'I will be very miserly with my new gas cylinders,' Aunty Ifeoma said, smiling, when she saw me. 'I'll use them only for special meals, so they will last long. I'm not packing away this kerosene stove just yet.'
I paused because what I wanted to say was so far removed from gas cookers and kerosene stoves. I could hear Obiora's laughter from the verandah. 'Aunty, there's no water to flush the toilet.'
'You urinated?'
'Yes.'
'Our water only runs in the morning, o di egwu. So we don't flush when we urinate, only when there is actually something to flush. Or sometimes, when the water does not run for a few days, we just close the lid until everybody has gone and then we flush with one bucket. It saves water.' Aunty Ifeoma was smiling ruefully.
'Oh,' I said.
Amaka had come in as Aunty Ifeoma spoke. I watched her walk to the refrigerator. 'I'm sure that back home you flush every hour, just to keep the water fresh, but we don't do here,' she said.
'Amaka, o gini? I don't like that tone!' Aunty Ifeoma said.
'Sorry,' Amaka muttered, pouring cold water from a plastic bottle into a glass. I moved closer to the wall darkened by kerosene smoke, wishing I could blend into it and disappear. I wanted to apologize to Amaka, but I was not sure what for.
'Tomorrow, we will take Kambili and Jaja around to show them the campus,' Aunty Ifeoma said, sounding so normal that I wondered if I had just imagined the raised voice.
'There's nothing to see. They will be bored.'
The phone rang then, loud and jarring, unlike the mute purr of ours back home. Aunty Ifeoma hurried to her bedroom to pick it up. 'Kambili! Jaja!' she called out a moment later. I knew it was Papa. I waited for Jaja to come in from the verandah so we could go in together. When we got to the phone, Jaja stood back and gestured that I speak first. 'Hello, Papa. Good evening,' I said, and then I wondered if he could tell that I had eaten after saying a too short prayer.
'How are you?'
'Fine, Papa.'
'The house is empty without you.'
'Oh.'
'Do you need anything?'
'No, Papa.'
'Call at once if you need anything, and I will send Kevin. I'll call every day. Remember to study and pray.'
'Yes, Papa.'
When Mama came on the line, her voice sounded louder than her usual whisper, or perhaps it was just the phone. She told me Sisi had forgotten we were away and cooked lunch for four.
When Jaja and I sat down to have dinner that evening, I thought about Papa and Mama, sitting alone at our wide dining table. We had the leftover rice and chicken. We drank water because the soft drinks bought in the afternoon were finished. I thought about the always full crates of Coke and Fanta and Sprite in the kitchen store back home and then quickly gulped my water down as if I could wash away the thoughts. I knew that if Amaka could read thoughts, mine would not please her.
There was less talk and laughter at dinner because the TV was on and my cousins took their plates to the living room. The older two ignored the sofa and chairs to settle on the floor while Chima curled up on the sofa, balancing his plastic plate on his lap. Aunty Ifeoma asked Jaja and me to go and sit in the living room, too, so we could see the TV clearly. I waited to hear Jaja say no, that we did not mind sitting at the dining table, before I nodded in agreement.
Aunty Ifeoma sat with us, glancing often at the TV as she ate. 'I don't understand why they fill our television with second rate Mexican shows and ignore all the potential our people have,' she muttered.
'Mom, please don't lecture now,' Amaka said.
'It's cheaper to import soap operas from Mexico,' Obiorftj said, his eyes still glued to the television.
Aunty Ifeoma stood up. 'Jaja and Kambili, we usually say the rosary every night before bed. Of course, you can stay up as long as you want afterward to watch TV or whatever else.'
Jaja shifted on his chair before pulling his schedule out of his pocket. 'Aunty, Papa's schedule says we should study in the evenings; we brought our books.'
Aunty Ifeoma stared at the paper in Jaja's hand. Then she started to laugh so hard that she staggered, her tall body bending like a whistling pine tree on a windy day. 'Eugene gave you a schedule to follow when you're here? Nekwanu anya, what does that mean?' Aunty Ifeoma laughed some more before she held out her hand and asked for the sheet of paper. When she turned to me, I brought mine, folded in crisp quarters, out of my skirt pocket.
'I will keep them for you until you leave.'
'Aunty…' Jaja started.
'If you do not tell Eugene, eh, then how will he know that you did not follow the schedule, gbo? You are on holiday here, and it is my house, so you will follow my own rules.'
I watched Aunty Ifeoma walk into her room with our schedules. My mouth felt dry, my tongue clinging to the roof.
'Do you have a schedule at home that you follow every day?' Amaka asked. She lay face up on the floor, her head resting on one of the cushions from a chair.
'Yes,' Jaja said.
'Interesting. So now rich people can't decide what to do day by day, they need a schedule to tell them.'
'Amaka!' Obiora shouted.
Aunty Ifeoma came out holding a huge rosary with blue beads and a metal crucifix. Obiora turned off the TV as the credits started to slide down the screen. Obiora and Amaka went to get their rosaries from the bedroom while Jaja and I slipped ours out of our pockets. We knelt next to the cane chairs and Aunty Ifeoma started the first decade. After we said the last Hail Mary, my head snapped back when I heard the raised, melodious voice. Amaka was singing! 'Ka m bunie afa gi enu..' Aunty Ifeoma and Obiora joined her, their voices melding. My eyes met Jaja's. His eyes were watery, full of suggestions. No! I told him, with a tight blink. It was not right. You did not break into song in the middle of the rosary. I did not join in the singing, and neither did Jaja. Amaka broke into song at the end of each decade, uplifting Igbo songs that made Aunty Ifeoma sing in echoes, like an opera singer drawing the words from the pit of her stomach.
After the rosary, Aunty Ifeoma asked if we knew any of the songs. 'We don't sing at home,' Jaja answered.
'We do here,' Aunty Ifeoma said, and I wondered if it was irritation that made her lower her eyebrows.
Obiora turned on the TV after Aunty Ifeoma said good night and went into her bedroom. I sat on the sofa, next to Jaja, watching the images on TV, but I couldn't tell the olive-skinned characters apart. I felt as if my shadow were visiting Aunty Ifeoma and her family, while the real me was studying in my room in Enugu, my schedule posted above me. I stood up shortly and went into the bedroom to get ready for bed. Even though I did not have the schedule, I knew what time Papa had penciled in for bed. I fell off to sleep wondering when Amaka would come in, if her lips would turn down at the corners in a sneer when she looked at me sleeping.
I dreamed that Amaka submerged me in a toilet bowl full of greenish-brown lumps. First my head went in, and then the bowl expanded so that my whole body went in, too. Amaka chanted, 'Flush, flush, flush,' while I struggled to break free. I was still struggling when I woke up. Amaka had rolled out of bed and was knotting her wrapper over her nightdress. 'We're going to fetch water at the tap,' she said. She did not ask me to come, but I got up, tightened my wrapper, and followed her. Jaja and Obiora were already at the tap in the tiny backyard, old car tires and bicycle parts and broken trunks were piled in a corner. Obiora placed the containers under the tap, aligning the open mouths with the rushing water. Jaja offered to take the first filled container back to the kitchen, but Obiora said not to worry and took it in. While Amaka took the next,]M placed a smaller container under the tap and filled it. He had slept in the living room, he told me, on a mattress that Obiofl unrolled from behind the bedroom door and covered with a wrapper. I listened to him and marveled at the wonder in his voice, at how much lighter the brown of his pupils was. I ofered to carry the next container, but Amaka laughed and said I had soft bones and could not carry it.
