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The pixel at the base of Nwadi’s neck bounced to life without warning. It began to buzz like a honey-bee for several seconds, radiating flashes like fire-flies. But then, suddenly it popped like corn in a fire, and collapsed into its core; curdling up until it vanished. The reaction left a very noticeable hole in the expanse of Nwadi’s skin – a transparent patch. This wasn’t the first time this had happened. It was, in fact, now a regular occurrence. Several random little blocks of colour imploded every hour.

Nwadinobi was gradually losing her complexion. Even the array of carefully selected oils and ointments spread out on the dresser (which had been a special gift from her mama-kuku when she visited during Easter) could not put off the inevitable for much longer: she was becoming colourless. The vibrant dark chocolate skin that used to glisten in the sun beneath a film of spicy sweat was now gone, and it filled Nwadi with sheer dismay to think that something was steadily eating away at her body, leaving only her consciousness behind. She regarded her reflection in the mirror on her bedside table, and noted how easily she could make out the fine details of the Ijebu drummer in the old oil painting on the wall. It hung behind her head but she saw it clearly, without turning around, through the raggedly honeycombed membrane that was her skin. It won’t be much longer now before she would be completely invisible.

Nwadi first began to notice her skin fade on the eve of her eighteenth birthday. It hadn’t surprised or concerned her in any way particular, because it was not unusual for a girl to change in that way when she came of a certain age. In fact, it was a phenomenon as natural as seeing the first stream of blood ooze from the womanly crevices of an adolescent girl; or, the first strand of hair turn from black to silver, on the head of a person approaching middle-age. It was just a thing that the body did to get a person to pay attention to time, and to remind them not to miss the exits to the many new milestones along the way. Nwadi accepted that she was entering a new phase in her life.

“You are changing” her mama had simply remarked as she keenly observed the flickering pixels buzz like little insects and then collapse into gaping holes on her daughter’s dying skin. “We must find you a husband soon.”

A girl could only hope to display her original colours – the colours of her birth – for a limited amount of time. She was born in rich pigments of yellow, and brown, and black; and she was branded with her father’s name just like her brothers were. But unlike her brothers, a girl was made aware, early on, that she did not own that name for ever – the tattoo was made to fade with time. She did not have a life-time claim to it like a boy did; it was merely leased to her to get her started on her path in the world. She was always a transient being in her father’s house. This was why the birth of a girl warranted a much more subdued demonstration of joy than the birth of a son. A girl was never a full gift from the gods.

“This one is only a visitor.” A father would say of the squirmy infant who was clearly missing that vital appendage between the legs, “She will find her roots when she is old enough.”

It was as if the feet of a girl could not be firmly planted on the ground without fearing that she would fly away aimlessly like an untethered balloon into the vast blue sky. It was as if only a boy’s feet were appropriately weighted to make foot-prints in the sand. And a girl’s chance to remain rooted was to allow a boy be her anchor..

Mama had made sure Nwadinobi would be ready to be wrapped around an anchor when the time came, so that her daughter would not vanish into thin air. She kept chickens and goats in the backyard, and cared for them lovingly. But whenever a hen hatched its chicks or a nanny-goat birthed a kid, and Nwadi and her brothers bonded with the little offspring in the yard, mama would discourage them from doing that with stern words and a stick. She warned them not to get too attached to the livestock as the chickens and goats were fattened only for the market or for slaughter. A fat goat without blemishes would fetch a good price. And so, it was not out of a profound love for the animal but rather just good market-sense that mama ensured the livestock were kept in proper shape.

She handled Nwadinobi in a very similar manner. It was a mother’s duty to ensure her daughter was properly cultured in order to make her into valuable wife-material for the men who would come calling.

“Nwadi, do not climb that tree! Do you want to have marks on your body?”
“Nwadi, a girl does not sit with her legs open.”
“Nwadi, a girl should not laugh like that.”
“Nwadi, a girl does not sleep beyond five o’clock.”
“Nwadi, a girl must pick up a broom to sweep the compound as soon as she wakes in the morning.”
“Nwadi, if you do not know how to prepare ofe aku, you will never find a husband.”
“Nwadi, forget your stubbornness if you do not want to grow old in your father’s house.”

