the Secret Lives Of Baba Segi's Wives (2010) by Shoneyin Lola

Author:Shoneyin, Lola [Lola, Shoneyin,]
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2011-01-14T19:07:55.218000+00:00

THE FIRST THINGS THAT STRUCK ME about Baba Segi’s house were the soiled curtains. The layer of dust on them was so thick that Grandma would have sliced the veins in my neck if she ever came home to find hers looking like that. Except her imported voile curtains wouldn’t have been that way; the house girl would have washed them as soon as she felt the pinch of the red harmattan winds!

The walls of Baba Segi’s house were stained too. Everything was grubby but the wives were the worst of all—the aging toad and the shameless goat! One ruled the pond, the other played with its shadow all day! And how they stank! If I’d really wanted to punish them, I would have turned round and returned to Grandma’s house immediately, but I decided to show mercy, especially after Baba Segi showed me my room. I was twenty-three yet I’d never had my own room before; I’d slept between my parents until the day they died. I looked at the double bed and tested the softness of the mattress with both palms. I would have been a fool not to lie on it, even if it was for just one night. I now know why rich people sleep longer than paupers. When I woke up the next morning, I felt like I was suspended in midair. It was as if I had reached my heaven. Not even God himself could have made me leave Baba Segi’s house after that.

The next morning, Iya Tope brought breakfast into my room. Her fingers touched the face of the plate as she placed it on the bedside table. There was no way I could eat it so for two days all I did was sleep and wake, wake and sleep, harboring unbearable hunger pangs. On the third day, I stood up from my slumber knowing I’d die if I didn’t eat. I found the kitchen and scrubbed every inch of it. The wives stepped around me in hushed curiosity. I finished at eight o’clock in the evening. Then I sat on the floor and finished a plate of yam. I cleaned and cooked the yam myself.

That night, Baba Segi came to me. He sat on my bed and grabbed my breasts. I thought it was all quite amusing until he jumped between my legs and tried to force his penis into me. “I am still wearing my underwear,” I told him.

He wasn’t like Tunde at all. There was no sucking, no licking, no nuzzling, no moistening. Baba Segi was heavy; everything about him was clumsy and awkward. He heaved and hoed, poured his water into me and collapsed onto my breasts. Tunde never did that; he always shook his water onto my belly. I looked forward to the day our paths would cross again at meet-roads. For months, I cleaned. I knew I would find Tunde when the time was right.

One day, that fat frog Iya Segi asked if I’d noticed that Iya Tope had left all the housecleaning to me.

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