Bab 0007

I've got oil and beans.

I've got oil and beans.

I am not scared, no, not at all

I'm not scared of having twins

I've got oil and beans.

Eniiyi scowled at the women's loud singing. She looked around for the mother of the twins, all she could see was the women and children. Some sat around the lounge room, singing. She could hear the noise some were making from the kitchen and from the aroma, they were cooking. She could see her grandmother among the women seated and just when she was going to look away, the woman caught her gaze.

'Eniiyi, wáńbí,' she called over.

Eniiyi winced and looked at Lastborn who nodded her on. She turned back to her grandmother, sighed and started to walk towards her, lowering her head to scowl. Why did she have to call her that loud in these room full of women? Now all those annoying people would start staring at her. She made a mental note to give Lastborn a piece of her mind. All she'd wanted was to see babies.

'Ẹ káàsán mà,' she said and curtsied low on reaching her. Grandma had insisted she at least learn how to greet 'properly' in Yoruba.

G.ma pulled her to sit on her lap and touched her all over the body.

'Káàsán, Eniiyi. How was your sleep? Are you feeling okay now? Have you eaten? I told Taiwo to serve you food once you're up.'

'I've not eaten,' she answered the question that seemed priority.

'Ehya, he probably didn't see you. That boy, and he was supposed to keep an eye on you, o.' Grandma frowned, as if Taiwo were in front of her right now and she was reprimanding him.

Taiwo was G.ma's houseboy and the only person Eniiyi actually warmed up to. The man of nineteen always made her laugh whenever he was around.

'Iya Kutu,' Grandma called to a very dark-skin woman who was just exiting the kitchen.

The young woman walked over to her wiping her hands on her outer wrapper. 'Yes, Mama Nurse?'

People called her grandmother Mama Nurse, because her husband had been a nurse when he was still alive, Taiwo had explained.

'Can you find something to serve my daughter here?'

The woman smiled. 'We just put the moin-moin* off the stove. Would you like moin-moin and ẹ̀kọ**?' The woman looked at her.

She had dazzling white teeth, and a deep dimple on her left cheek, Eniiyi noted. She nodded yes and smiled back.

'Ṣé oò le sọ̀rọ̀ ni?' Grandma chided her.

'I'd like that,' she said. Why was G.ma now angry she'd only nodded, it's not as if the woman didn't understand. She suddenly remembered she was still perched on Grandma's lap and stood up.

The woman was already heading back to the kitchen and she wasn't sure if to follow or wait for her to bring the meal. In the end she decided to follow. She pushed through the crowd in the living room, wondering where the baby mother was in all these.

'Is your child's name Kut?' she asked the figure in front of her.

The woman turned on reaching the kitchen. 'No, the people call him that. We named him Cuthbert.'

'Smashing,' Eniiyi muttered under her breath, sarcastically. Gratefully, the woman didn't seem to hear.

She was served two wraps of moin-moin and a cup of pap. She'd have preferred custard, but she had an idea she'd probably never get to take custard till she was back in Osogbo.

'Why are you cooking when it's not the naming ceremony yet?' she asked while eating.

Iya Kutu dimpled fondly and shook her head. 'No one jokes with twins. They're children that have a legendary reputation of making their parents rich. So everyone welcomes them with arms open. A Yoruba adage says "Ọmọ tó bá ṣípá ni ìyá èńgbé", meaning: It is the child that has his arms outstretched that the mother carries. Besides, if it had not been twins we'd have cooked, too, but not as elaborate.'

By then Eniiyi was done eating and she stood up to go and rinse the pap cup and discard of the moin-moin leaves.

'Hey, you, child! Didn't your mother teach you to wash plate after using it?' A tall skinny woman asked over where she was scooping pap into containers.

'But I just . . .'

'Don't talk back to an adult when you're being spoken to,' a woman beside the first added.

Eniiyi scowled and drew her eyes to slits. 'I was just about to tell her that I'd rinsed the cup, thank you very much, you're not welcome.' She dropped the cup on a tray and, pretending not to hear the women gasp, left the kitchen. She did catch a look of surprise Mrs Kut (Or what was her name again?)'s face.

She smirked. The nosy women had asked for it and she was not one to let anybody condescend her, be it an adult. Any adult that provoked children was calling for disrespect and shouldn't flare up for getting what they asked for.