Helon Habila - Oil on Water

— And did that help? Did the rivers return to normal?

— Yes, and ever since we have managed to keep this island free from oil prospecting and other activities that contaminate the water and lead to greed and violence.

I looked at Gloria and wondered what she thought of the story, and of the worshippers in general, but she was focused on her food. She looked like a child sitting there in the grass with her long skirt around her shapely legs, a child lost, or merely playing with its toys.

— So, why aren’t you a worshipper?

My voice was low so that only she could hear me. But I was not sure she had heard me, because her head was still bent over her plate. I cleared my voice to repeat myself, but she looked up and smiled.

— Well, I’m quite new here. The shrine hired me to work as a nurse. I really haven’t thought much about the religious aspect of things.

I pushed my plate aside. The yam with fish stew was surprisingly tasty. The others had finished eating too and were still talking to Naman.

— How long have you been here?

— Two months this trip, but I come and go.

— And you stay here at the shrine?

— I have a place in the village. I use it whenever I’m here.

I wanted to bring the conversation around to the kidnapping and the militants, but I didn’t want to sound rude or pushy.

— Are you happy here? Do you feel safe?

She looked at me, her expression solemn, thoughtful. — Everything makes sense here.

— I see. Will you come to see Zaq? He was in pain when I left him.

I was reluctant to leave her. So far she had been willing to answer my questions, and perhaps if I could take her to the hut she’d be willing to answer even more direct ones. She was not a worshipper, and she had been on the island long enough to know what was going on, which made her an ideal source. And I found her very attractive.

— Yes, of course. I’ll see how he’s doing before he turns in.

We found Zaq seated on his mat, facing a fire in a brazier that had been placed near his feet. His back was propped against the wall and his face didn’t change expression when he saw me enter with Gloria. He appeared lost in thought.

— The nurse is here to see you.

It took him a few minutes to look up, sighing heavily as he did so. The flames danced in the light and shadows on his face, merging with and accentuating the hollows and lines on it. His eyes were shiny, and I knew that he had been at what was left of the bottle. When the nurse knelt before him and took his wrist in her hand, she noticed it too. She also saw the bottle of whiskey near his pillow. She reached forward and took it.

— You’ve been drinking. Your pulse is very weak, I can’t allow you to drink.

And she flung the bottle at the open doorway, into the dark. To my surprise, Zaq did not protest. He looked at her with a fixed gaze.

— Ah, Nurse. You look great today.

— And you look drunk today, Mr. Zaq.

— Rufus, isn’t she very pretty?

The sternness went out of her face, and for a moment she appeared uncertain — her hand went up to adjust her scarf — and then she became serious again. I went out and sat on a tree trunk by the hut door. From there I could see the sculpture garden: the frozen community watching the night, warding off evil, ears cocked for the night’s watchword, whatever that might be. She came out and stood quietly beside me. I wanted to talk to her, but there was a stillness about her that I didn’t want to shatter. At last she turned and looked at me.

— It’s so peaceful here, isn’t it?

She sat down on the log beside me, and I felt the back of her hand brush against mine briefly. We sat in silence for a long time, watching the darkness.

— It is my fault. I brought him the drink. I thought it would cheer him up.

— You didn’t force him to drink it. He’s old enough to know what’s good for him.

— He is a good man. A great reporter.

She didn’t say anything to that. At last she stood up.

— I have to go now. My place in the village is near the jetty. You must come and see the jetty if you’re still here tomorrow. It’s beautiful in the evening when the boats come in.

— I will.

She left, and I watched after her until her shape became one with the night, invisible.

— I THINK SHE LIKES YOU, Rufus, my friend.

Zaq had come out onto the grass and felt around on hands and knees till he found his whiskey bottle. Now he kept spitting out bits of grass as he took long sips at the bottle.

— No, she doesn’t.

— She likes you. Trust me. I may not look it, but I do know about women. I saw the way she was looking at you. No doubt about it. She likes you. You’re not married, are you?

— No. Not yet.

— Surely you must have a girlfriend back in Port Harcourt? Look at you, a very fine young man, and being a journalist the girls must be after you all the time.

— Well, not really. I’m always busy with the job.

There was Mary, whom I’d met at journalism school, but I didn’t tell him about that. Mary, who wanted so badly to get married. She had made all the plans, and at night she’d go over them with me in the little room we shared not far from the campus. It was a tenement house, a face-me-I-face-you. I moved in with her a shirt, a brush, a shoe at a time. It was cheaper if we stayed together, she said. Looking back, I guess she must have started planning to marry me from the first day we met. She was that kind of girl. Forward-looking.

She was a TV journalist and her employers had sent her to the journalism school to specialize in news editing. Sometimes she’d go away for the weekend, and I knew she was away with her old boyfriend from her office. She never talked about him, and I never asked her — why would I, since I didn’t really love her? She was pretty and clever and the sex was good, but I didn’t see myself spending the rest of my life with her. Whenever she came back from her little trips she’d hold me all night long, tight, sometimes crying just to show how much she’d missed me.

Once, she went to Ibadan to visit her parents, and when she came back she had changed. She was scared, and for two nights she didn’t sleep. When I asked what was wrong, she told me about the holy man. Her father had died many years back, and her mother wanted to remarry but wasn’t having any luck, and so she asked a holy man to pray for her. He moved into the guest room, and then one day Mary came home to find he’d moved into her mother’s bedroom, and had impregnated not only her mother but also her seventeen-year-old sister. She went to the police, but her mother refused to back her up, and her sister was terrified and confused and didn’t know whom to support, and all the while the holy man was there in the background, not saying a word, clutching his Bible, taking the name of God in vain. And she had left. She gave up. She held me tight, till I couldn’t breathe, sobbing, I don’t have a family anymore, you are all I have. Promise me you’ll be with me always.

But I didn’t tell Zaq any of this.

— My last girlfriend wanted to get married, but I wasn’t ready. We were too young. Twenty-three, both us. She wanted us to run away to Abuja and start a life together. Alone. Away from family and friends.

— No. She was wrong, and selfish. You can’t run from your family. It’s not right.

THE NEXT DAY ZAQ was a changed man: he woke me up early, in time to see the procession go for its morning dip.

— It’s time to find out a few truths. Time to move on.

— You mean go back to Port Harcourt?

— You know, I’m not going back.

— What do you mean?

— Just what I said. All the time I was in that windowless, airless office, with my good friend Beke out there behind his editor’s desk gloating over the fact that he was now actually my employer, the great Zaq cut down to size — he always envied me, you see — all that time my greatest fear was that I’d die there, unable to get out and follow a true story one more time. I knew all I had to do was stand up and walk out, but I was scared. I’ve failed so many times before, in my profession, and in many other things as well.