He smiled. “Yes. A fool.”
Later that evening he felt a chill come upon him. Within days he was ill, his fever raging so hard that he passed out into a place of spasms and hallucinations. When he regained consciousness, the young girl was mopping his brow and Okon was nervously smoking a cigarette. Elvis sat up and wrapped the hole-ridden lappa tighter around himself, cowering away from the thundering rain. It came down in solid sheets, and in minutes the ground under the bridge was flooded.
The beggar children slept standing up, gently swaying with the rhythm of the rain. He had been given the only dry spot there was, on top of a pile of tires, as he was the sick one. Besides, he was the gentlest caretaker, taking only what was actually offered to him and in many cases handing it back when he didn’t actually need it.
Okon looked at him. “You worry us,” he said.
“How long was I unconscious?” Elvis asked.
“Four days.”
“Four days?”
“Yes. But you are back.”
He felt the young girl arranging cardboard boxes around him to fend off the spray carried by the wind, and he looked up and his eyes met hers.
“Go and sleep,” he whispered hoarsely.
“Shh,” she said, and wiped his fevered brow.
“I’ll never leave you,” he promised her rashly. He knew somewhere in him that of all the promises ever made, that was the one most likely to be broken. What circumstance did not steal, time eroded.
“Sleep now,” she said gently.
Her fingers, like butterfly wings, cooled his brow. She then climbed up beside him and, wrapping her little body around him for warmth, she slept, and this time he was not aroused.
The rain came down in one solid, unyielding sheet. It had been like this for days now, and few had been able to leave their homes as the city flooded. Shops closed and everything had slowly ground to a halt. No cars moved, because the streets had become canals. The only people about were the beggar children, who were making a fortune by fetching buckets of clean water to housebound people.
The young girl whispered the news to Elvis. Religious leaders, Muslim and Christian, had come together to urge their followers to pray together for the rain to stop.
Across Lagos, in another slum, Comfort waded through the ankle-deep water that flooded her home. She was lucky that the flooding was minor. The new man she was living with sat in a wicker work chair with his feet on top of a stool, reading a newspaper. He stopped to bawl out that he was hungry and then went back to reading.
Dinner was served in watery silence, broken only by the occasional slosh as some undercurrent disturbed them. Tope, her youngest child, paused in her meal to watch a rat that had just swum into the room. Taking careful aim, she hit it on the nose with a lump of fufu. It shrieked in anger and swam out hurriedly, muttering under its breath about the indignities of mixing with the poor. Tope laughed so much that she dropped her small piece of meat in the water. In a flash she was down on the floor, rooting in the water for it. Her brothers, Tunji and Akin, laughed at her loss, but with a triumphant yelp she held up the piece of meat, inspecting it critically before plopping it into her mouth. Her mother regarded her with a bored stare and went back to her own food.
The storm had not eased up for days. Almost as if they were symbiotically bound, Elvis’s fever still burned. Through the film of rain, hazy and unclear, Elvis saw a young boy standing around at a public tap waiting for his bucket to fill up. The public tap was situated directly below a high-voltage power line. Picking up a thin piece of metal, the boy rapped out a tune on the metal beak of the tap, dancing in the puddles, laughing. Suddenly the girl jerked up. Eyes wide, she reached out a trembling hand and pointed. Elvis saw it too. More than four thousand volts of electricity arced from the overhead cable in a beautiful steel-blue hue, like ice reflecting the sun, and hit the upturned bicycle spoke the boy held with the grace of a cat.
There was a brief flash like a bolt of lightning and then, scarcely disturbing the heavy air, its fragrance alluding to death, a choking smell filled the nostrils as only the smell of burning flesh can. Elvis watched the boy’s body float away in the deluge, while another took his place and took the full bucket of water to whatever destination would pay for it.
Elvis shut his eyes and went back to sleep. He was woken by the smell of cigarette smoke and the slap of checker tiles on a wooden board. He sat up and stared uncomprehendingly at the sight of Redemption and Okon playing a game of checkers. He thought he might still be asleep and dreaming.
“Redemption?”
Redemption looked up, saw Elvis and sprang to his feet, scattering the checkers everywhere, the board falling to the floor with a thump.
“Elvis!” he said, giving Elvis a hug. Standing back, he pulled Elvis to his feet. “Make I see you.” Redemption continued, examining Elvis critically. “Well, you done lose weight but not too much.”
Elvis was still confused and a little lightheaded, so he sat down, leaning back against a bridge support.
“Redemption. How? When?”
“I find him,” Okon said from the floor, where he was picking up the checkers.
Just then the young girl rushed up to Elvis from where she was buying some food, with a cup of strong eucalyptus-flavored tea. He took it with a smile and sipped it slowly.
“You sleep well?”
He nodded, embarrassed by her attentions and the smile on Redemption’s face.
“How long did I sleep this time?” he asked the girl.
“Two days.”
“Two days?”
“Yes.”
The rain had stopped, though the sky was a troubled grey. Elvis realized that his fever had abated. As the young girl fussed around Elvis, Redemption was busy sending another child off to buy them beer and some more cigarettes from Madam Caro’s.
“What is your name?” Elvis asked the young girl.
“Blessing,” she replied.
He smiled. He finished the tea and watched her take the cup back. She reminded him so much of Efua, and he wondered why all the women in his life had to take care of him — even those he should have been taking care of.
Blessing came back quickly and tried to make him lie down again.
“Aren’t you losing money by staying to take care of me?” Elvis asked her.
“Sleep, you never strong,” Blessing said.
Yes, he thought, dozing off, sleep.
He woke up to someone slapping him gently.
“Redemption,” he said as his eyes focused.
“Yes, how you go sleep again. Two days sleep never do?”
Elvis yawned and sat up again, back against the same bridge support.
“Beer?”
Elvis nodded and took the offered drink from Redemption. He took a cautious sip and let out his breath in a satisfied sigh.
“I see you done better. You want food?” Redemption asked.
“No.”
“So, Okon told me of your deal here. I see dat I teach you well.”
“Whatever.”
“Elvis, your words dey cut me.”
“Sorry.”
“So, what’s making you sick?”
Elvis shrugged.
“Well, even though I am not a doctor, make I guess. Dis life you are living?”
“Ah, Redemption, no mock our life,” Okon protested.
“I hear you. But not de life I dey talk of. Na Elvis here. He is not able for dis type of living. Abi?”
Elvis nodded.
“So what do you want to do?”
Again Elvis shrugged.
“De sickness affect your tongue?” Redemption asked angrily.
“No, but I don’t have answers for you.”
“I see you never change. Always big grammar for lie.”
“I am still trying to understand what happened to you. How you managed to escape the Colonel. Why you disappeared for so long. What you are doing back here. So forgive me if I am a little tongue-tied.”