“In social studies we learn about history, geography, and economics. We put it all together so that we can study how we live with one another,” Mrs. Oluwatosin said as she sat in her chair at the front of the class. “But in many ways, social studies class is all about you. It should help you look at yourself and ask, ‘Who am I? And who do I want to be when I am an adult?’ So today, I want to ask you all: Who do you want to be? What do you want to do when you grow up?”
She paused, waiting. No one in the class raised a hand. Sunny yawned, pushing up her glasses for the millionth time. She was too busy navigating an intense magical world to figure out what she wanted to be when she grew up. She’d only managed two hours of sleep after she’d returned home. And those two hours were plagued by thoughts of the giant lake-dwelling octopus that had tried to grab her. What the hell was its problem?. She’d been too sluggish to bother with breakfast, and though she’d finished all her homework, she could barely remember what she’d done. Beside her, Precious Agu raised a hand. Mrs. Oluwatosin smiled with relief and nodded for her to speak.
“I want to be president,” Precious said with a grand smile.
There was a pause, and then the entire class burst out laughing.
“You can’t be president when you are not rich,” Periwinkle said from the other side of the room.
“What will your husband think?” a boy beside him asked. They slapped hands.
Precious cut her eyes at them and turned away, hissing. “You people are still living in the Dark Ages,” she muttered.
“Because we live on the Dark Continent,” Periwinkle retorted, and the class laughed harder.
“Quiet!” Mrs. Oluwatosin snapped. “Precious, that is a fine idea. Nigeria could use its first female president. Hold on to your dream and study hard, and you may be the one to make it come true.”
Precious seemed to swell with pride, despite the snickering of the boys. Sunny watched all this through her groggy haze. She liked Mrs. Oluwatosin. She had just joined the faculty at Sunny’s exclusive secondary school, and she was a welcome addition; she was the type of teacher who truly believed in the potential of her students.
Periwinkle raised his hand. When Mrs. Oluwatosin called on him, he said, “I want to be chief of the police force.”
“So that people can be dashing you money all over the place?” Jibaku asked.
More laughter.
Periwinkle nodded. “I plan to have many, many wives, so I’ll need to make extra money to keep them all happy.” He winked at Jibaku, and she sucked her teeth and rolled her eyes.
“You’ll be lucky to even have one wife,” she retorted. “With your fat head.”
Sunny chuckled, resting her chin on her hands. Jibaku’s meanness was certainly funnier when it wasn’t aimed at her. She shut her eyes for a moment, feeling sleep try to take her. In the darkness behind her eyes she felt that thing again, like something was pulling her to the left and something else was pulling her to the right. It was unsettling, but for a moment she tried to analyse it. Doing so made her stomach lurch. She felt her body sway and was about to open her eyes when she heard snoring.
Oh no! I’m asleep, she thought, quickly opening her eyes, sure people would be staring at her. No one was, thank goodness. Apparently her snoring had been in her head.
“Orlu,” Mrs. Oluwatosin said. “What do you want to be when you grow up?”
Sunny perked up. Orlu was at the front of the class so she couldn’t see his face. She’d barely had a chance to say hello to him this morning, but it seemed Orlu had gotten a fine night’s sleep. She wondered what his mentor, Taiwo, had him doing last night and how he’d been able to return early enough to sleep well.
“A zoologist, I think,” he said. “I love studying animals.”
“Very nice,” Mrs. Oluwatosin said. “That’s an excellent career. And an exciting one, too.”
Sunny agreed. Plus, Orlu was already like a walking encyclopedia when it came to creatures and beasts, magical or non-magical.
“Sunny? What about you?”
Sunny opened her mouth and then closed it. She didn’t know what she wanted to be. A professional soccer player? she thought. I’m good at that.
For the past few months, she’d been playing soccer with her male classmates when they gathered in the field beside the school. Proving to them that she was worthy enough to play with them had been easy. All she had to do was take the soccer ball and do her thing; it came as naturally as breathing.
