I bump into him while in line at the supermarket. Before I notice him, I’m knee-deep in a dilemma over milk. Do I have a need for an entire quart of it, or will I be stuck with the shameful task of chucking sour liquid down the drain at the end of the week? Food in this country is rarely portioned with consideration of those doing life alone — an observation that only recently came to me.
I’m still contemplating the contents of my shopping cart when I hear guffawing ahead. I would know that sound anywhere—laughter that comes from deep within the diaphragm and reeks of self-assuredness. Laughter I have not heard in six weeks. Looking up, I see the three soft folds of flesh at his nape. And there’s that pea-sized mole just behind his right ear. He seems to have started hitting the gym again, flaunting a more toned physique underneath a hooded sweatshirt. I catch his accent—a love child of punchy Ghanaian enunciation and runny American twang –- as he shares a joke with the cashier.
What brings him to this side of town, fifty miles south of the home we used to share? As far as I know, he has neither friends nor business here. This side of town is too urban for his liking. He much prefers the privacy and wholesomeness of the suburbs. But here he is, two bodies ahead of me, chatting up a wide-eyed brunette. He has always been adept at small talk, which I suppose is a necessary skill for any doctor to possess. I diminish myself, praying the other shopper between us is enough of a barrier, that her elaborate updo and puffy jacket serve as a shield. As luck would have it, he swivels in my direction and looks straight at me. His face is darker, moustached, unaffected by my presence. This face belongs to another man.
Balancing two shopping bags en route to my apartment, I replay the scene: the goosebumps along my arms, the dryness of my mouth, the heat in my face, when I thought the man at the supermarket was my husband. These are not reactions his presence would have ordinarily evoked. He had always been my home in this foreign land. But now, home is a third-floor walk-up on Atwater Drive I recently signed a lease for. The apartment has high ceilings, gleaming parquet floors, and a balcony overlooking an inky pond. It also has unfortunate brown walls reminiscent of earthworms and puke, but why worry? I won’t be here for too long.
***
Atwater Drive is lined with cracked pavements and pre-war apartment complexes. I’m friendly with the neighbours, most of whom are at least ten years younger than I am. We exchange smiles and waves and nods, and on a good day, I stop to pinch the cheeks of the children they push around in strollers. Though the little ones seldom appreciate this gesture, their parents are happy to have me admire their bundled-up trophies. Here, I am not the wife of Dr Addo or deaconess at the Emmanuel Presbyterian Church. Over here, I am simply the Lady-In-306. There is no risk of bumping into mutual acquaintances of ours, no pressure to read their body language for an indication of how much they know. People often feel the need to take sides in such situations and in our case, my husband is easier to sympathise with.
I often imagine our friends rallying around him, patting him on the shoulder, assuring him he always deserved better anyway. I visit their Facebook profiles, these friends who were first his, and scope out the evidence of birthdays and housewarmings and potlucks in the hopes that I will catch him with a glass of Prosecco in hand, head thrown back in laughter. But he is nowhere to be found. I suspect he is putting in more hours at the hospital, numbing himself with ward rounds and research grant applications. I despise him for not showing up in those photos.
On an evening stroll along the pond, I spot his dark green Chevrolet. It circles around for a while before coming to a stop a few metres away from me. The dent on the driver’s side is new. The hum of its idling engine is a taunt. I fix my wind-blown hair, square my shoulders and march towards the car with quickening steps. The engine roars. He leaves me standing there with nothing but a trail of sulphurous exhaust fumes. At the end of the day, none of it means anything; the licence plates are from out-of-state.
***
My cell phone rings loudly on a Saturday. It’s my mother.
“Ah, I forgot it’s still early where you are,” she says, feigning an apology.
“It’s fine. How is home?”
“Accra is same-same. Your father has gone golfing and your sister is at the hairdresser’s. And you? How are you?”
“I believe you know the answer to that question, Ma.”
“What could be so bad to make you move out of your marital home?”
Her tone is that of a woman who has been married to the same man for the last thirty-nine years, one who can barely remember her life outside of being someone’s missus.
“Does he hit you?”
“No.”
“Did he cheat?”
“No.”
“Then what could it be?”
“That’s between the two of us.”
My mother kisses her teeth.
“When his family sent an entourage to ask us for your hand in marriage, was it between the two of you? When they filed into our house carrying your dowry on their heads, was that also between the two of you?”