Or disappear into thin air.

And Nwadinobi forgot her stubbornness and did exactly as her mama instructed. She knew that mama was not making idle threats. She had seen, with her own eyes, young girls lose their complexion and become invisible. There was the beautiful Njideka who lived in the compound next to hers. She had been full of foolish dreams and unreasonable expectations for herself, and she had refused to swallow her stubbornness or any other parts of herself. She believed that her ability to make the most beautiful dresses in the village would guarantee that she would keep her colour, even after her father’s name had begun to fade from her skin. The wealthiest homes in the village depended on the dexterity of Njideka’s delicate hands for brilliantly crafted dresses. But in the end, her skill had not been enough. It had not saved her. Her mother had cried and pleaded, all in vain. She became brittle, mottled figure – increasingly obscure with each passing day as she spurned the advances of men. And on her twenty-fifth birthday, Njideka had vanished completely. Her name was still mentioned amongst small groups in the village, but only as a cautionary tale – a symbol of shame and how not to be. And Nwadi found herself wondering if, perhaps, it would be preferable for Njideka’s name to be forgotten altogether.

She had also witnessed how Adaora, whose skin was almost completely transparent, had been magically restored on her wedding day. She was an unlucky girl who had been disappointed by several irresponsible suitors and so she stayed in her father’s house for a very long time – a bottle of milk on the verge of going stale on the shelf. She had started to contend with public ridicule regarding her status. However, her luck turned when Osita came for her. When she was called out to greet the guests that had gathered in her father’s compound in honour of her igba-nkwu, Adaora was only recognizable by the pink lace she was putting on and a flicker on her forehead. Many men might have abandoned their ambitions to marry her, right there, but Osita kept faith with his intended. And as soon as Osita, her husband, accepted the wine she humbly presented to him on her knees, her skin began its restoration process pixel after pixel, until she was entirely visible again. The incident had been greeted with roaring applause. It didn’t worry anyone that Osita’s hand now occasionally got heavy on Adaora’s skin, because they remember how she had been rescued by him from a desperate situation on that fateful day. It was a small price to pay, a small inconvenience to endure; and Adaora, ultimately, thought so too.

Nwadinobi was about to turn twenty-four in a month, and she was now teetering upon the brink of oblivion herself. But she was not without hope. Last November, a suitor had come for her hand. Although she was no longer as vibrantly complexioned as she was at sixteen, there were still parts of her that flashed in solid matter. So when Anyam described her as the delicate flower twirling in her father’s compound which he wished so desperately to pluck, she could not successfully suppress her smile and elation. Anyam had come with his father and two elders from his village to knock on her father’s door and to formally state his intentions towards Nwadi.

“My son has seen a ripe udala fruit in your compound and he came to tell me about it,” Anyam’s father spoke with the theatrics and pretentiousness of a typical traditionalist, “We are here now to inform you of our desire to pluck it.”

He presented Papa-Nwadi with one bottle of foreign blend whiskey and another of South-African red wine, but Papa made no move to acknowledge the gift. His thick brows shifted into a furrow above his broad nose as he leaned forward in his favourite chair. “The young man must be mistaking,” he said, “I do not have any udala trees in my compound; much less one that has borne fruit ripe enough to be plucked.”

The visitors launched into uneasy laughter – a tentative guffaw – to confirm that Papa had indeed only been making a joke. “It is your daughter, Nwadinobi, whom we have come for today.”

Anyam was accepted by Papa-Nwadi with very little objections; it was, after all, in his daughter’s interest to be wed before her complexion was lost completely. So, he invited them back to his home a month after to negotiate the bride-price. They sat in the living room chewing kola nuts, their voices raised as they haggled over what should be considered the most appropriate compensation to Papa-Nwadi for what he had spent on raising his daughter. Nwadi sat in the kitchen with her mother as the men conducted their business over the heads of the women; they had both done their part. There was nothing more to be done or said, but Nwadi could still think. And she thought about the moment she had watched mama at the market, pursing her lips and shaking her head fervently to reject the paltry offers from the customer bargaining over the price of her goat – Aruocha – which she had named against her mama’s warning. She also noted the similarities between her fate and the fate of Aruocha.

