Web of Lies (9 page)

“At least fifteen people are reported to have been killed when a Nigerian fighter jet bombed the military headquarters of the Sierra Leone army in Freetown….”

Papa’s head stooped toward the little radio on the kitchen table. Femi dropped his backpack by the door.
Thud.
Papa’s eyes shot up, flicking from the floor to Femi. How stupid to be so casual with his schoolbag in front of Papa! That was asking for trouble. But Papa’s eyes reverted to the radio, assuming a distant look as if he were thousands of miles away.

“The United Nations Security Council voted unanimously this week to impose international sanctions on Sierra Leone’s military government. They include a ban on the sale of oil, weapons, and military equipment….”

Femi squeezed his fingers into his palms. The letter about Parents Evening lay tucked in his bag. He was
meant to have given it to Papa a week ago, and today was the deadline for Papa’s reply.

It hadn’t worried him at first. Their form tutor, Ms. Gray, was so scatty that he could always say he had handed in Papa’s slip. She wouldn’t be sure whether she had mislaid it and would simply ask him whether Papa was coming or not. But on Monday their math teacher, Ms. Hassan, had walked into their tutor room and announced that Ms. Gray was unwell. She would be their replacement form tutor “for the foreseeable future.” She could have been carrying an invisible stun gun. So far no one in 7B had seriously messed around with Ms. Hassan. After taking the attendance register, she had opened a folder marked in bold letters:

7B PARENTS EVENING
TUESDAY 14TH OCTOBER

She had called out a list of names from a batch of reply slips. Those whose names were not called had to raise their hands. Femi’s hand had felt like a lead weight. His plan was sunk.

Femi’s eyes traveled from the bag to Papa and back again. The letter was still inside it. Whenever the thought had come into his mind that he shouldn’t delay any longer, he had allowed it to slip away again. This morning was his last chance to give Papa the letter before having to account to Ms. Hassan.

“A spokesman for the military government said that
Sierra Leoneans should be free to sort out their own problems without interference from Nigeria and the United Nations….”

If only he could be free of interference! The letter put him in a trap. If he gave it now, Papa would be mad at Femi for giving it to him so late. Papa liked to do things properly. He would say that he needed time to check that he could get away from work in time. But worse still, when Papa came to Parents Evening, he would talk to Hendy and say something about football practice on Saturday afternoons. He would probably even start by thanking Hendy! Femi could just imagine the smile being wiped off Papa’s face.

“Senseless! Brother killing brother!” Papa switched off the radio. The fury rumbled in his voice. Then he took a deep breath. He turned to Femi. “Did you manage your homework last night?”

“Yes, Papa. It was easy.”

“What’s easy?” Sade cut in from behind. She pressed past Femi into the kitchen. She already had her coat on.

“My homework!” Femi snapped.

“That’s because you only do five minutes!”

“No I don’t! You don’t know because you play music in your room all the time!”

“Anyway, Papa will find out for himself when you have Parents Evening. Haven’t you got one yet?”

Femi froze. Trust Sade to bring up the subject! He was counting on her not knowing about arrangements for year seven.

“Stop quarreling.” Papa rapped his fingers on the table.
“Don’t you young people think we have enough wars already? You’ll be late if you don’t hurry up.”

Sade removed two packets of crisps from the cupboard and held one out. Femi took it and unlatched his bag. As he stuffed the packet in, he glimpsed the letter for Papa tucked down the side. Suddenly he knew what to do.

“I’m ready! I’ve just got to get a book for science!” he called, darting back to his bedroom.

As soon as they reached school, Femi headed for the boys’ toilets and into one of the cubicles. It was the most private place he knew in school. He sat down and pulled out his pen, the Parents Evening letter and the
Dictionary of Science
that Papa had given him for his eleventh birthday. He balanced the book on his knees and spread out the letter on top of it. He focused on the bottom of the page.

Carefully, he crossed out the words “We shall.” He checked the sentence twice. “I shall not be able to attend….” Now for the tricky part! His fingers flicked through the pages of the book until he pulled out a sheet of paper. Another letter. But this one was from Papa, written to his
year-six teacher at Greenslades Primary.

Mr. Fisher had told Femi he was very sorry and left Papa’s letter lying on his desk. It was like an open sore and, when no one was looking, Femi had whisked it back. Reading the letter later in his bedroom, he felt empty. Without knowing why, he had hidden it between the pages of his
Dictionary of Science.
He couldn’t have imagined then how it would be useful now. For a couple of moments, he held his pen poised above the Parents Evening letter. First he needed to practice. The margins at the top filled up with replicas of Papa’s signature. Then he tore off the reply slip and printed the date and his name. The bell rang for tutor time. He mustn’t be late for Ms. Hassan. Taking the plunge, he signed:
Folarin Solaja
.