“You’ve always told me to never invite a third party into our marriage.”
“But we are your parents. It’s different. It’s our job to guide and protect you. We are the custodians of your happiness.”
“Then you should respect my decision, if this is what would make me happy.”
“But it is not what would make your husband happy. The poor boy has not stopped calling your father and I, pleading for us to intervene. But even he has refused to tell us the cause of this rift.”
I hear what sounds like faint sobbing over the line. I strain to ascertain its authenticity.
“Please don’t put your father and I through the humiliation of returning the marriage drinks.”
“There’ll be no need for that. No one does that anymore.”
“I did not raise you to talk back to your elders.”
Her tone is beginning to cut. I know better than to let this continue.
“I’ve got to go now, Ma. I have errands to run.”
“Fine,” she responds, reluctantly. “But give me a call back. Your father and I need to get to the bottom of this.”
After I hang up, I sit with my mother’s words. It saddens me that she believes I am being evasive when in truth, I do not have the language to describe why I’ve left my husband. It’s not a reason I can articulate. It is a reason I can only feel.
***
We met through a mutual friend who had thought us a good match. It began with awkward cross-continental video calls and steadily progressed into flirtatious banter well into the night. He was in his third year of a paediatrics residency at Johns Hopkins while I was finishing up my accounting degree at Legon. His endless medical stories kept me entertained—the freakiest of which was him fishing a three-pound hairball out of a ten-year-old with trichophagia. He laughed when I whined about my family—my mother’s lack of regard for privacy and my younger sister’s insistence on borrowing my clothes without permission. He spoke fondly of his own mother, who he had left back in Ghana. But when I asked about his father, he shrugged off my question and said he was simply grateful to be nothing like the man.
“Let’s get married,” he announced six months into our relationship.
“But we barely know each other,” I argued.
“What else is there to know? I know what makes you smile and what makes you squint the way you do when you’re upset. I even feel like I know what you smell like.”
I chuckled. “And what do I smell like?”
“Like petrichor.”
I laughed even harder.
Weeks later, he flew home to perform the marriage rites. And on my wedding morning, when my mother asked, while she covered my face with a veil, if I was feeling sure, I responded, “How sure is sure enough?”
Back in America, my new husband and I lived in housing provided by the university. Our meals, which were limited to anything that did not require more than a microwave to prepare, were eaten around a small writing desk. I soon found a job as a receptionist in a nearby dental practice, scheduling appointments and fielding phone enquiries about root canals. With no television, we developed a pastime of driving around Baltimore’s fanciest neighbourhoods in our second-hand Corolla. As we rolled along, we would point to houses we admired—the multi-storey ones with generous yards like houses back home. The air was always a little too still in those parts—rarely a playing child, a boisterous dog, or a persevering jogger in sight. I imagined the residents of those homes spent the bulk of their time at wine tastings and art exhibitions. What else did one do when your money was working hard for you? We allowed ourselves to daydream that soon we would boast of an address in one of those zip codes.
Just as the sun was beginning to set on one of such drives, I noticed a police vehicle through the side mirror. It followed at a safe distance for an uncomfortable length of time.
“Why are they trailing us?” I asked my husband.
“I’m not sure but perhaps, we should turn around and head back home.”
“Why should we? We’ve done nothing wrong.”
“You never know with these cops. I’d rather just head back home.”
The police vehicle began to flash its blue and red lights, our signal to pull over. A lofty officer exited the vehicle and sauntered towards ours.
“You folks from around here?” he asked, leaning over the driver’s side, mousy brown hair slicked all the way back.
“No, we live in Elmwood,” my husband answered.
“So, what brings you to these parts?”
“My wife and I were just driving around for some air.”
“All the way out here?”
I squinted at the cop from my seat.
“Is there a problem, officer?”
My husband squeezed my thigh. He too must have noticed the rising redness in the cop’s face.
“Well, ma’am, you are trespassing.”
“Trespassing? Aren’t these public roads?”
My husband squeezed my thigh again. This time, more firmly.
“If you’d let me finish, ma’am, you’d also know that what you’re doing counts as loitering.”
“We’re sorry, officer,” my husband interjected. “We didn’t mean any trouble. We’ll leave now.”