Nwadi rubbed one of the many balms mama-kuku had furnished her with into her fragmented skin. The results were less and less convincing each day but she still thanked mama-kuku for the kind gesture and the gift of the power to remain visible for as long as possible even without a man.

“This is to postpone the inevitable for as long as you can,” mama-kuku had said firmly. “I know it is not fair to us women that we are here only on the condition that a man holds us by the hand and brands us with his name.”

Nwadi fidgeted in discomfort. “But mama-kuku, I don’t mind that I have to marry Anyam so that my skin becomes whole again.”

Mama-kuku regarded her granddaughter with sad eyes as she rested a gnarled hand on Nwadi’s grossly mottled knee. “Yes. You are a good girl, and your mama raised you well.” Mama-kuku had seen that docility in many girls in the many years she had been blessed with – that calm surrender of a caged bird that would yet sing to amuse its captor. She had seen how girls converted the thorns into a glorious crown – something to covet and a tool to taunt their peers with, while the unfortunate ones languished nameless in obscurity.

“But you do have a choice.” Mama-kuku told Nwadi, “The world cannot remain blind to us women for ever. Someday, even Njideka will be seen again and we will acknowledge the brilliance of her dress-making. And we would realize how much we missed her craft. Be happy, Nwadinobi m. Your happiness is in your heart, it is real, and it will be there whether people see you or not.”

Mama-kuku left Nwadi biting her lip in deep thought. She had never before considered that she might do things for her own pleasure. Mama had stopped her from climbing trees, and from doing all the things that came naturally to her, when she was very little; because they weren’t things to be done by a girl.

***
On the day of Nwadinobi’s Igba-nkwu, her mind was already made up. She had only very little time left before she would be lost to the eyes of the world. Her papa blessed the wine in a chalice and handed it to her. “Nwadinobi nwa m, show us your husband.” He instructed full of fatherly pride. Nwadi took the cup and danced amid a throng of beautiful aso-ebi girls to beating drums and a joyful flute. She teased the crowd attempting to move towards strange men, indulging them as they called for her, “Nne, bia!” But when the music died, she ended up on her knees in front of Anyam to everyone’s delight as they laughed off the earlier spectacle.

“Hai! Nwanyi oma! Beautiful girl.” Someone, who obviously couldn’t help himself, remarked.

But Nwadi did not release the cup to Anyam when he reached for it with a broad smile expanding his lips. She gripped it as tightly as she could in her trembling hands. They were only barely visible now. Anyam’s smile collapsed in an instant as he contemplated the shame Nwadi was about to bestow on his person.

“What is wrong?” He asked.

Nwadi’s eyes met Anyam’s squarely as she tightened her lips in resolution. She poured out the sweet red wine onto the black bitter earth. The small purple stream crept into the pores, softening the ground beneath Anyam’s feet. The earth had drunk her wine. Would it hold her now, or would she still fly away like a balloon if Anyam would not hold her down? Her action aroused an immediate outrage from the crowd. But it did not matter. It was only a moment before the last pixel on Nwadi’s skin collapsed and she faded into oblivion. In all of the commotion that ensued, mama-kuku smiled calmly. She knew that the world was much bigger than could be fathomed by any one of them, and she knew that Nwadinobi would find a place in it where she could completely be herself.

Let me book my space and spread my mat

WOW
This is a wonderfully Crafted piece. Great job

ttime:
WOW
This is a wonderfully Crafted piece. Great job

Thank you.

Following...

RaggedyAnn:
Thank you.

Permit me to copy this to my blog

I’ll be back to read

Come back here and finish up your story.

Nice job... Enjoy other cool stories on Tushstories via

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HeWrites:
Permit me to copy this to my blog

You're welcome to.

Awesome.....short stories are the best and this makes my day!