Free Butterfly Fish by Irenosen Okojie Page B

save my reading for another time. I played with the idea of who these men were. How they were linked to my mother, if at all. When I got to my final stop, I let out a sigh of relief and felt deflated as if my body was a deployed airbag.

Chewing Sticks
    A near-sated Benin now gorged on fat sunrays producing warm belches of air-spun dust that tethered to the tips of body hairs and coated the fingernails of its inhabitants. Adesua stood on the brink of being a little pleased. A sweeter alternative place to the misery she had experienced, not full happiness but a small portion she could be persuaded to dive into. This was because the Oba had handed over a peace offering that chipped somewhat at her newly erected barricade of a hard heart.
    Adesua had never seen anything like the brass head. It was so beautiful and so well polished that had it been possible to see her reflection in it, she would have found that an interference and attempted to wipe her image away just to continue admiring it. The proud expression captured on its face was disturbingly life-like and inspired the viewer to want to stand to attention. Adesua felt the sculpted face was the face of a true king, but of course did not say this to the Oba. Instead, she genuflected gracefully and thanked him for his consideration.
    Oba Odion in return forgetting his motivation for disposing of the object preened at her obvious pleasure. She was certain if he could have patted himself on the back he would have. He made a show of slapping his chest and announcing to her, let nobody say the Oba neglected his wives. He was so loud she was sure even theservants who kept their ears hovering near the ground at all times had already heard and digested the news and by the next day, would have repeated it to each other amidst their morning tasks while swapping complaints and gnawing on chewing sticks. Adesua did not complain when the Oba insisted he had court matters to see to, she caught the look of relief on his face, although, even that did not detract from the new prize in her possession.
    Oba Odion had eight wives. Eight wives who lined their chambers every morning like the curious bottles of perfume a Portuguese ally had brought for him several seasons ago. Eight lives he attempted to delicately shelter depending on his mood. His platoon of women were there to bear his children and prop up his pride even when their hands were bruised and left wanting. Of course the Oba did not love all of his wives. This was a task he was convinced most men would fail at even if they tried, so he did not pretend to try. Sometimes he imagined himself cut into eight slices served on a different platter for each wife to swallow. They were an unlikely bunch, each one different to the next, like colourful seashells thrown into a sandpit of the palace rather than coughed up freely on the banks of the sea.
    Omotole was his third and favourite wife and the smartest of all, with dark beady eyes that pulled you into their depths. His fourth wife Ekere was always sickly and each season the palace fretted whether she would see the beginning of the next. She had an angular jutting face and looked like thin brown skin poured over walking bones. At night she clutched her youngest child to her side as if she would draw strength from his soft smooth fleshed youth. Filo the fifth wife wore her sadness on her wrists like haphazard bracelets that wounded her skin. Her womb had apologetically born three dead babies, and on days when the air was thick with disdain for all who resided in the royal enclave, she could be found wandering the grounds harassing whoever she encountered to return her children. When the Oba had important guests visiting, she was kept hidden as if she were dirt sullying the Oba’s name.
    The sixth wife Remitan was known to stretch the truth as though it was a large ball of string. Most people in the palace believed every other word she uttered was a lie. Her hair was the envy of many.