Ben Okri - The Famished Road

‘She’s a witch,’ one of the creditors said.

‘She’s not,’ I said.

‘Shut up,’ said Mum.

When I looked closer at the pictures we all seemed strange. The pictures were grained, there were dots over our faces, smudges everywhere. Dad looked as if he had a patch over one eye, Mum was blurred in both eyes, the children were like squirrels, and I resembled a rabbit. We all looked like celebrating refugees. We were cramped, and hungry, and our smiles were fixed. The room appeared to be constructed out of garbage and together we seemed a people who had never known happiness. Those of us that smiled had our faces contorted into grimaces, like people who had been defeated but who smile when a camera is trained on them.

The photographer was very pleased with the results and quoted prices for copies. One. of the creditors said he would get his copy when Dad paid up. The landlord said:

‘I look like a chief.’ ‘Thief,’ I said.

Mum knocked me on the head.

‘Your son looks like a goat,’ the landlord said. The creditors laughed. Mum said: ‘We want to sleep now. Everyone should leave.’ ‘Is that how you talk to your landlord?’

‘Okay, everyone should stay,’ Mum said. ‘Azaro, prepare your bed.’

I got up in the dark, moved the centre table, and unrolled my mat. I lay down. The creditors’ feet were all around my head. The landlord went on chewing. After a brief silence one of the creditors said:

‘All right, if I can’t get my money now, I’m going to seize something.’

He got up from the bed, lifted the centre table, and went to the door.

‘Goodnight, landlord,’ he said, and left.Mum didn’t move. Another creditor, asking the landlord to light a match for him, took Dad’s boots. The third one said: ‘Iwon’ttakeanythingbutIwillkeep comingback.’Thephotographersaid: ‘I will come tomorrow.’ The landlord said: ‘Tell your husband I want to see him.’ Then they all left. Mum got out of bed and warmed some food for Dad. When she finished she counted the money she had made that day. She put some aside for buying provisions and some towards the rent. The candle was low and as it burned towards the end its poor illumination showed up Mum’s bony face, her hardening eyes, and the veins on her neck.

‘I saw a mad boy today. They tied him to a chair and his mother was crying.’‘What happened to him?’‘How should I know?’ We were quiet.‘How is Madame Koto?’ ‘She’s fine.’‘Does she ask about me?’‘No.’‘What does she do all the time?’‘She stays in her room. Today she had a lot of strange customers. She put up a juju on the wall. A madman came into the bar and ate a lizard and pissed everywhere.’ ‘Ifit’slikethatyoumuststop goingthere.’ ‘I don’t want to.’ ‘Why not?’ ‘I don’t want to.’ ‘How was school?’ ‘I don’t like school.’ ‘You must like school. If your father had gone to school we wouldn’t be suffering so much. Learn all you can learn. This is a new age. Independence is coming. Only thosewhogotoschoolcaneat goodfood.Otherwise,youwillendupcarryingloads like your father.’

We were silent again.‘You must be careful of Madame Koto.’‘Why?’‘People have been saying things about her. We don’t know where she comes from.

And that juju of hers, who made it?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Don’t touch it.’

‘I won’t touch it. But what do they say about her?’

‘You’re a small boy. You won’t understand.’

‘Tell me.’

‘Go to sleep.’

‘Did she kill someone?’

‘Go to sleep.’

We fell silent and Mum put away her basin of provisions and her money. She hadn’t made much and the sourness of her face told me she was wondering whether walkingthestreets of theworld,day afterboilingday,crooningoutherprovisionstill her voice was hoarse, was worth the little she earned at the end of it all. She sighed and I knew that in spite of everything she would carry on hawking. Her sigh was full of despair, but at the bottom of her lungs, at the depth of her breath’s expulsion, there wasalsohope,waitinglikesleep attheendofeventhemosttorridday.

As I drifted in the corridors of sleep, I heard a great loud voice singing from the gateway of the compound. The voice was rough and drunken. Another voice cried:

‘Black Tyger!’

Dad kicked open the door and staggered into the room like a dreaded announcement. Mum jumped up and hurriedly lit a reserve candle. Her brightened face was tinged with uncertainty. Dad stood in the doorway like a drunken giant. His shoulders were hunched. He held a bottle of ogogoro in one hand. Both of his trouser legs were covered in mud up to the knees. He had on only one shoe. The room stank of drunkenness and mud. His neck creaked. Twisting his mouth, blinking as if reality wereblindinghim,hesaid,very loudly:

‘I amgoingto join thearmy!’

And then he collapsed into a heap on the floor. We rushed over to help him up. He revived quickly, saw us struggling over him, and shoved us away. I was sent flyingto the corner where his shoes used to be. Mum tumbled on to the bed. He staggered up, weaved, snatched up his bottle of ogogoro, took a deep drink, and said:

‘How is my family?’

‘We are well,’ replied Mum.

‘Good. Now I have some money. We can pay off the bastard creditors. We can pay off everybody. And then I will shoot them.’

He made an exaggerated imitation of a machine-gun.

‘Aren’t you hungry?’ asked Mum.

‘I fell into mud,’ said Dad. ‘I was coming down the road, drinking, singing, and then the road said to me: “Watch yourself.” So I abused the road. Then it turned into a river, and I swam. It changed into fire and I sweated. It transformed into a tiger, and I killed it with one blow. And then it shrunk into a big rat and I shouted at it and it ran, like the creditors. And then it dissolved into mud, and I lost my shoe. If I had money I would be a great man.’

We stared at him in fear and confusion. He weaved a bit, stretched his back, and staggered towards his chair. He did not sit down but stood regarding the chair as if it were an enemy.

‘You’re looking at me, chair,’ he said. ‘You don’t want me to sit on you, eh, because I fell in mud, isn’t that correct?’

The chair said nothing.

‘I’m talking to you, chair. Are you better than my bed? I talk to you and you move. What do you think you are, eh?’

The chair pondered the question for too long, so Dad kicked it – with his shoeless foot. He cried out, and looked at the chair again.

‘Sit on the bed,’ Mum said.

Dad looked at her venomously. Then he turned back to the chair.

‘Be Still!’ he said, with great authority.

The chair was still.

‘That’s better. Now I’mgoingtositonyou,whetherI’mcoveredinmudorevenin gold, you hear? And if you move, I will beat you up.’

He paused.

‘They don’t call me Black Tyger for nothing.’

Then he sat down heavily and the chair creaked so loudly that for a moment I thought it would disintegrate under his drunkenness. The chair wobbled and for some reason Dad wobbled with it and then he got up and grabbed it and flung it against the window. The chair clattered on the floor and the window flew open. Mosquitoes and midges invaded us and lizards scurried up the walls and rats scattered from underneath the cupboard and ran confused about the room. Dad went wild, grabbing at the chair, and lashing at the rats. He pursued them everywhere and banged his head against thecupboard.Arat fledtowardsthedoorandhechasedit,dumpingthechair, stamping, makingmachine-gun noises.

He stayed outside for a while and Mum picked up the chair and put it upright in its customary position. After a long while, Dad came back in with someone else’s wrapper round his waist. He had bathed, and water dripped from his hair and he looked like a deranged boxer. His trousers were over his shoulder. Dad came in quietly, his eyes bright, and he looked at us furtively as though we might be angry with him. He drank some water and attempted to shut the window, but it wouldn’t shut. He tried again. He raised a fist against it and sat slowly into the chair. He got up suddenly, ducking his head, throwing combination punches. Then he struggled into a pair of khaki trousers. His chest was bare and he was sweating already and his body glistened.