Ikenga Read online

  By the time all the kids spilled into the schoolyard on their way home, Nnamdi could barely contain his anger. All day, he’d seemed to be looking at Chioma’s back. In the hallway, during class, during recess, and now as school let out. As he stood with his friends, he watched Chioma and her girlfriends buy Fanta and Coca-Cola from a hawker on the side of the road. He knew she’d buy Bitter Lemon, her favorite.

  “I think if we gang up on him, he’ll lower the price,” Jide was saying. Jide, Hassan, and Ruff Diamond were about to accost the bun-seller for having the nerve to raise his prices this week.

  “The man is stubborn,” Hassan said. “He’ll probably raise the prices even more if we do that. He knows he’s the only one around here who sells them.”

  “And it’s not the price, man,” Ruff Diamond said. “It’s the size. Who wants to eat those bite-sized things he’s switched to selling?”

  Nnamdi couldn’t have cared less. He gazed at Chioma. How could he have raised a hand to his friend . . . his best friend? He had his school buddies, sure. They played soccer after school and talked about girls. But Chioma was the only person who noticed how quiet he’d gotten after his father’s death. She was the only one who asked him why he liked pepper soup with fish in it instead of goat meat. She was the only one who’d known his father as well as he had.

  “Hey! Nnamdi?!”

  He nearly jumped, taking his eyes from Chioma to glare at his friend Jide. He could feel a headache coming on. “What, Jide?” Nnamdi snapped. But he couldn’t help it. He glanced back at Chioma one more time. “What is it?”

  Jide laughed loudly. “What is it with you and that girl Chioma?”

  Ruff Diamond snickered. “Isn’t it obvious? She dumped him!”

  “HA HA!” Jide shouted. “You must be kidding. You dated her? That rascally looking loudmouthed girl? I thought she was just your neighbor or family friend.”

  Nnamdi could barely contain himself. His headache was raging, and he felt his muscles tense up.

  Ruff Diamond chuckled lightheartedly. “If you get her to date you again, you should ask her to wash her crazy hair.”

  “Shut up,” Nnamdi said through clenched teeth. “Do I need to mention Fisayo dumping you because of your body odor?”

  The smile dropped from Ruff Diamond’s face. “Look at this idiot,” Ruff Diamond said to Jide. Hassan had long since backed away, seeming to sense things were about to get bad. “Who are you?” Ruff Diamond hissed, looking Nnamdi up and down. Jide laughed, siding with Ruff Diamond, and Ruff Diamond kept talking. “They kill your father in his own office, yet some shadow guy comes and takes out two of those criminals in two nights. He did in two days what your father couldn’t do in years! You come from weak stock, man.”

  POW! Nnamdi punched Ruff Diamond in the face before he knew what he was doing. He felt his fist connect with Ruff Diamond’s chin. Ruff Diamond was a tall, strong boy, much bigger than Nnamdi. But to Nnamdi right now, Ruff Diamond was nothing. Ruff Diamond stumbled, then lunged at Nnamdi, bringing his fist back. Nnamdi easily stepped aside and pushed him down.

  “Gonna kill you!” Ruff Diamond growled, trying to get to his feet, sniffing back tears.

  Nnamdi kicked him back down. “Stay down!” Nnamdi roared, his voice deepening. He was shaking now. Ruff Diamond whimpered, went flat on the ground, and did not move. Jide and Hassan stood feet away, shocked. “Stay in the dirt where you belong!” Nnamdi said. “You cover yourself with all that bling, but underneath you’re just like everyone else.” He looked up and met Chioma’s eyes and immediately his clouded mind cleared. My voice, he realized. Oh God! What am I doing?! He felt himself deflate. Had he grown taller, too?

  “. . . hurting him!” she was saying. She’d been standing there all along, shouting at him. “STOP IT!” Her friend Onuchi stood behind her, grabbing at her arm and staring at Nnamdi with terrified eyes.

  “Leave him,” Onuchi screeched. “He’s crazy!”