However, it was explaining how she could have albinism and yet play in the pounding Nigerian sun that was trickier; she certainly couldn’t tell them that her ability to do this was linked to her being a Leopard Person. “My father had a drug delivered from America that makes me able to be in the sun,” she told the boys who asked. She was such an excellent soccer player that they all accepted her answer and let her play. When she was on the field, she was so so happy.
But being a soccer player wasn’t a career. Not really. Not for a girl. And honestly, did she want to make such a spectacle of herself for a living? If she played, she’d play for Nigeria, and she’d stand out too much, having albinism. She frowned, her own thought stinging her. I’m not really good at anything else, she thought. “Um… I… I don’t know, ma,” she said. “I’m still figuring it out.”
Mrs. Oluwatosin chuckled. “That’s okay, you have plenty of time. But let yourself think about it. God has plans for you; you want to know what they are, right?”
“Yes, ma,” Sunny said quietly. She was glad when Mrs. Oluwatosin moved on with the lesson. Considering the chaos of last year, Sunny wasn’t quite sure if she wanted to know what “God had planned” for her. I would be surprised if God took notice of me at all, she thought tiredly.
“That lake beast and the river beast clearly have a thing for you,” Sasha said that afternoon in Chichi’s mother’s hut. “What’d you do to them in your past life?” He laughed loudly. Chichi snickered, plopping down onto his lap and leaning back against his chest. She was carrying a large heavy book, and Sasha wheezed beneath her weight. “Jesus, Chichi, you trying to kill me?”
“Oh, you’ll live,” she said, kissing him on the cheek and nuzzling it with her nose. With effort, she brought the book up and began to flip through the pages. Sunny rolled her eyes but smiled. Ever since she and Orlu had caught them kissing the year before, the two had become inseparable. It was nice to see her friends happy after all that had happened in the last twenty-four hours.
“The lake beast is of the genus Enteroctopus,” Orlu said. “They’re born and raised in the full lands by large extended families. Most of them venture out into the world moving with their bodies of water. Why was it in Leopard Knocks?”
“What are ‘full lands’?” Sunny asked.
“Places that mix evenly with the wilderness,” he said. “A few places in Nigeria are known full lands: Osisi, Arochukwu, Ikare-Akoko, and sometimes Chibok gets a little full. Full places are a little bit of here and a little bit of there, layered over and meshed with each other.”
“A beast attacked her in Leopard Knocks,” Chichi said. “Who cares why it was there? Things come and go all the time for whatever reason. I’m more interested in who saved you! Hey, can I see the comb?!”
Sunny plucked it from the front of her hair and handed it to Chichi. As soon as it was out of her hair, she was very aware of it not being there. The comb was rather heavy, but it was a nice kind of heavy, comforting. The oysterlike colouring went well with Sunny’s thick blonde Afro.
“What’s this? Metal or shell?” Chichi asked.
Sunny shrugged as she got up. “I have to go home.”
Chichi handed the comb back to her, and Sunny tucked it into her hair. She slapped hands with Sasha, and Chichi gave her a hug. “Are you all right?” Chichi asked.
“Yeah,” she said. “It didn’t get me; I’m alive.”
“Don’t know why that thing goes after you when it can more easily catch smaller weaker prey out there,” Chichi said, pinching one of Sunny’s strong arms.
Sunny smiled but looked away from Chichi. Sunny’d always been somewhat tall, but even she had to admit, she’d become quite strong. It was probably all the soccer she was playing with the boys, but there was something more to it, too. She wasn’t bulking up like a body-builder, but there were… changes, like being able to squeeze someone’s wrist into terrible pain, being able to kick the soccer ball so hard that it hurt if it hit anyone, and being able to lift things she hadn’t been able to lift last year.
“You want me to work some juju on it to humiliate all of its ancestors and deform every single one of its offspring?” Sasha asked.
Sunny smiled, pausing to consider. “Nah,” she said. “I’ll let karma handle it.”
“Juju works better and faster than karma,” Chichi said.
Sunny walked out and Orlu followed her, gently taking her hand. When Sunny let go of his hand as she stepped onto the empty road, Orlu said, “See you tomorrow.”
Sunny smiled at him, looking into his sweet eyes, and said, “Yeah.”