Ancestor Stones - Aminatta Forna [81]
‘You vote for the candidate of your choice.’
‘What is his name?’
‘Your choice is your own. I can’t tell you that.’ The man stood and gazed at the paper in his hand. He moved neither forward nor back.
‘So who did you vote for?’ he asked. I hadn’t voted. I hadn’t thought about it.
‘Sulaiman Bio. The people’s choice.’ I cited the campaign literature. ‘People’s Progress Party.’
‘The people’s choice?’
I smiled, nodding. Said it again. The people’s choice. The choice of the people. That way round it sounded like a foregone conclusion. The man moved towards the booth. ‘Third one down,’ I added, to be helpful.
Minutes later he departed with a purple thumb and a purple stamp on the back of his hand to stop him from trying to vote again.
Later in the afternoon I kicked off my red shoes and rubbed the soles of my feet. From time to time I went to the door to try to encourage passers-by, such as there were, to come inside. Still no one came. I went back to the desk and gazed idly at the list of names. I felt like a hostess who had been snubbed by her guests.
I let my eyes run down the list. Name upon name.
Like ladder rungs.
Railway track sleepers.
Or a row of sleeping children.
Players waiting to be picked for a team.
First I stole Jeneba Turay’s vote. I took it as my own. I reckoned by now she wasn’t coming, whoever she was. Since I hadn’t voted anywhere else I didn’t see how it could possibly matter. I pressed my right thumb into the ink pad and then on to the bottom left of the voting slip.
With an hour to go before the election was over, two votes lay in the cavern of the ballot box, like visitors in an empty church. So I spent the remainder of the time filling it up: creating signatures and using up the fingers of one hand and then the other and finally each of my toes to create fictional thumb prints. At six o’ clock I closed the door and waited for the box to be collected. I kept my inky hands folded behind my back while the men heaved it into the back of a van along with the others.
On the Honda I clung tight to Janneh as we raced through the towns and villages. The votes were being counted. People were dancing in the streets. We were still travelling when the moon joined the sun in the sky. On the road raindrops thudded like silver bullets into the dust. We left the bike at the side of the road and ran across the fields to shelter in a kabanka. And there, for the first time, we made love. Tracing trails of shivers across each other’s skin with the tips of our fingers. Moving to the rhythm of the rain as the storm gathered force above us. Drowning in a smell like crumbled chocolate and newborn puppies.
In the morning we stepped out to shower ourselves clean in the rain. And lay sparkling on a bed of stones while the sun dried our skin. Though neither of us knew it, this was the last time we would be alone together. Soon after, Janneh headed back south where he became Information Officer of the National Students’ Union. I graduated with honours in my West African School Certificate and won a scholarship to study in England. We tried to stay in touch, but you know how these things go. I missed him, of course. But so many things were happening in my life I could not carry on minding for too long.
After much counting and recounting the results of the first election ever to be held in our soon-to-be republic were announced. On the radio the BBC World Service described it as a mixed verdict. An opportunity missed, they said. An African election marred once again by the blight of the tribal vote. In almost every ward people had voted for members of their own ethnic group regardless, it seemed, of the qualities of other candidates.
One or two of the local newspapers, however, noted one small exception: the successful candidacy and surprise win of one Sulaiman Bio, representative of the People’s Progress Party. A southerner, who had succeeded in defeating his rival candidates in an otherwise totally northern stronghold.
SECRETS
10
Hawa, 1965
The Music of Flutes
Well I