Reading the Ceiling (26 page)

‘Did Amadou tell you all this?'

‘No, of course he didn't. I found out from the househelp. She heard all the shouting and saw this man hopping out of the bedroom with one trouser leg dragging on the floor.'

Bintou breaks into the pause by coming back with a tray of biscuits.

‘Did you know about the new underwear at the Hochiemys'?' Rohey asks. When I shake my head she says, ‘Why don't you come with me, I'm going there now You might find something you like.' She sees my hesitation and presses her point. ‘Amadou might like it too.'

‘All right then. Let me make sure Bintou understands what else to prepare for his supper.'

Bintou is sitting on a stool outside the kitchen door, singing a lilt from her home town in Cassamance. I launch into instructions. ‘Don't forget to get the
chereh
before dark. Start the sauce for me in the large saucepan. Leave the fish in the fridge and I'll finish it off when I get back. Get me some limes from the garden. This floor needs doing. And you need to make sure these surfaces are clean as you go along.'

Life is different from my best imaginings. I am about to go off to buy underwear with a woman who shares another bed with my husband. ‘Don't you think we're lucky?' says Rohey, as we head for her car together.

Moira, with the familiarity of a friend from childhood, visits every week after Amadou dies, usually laden with plants – ferns, orchids, a lady's-slipper. She stays and cooks with me – fish
chereh
, oxtail soup,
akara
with a fiery chilli sauce. Kweku Sola is often out when he's not in his room studying for his O levels. Soon, I start to look forward to Moira's company. It's the doing that helps mostly, someone to chat alongside. One Friday, she says she can't come to visit me because she is hosting a church supper at her house. She invites me along. I meet Brother Paul, who extracts a promise from me to attend his next Sunday evening service.

I go to the service three times before I offer my life to Christ. The church is in Brother Paul's house – a tidy verandahed bungalow off an untidy smelly street in Churchill's Town. Twenty of us meet there, in the combined sitting/dining room. We move the dining table to the front, as a preacher's desk. We edge the sofa and armchairs around the room, and dot the dining chairs between them.

Brother Paul has a round face and wears round glasses. He is balding on top, with hair around the side and the back which he shaves to match the hairless circle at the front. He favours brown safari suits. He and his equally round wife Acy huddle me into a new family and provide comfort with explanations.

Brother Paul preaches with power, his face mirroring the energy in his words. His voice changes tone, direction, volume. It lowers to a whisper, heightens to a roar. Sweat pours off him. He uses a large white handkerchief to mop his brow. On the Sunday I join the clump of two at the front of the room, the sermon is about a peace that passes all understanding. A peace that can become mine if I believe. It makes sense without me knowing why. I choose to go up and be prayed for with the laying on of hands. I turn to it all with relief. I choose to believe.

Amadou has been dead for six months. I knew the businesses and how much each one could make. Rohey did not. I knew that although the Mercedes distributorship had a smaller turnover, it also gave higher returns – more money for far less work. The Peugeot business was bigger, busier and brought with it a lot more hassle – more angry customers, more staff with hospital or school fees to settle. I knew which I preferred. I showed Rohey the figures. She chose the Peugeot saying she prefers a business with a lot of activity – she wants to keep herself busy.

We go out on church picnics at a spot way beyond the tourist beaches, past the young men who sell their bodies to wizened European tourists, to where the sand sparkles with glitter treasure from the sea. The water here moves with varieties of blue, the waves froth and spill onto the beach. Lagoons often get abandoned by the sea at low tide, and the water in them is still, reflecting palm trees against sand so sunbeaten it looks white.

Brother Paul says, ‘Look at God's creation. Look at the things around us. See how God's hand is in the blue of the sky. See how restless the sea is, how green the palm fronds. This is all God's doing.'

I can see what he means as the breeze that sways the trees also blows through my head, whisking away the whys crowding it out.

