Page 67 of Cursed Daughters
She was ready to leave thirty minutes after she arrived. She had work the next day, and no real skill for small talk. But she could see Eniiyi was having fun; she could give her another forty-five minutes.
She sipped the champagne offered, and tried to look as though she were not out of place. The music was good at least, and the food kept on coming. Tolu had left with his date; he claimed to have another party he was hoping to make, but she suspected he was simply trying to get away from her.
She felt the presence before she saw the man. Instinctively, her body stiffened.
“Hello, stranger,” he said.
She finished the rest of her champagne before saying, “I wasn’t aware you knew Tomisin.”
“I don’t. I’m a friend of his wife’s friend.”
“It’s a children’s birthday party.”
“I was not given that information before I showed up.” He laughed. He liked to laugh at himself. He said something to her, but the music was too loud for her to hear him clearly, and she didn’t bother asking him to repeatit.
“Ebunoluwa, can I get you something to drink?”
“No. I…I’m not looking for…”
“It’s just a drink. What are you afraid of?” When she didn’t answer, he shrugged. “I’m heading off. But if you want to talk, you know how to find me.”
She watched from the corner of her eye as he left the party, thenshe heard someone shouting for help. She stood up and instinctively scanned for her daughter. She couldn’t see her. She started to head for the pool, which was where the crowd was at its most dense. The music was still playing, and most people were oblivious to the shouting. She moved quickly, her heart in her mouth. Someone jumped into the swimming pool.
And then she saw the beaded hair, the small, struggling hands, and her brain filled the gaps. Her daughter was going to die. She was going to lose Eniiyi the same way Aunty Bunmi lost Monife. She saw her daughter go under, and she ran, kicking off her heels as she went and shouldering through the crowd. She couldn’t swim, but she didn’t recall that in the moment. Someone grabbed her arm.
“He has her.”
The someone that had jumped into the pool was just a teenager. But he was swimming with one arm, towing her daughter beside him. The onlookers pulled the teenager and the small child up. Ebun ran to the side of the pool, nearly slipping, and grabbed Eniiyi, holding her tightly. Her daughter was crying, shaking, sobbing; but it was over. And yet she couldn’t shake the dread that descended on her. She had lived several lifetimes in that moment. She had seen her laughing, dancing cousin dead on a slab. She had nearly seen her child dead on a slab. Was that what it meant to be a reincarnation? Was her child doomed to walk the same path that Mo did? She held her baby to her chest and hushed both their thumping hearts.
III
Her daughter’s first swimming lesson was unpleasant. Eniiyi kept crying out for her, but Ebun hardened her heart. There was more at stake than a six-year-old’s discomfort. It was a matter of life and death.
The swim coach—Mr. Alieu—lacked any form of patience. She wasn’t convinced he was accustomed to teaching children. She wasn’t even certain he had been trained to teach. In Eniiyi’s first lesson, he picked her up and tossed her into the deep end.
She watched her daughter flailing in the water, and fought the urge to jump in. She wouldn’t help the child by saving her. One day Eniiyi would understand; maybe she would even thank her. Whatever else happened, she would make sure that her daughter could conquer the water, so that if Monife were ever tempted to call her into the watery depths, Eniiyi could fight for her life. But as for the present, Ebun could see that Eniiyi hated the lessons. She would start to cry as soon as they arrived at the pool, but found no sympathy in her mother’s stony gaze.
Mr. Alieu shouted his instructions, growing annoyed when Eniiyi repeated a mistake—“Abi, are you deaf ni? Why are you twisting your body from side to side? Elongate! Elongate!” And he would push her to the point of exhaustion.
Ebun could have stopped it. She came close to stopping it; but then she saw how her daughter had improved, her arms and legs working as one, propelling her in the water. She was gliding. And though she continued to resist, to call Mr. Alieu names under herbreath, there was no denying the progress. Eniiyi was six when they started the lessons; a hundred and fifty sessions later, a pre-pubescent girl climbed out of the water and wrung her hair with her hands before turning and seeing her mother. Their eyes met across the pool. And then Eniiyi walked away.
IV
“…and you will meet a man who will take care of you and your children; and break our family curse.”
“And then you’ll get married too, Grandma?”
“Well, I have been married plenty of times before, darling. We need to focus on you.”
Ebun chose that moment to enter her mother’s bedroom. She was beginning to feel like the ghost in the Falodun home; lurking around corners, eavesdropping on conversations. All because she couldn’t trust that her mother and aunt weren’t saying what they weren’t supposed to say or doing what they weren’t supposed to do.
Kemi was sitting at her dresser in her cotton nightie, curling sections of her hair with rollers, whilst Eniiyi was lying on her grandmother’s bed half listening and half playing Snake on the Nokia phone Kemi had gotten for her, despite Ebun’s express request that she not do so. The dog was dozing at the foot of the bed, smelling strongly of perfume.
Ebun now glared at her mother. “What are you talking about?”
“She will need to learn about the curse sooner or later, Ebun,” her mother replied.
“Mum, I need you to stop filling her head with nonsense. This is how you guys confused Monife.”
