Dust by Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor Read Free Book Online

hands gesturing upward. “Akai …”
    “Nyipir! I told you, ‘Bring my son home.’ Didn’t you hear me?”
    Nyipir’s hands move upward again. His mouth opens and closes. Saliva clings to his jaw.
    “Nyipir— where’s my child? ” Akai’s eyes bulge.
    “M-mama?” stutters Ajany.
    Akai points at the coffin. “Who?”
    Galgalu moves closer. He props the lantern against the tree. Uses his whole arm to wipe tears off his face. He had known it would come to this. He had known.
    Akai hobbles past. “Show. Me.”
    Galgalu unscrews the large bolts and opens the coffin lid.
    No time. No space.
    Akai-ma falls, arms stretched forward. She crawls, leans over Odidi’s body, reaches in, takes it by the shoulders, holding him to her breast, keening in intermittent groans, lips on Odidi’s forehead. She rocks her son, strokes his face, rocks her son. Odidi , she croons. Odidi, wake up. Son. Listen. Ebewesit. I’m calling you .
    To name something is to bring it to life.
    A churning heat, like heartburn with a rusty aftertaste, grows in Ajany’s gullet. Cry , Ajany tells herself. An ugly jealousy, of wanting to be the dead one held by her mother, being invoked to life by such sounds. Shame. Akai’s whimper. Cry , Ajany tells herself. Watches her brother limp in her mother’s arms. Live , she commands Odidi. But her eyes are dry.
    Akai-ma moans furiously. She batters the earth with one hand, while the other grips Odidi. “Take me. Here, you thing, take me.” Akai holds Odidi with dust-stained hands as if he were just born. She adjusts his shirt, moves his headrest, and swabs invisible drops from his face. She holds him to her breast, her head resting on his. She hums, her voice large, deep, husky, and ancient. She stares at the sky, rubs her face with her son’s hands. All of a sudden she looks over her shoulder and stares with intent at Nyipir.
    Ajany flinches at what hurtles between them. Nyipir shakes his head, palms out. “Akai.” A gray shadow descends around him. From his mouth, a whistling of deflation, and then his face is sunken and old.
    Akai-ma turns again to rock Odidi, humming.
    Nyipir lumbers toward her.
    Ajany kneels, watching them.
    Nyipir approaches; Akai lifts up her hands. She screeches, “Don’t. Touch. Me. You. Don’t. Touch …” She points at Nyipir. “Don’t.”
    Nyipir stands still in the middle of an eternal landscape that seems to foreshadow the end of life.
    Akai: coded prayers, unrepeatable curses.
    Galgalu pleads with her. “Mama, mamama …” Akai looks through him.
    Galgalu says, “Ma, give me the boy. I’ll put him to sleep.”
    Akai places her head against Odidi’s.
    Connecting.
    Galgalu kneels next to her, his face close to hers, her rifle floating in and out between them. Sticky wet of sorrow tears merging.
    “Odidi?” Akai-ma purrs, easing her son, she imagines, into wakefulness.
    It is more than an hour before Akai-ma lets Galgalu return Odidi’s body to the coffin. She adjusts Odidi’s shirt, strokes his sewn-shut eyes. “I can’t see,” she whispers to Galgalu when he seals the coffin’s lid.
    Galgalu places the lantern on top, a miniature beacon, then wipes its surface with his shawl and helps Akai up.
    Ajany and Nyipir creep closer to her.
    “M-mama,” Ajany calls.
    Akai-ma straightens up and blinks. “You?”
    A cold stone inside Ajany’s stomach flutters.
    “Arabel Ajany,” Akai-ma says. “Arabel Ajany.” Her voice falters.
    Ajany takes four steps toward Akai-ma, a history of longing in the movement. Akai’s arms reach out. Ajany steps in, inhales Akai-ma’s rancid, sad warmth. Incense, hope, and softness. Almost touching, almost disappearing into her mother. But then Akai shoves Ajany away. She drops her arms; her eyes dart left, up, and right. She groans, “Where’s your brother?”
    Ajany goes rigid.
    Nyipir intervenes. “See, Akai, see, Ajany’s home.”
    Akai-ma sucks air. “Why?” Childlike sound: “Where’s Odidi?”
    Ajany not