He says, ‘When I used to think I was clever, clever with the knowledge of science, I batted God away. I made up chemicals in the laboratory not knowing that their beauty was part of God's creation. Now my cleverness is based on how much I know of His word.' He holds up the Bible in his hand. He sounds certain, as if he knows the truth from deep inside his gut. He unfolds the teachings in the Bible like the careful peeling of a Sa'lone plum, with each strip letting loose dribbles of juice, with a sweet tang. Eating the soft, firm flesh is a delight that needs practice – in the middle is an energetically spiky seed. As he puts it, ‘The word of God is sweet and tears asunder.'

Our church grows. We move out of Brother Paul's house. We rent the school hall by the Latrikunda market. It is convenient and easy to get to – the main taxi park is close by.

One Good Friday, we decide to have a celebration. We sing with passion:
Freely, freely, you have received, freely, freely, give / Go in my name and because you believe, others will know that I live
. Brother Paul challenges us: ‘We are going outside right now to share our faith. Set yourself a goal – to witness to one person. Just one. One person to give over a tract and encourage to come to our service.'

I feel rather useless standing in the line of us outside the school. People walking past seem busy – intent on getting somewhere. It being Friday, many are walking past with the ends of their long gowns trailing up dust. They carry prayer mats and a few hold plastic kettles full of water. They are heading for the nearby mosque which is already belching out the call to prayer from two loudspeakers set on the minarets.

In the end, we provoke anger with our proselytising booklets. The imam comes to the school the next day to complain to the headmistress. As Brother Paul tells us the following Sunday, the headmistress said we should not be a nuisance in the neighbourhood. The imam said he is prepared to let our flock be. We should return the courtesy and allow his worshippers to attend to their prayers without harassment. He believed in his Allah, and that Mohammed was His Prophet – he wasn't about to change his mind. The headmistress let us off on a stern warning.

As Latrikunda High School hall is not only cheap but convenient, Brother Paul advises us thus: ‘Remember that the seed of the Word of God can fall on hard ground. All we can do is to be patient, and pray that by our very lives, others will be encouraged to know this God of ours, and that the ground of their hearts will become prepared.'

Three years on, I am voted onto the church council. We meet once a month at Brother Paul's house to discuss things that concern us all. This month, there are several issues on our agenda. First, though, we pray and we sing.

Hair covering is item number one. Sister Moira mentions the sayings of Saint Paul in 1 Corinthians 11:5:

The church is changing in tiny ways. This is one of them. If a headscarf matches my dress, I don't mind having one on. But if I have to carry one in my bag in case someone is stricken by an urge to pray ... It's as if they don't realise that short hair and shorn heads are unfashionable in women these days. My sister Kainde cut off her dreads in favour of hardly any hair. In our meeting today, uncovered heads are crowned with short black hair, or various shades of brown skin glistening with after-singing sweat. All these heads belong to men.

Brother Tani smiles at me with teeth that are stained, but not from too many kola nuts. He walks through the dining room into the bathroom. Later, I know, he will sneak past us quietly into the kitchen and out of the back door for a smoke. He will clutch his phone in his hand and wave it at whoever catches him. We all have our burdens. Where would the freedom be otherwise, if I marched up to him and told him off for pretence? He's doing his best and that's all that God requires of us.

Indeed,
the truth shall set us free
.

 Item number two is on home visits. I put in my report. ‘I visited Mr Bright last night. I took him a cane food basket with Ovaltine, Gem biscuits, cans of Peak milk,
nanburu
, some bread I made at home, and some imported apples. We chatted. He was full of memories of his wife. He said to me ‘She's now passed over to the other side, but she used to make the best
nanburu
I've ever tasted.' These home visits are an important way to show we care for each other.'

Brother Paul says, ‘How good it is to give, as well as to receive. Well done, Sister Dele.' I smile at the praise, casting my eyes down at the floor.

For Any Other Business, I propose the following: ‘Um, I remember when we were having a picnic at the beach once, and Brother Paul talked about the beauty of God's creation. I wonder whether we can start to put flowers in the church on Sundays?'

‘That will be expensive, won't it,' says Brother Tani.

‘I don't mind increasing my tithe to cover the cost,' I reply.

