikoyi?” Elvis asked.

Redemption squinted.

“Oh yes,” he replied. “Dis is why I like Lagos.”