“Daalụ.” Aima sat down opposite her friend, trying not to let the kindness set off a wave of tears. The plate was sectioned into quadrants—rice, dodo, fish, and shredded cabbage in the name of salad.
“I’m glad you stayed,” Ijendu said, cutting into her chicken thigh. “Even if it wasn’t for him. I was already missing you. Besides, running away never fixes anything.”
“What’s there to fix?” Aima replied, poking at her food. She knew she sounded flat, but she couldn’t help it. She’d moved home not for Kalu but with him. It was strange to suddenly be directionless now that she’d ended their relationship, like she’d turned into one of those women who ruined their own lives by centering it on a man. It hadn’t felt like that at the time. It had felt like they were a unit, partners. She could already hear the voices calling her stupid for thinking like that without a ring, without actual commitment. What were words without a contract? What was a partnership without God’s presence? She should have protected herself.
“Ah-ahn, don’t be like that.” Ijendu gave her a kind look. “Don’t start repressing your feelings. These emotions are necessary! They’re part of healing.”
Aima rolled her eyes and stabbed her fish with her fork. “Emotions ko, feelings ni.”
Ijendu snorted. “You know what? Let’s not even discuss him for now. We need to distract you.” She thought for a moment, then snapped her fingers, the sound echoing through the dining room. “Ah, I know! We already planned to go clubbing tonight, but now you’re coming with us. Paffect. You can dance away your troubles.”
“Coming with who? Your usual bad gehls?” Aima let her voice sound as mocking as she felt. She’d never bothered to hide how little she liked Ijendu’s friends. It wasn’t that she was a prude or anything, but she just wasn’t on their level. The kind of things they liked to do left her uncomfortable—they were too free with themselves, with their bodies and what they put into them. She and Ijendu had known each other in secondary school, gone to Bible study together because their families went to the same church. When Aima’s parents moved to London and Aima to the States, they never minded her returning to New Lagos without them because they knew Ijendu’s family was there. The girls had essentially been sisters in Christ, but Ijendu had splintered off quietly into a secular decadence, something she and Aima never really talked about. It hadn’t mattered; neither of them judged the other for her beliefs or lack thereof.
Ijendu gave Aima a look. “They’re not that bad,” she tried to say but couldn’t make it through without smiling. “No, you’re right, they are. They really are.”
Aima laughed back. “It’s no wahala; they’re always entertaining.” She pointed her knife at Ijendu. “But I swear, if one of them tries to start a fight again, I’m calling an Uber and leaving you there.”
“Guy, Biola wasn’t starting a fight, that bastard grabbed her ass.”
“And then she broke a whole bottle on his head! Please.” Aima raised her hands. “I’m just glad I wasn’t near you people when that happened.”
Ijendu grimaced. “I forgot about the bottle part, yeah. We can’t go back to that club for a while.”
“You see? Drama.”
“Anyway, Biola’s traveling; she won’t even be coming out with us tonight.”
Aima snorted. “We thank God.” The phrase was flippant in her mouth, leaving sourness on the inside of her cheeks. What was there to actually thank God for? Half her things were still in Kalu’s house—should she have made them get their own house together instead of moving into the one he had inherited from his family? Too late, too late—and the rest of her things were packed into one hasty suitcase and she had nowhere to live unless she went to London and faced her mother’s overt disappointment, her father’s gentle confusion at how she kept making choices he didn’t understand, just like when she’d chosen Texas over London. Aima had just wanted some air, some real space away from her family so she could figure herself out. She’d landed a cushy finance job there, but her parents still didn’t get why she’d chosen somewhere like Houston when she could have had London. Even after Aima had met Kalu at a corporate mixer, even after they’d fallen in love and moved in together, her parents treated it like it was all a distraction from the life she was supposed to be living. Moving back to New Lagos had been the first thing that had made sense to them in a long time, and now Aima had fucked that up. She was going to be illegible to her parents again, and it would have hurt, but right now she was illegible to herself, and that hurt far more.
Ijendu’s phone buzzed with a text message. She read it in a glance, cutting up plantain with the edge of her fork. “Okay, some of the girls are on their way.”
Aima glanced at the time. It was still early in the evening. “Already?”
“We’re all doing our makeup here.”
“Oh, okay.” Aima peeled some of her fish off its frail skeleton. “In that case, shouldn’t they have come a few hours before? You people who need to bake and whatnot.” She faked a grin as Ijendu cut her a side eye. Aima didn’t wear makeup like that and she liked teasing Ijendu about it, a small reminder that they could be different and it could still be okay.
“I’ve already told you you’re rude,” Ijendu replied. “Biko, finish your food; let’s go upstairs. The maid will clear the plates.”