  THUMP THUMP. The pounding was deep in his head. THUMP THUMP. And it seemed as if a red shadow lifted from his eyes. THUMP THUMP. Nnamdi just stood there as Chioma helped Ruff Diamond up. His nose was bleeding and his face was swollen. Nnamdi looked around. Hassan, Jide, and several other kids stood around him, silent, eyes wide.

  “What’s wrong with you, Nnamdi?” Chioma shouted at him. Nnamdi glared at her, ignoring a pang of guilt. All day she had refused to speak to him and now, finally, after he’d nearly killed one of his stupid friends, she decided to say something. Nnamdi wiped the tears of anger from his eyes, shoved his hands in his pockets, and quickly walked away.

  He saw that Chioma let her friend pull her away in the opposite direction. Good, he thought. He didn’t want to be around anyone. His vision had gone red and black when he was beating his friend. He could feel the size and strength of the Man within him, powering his punches, fueling his rage. What was happening to him?

  He pushed the image of Ruff Diamond’s bloody face out of his mind. He had done that. Car horns blasted at him as he walked onto the road, not looking to see if any cars were coming. He didn’t care. I should throw the Ikenga away, he thought. But throwing it away would make him feel more hopeless. No, he’d do no such thing. It wasn’t the Ikenga’s fault. Ruff Diamond had it coming, he thought darkly.

  * * *

  “Good afternoon,” Mr. Oke said, opening the gate for him.

  “Afternoon,” Nnamdi muttered, looking down so that Mr. Oke wouldn’t see his red swollen eyes. He’d tried to hold them back, but as he walked home, the tears kept coming.

  Mr. Oke walked up to him. “What’s wrong? You look—”

  “I’m fine,” he said, quickly moving past him. He wasn’t ready for any questions. Not yet. His mother would hear about the fight by the end of the day anyway. Nnamdi froze. There was a blue Mercedes parked in the driveway, right in front of the house. Nnamdi frowned.

  “Nnamdi, did someone hurt you?” Mr. Oke asked.

  Nnamdi just shook his head. Mr. Oke’s cell phone went off and he held up a hand as he answered it. He grinned widely, “Vicky,” he said. “Baby, I’ve been waiting for your call.” He walked away for privacy and Nnamdi quickly went inside. He entered the living room and froze.

  His mother was sitting on the couch. “Nnamdi, honey,” she said. A man sat on the couch as well and he was seated way too close to her. She quickly got up, pausing for a moment to look at his dirty school uniform. “Nnamdi, this is my friend Mr. Bonny Chibuzor.”

  The man stood and stepped up to Nnamdi.

  “Nice to meet you,” he said, shaking Nnamdi’s hand firmly.

  Mr. Bonny Chibuzor was not as tall as Nnamdi’s father. But he was built strong. He looked like one of those construction workers who lifted and cemented concrete blocks all day. The only difference was that he wore a stylish suit and his big hands were not that rough.

  “Your mother has told me many good things about you,” Bonny added.

  “Well, she hasn’t told me anything about you,” Nnamdi said.

  “Nnamdi!” his mother snapped. Then she chuckled. “He’s just tired from school.” She gave Nnamdi a dirty look.

  “It’s nice to meet you, sir,” Nnamdi said, lowering his head. He glanced at his mother. “Can I go do my homework?”

  “Please do,” his mother coolly said.

  The Go-Slow

  IT TOOK NNAMDI two weeks to accept it; his mother was dating Bonny. Nnamdi had to see him every Saturday and many times during the week, when Bonny would drive his mother to and from the market. Bonny, who was a medical doctor, always had a smile on his face and something in his hands that made his mother squeal with delight. His mother had settled into the job selling tapioca and now even had a stall in the market. Nnamdi’s mother had her pride, so she refused when Bonny offered to help with money.

  She didn’t even let Bonny help with Nnamdi’s school fees or groceri
es. However, she enjoyed the little things he bought her—like fresh fish, delicious teas, and a dress he knew she had her eye on. Nnamdi had never seen his mother like this and he wasn’t sure whether it relieved or irritated him. He didn’t like Bonny, no matter how many packets of biscuits he gave Nnamdi or how many times he asked how school was going.

