Twice as Perfect by Louisa Onomé

Author:Louisa Onomé [Onomé, Louisa]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Canada
Published: 2022-04-25T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Fifteen

I TAKE TWO BUSES: THE first picks me and my heavy schoolbag up around the corner from my house after I convince my parents to let me bus to the library. Mom insists she can just drop me, but I tell her I want to use the time on the bus to study more—to pre-study. Neither her nor Dad watch as I get scooped up and driven twenty minutes away to a busy junction. My next stop is on one of the diagonals, but it takes me too long to figure out which and by the time I do, the bus I need rushes by me. The next one takes me ten minutes into a suburb I haven’t been to before. Forest Hill area, I think. I imagine everyone here has a career job and drives nice cars, but maybe not.

The bus curves down a street with rows of apartment complexes that are all the same copper brick save for different colored doors. I step off the bus in front of one of the buildings, this one with a green door. A group of guys stands outside laughing and talking loudly with backpacks hiked up their shoulders. None of them pay me any attention as I slip past.

The seventh floor is the top floor but it isn’t labeled as penthouse like it would be in other buildings. When the elevator doors stagger open, I see why. It’s less of a penthouse and more like a pre-rooftop; a hazy hallway with musty windows that used to shine light through them. At the very end of the hall, there’s a door that leads outside onto the real roof, but I stop my feet just short of it. I head straight to number 706.

Sam opens the door without me having to knock.

He grins and pulls the door open wider. I’m immediately assaulted by the smell of jollof rice, always a staple in our house, and it hits me with a deep nostalgia. It’s like nostalgia for a simpler time, hunger, and relief all at once. “You’re late,” he says plainly. No greeting, nothing. And I don’t even feel mad about it.

I grin widely, my first in a long time with Sam. “Pleeeeease. Instead of you to greet me—”

“Ah-ah, greet wetin? I’m your elder,” he jokes.

“Elder for where? Common mumu like you.”

He snorts. “Okay, get in.”

My eyes take in every inch of his place as if I’ll never be back here again. I memorize every corner, every scuffed-up wall, every desk stacked high with books. So many books. Engineering books, too. With one step closer, it’s easy to see the layer of dust on top of them. It must have been ages since he was actually in school.

Sam pops his head out from around the corner. “Sit, sit,” he says, gesturing to the worn-in leather sofa by the wall. “Give me one second. How’s the poetry going?”

I sit and sink into the sofa immediately. “Sorry?”

He calls again, “The poetry,” and emerges from past the kitchen wall.

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