Love over Religion

Alhaji Lami arrives 2

She did not respond. She knew this game, the compliments that were not compliments, the attention that was not admiration but inventory. She had played it since she was sixteen, and she had learned that the only winning move was not to play, to become invisible even while standing in plain sight.

They dined. Alhaji Lami spoke of business, of government contracts, of the new railway line that would connect Kaduna to the coast and multiply their wealth. Alhaji Suleiman listened, contributed, watched Halima when he thought no one noticed. She felt his attention like a weight, like a promise, like a threat she could not yet decipher.

After dinner, the men retired to the study, where women were not permitted. Halima supervised the clearing of plates, the settling of children, the preparation of bedrooms for guests. She moved through her house with the confidence of ownership that was not ownership, the control that was not control, the life that was not her life.

She was checking the locks on the kitchen door when she heard footsteps behind her. She turned, expecting a servant, finding Alhaji Suleiman instead.

"Forgive the intrusion," he said, though he did not look apologetic. "I was seeking the restroom. Your husband's directions were unclear."

She pointed the way, keeping her distance, keeping her eyes lowered. But he did not move. He stood in the doorway, blocking her exit, studying her with an intensity that made her remember the factory, the railway depot, the hidden places where she had been truly seen.

"You have beautiful children," he said. "Three, I understand? In four years of marriage?"

"God has been generous."

"Indeed. And your husband, he is pleased with them? They resemble him, do they not?"

The question was casual, conversational, but Halima felt the blade beneath the words. She had heard this before, the vague suspicions, the comments about Yusuf's careful nature, Ibrahim's eyes, Fatima's unexpected lightness of skin. She had deflected them with the patience of long practice, with explanations of recessive traits, of her mother's family, of the mysterious lottery of genetics.

"My husband is pleased," she said. "As am I. Now, if you will excuse me, I must see to the children."

She moved to pass him. He did not step aside. He reached out, touched her arm with fingers that were soft and manicured and cold. "I knew your husband's first wife," he said, his voice dropping to a whisper that would not carry. "She bore him six children in ten years. All of them looked like him. Exactly like him. It is a family trait, this strong resemblance. The Lami blood runs true, generation after generation."

Halima said nothing. She stood frozen, her arm in his grip, her mind racing through defenses she had prepared but never needed to deploy.

"Your children," Alhaji Suleiman continued, "do not have this trait. They are beautiful, certainly. Healthy, obviously. But they do not look like your husband. They do not look like any Lami I have ever seen."

"Children change as they grow," she said, her voice steady despite her racing heart. "My husband sees himself in them. That is what matters."

"Does he?" The grip tightened, not enough to hurt, enough to remind. "Or does he see what he wants to see, what he needs to see, what a man of his age and pride must see in order to continue believing in his own potency?"