A. Barrett - Love Is Power, or Something Like That - Stories

Yes, funny you asked, his father replied, staring at him with a creased brow, she just ran past me with a bowl of cornflakes!

Can you imagine, she’s angry at me because I refused to call her Shakira, he said, and then mustered all his willpower to sustain the grin with which he met his father’s guffaws.

On Thursday, he rose early, got ready, and left. But when the gate clanged shut behind him, he reversed the car and parked by the fence of the house, to wait for her to emerge on her way to school. A quarter of an hour went by before she appeared, accompanied by his sisters. He called out to her but she refused to answer, and hurried away with the twins staring after her in amazement. He could dare nothing but stand and watch her go, his distress concealed behind a fractured smile.

I refused to call her Shakira, that’s why she’s angry with me, he told the twins, then throttled the car until it wailed with power and jumped forward with a spray of dust and stones.

That night at dinner, after his father commented on her absence, his sisters, their tones shrill with reproach, shared the story of their cousin’s impoliteness toward their brother. His mother’s glance of approval turned the rice bolus in his mouth to ash. He let his fork fall to his plate, and wiping his lips with the back of his hand, he rose from the table and mumbled, I had a long day at the office, I’m sorry, I need to rest. He shuffled away with heavy steps and climbed the stairs one at a time, his footfalls ringing through the house. When he reached the upstairs landing, he dashed soft-footed to the door of the girls’ bedroom, but found it locked.

On the night of Friday the sixteenth — a humid, starless night — he headed toward the house like a farm animal to the slaughter, his heartbeats frenetic from a conviction he couldn’t shake off. He’d sent her a stream of text messages throughout the day, begging forgiveness, confessing regret, asking her to meet him. By the close of work he had received no reply, so he called her number, but her phone was switched off.

He was scuffing the soles of his loafers on the front doormat when he heard her voice. It came from the sitting room. He stopped and listened; crept forward and listened. His mother was now talking, her words indistinct.

He tiptoed to the sitting room doorway to hear better, and then peered in. She sat alone with his mother, the two figures side by side, his crime and punishment. Her face looked wan, subdued by distress; but it could have been the lighting, which was dull. She was staring at her feet, which never used to be still, but were now pressed together, toe to heel. Her hands were clasped between her knees, and she sat hunched over on the chair’s edge.

. . called you down is because I won’t stand for any of this childishness anymore, his mother was saying in a low-pitched voice. Her head was cocked to one side. She fixed her niece in her stare. It’s no longer about the name. It’s about respect for your elders, about taking responsibility for your decisions. If you won’t change your mind I’ll have to send you back to your mother, because to tell you the truth, I’ve had enough.

Before she spoke, he knew her reply.

I’ll go. Her voice rasped in her throat. She coughed, and then added: Tomorrow.

Again, that night, she did not come down for dinner, and the conversation at the table was about her departure. His mother ate little; she buffeted the air with sighs and spoke in monosyllables. When his father glanced up from the book he was reading and said that maybe her going away was not such a bad thing, his mother hissed and shot furious looks with haphazard aim. Then she spoke in a slow, shaking voice about her dead twin brother, about his stubbornness, which his daughter had inherited.

I’ll miss Shakira, said his brother, sweeping a glum, defiant look round the table.

I’ll miss her too, his mother said, and smiled at her youngest child, her eyes glistening.

He finished his meal, bid good night, and retreated to his bedroom. It was past midnight before the upstairs hallway light went off. He swung his legs off the bed, waited in the dark for the sound of shutting doors to cease, then counted to five hundred before he stood up and slipped from the room, leaving the door ajar. He crossed to the staircase and sank to a crouch on the second step. He was hidden from anybody who emerged from the bedrooms, but if he leaned forward he could see the end of the hallway, where the bathroom was. He settled to wait.

Five times during his vigil the bathroom was used, but every time it was by someone else. A cock had crowed and a car blaring fuji music had sped past on the road, before she emerged. He waited for her to finish, he stood in front of the door until she flushed, then he turned the handle.

She whipped up her head and opened her mouth to complain, but when she saw him, she pressed a hand over her mouth and backed away. He pulled the door closed and turned the key. Placing his palms together, he held them in front of him, beseeched her as he advanced. Please, I beg you, just hear what I have to say.

No, she muttered, shaking her head side to side, don’t.

She was backed up against the wall beside the toilet bowl. She held onto the cistern for support, but when the lid rattled from her trembling, she removed her hand. He drew up in front of her. His bare feet, as he rocked on his heels, made sucking noises on the wet floor tiles. He raised his arms to embrace her, but she flinched away, then turned her side to him, folded her arms across her chest, pressed her face against the wall, and squeezed her eyes shut.

He whispered into the ear that was turned to him, coaxing her with words that he had whetted over days. His hand rubbed her shaking shoulder, and then traveled down her arm, over her belly, across her hip. Beneath his fingers, her muscles quivered. His words fluttered strands of her hair and sent ripples through her cheek. Heat rose from her skin with a bruised scent. His hand moved again, growing bolder. He stroked her face. He smoothed her hair. He patted her belly, traced patterns around her navel. When his fingers slipped under her nightdress, she whimpered, opened her eyes, and dropped her arms.

Come, my love, he said to her, and led her by the hand out of the bathroom, across the hallway, into the night.

.1 .

On the day she turned seven months, three weeks, and six days old, the Anabraba child contracted an infection that by nightfall had turned her head the size of a watermelon. Her mother, unable to handle the thought of losing a piece of her soul to the dust-bin of all things flesh, abandoned the fever-wracked infant with the father and fled to the Citadel of Fire and Miracles, a nearby church. The father was a thirty-five-year-old career civil servant and a first-time parent: he was not equipped, by training or experience, for the undertaking.

When the mother returned to the house after three days of fast and prayer, she found the child alive. A lifetime of change had taken place in the time she was away. Now it was only the sound of her husband’s voice that had power to calm the baby’s cries, to lull her to sleep. She ate with no trouble when it was her father’s hand that fed her; she gurgled with delight when it was her father’s hand that bathed her. The father had in the past shown no interest in these motherly duties, but now he volunteered for them, he even altered his work schedule to allow for them. His wife saw through the excuse of affection that he gave as his reason. He was the one who had stayed behind, he believed he had saved the child, so his plan, she was sure, was to take over the role of caregiver and keep for himself all of their daughter’s love.