Ugwu walked with her to the end of Odim Street in the morning. He had never seen her walk so fast, even with the twined bundle balanced on her head, never seen her face so free of lines.
“Stay well, my son,” she said, and thrust a chewing stick into his hand.
On the day Master’s mother arrived from the village, Ugwu cooked a peppery jollof rice. He mixed white rice into tomato sauce, tasted it, and then covered it and reduced the heat. He went back outside. Jomo had leaned his rake against the wall and was sitting on the steps eating a mango.
“That thing you are cooking smells very good,” Jomo said.
“It is for my master’s mother, jollof rice with fried chicken.”
“I should have given you some of my meat. It will be better than the chicken.” Jomo gestured to the bag tied behind his bicycle. He had shown Ugwu the small furry animal wrapped in fresh leaves.
“I cannot cook bush meat here!” Ugwu said in English, laughing.
Jomo turned to look at him. “Dianyi, you now speak English just like the children of the lecturers.”
Ugwu nodded, happy to hear the compliment, happier because Jomo would never guess that those children with their cream-pampered skin and their effortless English sniggered whenever Mrs. Oguike asked him a question because of how he pronounced his words, how thick his bush accent was.
“Harrison should come and hear good English from somebody who does not brag about it,” Jomo said. “He thinks he knows everything just because he lives with a white man. Onye nzuzu! Stupid man!”
“Very stupid man!” Ugwu said. He had been just as vigorous last weekend when he agreed with Harrison that Jomo was foolish.
“Yesterday the he-goat locked the tank and refused to give me the key,” Jomo said. “He said I am wasting water. Is it his water? Now if the plants die, what do I tell Mr. Richard?”
“That is bad.” Ugwu snapped his fingers to show just how bad. The last quarrel between the two men was when Harrison hid the lawn mower and refused to tell Jomo where it was until Jomo rewashed Mr. Richard’s shirt, which had been splattered with bird droppings. It was Jomo’s useless flowers, after all, that attracted the birds. Ugwu had supported both men. He told Jomo that Harrison was wrong to have hidden the lawn mower, and later he told Harrison that Jomo was wrong to have planted the flowers there in the first place, knowing they attracted birds. Ugwu preferred Jomo’s solemn ways and false stories, but Harrison, with his insistent bad English, was mysteriously full of knowledge of things that were foreign and different. Ugwu wanted to learn these things, so he nurtured his friendship with both men; he had become their sponge, absorbing much and giving little away.
“One day I will wound Harrison seriously, maka Chukwu,” Jomo said. He threw away the mango seed, sucked so clean of the orange pulp that it was white. “Somebody is knocking on the front door.”
“Oh. She has come! It must be my master’s mother.” Ugwu dashed inside; he barely heard Jomo say goodbye.
Master’s mother had the same stocky build, dark skin, and vibrant energy as her son; it was as if she would never need help with carrying her water pot or lowering a stack of firewood from her head. Ugwu was surprised to see the young woman with downcast eyes sta
nding beside her, holding bags. He had expected that she would come alone. He had hoped she would come a little later, too, when the rice was done.
“Welcome, Mama, nno,” he said. He took the bags from the young woman. “Welcome, Aunty, nno.”
“You are the one that is Ugwu? How are you?” Master’s mother said, patting his shoulder.
“Fine, Mama. Did your journey go well?”
“Yes. Chukwu du anyi. God led us.” She was looking at the radiogram. Her green george wrapper hung stiff on her waist and made her hips look square-shaped. She did not wear it with the air of the women on campus, the women who were used to owning coral beads and gold earrings. She wore it in the way that Ugwu imagined his mother would if she had the same wrapper: uncertainly, as if she did not believe that she was no longer poor.
“How are you, Ugwu?” she asked again.
“I am well, Mama.”
“My son has told me how well you are doing.” She reached out to adjust her green headgear, worn low on her head, almost covering her eyebrows.
“Yes, Mama.” Ugwu looked down modestly.
“God bless you, your chi will break away the rocks on your path. Do you hear me?” She sounded like Master, that sonorous and authoritative tone.
“Yes, Mama.”
“When will my son be back?”
“They will return in the evening. They said you should rest, Mama, when you come. I am cooking rice and chicken.”
“Rest?” She smiled and walked into the kitchen. Ugwu watched her unpack foodstuffs from a bag: dried fish and cocoyams and spices and bitter leaf. “Have I not come from the farm?” she asked. “This is my rest. I have brought ingredients to make a proper soup for my son. I know you try, but you are only a boy. What does a boy know about real cooking?” She smirked and turned to the younger woman, who was standing by the door, arms folded and eyes still downcast, as if waiting for orders. “Is that not so, Amala? Does a boy belong in the kitchen?”