WE DRIVE TO THE UNIVERSITY IN THE AFTERNOON IN search of a sculptor to make a statue for Okike’s tomb. Chikelue is playing loud music on his car stereo as we cruise into a lonely campus. It is always like this when students go on vacation, leaving the hostels sitting like bored old men gazing at a barren housefront view, and trees and their shadows leaning away from each other like isolated lovers. The green campus shuttles are noticeably absent. We drive to the faculty of arts, where a gallery of artwork is on display, passing by the general studies building with a sense of nostalgia. I had been in the building countless times for lectures.
“A village of a mute tribe.” Chikelue whistles as he pulls up by the side of the road.
We come down from the car, and walk towards a big muscular man. He is bare to his loincloth, a giant who dwarfs us as if we were toddlers, though he is pulling a muscle to break the chains cuffing his great wrists, held high above his head, an action that forces him down on one knee. A short, dark boy with an afro haircut pauses in his work to talk to us while the giant stares away with only the whites of his eyes. Next to him, a large antelope escapes at an easy lope.
“I want a statue for my aunt.” I reach for the photograph of Okike in my breast pocket and pass it to the artist. My mother had exhumed the photograph from our household detritus. “I want something really special.”
“It depends on your pocket.” The sculptor is perching on a high stool, putting finishing touches on the giant’s nose.
“Money is not a problem,” Chikelue chips in, rubbing the giant’s long, sinewy arms and a gritty torso coloured like cement.
While we bargain, the sculptor and I, Chikelue wanders off to admire the loping antelope. We settle for twenty-five thousand naira when he wanders back.
“Here is half payment.” He hands the money to the boy. “You get the balance on delivery.”
The boy collects the money, pockets it.
“What’s your name?” I ask.
“Chinedu Ugwuja, Department of Fine and Applied Art, 300 level.”
“How soon are you going to fix it?” I ask.
“It will be ready before the end of the month.”
“If I don’t come, someone else will take the delivery.” We shake hands and exchange phone numbers. “I want a good job.”
“You will get it.”
We walk back into the car and drive off. I was thinking of Machebe when I told the boy I would send someone to pick up the statue. I will talk it over with him and see if Machebe could use any of the cars he works on at the Mechanic Village to come fetch it. We drive back home past Uwakwe’s shop. He is seated outside with chin cupped in hand, in frayed singlet and boxers, looking into the emptiness of the afternoon. We stop to speak with him. He looks aged, with streaks of grey in his hair and on his chest.
“I am happy to see you again.” He stretches a coarse hand to shake mine, his angular face broadening in a grin.
“How’s business?” My eyes wander to the inside of the shop. The shelves are empty.
“You don’t bury a man who is still breathing,” Uwakwe says with a shrug. “That’s the improper thing to do.”
We settle on Uwakwe’s crooked bench, which evokes a flood of memories. I notice the way he is stealing curious glances at Chikelue, so I introduce them.
“What has been happening?” I ask.
“They silenced the people with their guns.” Uwakwe seems to speak with effort. He looks sick and emaciated. “I heard they are now plucking young men out of their homes and killing and disposing of their bodies in secret. It is their way of weakening the opposition. They are afraid of another war. But they either accept us or they let us go in peace. You cannot stamp a man to the ground and expect him not to cry out.”
The mood in the village is low. I can feel it, the growing sense of trepidation and hopeless longing that Uwakwe’s melancholic figure symbolizes.
“That sounds like ethnic cleansing.” Chikelue whistles.
We sit for a long time in brooding silence. And then we drive away. Back in my father’s compound, we spend the afternoon sitting on the bonnet of the car, playing loud music and watching a sunset’s orange landscape.
We leave for Lagos the next day, a bright Saturday morning full of sunshine and long shadows. The university town rolls away in green hills and fluffy white clouds like young chicks huddled together. Chikelue had phoned his parents and told them he was coming back healed.
“I am excited. And anxious. I can’t wait for the three days to elapse,” he says.
He is playing a gospel tune: Patty Obasi’s “Ezinwanyi Di Uko.” He hardly plays gospels, but he is crazy about R&B, about R. Kelly and Boyz II Men, and he likes to sing tenor along with Wanya Morris. “That voice, Wanya Morris’s catching tenor, is unrivalled,” he’d say while singing along.
But now it is Patty Obasi who is singing in his sleepy, unhurried voice. How I like the song, I muse. How the slowness of the music blends with motion and rolling tyres. When Patty Obasi sings “Ezinwanyi Di Uko,” I think of birds and brooks and nothing else. After a long, bumpy drive on a potholed road, we arrive at Nine Mile Corner with its slow traffic and the scent of okpa. We buy canned Coke, chilled, and hit the potholed Enugu/Onitsha Expressway. If Chikelue turns left, we will head towards Anukwu, the land that drank Eke’s blood, but we drive straight up past Awka, with the old whiff of bronze and hot metal wafting through. And then we enter Onitsha, bustling Onitsha, with a faint imperial aura in the air. Niger Bridge looms into view, an oriental gait calling up memories of broken bridges. As our car tyres are rolling away against metal, the calm voice of a female broadcaster filters from the car radio. The voice alights from a commercial to report the bombing of an army base in the Lake Chad region, the third of similar attacks in one week. The soft voice trails off again, giving way to a blasting pop music.
At Umunede, we stop to eat garri and egusi soup.
Chikelue swings the car into the long drive edged with palms, and Ahmed, a dark, lanky, hilarious Housaman in a milk-white caftan, throws the gate open and smiles at us with teeth stained rust-red with kola. We climb out of the car. Ahmed, excited, scurries around to get our luggage and take it inside. He grins and bows so many times I can’t help but laugh and feel slightly irritated at the same time. The mansion’s floodlights are on. They brighten the surroundings and emphasize the whiteness of the house against a solid black background. Beyond the blackness the sea stretches and extends forever. The garden is blazing with sweet William, and Star of Bethlehem, and frangipani blossoms. We walk into a chandelier-illuminated lounge full of people.
Chikelue’s parents have planned a surprise celebratory reception dinner for him, attended by his uncles, aunts, and family friends. The party blossoms with our arrival. More guests, all looking glamorous, arrive and stretch their jewel-laden hands to hand Chikelue bouquets of flowers. They touch his cheek with their own cheeks like white people.
“Congratulations.”