“Are… are you all right?” he asked, as he helped.
She frowned. “I’m fine. No thanks to you.”
“Your face looks all red and, well, punched.”
“Who cares?” she said, putting the last book in her satchel.
“Your mother will,” he said.
“Then why didn’t you stop them?” she screamed. She slung the satchel over her shoulder and walked away. Orlu followed.
“I tried.”
“Whatever.”
“I did. You didn’t see Periwinkle and Calculus do this?” He turned his head so she could see his swollen cheek.
“Oh,” she said, instantly ashamed. “I’m sorry.”
By the time they got to the intersection where their paths home diverged, she felt a little better. It seemed she and Orlu had a lot in common. He agreed Miss Tate’s actions were way out of line, he liked reading books for fun, and he, too, noticed the weaver birds that lived in the tree beside the school.
“I live just a little that way,” Orlu said.
“I know,” she said, looking up the paved road. Like hers, his house was white with a modest fence surrounding it. Her eye settled on the mud hut with the water-damaged walls next door.
“Do you know the lady who lives there?” she asked.
There was smoke coming from the back. Probably from a cooking fire, she thought. She had only once seen the woman who lived in it, some years ago. She’d had smooth brown skin tinted slightly red from the palm oil she rubbed into it. Most of the people in the area believed she was some sort of witch and left her alone.
“That’s Nimm’s house. She lives there with her daughter,” Orlu said.
“Daughter?” she asked. She’d assumed the woman lived alone.
“Hey!” someone yelled from behind them. “Orlu! Who’s the onyocha?”
“Good Lord,” Orlu groaned. “Will the drama never end?”
Sunny whirled around. “Don’t call me that,” she said before she got a good look at the girl. “I hate when people call me that. Do I look like a European? You don’t even know me!”
“Seen you around,” the girl said. She was fine-boned, dark brown, and elfin, but her voice was loud and strong and arrogant. So was her smile. She wore an old-looking red, yellow, and blue dress and no shoes. She swaggered over to Sunny and they stood there, sizing each other up.
“Who are you?” Sunny finally asked.
“Who are you?” the girl retorted. “Did someone run you over?”
Orlu sighed loudly, rolling his eyes. “Sunny, this is Chichi, my neighbor. Chichi, this is Sunny, my classmate.”
“How come I’ve never seen you at school?” Sunny asked, still irritated. She dusted off her hopelessly dirty clothes. “You look around our age, even if you are kind of… small.”
“I’ve never needed your stupid school.” Before Chichi could say any more, she and Orlu exchanged a look. “And I’ll never tell you my age. I could be older or younger than you. You’ll never know, even if you are half ghost and half human.” She smirked, looking Sunny up and down, obviously itching for a fight. “Even when you speak Igbo you don’t quite sound Igbo.”
“That’s my accent. I’m American,” Sunny said through gritted teeth. “I spent most of my life there. I can’t help the way I speak.”
Chichi put her hand up in mock defense. “Oh, did I hit a sore spot? I am so sorry.” She laughed.
Sunny could have slapped her. At this point, another fight wouldn’t have made much difference.
“Well,” Orlu quickly said, stepping between them, “this isn’t going very well.”
“You live there?” Sunny asked, leaning around Orlu and motioning toward the hut.
“Yeah,” Chichi asked. “My mother and I don’t need much.”
“Why?” she asked.
Orlu stepped back, looking perplexed.
“I’ll never tell you,” Chichi said with a sly grin. “There’s more to the world than big houses.” She chuckled, turning away. “Have a nice evening, Orlu. See you around, Sunny.”
“Yeah, if I don’t step on you first,” Sunny said.
“Yeah, and if I can even see you coming, ghost girl,” Chichi shot back over her shoulder.
Orlu only shook his head.
Home
Home will never be the same once you know what you are. Your whole life will change. Nigeria is already full of groups, circles, cultures. We have many ways. You are Yoruba, Hausa, Ibibio, Fulani, Ogoni, Tiv, Nupe, Kanuri, Ijaw, Annang, and so on. You add being a Leopard Person to that and your groups split into a thousand more groups. The world becomes that much more complicated. Travel overseas and it’s even more complex. Plus, you are a Leopard Person living in a world of idiot Lambs, so that doesn’t help. You are fortunate because being a free agent puts you (though uncomfortably) with the rest of us Leopard folk, and comfortably with Lambs. Your ignorance will smooth out the edges of your dealings with the world you used to be a part of.
from Fast Facts for Free Agents
2
Over the next two weeks, Orlu and Sunny made a habit of walking home together. A friendship was sprouting between them. For Sunny, this was a nice distraction from what she’d seen in the candle. But there was another reason for walking home together these days, too.
That reason’s name was Black Hat Otokoto. He was a ritual killer, and he was on the loose. The local newspapers were constantly running terrifying stories about him with headlines like: BLACK HAT OTOKOTO CLAIMS ANOTHER VICTIM; KILLER KILLS CALM YET AGAIN; and FRESH RITUAL KILLINGS IN OWERRI.
Black Hat’s targets were always children.
“Make sure you and that boy Orlu walk home together,” Sunny’s mother insisted. Her mother had liked Orlu since the day Sunny came home all bruised up and Sunny had told her that Orlu had stopped the fight.
Almost every day, Chichi was there to greet them, and Sunny began to grow used to her. Chichi said she spent most of her time helping her mother around their hut. When she wasn’t helping, she did what she called “traveling,” walking to the market, the river, kilometers and kilometers all over the countryside. Sunny wasn’t sure if she believed Chichi’s story of walking the fifty-five kilometers all the way to Owerri and back in an afternoon.
“I got this wrapper from the market there,” she said, holding up a colorful cut of cloth.
It was indeed very fine. “Looks expensive,” Sunny said.
“Yeah,” Chichi said, grinning. “I kind of stole it.”
She laughed at the disgust on Sunny’s face.
Chichi loved bombast and trickery, too. She bragged that she sometimes approached strange men and told them how lovely they were, just to see their reactions. If they were too friendly, she scolded them for being nasty and perverted, reminding them that she was only ten or thirteen years old-whatever age she felt like using at the time. Then she ran off, laughing.
Sunny had never met anyone like Chichi-not in Nigeria, and not in America, either. Chichi didn’t know where her father was, and that was all she would say. But Orlu told Sunny that Chichi’s father was a musician who used to be Chichi’s mother’s best friend. “They were never married,” he said. “When he got famous, he left to pursue his career.”
Sunny almost spontaneously combusted when he told her it was Nyanga Tolotolo. “He’s my father’s favorite musician!” Sunny exclaimed. “I hear him on the radio all the time!”