  Bonny had recently bought his mother her first cell phone. His father had never liked cell phones and banned them from the house. His mother had not argued about this, despite the fact that all her friends had them. Nnamdi wondered if this had to do with the fact that his mother never wanted to receive the News on her cell. But not owning a phone hadn’t kept away the News that every family of a police officer dreads. Nnamdi had received the Letter instead. Maybe the fact that she’d gotten the News regardless was why she accepted the cell phone from Bonny.

  Nnamdi hated hearing his mother chat with Bonny in the evenings. The sound of his mother’s happy voice made him think about his father and the fact that he wasn’t there. The only direct connection he had to his father now was the Ikenga. The Ikenga! What to do with it? He wished he could ask Chioma what he should do, but it had been two weeks now and Chioma was still not speaking to him. Neither were any of his friends.

  Nnamdi sighed as he stared out the car window, his mind heavy with his own miseries and confusion. He still had no idea how to control when he changed into the Man. It hadn’t happened since that time with Bad Market. And he still had not gotten revenge on the Chief of Chiefs. His world was upside down and now he was in Bonny’s car with his mother on their way to eat at the Calabar Kitchen Restaurant.

  “I’m not kidding, o,” Bonny was saying to Nnamdi’s mother. She laughed hard and tapped him on the shoulder to stop talking. But he kept going. “The woman was so empty-headed that when she finally got to the house, she forgot her child in the car, and the taxi driver . . .” Both he and Nnamdi’s mother totally lost it, laughing like crazy. Nnamdi hoped Bonny wouldn’t crash his precious blue Mercedes. But then again, that would be kind of funny. The only time Bonny had ever gotten irritated with Nnamdi was when he saw Nnamdi leaning against the vehicle one day.

  “Off the car!” he’d snapped, coming out of the house.

  When Nnamdi had quickly moved away, Bonny had polished the place Nnamdi had been touching, using the sleeve of his white shirt. Bonny would probably have a heart attack if he ever crashed his car, Nnamdi thought. Of course, that wasn’t likely to happen today, as they’d just gotten stuck in a “go-slow.” Who knew how long they’d be in the congested traffic?

  Sunset was fast approaching and Nnamdi’s stomach was growling. He had his mother’s cell phone and was playing Connect Four on it to keep himself occupied. He was winning. His mother let out another peal of laughter and Nnamdi squeezed her phone in anger. CRACK! He gasped. He’d crushed it. A piece of plastic fell to the floor.

  He stared at the phone, feeling a drop in the pit of his belly. His mother was going to kill him. And how was he going to explain how he did it? In the car? He looked at his mother and Bonny and wondered if he should say something now while they were both in such a giggly mood. A shadow passed his window and he felt a chill.

  “Mommy, did you see that?” he asked.

  But she and Bonny were fiddling with the radio. Bonny found a music station and she shimmied her shoulders as Bonny sang along to the tune. The windows were down and the car’s engine was off, the same as the other vehicles around them. Nnamdi leaned out the window to see if he could spot anything ahead. There were hawkers walking from window to window, selling peanuts, plantain chips, “pure water,” and Coca-Cola. Things seemed normal enough. But he could feel it in his chest—something was very wrong.

  He was looking through the windshield when he saw his mother’s purse disappear right before his eyes. He blinked. It had been there. Sitting on the dashboard. Then it was gone!

  “Mommy!” he shouted, pointing to where her purse had been. “Your purse!”

  She frowned a bit at him, looking annoyed at being shaken from her enjoyment of the music.

  “Eh?” Bonny asked.

  “Mommy’s purse!” Nnamdi insisted. “It was right there! It’s gone! I saw it disappear!”

  His mother started, looking around her seat. “Oh my God,” she said. “Oh my God!” Bonny started looking around his seat, too.

  He felt the softest touch in his hand. He looked down. Now the crushed mobile phone was gone! He was about to say something when Bonny jumped up, bashing his head on the car ceiling. “Ah!” he exclaimed, rubbing his head. He started looking around like crazy. “My watch, o! What is going on?”

  Nnamdi heard similar exclamations from other vehicles all around him. People’s things were disappearing left and right. Some people jumped out of their cars and ran off.