Ms. Hassan scanned the reply slip. Her brow puckered. Did she have X-ray eyes?

“Why can’t your father come, Femi?”

He was caught in her spotlight.

“They won’t let him have time off from work, Miss.”

Her terminator eyebrows shot up.

“I am very surprised! I taught your sister last year. Your father never missed an opportunity to discuss her work.”

His stomach cramped.

“He says he’ll come next time, Miss, when I’ve been here longer.” Femi lowered his gaze.

Ms. Hassan sighed loudly. “The whole point…”—she paused to get the attention of the class—“the whole point of holding a Parents Evening early in the term for first years is for us to spot problems before they become serious. It’s for your own benefit.”

If he was wearing his hood, he would have let his head shrink away. He avoided looking around him as he returned to his seat. When Gary nudged him, he flinched like a snail. He didn’t want to talk to anyone.

It was double bad luck that tutor time was followed by double math. The school had Papa’s telephone number at the Refugee Center. Was Ms. Hassan suspicious enough to ring him? Whenever her eyes roamed in his direction, Femi wanted to duck. It was a miracle that he got through the lesson without her picking on him again.

At break Femi said that he had a stomachache and had to get to the boys’ toilets. Gary offered to come with him.

“Nah, man. I might be there all break!” he said irritably.

The stomachache was real, but instead of heading for the toilets, Femi weaved his way to the back of the school. He needed to see James. More to the point, he needed a puff on one of James’s little roll-ups. There was a chance that James wouldn’t be too pleased. He had made it quite clear that he didn’t want Femi to be seen hanging around in school with him.

“Teachers like to think they’re detectives, right. Two and two makes five and all that!” James had laughed, then turned serious. “I want you to stay clean in school, you get my meaning?”

But hadn’t James spoken briefly to Femi in school himself, once or twice? If he was careful not to be seen, Femi hoped that James wouldn’t be mad at him for seeking him out now like an older brother.

Femi heard voices in the bicycle shed before he reached it. Approaching from the side, he couldn’t see who was there and they couldn’t see him either. But he could hear someone pleading. He held back behind the brick wall at the end of the shed.

“Please, man, I’m stressed out! Just a little, man! To see me through, right? I promise I’ll—”

“No way. I don’t do credit,” James cut in bluntly.

“I’ll bring it to you tomorrow, man. Trust me!” The boy’s voice rose to a whine.

“Nuh! Forget it! You already got me into trouble with Errol, bwoy! Never again, bwoy, never again!” James was
beginning to heat up. “Tomorrow is tomorrow. I deal today.”

Femi edged away from the wall. James was in no mood to be asked any favors. He had needed something to relax the tightness and cramps. This felt like a kick in the stomach instead.

He hadn’t meant to ask the question in front of Papa, but it popped out of his mouth at supper.

“What was Ms. Hassan like when she taught you math, Sade?”

Papa’s spoon hovered in midair and his eyes lit up.

“Strict! Really strict!” His sister pulled a face. “Ms. Hassan could teach in Nigeria! She doesn’t let you get away with anything.”

“That just means she wants the best for her students,” Papa said. “I hope you’re not in trouble with her, Femi, eh?”

“No, Papa,” he mumbled.

“Good. When they have an evening for parents, I look forward to discussing your progress.”

Femi did not reply.

“Why are you asking about her?” Sade was about to turn detective.

“I just wanted to know. I like your pudding, Sade. You could be a chef.”

T
HURSDAY
9
TH
O
CTOBER

The first thing Sade noticed as she opened the front door after school on Friday was Papa’s briefcase.

“Why is Papa home so early?” Femi jostled her from behind.

Sade was about to say she wasn’t psychic when she heard a female voice. Inside the living room Mrs. Wallace was sitting next to the telephone with Papa’s hand on her shoulder. Her spine was rigid, with her head bent over the receiver. Papa lifted a finger to his lips.

“The line is bad. Please repeat what you said.” Her voice was as stiff as her back. “Rebels attacked Edward’s school?…Abducted children, oh my God! What about Eddie?…No, I can’t believe this, oh my God….”

Sade saw Papa’s long fingers stretch over Mrs. Wallace’s shoulder. Her tone was rising.

“…Did no one try to stop them? What about the
teachers, the police, the army?…Shot, my God! What’s happening now?” Mrs. Wallace was shaking. Her free hand swung from her mouth to her forehead, through her hair, out in front of her, beating the air, until Papa caught it and held it tight. Sade watched, mesmerized. Femi stood stock still beside her.