Moira chips in, ‘It will be good to increase your tithe. But the church should use the money for slightly more useful things than flower decorations. We need to help the mentally ill at Campana. We support the orphanage at Farafenni and there are many more things to do than we have the money for.' Moira is changing.

‘I wouldn't mind using flowers from my garden instead.'

She puts up her right hand. ‘Excuse me, but don't you think,' she says in that high-pitched girl voice of hers that can send barbs into the ears of all who don't prepare themselves, ‘that the two hours you spend putting the flowers into vases could be used more productively on your knees? Remember,' she continues, ‘how beautiful heaven will be. You'll have flowers there to your heart's content. While we're here,' and she turns to smile at Brother Paul, ‘we need to be as useful as we can.'

I don't give up easily. ‘Different things for different purposes. We can celebrate by bringing nature into our church. On days with communion especially, I wish the front of the church looked a bit +more festive.  When I was little, my mother's church always looked beautiful on Easter Sunday, flowers everywhere.' I could add that the breeze played through the windows and the sea sparkled against the sun beyond. I am changing too, but crossways.

Everyone stays silent. Except Moira.

‘You keep talking about how things used to be in your mother's church! Well, they are different in this one. Those churches with orders of service and polite prayers are dying. Our kind of church is where the Lord chooses to do new things.' Her face is shiny with rightness. ‘Not so?' she says to everyone clustered around the room, turning her eye on each one and daring them to contradict her.

Moira is wearing black patent leather strappy sandals that show off her bunions with style. She has on some straw hat with a wide brim and what seems like an even wider ribbon attached to the rim in tight ruching. Brown hat. Beige ribbon. Her high-necked dress has large pink and brown flowers on a beige background. It is low-waisted and at the seam are three giant pleats, unevenly ironed, curving out stiffly over the chair she is perched on, bum so dangerously near the edge, I wonder how she will stop us all from seeing her knickers if she tips off the chair.

I give up.

We stand together and hold hands, then bow our heads for prayer. Brother Paul intones, ‘Search our hearts, Lord. Let anything that can come between us and serving you properly be stamped out.' He stops to wait for the Holy Spirit to act.

There is a snuffle. I do not look up. We are all prone to the occasional public confession when God rests among us. The snuffles get louder. Brother Paul continues, ‘Dear Lord, thank you for working in our lives. Thank you for shining your light and showing up the dross. We ask for forgiveness, and ask that you set us on the path to righteousness.'

We open our eyes but Brother Isaac is bawling now. Tears run down his face, his shoulders shake. ‘I need to confess before all of you. I have sinned with Aina. May the Lord forgive me, forgive us.'

Moira shakes her head in disbelief. Aina! Aina used to come to church in tight trousers. Moira, who's appointed herself our watchwoman of virtue, took her aside to recommend dresses. Aina did switch to dresses, but they also were tight, fitting as closely to her body as a stocking. It was as if she spilled out of her clothes. Moira says, ‘It was just like I told her. What she wears only encourages young men to have sinful thoughts.'

Brother Paul says, ‘We'll end here for tonight. Brother Isaac – you can stay behind for counselling. You'll need to clear your soul before God.'

We amen and hallelujah, say our goodnights and leave.

*

It's good to stay in fellowship. I wish it continued into all areas of our lives. I do not struggle alone. We are individuals, each with our own place in the body of Christ, and the body has to work together to stay whole. I wish I knew for sure whether I'm meant to be a little finger, and at least given a reasonable role to play, or whether I should be content being an eyebrow hair. Bubbles of discord arise like the ripe farts that churn the stomach after eating too many slices of green mango dipped in chilli and salt.

I turn thirty-five on a Sunday. I ask Brother Paul to come and mark it for me with special prayers for the coming year. Moira invites herself as soon as she gets wind of the party, but of course I did mean to ask her. She phones me the night before to discuss the arrangement of songs for the Sunday evening service. To conclude our conversation, she says, ‘I'll be coming round to yours after the service of course.' Then she titters.