Free Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Page A

they were. A person who had to spread the cloak of religion over her own petty desires.Suddenly, the last thing Ifemelu wanted was to be in that small room full of shadows. It had all seemed benign before, her mother’s faith, all drenched in grace, and suddenly it no longer was. She wished, fleetingly, that her mother was not her mother, and for this she felt not guilt and sadness but a single emotion, a blend of guilt and sadness.
    The bus stop was eerily empty, and she imagined all the people who would have been crowded here, now in churches, singing and praying. She waited for the bus, wondering whether to go home or somewhere else to wait for a while. It was best to go home, and face whatever she had to face.

    HER MOTHER PULLED her ear, an almost-gentle tug, as though reluctant to cause real pain. She had done that since Ifemelu was a child. “I will beat you!” she would say, when Ifemelu did something wrong, but there was never any beating, only the limp ear pull. Now, she pulled it twice, once and then again to emphasize her words. “The devil is using you. You have to pray about this. Do not judge. Leave the judging to God!”
    Her father said, “You must refrain from your natural proclivity towards provocation, Ifemelu. You have singled yourself out at school where you are known for insubordination and I have told you that it has already sullied your singular academic record. There is no need to create a similar pattern in church.”
    “Yes, Daddy.”
    When Aunty Uju arrived, Ifemelu’s mother told her what had happened. “Go and give that Ifemelu a talking-to. You are the only person she will listen to. Ask her what I did to her that makes her want to embarrass me in the church like this. She insulted Sister Ibinabo! It is like insulting Pastor! Why must this girl be a troublemaker? I have been saying it since, that it would be better if she was a boy, behaving like this.”
    “Sister, you know her problem is that she doesn’t always know when to keep her mouth shut. Don’t worry, I will talk to her,” Aunty Uju said, playing her role of pacifier, soothing her cousin’s wife. She had always got along with Ifemelu’s mother, the easy relationshipbetween two people who carefully avoided conversations of any depth. Perhaps Aunty Uju felt gratitude to Ifemelu’s mother for embracing her, accepting her status as the special resident relative. Growing up, Ifemelu did not feel like an only child because of the cousins, aunts, and uncles who lived with them. There were always suitcases and bags in the flat; sometimes a relative or two would sleep on the floor of the living room for weeks. Most were her father’s family, brought to Lagos to learn a trade or go to school or look for a job, so that the people back in the village would not mutter about their brother with only one child who did not want to help raise others. Her father felt an obligation to them, he insisted that everyone be home before eight p.m., made sure there was enough food to go around, and locked his bedroom door even when he went to the bathroom, because any of them could wander in and steal something. But Aunty Uju was different. Too clever to waste away in that backwater, he said. He called her his youngest sister although she was the child of his father’s brother, and he had been more protective, less distant, with her. Whenever he came across Ifemelu and Aunty Uju curled up in bed talking, he would fondly say “You two.” After Aunty Uju left to go to university in Ibadan, he told Ifemelu, almost wistfully, “Uju exerted a calming influence on you.” He seemed to see, in their closeness, proof of his own good choice, as though he had knowingly brought a gift to his family, a buffer between his wife and daughter.
    And so, in the bedroom, Aunty Uju told Ifemelu, “You should have just made the garland. I’ve told you that you don’t have to say everything. You have to learn that. You don’t have to
say
everything.”
    “Why