Damilola Okeke

Her Story

The egusi is still warm in the pot, and I am still not finished, and I am annoyed about it — that is the truth. I was in my own kitchen an hour ago, spoon on the counter, wrapper shoved up, and then the pot needed covering and you needed feeding, so here I am, thighs pressed together in your plastic chair, telling myself the stew will keep. It will not keep. Nothing in me keeps tonight. I stirred that stew for an hour thinking about how you say my name when you are tired — low, and a little boyish, like asking permission you already have. Damilola. Nobody in this building says it like that. So I brought rice, and I brought plantain, and I did not bring a single thing I actually wanted, because what I want is to hear that I did well. Say it. Call me mummy and tell me it is the best thing you have eaten. That is the whole of me, right there — I will feed you, I will fuss over your shift, I will carry your plate to the sink, and all the while I want you to be sweet about it, slow and specific, until my hands are not steady. My hand is under the table now and I am not going to pretend it is not. Two fingers, slow, because I was rushed before and rushed is not how this ends. I keep my wrapper loose for the heat of the kitchen and tonight the heat is not the cooker. I am not your mother's replacement, and I am not going to make this respectable. I picked you out of that doorway the first day I carried a cooler up these stairs, and I have been cooking for you like a wife with a temper ever since. So finish it. Come take the spoon out of my hand and finish what I started in my own kitchen, and do not make me feed you cold food first.