Ijendu’s house had a marble staircase that clung and swooped dramatically against a curved wall and led to the upstairs parlor, which was upholstered in a deep plum velvet. Her bedroom was off to the side, large and lined with wardrobes, all filled to near bursting. Aima’s suitcase had been tucked away neatly in a corner. She put her purse on top of it and plopped down on the bed, watching Ijendu throw open her closet doors to decide what she was going to wear later.
“I know you love those your platform heels,” Aima interjected, trying to focus on anything other than the heartbreak crawling through her. “But if you’re serious about dancing with me tonight, shey you know you have to wear something else—something you can actually move in.”
Ijendu groaned. “Please don’t ask me to kill my aesthetic in the name of practicality, Aima. I can’t be going out in flats.”
Aima rolled her eyes. “That’s why the block heel was invented. Or the wedge. Or literally anything that isn’t an actual stiletto.”
Ijendu turned slowly to look at her, eyes wide with horror. “A wedge? It’s only because you’re sad that I won’t slap you for even suggesting that. You that likes to wear sneakers to the club—remember how we had to beg that bouncer last time to let you in?”
“Beg ke? I had to bribe him.”
Aima tried to ignore the mention of her sadness. Spotlighting it would make it balloon into a monstrosity she wouldn’t be able to choke down.
Ijendu shrugged and turned back to her clothes. “That one is your own. We warned you, but you didn’t want to hear word.”
“But it’s so stupid. What if I was…recovering from a surgery or something? Something where I couldn’t wear heels.”
“If you’re recovering from a surgery, maybe you shouldn’t be in the club in the first place.”
Aima laughed. “Whatever. It’s still wrong. Like how they wouldn’t let us into the strip club that time because we didn’t have a man with us.” It had been her first time going to one, and she’d actually been rather relieved when they had to turn around and go back home.
Ijendu pulled out a silk peach dress. “That one pained me, I can’t lie. I was thinking the whole day about how I was going to take that yellow Anambra stripper into the private room and do certain things to her. And they just blocked me like that. Wickedness.” She held the dress against her and spun around to show Aima. “What do you think?” It was short, the hem hitting her upper thigh. Aima raised an eyebrow.
“I think you’re not serious about dancing tonight if you’re wearing that. Unless you’re ready to expose yourself to everyone.”
Ijendu winked. “Maybe I am.”
Aima blushed and Ijendu laughed at how easy it was to scandalize her, then dove back into the wardrobe to try and find an empty hanger for the dress. As soon as she turned away, Aima let her face fall and stared over the edge of the bed at the carpet, the hurt in her chest quiet and solid, a drowning weight.
Friday, 10:05 PM
Ijendu’s friends arrived in a flood of loud and raucous laughing, one of them connecting her phone to Ijendu’s speakers as soon as she got in and blasting amapiano until it was beating against the walls. The girls moved around the room in an effortless cloud of perfume and powder, their gist overlapping, threaded with more laughter, delight bouncing off one another.
Aima smiled from the bed, now quiet as she watched them share space at Ijendu’s vanity, their highlighted faces lined up in the large mirror. It felt as if they had their own world and she was a spy inside it, quietly witnessing, a visitor to a godless place, almost in a trance. Aima watched the stretch of sheer panties over hips and ass, the sway of breasts cupped in lace, their full lips as they slid small pills between them, the way their eyes dilated and hooded afterward. The whole thing was almost like boarding school again, that game of not letting anyone see the deliberately flimsy desire flitting about in her. Usually, she wouldn’t even look at it, that secret and shameful want, but tonight was different. Everything was broken, which meant something was broken open. She was angry with God. She was going to play in the places she wasn’t supposed to.
When they offered her a pill, Ijendu glanced over. She’d offered Aima things like that before, casually, open doors and windows in case Aima wanted to climb into that world or, at least, out of her own. Aima had always refused gently, and it had never been a thing. Ijendu offered portals and Aima said no, and that was just a fact of their friendship. But this night was different. Aima took the pill, and Ijendu smiled and blew her a kiss that said welcome and turned back to the mirror. Aima reached for her glass of juice balanced on the headboard and used it to swallow the pill. What did any of it matter anyway? She’d heard it could help make everything unreal, and that felt like exactly what she needed. Besides, she was with Ijendu; she’d be safe. The desire stretched out in her, her old confidante. She’d never told Kalu about it; there had never been a need. They’d thought they would be together forever and now he was gone, and she was free to think about different things, do different things since she didn’t have a road to follow anymore.
The housekeeper came in and collected the clothes that needed to be ironed or steamed, returning them carefully draped on hangers. Aima watched as the girls crafted their faces, as they contoured their cheeks and noses. She held still when Ijendu came over and took her face in her hand, sweeping a liquid lipstick carefully over Aima’s mouth. Her skin was buzzing from whatever the pill was. She hadn’t even asked. A brief alarm shot through her, but she wiped it away—it didn’t matter. Whatever happened would happen.