“That would be the smart thing to do,” the cop responded, straightening his back. “Folks around here can be difficult.”
I could hear the sneer in his voice. It rang in my ears as we turned around and navigated back onto the freeway. I unclenched my fists, unaware they had been balled up the entire time, my acrylic nails leaving indentations in my palms. I looked over at my husband whose eyes were focused on the road ahead, both of his hands gripping the steering wheel.
“You let him off too easily. We were not in the wrong. You knew it. He knew it. I knew it.”
“Just not worth the drama, babe.”
I glared at him. How did he manage to stay so calm when all I wanted to do was roll down my window and scream into the humid Baltimore evening? That was when it occurred to me—in all the time we had been married, I had never known the smell of my husband’s rage. I had seen him anxious and disappointed, even slightly irritated at times, but never angry. I thought back to all the times he should have lost it but had not. Like the day our neighbour’s dog scaled the fence and dug up our bed of hard-earned azaleas. Or when I burnt a hole in his only suit jacket, despite his insistence that it did not need ironing.
I suddenly became conscious of the weight of my own anger. I carefully examined it, tracing its contours with my fingers. Mine was the prickly type. The type that surged and thrashed like a tsunami. I was my mother’s daughter after all, raised in a city fuelled by ire. It was what moved traffic along during Accra’s infamous rush hours and the only language our politicians understood. My husband had been the victim of mine a few times. I had hurled it at him for remitting money home far too frequently. More than once, he had simmered in it for not helping out around the house more.
But what I now aspired to was my husband’s equanimity. That ability he had to take his displeasure and roll it around his palm like a pair of Baoding balls. I purchased a stack of self-help books: Tempering Your Temper; How to Stop Seeing Red; No Longer a Slave to Rage. They all advised that one look out for the seed—that dull vibration in the chest that if left unchecked, could quickly mature into a feral beast. The key, the experts said, was to take all of that energy and channel it into other avenues. I curated a cache of happy thoughts I could defer to in irksome situations. I took up baking and knitting. And on those days, when the seed waged an unrelenting war against my will, long walks in nature seemed to do the trick.
“Something’s different about you,” my husband remarked as we lay in bed one morning.
My stomach fluttered. So, that was what it felt like to be spiritually at par with another. Even our friends took notice. They commended us for our decorum, called us mature beyond our years. We would look on as the married ones squabbled in public, allowing disagreements over trivialities to get the best of them. And after, when they would apologise for embarrassing themselves, we waved our hands and said we did not mind.
Now in alignment, my husband and I decided we were ready to be parents. We claimed parenthood like it was just another basic human right. After all, we were both still young and healthy. But when conception evaded us, we sought the wisdom of my gynaecologist.
“Are you under a lot of stress at work or at home, Mrs Addo?” he asked, examining me.
I shook my head. “Far from it. I’ve never been happier.”
I was prescribed hormone injections, which my husband would administer three times a week because I had a fear of needles. Trypanophobia—my husband’s diagnosis. The shots left me tired and irritable. The smallest things triggered me. It could be the sound of the leaf blower going off next door or my husband leaving our bed dishevelled in the morning. I cracked a few times, each relapse making it more and more difficult to maintain my sobriety for long. And after the fits, as I lay in a heap of remorsefulness, my husband would gather me in his arms and stroke my head.
“Sh-sh-sh.”
“How are you not affected by any of this?” I once asked him.
I had watched him continue to glide through each day with unwavering optimism. He still found it in him to smile, to pray, to whistle a tune here and there.
“It’s not in our hands,” was his answer. “God’s time is the best.”
I felt very little solidarity in this venture of ours. Yes, my husband had diligently stuck a needle in my buttocks for the last five months and yes, he had soothed me on some of my darkest days. But what I needed more was collective outrage. I sat across from him at dinner one evening, listening to him complain about cuts in funding for paediatric diabetes research. With that level of composure, he could have been singing the praises of the government, not condemning them for potentially jeopardising the health of thousands of children.
I lay down my cutlery and sat up straight.
“I had an affair.” Each syllable purposefully emphasised.
He tightened his grip around the fork and knife until his knuckles began to pulse. I sat, waiting for him to ask for details—the when, the how, the why. The rehearsed answers danced at the tip of my tongue. When he regained movement, I watched as he reached down to smoothen out the napkin on his lap.