  “It’s Mama Go-Slow!” his mother said, taking off her seat belt. “We need to get out of here immediately. Sometimes she has people beaten. She won’t take the car; that’s not how she operates.”

  Nnamdi looked around, his body tingly with adrenaline. He knew what he was going to do. All he had to do was do it. I can do it, he thought. He remembered what Mama Go-Slow looked like at the funeral—wearing her stylish red abada clothing and blocky black shoes as she walked like a buffalo. She was a scary lady.

  “You sure they won’t take my car?!” Bonny said, looking distressed.

  “Yes, yes,” his mother said, jumping out of the car. “My . . . my husband said she never steals cars. Just people’s things.” She opened Nnamdi’s door. “Come on! Move, move, move!”

  Nnamdi got out and ran down the road behind his mother and Bonny and everyone else. When they weren’t watching, he stopped beside a truck. His legs felt rubbery. He looked at his mother and Bonny as they ran farther and farther, thinking he was right behind them. He bit his lip, his heart slamming in his chest. “Go,” he said. But he couldn’t move. “Go! Go, Nnamdi!” he shouted, and ran to the other side of the truck. He got down and rolled beneath it. He waited. Only for a moment. He gasped as he felt himself change into the Man. Everything stretched and he was sure he could crush bricks with his bare hands. This time it felt nearly voluntary and with the change came something else. His uneasiness disappeared. “Where is she?” he whispered to himself in his low, rumbly voice. He waited some more.

  From under the truck, he saw feet run by. Gym shoes. Sandals. Slippers. Pumps. Flip-flops. Oxfords. Big and small. All running. Then he saw a pair of wide, chunky black shoes standing a few cars away. He leaned out a bit and could see the shoes belonged to a pair of short, fat legs. He rolled out and jumped up.

  She had her back to Nnamdi and he stared at her. She was a short, stocky woman with patchy fair brown skin and thick, bushy black eyebrows. His father had speculated that she colored them with coal to make herself look more intimidating. Today she wore a bright yellow dress that barely reached her knees. Her method of attack was to wait until traffic was heavy and people got comfortable and turned off their vehicles. Then she and her trained thugs would descend on the cars, SUVs, and trucks, robbing people of everything they had with them . . . including useless things like crushed cell phones. Mama Go-Slow was a trained dibia gifted in the arts of all kinds of juju and charms, a ninja and an expert in the South African martial art of Musangwe. His father had said she taught her thugs the art of blending in and fighting, so that, like ninjas, they were not seen or heard when they struck, and like Musangwe fighters, you did not want to cross them.

  Nnamdi hid behind a car, mere yards from Mama Go-Slow. He watched her as she proudly observed her thugs do her work. She laughed crazily as people ran for their lives. A few of her thugs, who were dressed in camouflage bodysuits and were probably older teenage boys, purposely knocked people over and shouted and slapped at them until they fled.

  “Yes, yes, panic,” Mama Go-Slow loudly said. “Run. This road has a toll you must pay. I am like the
troll under the bridge: pay me or you can’t pass.” She laughed heartily, her round belly vibrating.

  Nnamdi took a deep breath; watching her like this gave him such a bad, bad feeling. It was now or never. He ran at her like a great lumbering black beast. If he grabbed her quickly enough, he could get a hand over her mouth and drag her away from the road before her thugs spotted them. But she’s just a tiny old woman, he briefly thought. He pushed the thought away. None of her thugs were around her. He would grab the collar of her dress and . . . She turned to him just before he reached her. WHAM! As if he’d run into a wall! He stumbled back and sat down hard, dazed. Right there on the road.

  Mama Go-Slow belly-laughed heartily as Nnamdi shook his head and pushed himself up, reaching out again to grab her, harnessing all his super-strength. The invisible force slammed into him again and he fell back to the street. This time the force ground his face onto the warm concrete. He painfully twisted his neck, fighting to keep his eye on her.

  “And stay down,” she said, still laughing.

  “Mama, are you all right?” one of her helpers asked her as he ran up. He was carrying several purses.

  “Oh, I’m fine,” she said, gazing down her nose at Nnamdi. “Gather the others. Have them take everything to the car. This is the Man and I’m going to show him who really has the power.”