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By Root 999 0

too submissive! You Nigerians are too aggressive! You Tanzanians have no fashion sense! You Senegalese are too brainwashed by the French! They talked about the war in the Sudan, about the decline of the African Writers Series, about books and writers. They agreed that Dambudzo Marechera was astonishing, that Alan Paton was patronizing, that Isak Dinesen was unforgivable. The Kenyan put on a generic European accent and, between drags at his cigarette, recited what Isak Dinesen had said about all Kikuyu children becoming mentally retarded at the age of nine. They laughed. The Zimbabwean said Achebe was boring and did nothing with style, and the Kenyan said that was a sacrilege and snatched at the Zimbabwean’s wineglass, until she recanted, laughing, saying of course Achebe was sublime. The Senegalese said she nearly vomited when a professor at the Sorbonne told her that Conrad was really on her side, as if she could not decide for herself who was on her side. Ujunwa began to jump up and down, babbling nonsense to mimic Conrad’s Africans, feeling the sweet lightness of wine in her head. The Zimbabwean staggered and fell into the water fountain and climbed out spluttering, her dreadlocks wet, saying she had felt some fish wriggling around in there. The Kenyan said he would use that for his story—fish in the fancy resort fountain—since he really had no idea what he was going to write about. The Senegalese said her story was really her story, about how she mourned her girlfriend and how her grieving had emboldened her to come out to her parents although they now treated her being a lesbian as a mild joke and continued to speak of the families of suitable young men. The black South African looked alarmed when he heard “lesbian.” He got up and walked away. The Kenyan said the black South African reminded him of his father, who attended a Holy Spirit Revival church and didn’t speak to people on the street because they were not saved. The Zimbabwean, Tanzanian, white South African, and Senegalese all spoke about their fathers.

They looked at Ujunwa and she realized that she was the only one who had said nothing, and for a moment the wine no longer fogged her mind. She shrugged and mumbled that there was really little to say about her father. He was a normal person. “Is he in your life?” the Senegalese asked, with the soft tone that meant she assumed he was not, and for the first time her Francophone accent irritated Ujunwa. “He is in my life,” Ujunwa said with a quiet force. “He was the one who bought me books when I was a child and the one who read my early poems and stories.” She paused, and everyone was looking at her and she added, “He did something that surprised me. It hurt me, too, but mostly it surprised me.” The Senegalese looked as if she wanted to ask more but changed her mind and said she wanted more wine. “Are you writing about your father?” the Kenyan asked and Ujunwa answered with an emphatic NO because she had never believed in fiction as therapy. The Tanzanian told her that all fiction was therapy, some sort of therapy, no matter what anybody said.

That evening, Ujunwa tried to write, but her eyeballs were swimming and her head was aching and so she went to bed. After breakfast, she sat before the laptop and cradled a cup of tea.

Chioma gets a call from Merchant Trust bank, one of the places her father contacted. He knows the chairman of the board. She is hopeful; all the bank people she knows drive nice secondhand Jettas and have nice flats in Gbagada. The deputy manager interviews her. He is dark and good-looking and his glasses have an elegant designer logo on the frames and, as he speaks to her, she desperately wishes he would notice her. He doesn’t. He tells her that they would like to hire her to do marketing, which will mean going out and bringing in new accounts. She will be working with Yinka. If she can bring in ten million naira during her trial period, she will be guaranteed a permanent position. She nods as he speaks. She is used to men’s attention and is sulky that he does not look at her as a man