“Mami, good morning.” Taiye smiled and kissed her mother’s warm forehead.
Good morning, my love.” Kambirinachi beamed up at her daughter as she received her kiss.
“How did you sleep?” Taiye asked, removing the cakes from the oven. She placed them one by one on a tray and put them safely on top of the fridge, away from the cat.
“Dreamlessly,” Kambirinachi responded. “And you, my love?”
“Fitfully.”
“Oh, darling! What’s bothering you?”
Taiye shrugged, and then she smiled. “I’m making a triple-layer cake.” She made her eyebrows jump up and down. “Chocolate caramel.”
“Yes!” Kambirinachi clapped and squealed. “Let the deliciousness commence!”
Taiye made them a breakfast of fried plantains and eggs scrambled with onions, tomatoes, and peppers. They ate on a blue striped aso oke on the carpeted floor of the parlour.
“What time does your sister’s flight come in?” Kambirinachi asked, mid-chew.
“Twelve.”
“Uh-oh, cutting it close, are we?”
“It’s only after eight,” Taiye said. “I’ll finish making the cake and go.”
“Will you drive?”
“No, I organized with the car hire guy yesterday. He’ll pick me up.”
“Okay.” Kambirinachi smiled wide. “We’ll finally get to meet your brother-in-law!”
“Yeah, it’s about time.”
“What are you thinking?”
“Nothing.” Taiye shook her head. “I’m going to make jollof rice.” She knew that her mother knew she was being less than honest.
The ceiling fan whirred loud, spinning sluggishly, as if protesting the low power with which it was fed, half-heartedly stirring the heavy air around them. Taiye thought she should ask the gateman to turn on the generator so they could use the A/C when Kehinde and Farouq arrived.
TAIYE FETCHED THE COOLED CAKES from the top of the refrigerator and placed them on the counter by the window looking out into the backyard. Taiye had painstakingly cleared the overgrown mess. She’d spent many many hours on her knees, under a fierce and boastful sun, tension pouring out of her pores in pools of sweat, as she pulled weeds from the hard, clayey soil. She’d wanted a garden, alive with tomatoes, basil, and spinach, but she needed better soil.
She built the frame of a Langstroth hive—a vertical beehive—with salvaged wood from discarded furniture and a manual she’d printed off the first website that showed up in her search. The idea of keeping bees, with gorgeous raw honey as a reward, filled her with a delicate kind of optimism, a tender, pearlescent sort of threshold to joy. She’d thrown herself into home beekeeping; it only took eight months and many fuckups, but she’d achieved a considerable healthy hive. The garden, however, remained mostly bare but for tufts of parched grass and purple heart vines that wandered out of their pots by the fence and encroached on her garden beds.
Taiye retrieved the chocolate caramel from the freezer and beat the thick mixture until beads of sweat formed along her hairline and rolled down, tickling the sides of her face. Until the caramel was just stiff enough to be spread without oozing down the sides of the cake. She iced the three layers with a large butter knife and assembled the dessert. Cake, caramel, a sprinkle of salt. Cake, caramel, a sprinkle of salt. Cake, caramel, a sprinkle of salt. She spread the rest of the caramel on the sides of the cake, and then she licked the bowl clean before leaving for the airport.
Kehinde
EXHAUSTION SHOULD BE STILL, spent, gently beckoning sleep—or better yet, just clocking out. Instead, it is churning inside me with unwelcome vigour. I know, I know, it is more than fatigue that is tugging at me.
The flight from Montreal to Lagos felt incredibly long. Stretched out even longer by the nine-and-a-half-hour layover in Frankfurt. Now I smell foul, like rotten onions or rotten eggs. Just general rot. And there’s this sharp throbbing in my temples that won’t go away, even though I’ve eaten a fistful of ibuprofen. I am not prepared for this, not prepared to see my sister, or our mother, for that matter. So much has gone unsaid for so long between us, Taiye and me, and Mami. We’ve been biting our tongues as if our silences will save us or freeze us in a time that required nothing more than just being. Together. More truthfully, I’ve been biting my tongue. Taiye tried, ever long-suffering. But even she gave up after enough time. Throughout our separation, daily calls turned biweekly, turned weekly, and then turned monthly. Eventually, the phone calls turned to monthly emails, turned to a letter now and then, turned to silence. Not that I blame her; I barely responded, and never honestly, and she knew.
We haven’t spoken properly in a very long time. Shit.
And there’s the box of letters.
Almost a year ago now Taiye sent me an orange shoebox filled with about ninety letters. Some date back as far as eleven years ago. Some are in sealed envelopes, some are on the backs of receipts and flyers, and others are folded pieces of loose-leaf paper. All handwritten. Her handwriting is the same as always: big looping lines and rounded letters. I started out by reading them slowly, one every few weeks. I haven’t gotten very far, and still, I feel apprehensive about delving into them.
The plane landed at noon Lagos time, and Taiye said she would collect us. After the slow wait for bags, and the even slower move through customs, I spot her among throngs of sweaty, expectant faces at Arrivals. Hers is my face, only narrower, peeking from between thin waist-length braids. Her skin is darker than I remember, burnt umber, shiny with oil and perspiration. I wave frantically to catch her attention, and her lips stretch into a smile that slightly calms the rapid thrumming in my chest. We tumble forward and catch each other in a fierce embrace. Her slim arms wind tightly around me. Her lean body is soft and hot against my own, and she has the same cocoa butter smell I remember. She pulls away, just as many smothered emotions begin to well up in my chest, so I cough to regain composure.
“Look at you,” Taiye says, and steps back. “You’re here.”
I’m here.
“And Farouq.” I pull at his arm. “He’s here, too.”
“I gathered.” She smiles. “You exist after all,” Taiye says, and hugs him.
The patch of sweat darkening the back of his grey T-shirt grows. The heat is thick.
“It’s good to finally meet you,” Taiye adds, looking him square in the face, no smile. I can sense Farouq’s uncertainty, but she means it. Intense and earnest as always.
“Likewise,” he responds, and looks at her with some type of restrained awe.
Taiye and I, we are identical. Almost. She’s always been thinner than me, even though as a child she ate and ate, everything, often. And she has this lure that draws people to her orbit; I don’t understand it. Our mother is the same. I am not jealous (anymore), and I am not worried—but only because I know where Taiye’s desires lie in that regard. I don’t want to feel threatened, because I trust Farouq. I do trust Farouq, but despite himself, he’s just a man.
We walk outside to find that the sky is too open; the sun pours down ferociously. Jesus Christ, I need ice water. I watch Farouq struggle to breathe in the humidity. The heat immediately coats him in a film of sweat that beads and rolls off his face and neck, catching in the beard he’s stubbornly refused to shave for weeks. I watch him decline help from the car hire driver and heave our suitcases into the boot of the silver Camry.