Little Family: A Novel by Ishmael Beah

Author:Ishmael Beah
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Riverhead Books
Published: 2020-04-27T23:00:00+00:00

6

The day following a holiday was also a holiday in this land of theirs. And now they had money to buy food, so there was no need to go searching for it. There was likely no necessity to stand guard either—who would come near their home, today of all days? But as Khoudi was awake and the others were slumbering, she decided to go stand guard. She told herself it was a good habit, but the truth was, she wanted the time alone to practice how she was going to partake in conversations at dinner later on. She headed for the bushes beyond the clearing and found a place to sit against a small tree with her eyes facing the road.

I have lived in the city for a while now. My family has a home in Aberdeen. Khoudiemata sensed that for her, practicing the art of chitchatting demanded responses that weren’t too specific, that didn’t give away too much or invite curiosity. She was aiming for an aura of reserve rather than mystery, a quiet thoughtfulness. She hoped she would be able to pull it off. Of course, she faced bigger challenges every day, but this was different.

Don’t practice too much, think on your feet, she told herself, making a mental note to adhere to big themes that directed discussion away from personal questions. Acting in agreement, the sun found her under the shrubs and brought her back to the reality of her surroundings. Suddenly she was tired, and hungry. The others were probably up by now. It was time to go find something to eat. Later she would go to her secret haven to prepare for her rendezvous. Preparing conversation was not sufficient. There was the question of how she would dress and carry herself, and she couldn’t practice that at home. She needed to be able to lose herself in a parallel world. She stood up and headed back to the plane.

Kpindi caught sight of her. “We were coming to get you so that we can go eat. And we need you to comment on Namsa’s fashion show. We’ve told her her clothes look great, but she says that’s not enough. And we don’t know what that means.”

The boys were plainly holding back laughter to spare Namsa’s feelings, and they turned to Khoudi with pleading faces that asked her to remedy the situation.

“Ah, you are back,” said Namsa when she saw Khoudi. Namsa was standing at the entrance to the plane, wearing black pants and a short red skirt over it, and on top, an undershirt with an unbuttoned man’s long-sleeved shirt over it, and a beanie that covered her ears.

“You are beautiful,” Khoudi called to her, and Namsa beamed. “You feel good in them?”

“Yes, and they smell new too.” Namsa came down the steps proudly, with the aplomb of a model on a fashion runway.

The truth was, Khoudi felt terrible about how badly dressed Namsa was. She wore boys’ clothes as Khoudi did, but unlike Khoudi, she had no sense of what colors matched.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.