“I’m going to come! I have to…. Of course I do. Yes, I know the risks…. I know that, I know…. All right, but…Does Mummy know?…I’ll ring later….”

Papa signaled urgently to Mrs. Wallace.

“Give your brother this number,” he whispered.

“You’d better take this number. It belongs to a friend….”

Mrs. Wallace replaced the receiver. Slowly she lifted her face up to Papa. Although embarrassed by their intimacy, Sade didn’t avert her eyes.

“Rebels broke into Eddie’s dormitory…early this morning…a teacher tried to bar them…they shot him…” Mrs. Wallace was breathing heavily. “They forced twenty boys to go with them…at gunpoint…two escaped but…but…” She was struggling to string her words together in a whirlwind. “But Eddie is missing. My Eddie…is…miss…”

Her words dissolved into sobs. Strange, alarming adult sobs that swept Sade back to a room full of shocked grown-ups and Mama’s sister wailing over their mother’s body wrapped in an embroidered bedspread, drenched in crimson. For the second time in a week, Sade saw Papa enclose Mrs. Wallace in his arms. Sade fled to her room.

She lay on top of her bed with her headphones on and
music drowning all sound from the living room. But pictures, already seeded inside her head, insisted on unfurling themselves. The images would have been like a story in a film if she hadn’t seen those children talking to Auntie Hannah. Real, flesh-and-blood children talking about doing things so frightful that no child would make them up. Their blank eyes spoke the truth. She had no idea what Edward looked like. But a face emerged with two terrified black holes for eyes and a gaping slash for a mouth. It belonged to a boy being grabbed from his bed. A boy in pajamas with a rifle poking him in the back, trampling over the body of his teacher, stumbling barefoot across a school yard before disappearing into thick dark forest. What would the rebels do to him? What would they make him do?

Sade returned to the kitchen when it was time to prepare supper. Through the doorway she heard Papa ring the cab office and cancel his work for the night. Mrs. Wallace sat covering her face with her hands. The tall, upright figure suddenly looked reduced and vulnerable. Sade left her headphones hanging around her neck and worked in silence. She washed the rice slowly, her fingers sifting through the grains in the cloudy water. An urgent conversation was beginning next door.

“Don’t rush, Cynthie, please. You—we—need to think this through. They could arrest you the moment you land in Freetown.”

“I’ll have to take the risk. I’ll tell them, I’m not coming back to disturb their sleep with my articles. I’m
coming back to look for my son!”

“Eh, eh! We can’t expect soldiers to be rational! If they lock you up, what good is that to Edward and your family? They will have two people to worry about!”

Sade’s mind somersaulted. Before they had fled to England, it was Papa who had taken risks—and he was the one who had to be cautioned by Uncle Tunde.

They’re not finished with you, Folarin!…They won’t stop until they’ve shut you up…. Tell me, what can you write from the grave?

Now here was Papa trying to convince Mrs. Wallace to be careful! Reminding her of danger. The government soldiers would laugh in her face. Why should they care if the son of a troublesome “pen pusher” had been kidnapped by rebels? They might say this would teach her a lesson. Papa spoke bluntly, and Mrs. Wallace said less and less.

“You don’t have to make a decision tonight. There are things we can do here. We’ll contact the International Red Cross—give them a photo of Edward. We’ll alert aid workers in the camps to look out for him.”

There was silence. Sade glanced into the living room. Mrs. Wallace was staring blankly ahead, not looking at Papa. With the film that must be running in her head, probably she could not even hear him.

Mrs. Wallace barely touched her plate of rice and beans. After supper she made another call to Freetown. From the snatches Sade heard, it sounded as if Mrs. Wallace’s brother was saying the same things as Papa. Afterward, when Mrs. Wallace wanted to return to her lodgings, Papa was adamant. She should not spend the
night alone. He would sleep on the sofa in the living room so she could have his bedroom.

“Mrs. Wallace can have my bed, Papa. I’ll sleep on the sofa. I’m shorter than you.” The words came out of Sade’s mouth before she had even thought about what she was saying.

“Thank you, Sade.” Mrs. Wallace accepted quietly. She sounded exhausted. “If I can sleep, maybe I shall think more clearly in the morning.”

If Papa was surprised, he kept it to himself. She had surprised herself. As she returned to her room to take what she needed for the night, she wondered what had come over her. She noticed that Femi’s door was already closed. No point trying to talk to him. She hadn’t heard him say a single word since the phone call from Freetown.