Ruqaiyyah finally seemed to be getting the hint. “Okay o,” she said. “If you want to behave like that.”
He relented a little. “Why would you think I was gay?”
“I didn’t say that. I know you like women too.”
The irritation spiked again in him. “Too? Are you serious?”
Ruqaiyyah shrugged. “I don’t know what you’re getting annoyed for. It’s such a terrible thing to be mistaken as anything other than straight? Okay, sorry, Alhaji. Ma binu.”
“You know what? You’re an asshole,” he’d said, clambering to his feet, wet sand mapping out on him.
“And you’re a coward, so whatever,” she’d replied, lying back down. Ahmed hadn’t looked back as he walked away, and they didn’t speak again until they were back in the city, months later, when she walked up and stood beside him at a Lady Donli concert.
“I was an asshole,” she said. “Sorry.”
They hadn’t looked at each other. “It’s all right,” Ahmed had replied. “Forget it happened.”
Ruqaiyyah had put her hand on his arm, and he covered it with his. A brief moment, then she pulled away and left. They remained friendly afterward; she came to some of his parties, and once in a while, they’d have lunch and she’d ask for advice about running hers. It took her a while to set it up, but she spent the time planning, and once it kicked off, she ran it with an even tighter leash than Ahmed ran his. “I allow some straight men there, for some of the girls. Some of the men end up not being so straight, but overall, they’re the type who won’t freak out at seeing some gay shit. You should come. We could have some fun.”
“I’ll think about it,” he’d said, wondering if she’d just said the bit about straight men to placate him. She shot him a WhatsApp message about the party every month and he had never taken her up on the offer. He hadn’t held on to the beach in Zanzibar, truly. There was nothing in Ahmed that held space for unfamiliar wants—he thought of himself as simple, his desires as simple if sometimes a little strong. There would only be a reason to hold what she said on the beach against Ruqaiyyah if something in him thought that there was truth in her assumption, and since there wasn’t (anything in him or truth), he didn’t.
Still. He didn’t go to her party. He didn’t know why, and he didn’t think about it past that. Now, standing outside her door, bracing for the moment when he would enter it, he swore at Kalu under his breath. Something was broken inside him, a seal perhaps, a key in a lock after swinging open a door. No, that was wrong.
“I wasn’t closeted,” he said, looking down at the cigarette in his hand.
Ruqaiyyah glanced at him. “Okay?” She didn’t sound confused, and he loved her a little in the moment for that, for knowing exactly what he was talking about, for not being surprised that he’d brought it up.
“I’m just saying. Everyone thinks it’s something being repressed, but maybe it just…wasn’t there. Or was there and faded.”
She turned slightly toward him. “And then came back?”
Ahmed lifted the cigarette and dragged on it.
“Is that why you’re here?” she asked.
He leaned his head back against the wall and was silent for a while. “It’s been a long night,” he finally said, and there was surrender under his words.
Ruqaiyyah heard it and nodded. “Well, there’s no point hiding outside here. If you’re coming in, then come in.” Her blue twists were shifting darkness in the night. She stretched a hand out to Ahmed. He tossed the cigarette to the floor and ground it out, then took her hand, feeling her cool fingers wrap around his.
“Take off your shoes,” she said. He slid them off just outside the door.
Walking in with her felt like the third, maybe the fourth, world of that night. There had been his party before Kalu arrived, every moment within the office, an attempt at a reset with Timi—a failed one—then now this, another attempt, maybe one that would scrub his inside skin of the things that were clinging to it. Or maybe it was a stupid plan, maybe coming here was just going to layer more things onto him and make him so heavy that he would fold, crash under new and unexpected skins. He blinked as they entered the house—it was so different from his own setup. Here everything was gauzed, white sheer curtains like a maze everywhere. The lighting was cool and blue, the whole thing was like a dream, shadows moving between the hanging ghosts, music curling through the air.
“Oh, wow,” he said. “This is…different.”
“Not what you were expecting, ehn?” Ruqaiyyah smiled and passed him a plate.
Ahmed looked down at the arrangement of delicate desserts, complete with fine-spun chocolate and sugar pearls. “What’s this?”
She grinned. “Edibles.”
He picked up one, powdered sugar sliding smoothly on his fingertips, and raised an eyebrow. “It’s a bit over the top, isn’t it?”
“Abeg. Everything is an experience here.” She spread out her arms and spun, reminding him a little of himself, ringmaster things. “You want common brownies? Go somewhere else.”
Ahmed shrugged and bit into the sphere. Coconut and cardamom burst in a swirl in his mouth and his eyes widened. “Oh, shit.” He looked down at the dessert. “That tastes fucking amazing.”
Ruqaiyyah laughed. “I know. We’ve got a wonderful pastry chef. Come, there’s someone I want you to meet.”
They wound their way through the maze, and Ahmed could hear sounds leaking out under the music from blurred corners of the room, moans and gasps and steady frictions. She led him to a back room where a bar was set up, chrome and shiny, a tall man who had to be a model with those cheekbones mixing the drinks. There were a few people sitting there, talking quietly—it looked like a scene from somewhere else.
“Okay,” Ruqaiyyah said, leaning close to Ahmed. “You see that one on the far end? In the orange shirt?”
Ahmed looked down the bar at the man she was talking about. He was young. Tall and skinny, corded arms coming out of a retro orange T-shirt, jeans, Converse high tops, short locs falling over his face, dark skin. “He looks familiar.”
“Ah, you’ve probably seen him on TV. That one is not important. The thing about seeing people here is that they also see you here; so do me, I do you.”
“I can’t remember his name at the moment.” The man was handsome enough, there was some ill-fitting elegance around him, like he’d dragged it on and not quite taken the time to make sure it was his size but was wearing it anyway.
“That’s not important either. I think you two would get along.”
Ahmed laughed shortly. “You think I’ll like him? Matchmaking now?”
“Oh, no. I think you’ll dislike him quite a bit. Most people do. He tries too hard.” Ruqaiyyah shrugged. “Actors, you know. Always fighting that their raging inadequacy.”
Ahmed liked that they weren’t pretending he was at her party for anything else other than what he was there for. “So why do you think we’d get along?”
Ruqaiyyah took a drink someone handed her, an inch of amber liquid with clattering ice cubes. “I’ve known him for a while, you know. He has this desperation he tries to hide, and when he’s with women, it makes him try to be dominant, try to be the kind of man he wishes he was, with the kind of power he wishes he had. But at the end of the day, he’s just looking for validation.”