“It’s water under the bridge. How do we move past this?”
My justification was now a bolus lodged somewhere along my oesophagus.
“Did you hear what I just said? I said I cheated on you.”
“Yes, I heard you,” he murmured. “I blame myself. Those long hours at the hospital, leaving you in this house all by yourself.”
Why was I surprised? This was a man who made a living out of diagnosing problems and patching people up. I moved out of our bedroom and into the guest room. He no longer had hot meals or warm embraces waiting for him when he got back from work. I flung my discontent around our house. It ricocheted against the walls and left shards everywhere. Yet, he still came to me every evening, his touch forgiving. And every evening, I tolerated the needling feel of his fingers against my skin until I no longer couldn’t.
“I’m leaving you,” I said to him.
His body stiffened. “That seems a bit extreme.”
“I’m sure of it.”
“Perhaps, what you need is a little more time to think this through?”
“I don’t think I’ll change my mind.”
He sighed, deeply. “Why don’t we give each other some space, maybe for a few weeks and if that’s what you still want…”
***
The walls in my apartment are beginning to bother me. Their brownness makes it difficult to fully appreciate the lovely view from the balcony. I spend more time around the pond and less time indoors. The blooming daisies stare at me with yellow eyes and once or twice, I’m lucky enough to spot the iridescence of a blue-headed mallard. Spring has a way of inducing such clarity: I, too, deserve colour.
I place a call to the leasing office to complain about the walls. An uninspired receptionist promises to take the matter up with her superiors but nothing changes. I call two more times after that. The third time, she is straight with me.
“Such work requests take time, Mrs Addo. The office prioritises more urgent things like clogged drains and blown fuses.”
“But this is urgent,” I explain. “I have to wake up every morning and live with these disgusting walls.”
There’s a pause on the other end of the line as she gathers her words.
“I have put in a work order, ma’am. I ask for your patience until our team is able to get to it.”
In the meantime, I go out and buy some drapes for my windows, a cheery floral pattern to distract from the dimness of the walls. I often think about the things I have left behind. The interior of the house we now own in a coveted zip code—an uplifting shade of green. The musky accents of my husband’s perfume that linger long after he’s gone. His discarded socks, strewn around our room. His balmy breath against my neck.
I stop picking up my mother’s calls and wish instead, for the name across the flashing screen to be replaced by his. But he continues to punish me with his absence from social media. I finally give in and call him one evening. It only has to ring once.
“I’m glad you called.”
“I was hoping you would call too.”
“I wanted to respect your need for space.”
“It’s good to hear your voice. You sound well.”
“You know I’m far from well.”
I imagine him on the other end, haggard from a lack of sleep, a sprinkling of new greys in his goatee.
“I need you back home,” he purrs.
I find his sweetness obscene.
“It was with Caesar.”
There’s a sharp draw of breath on the other end, followed by a long exhale.
“I don’t care who it was with.”
“I enjoyed it,” I spit out. “It made me feel alive.”
He does not need to know that I barely remember the whole thing—that fleeting brush of my co-worker’s lips against my cheek at our boss’ retirement party. I do vividly remember the instant awkwardness, Caesar’s profuse apology for getting carried away with the free wine and the realisation, as I drove home from the restaurant that night, that I now held a fire poker in my hand.
“You enjoyed me once—not too long ago. I can make you happy again.”
“I love him.”
I squeeze my eyes shut, waiting for the crack, the rumble, the boom. His breathing picks up. I can hear it blossom into a series of steady huffs. I brace myself against the edge of the bed. All he has to offer, though, is the soft click of a dropped call. The filthy walls jeer at me. I rise from the bed and head into the kitchen, rummaging around for a stainless-steel spatula.
Back in the bedroom, I launch my attack. I chip. I scrape. Puke-coloured flakes everywhere. Brown eventually gives way to a mouldy underbelly—scattered splotches of green and grey and black.
I stand back, hands on hips, to admire this work of abstract art. These walls…these walls I can live with.
Aba Amissah Asibon is a Ghanaian writer whose short fiction has been published in Guernica, Adda, The Johannesburg Review of Books, AFREADA, Lolwe and various anthologies. She has been shortlisted for the Commonwealth Short Story Prize and the Miles Morland African Writing Scholarship. She was also a 2023 Wilbur Smith New Voices winner for her novel-in-progress.