It rained heavily in Accra. ECG did not take away your light. A fucking miracle! Usually, the heavy rain was one of the easiest excuses ECG used to pocket their electricity from the average Ghanaian. Their favorite line had to do with some maintenance shit. Today they were either choosing to be generous or they genuinely forgot how to frustrate the average Ghanaian. Your close-to-the-sea rented apartment gets cold, by Ghanaian standards, easily. Add drool dripping rabidly roaring clouds to this mix, your melanated skin cannot handle it. This cold is some white people shit! Sub-Saharan African skin does not play this shit.
It’d been devil’s anus hot earlier. So when the clouds started to salivate, letting a few drops of liquid drop from their heavy lips, you’d thought it was one of those ‘matricki wo’ Accra rain situations. You know, the ones where it seems like it will rain on a furiously hot day only for the heavenly drops of water to evaporate into nothingness before it could reach the devil’s playground called Accra. You really did not believe the rains would stay so you left your AC on. Half-naked on your couch, you sat. You do not remember when you fell asleep. But then you woke up and the clouds were still roaring rabid! Goddamn! Was someone throwing stones on your roof? You scanned your body and the thin hairs on your arms and legs were at attention. Your nipples hard beneath the thin cotton bralette you fell asleep in. A quick reminder that your chocolate skin does not do cold AT ALL! You’ve known this though. You always keep a blueish-grey PLUSH BLANKET on your couch. You feel it by your feet. Grazing your big toe, you imagine this is what it might feel like with clouds touching your feet. Ah! This physical manifestation of tangible clouds had to be around your body.
The plush blanket works this way. As a fabric, it is piled. This essentially means, there are extra pieces of the fibers that make up the fabric coming off the surface of the fabric. Things like towels have this too. The extra fibers then make the fabric a little heavier, warmer, and more absorbent than just plain ole flat fabric. Plush blankets are made particularly with very soft fiber. So not only do they have the extra fabric coming off their surface (the pile), and the extra fibers are soo smooth they do not exist until they wrap your skin in warmth and comfort. Your outsides begin to warm up. But you were not able to save the cold air from penetrating your scantily covered chest into your insides. It would take too long for the outer warmth generated by the plush blanket to reach your core. Hmm, you think! A cup of tea or bowl of hot soup sounds divine right now. A bath however sounds precedingly better. Maybe both?
Click! Your kettle goes. The sizzling debauchery of the electricity transforming cold water into bubbling molecules confirms your appliance’s functionality. You like your water cook-da-chicken hot! Pulling the blanket tighter around you with its end lightly caressing the ground, you sigh in pleasure. The coldness of the tiled floor beneath your feet, coziness around you, the thought of hot water that will baptize your skin, cool rainy night breeze across your face, covers different parts of your body with different sensations of pleasure. A medley of tactile sensations. CLICK! Your kettle goes again. Your water is ready. You drop the blanket on the couch to pick up the plastic bucket. Pouring the water carefully, you let your head drop a little lower to feel the steam ricocheting onto your face leaving forming beads of droplets. You feel comfortable enough to walk bare-chested into the bathroom. Heat on your skin and through your nostrils, rain drops loud on your roof, the world goes dead as you bathe yourself. You enter a sensual space serene in the selections of stimuli singing songbird notes on your skin.
Reality returns with your last pail of hot water. In addition to cold feet and hands, another thing Black people don’t do is dry skin. The drastically low level of shea butter in front of your dressing mirror is evident of this. Next to the jar though is a cup of tea? Peppermint, with a few drops of peppermint essential oil. How you like it! You did not make this though. Shit! Your partner had walked in. They are the only other people who know how to make your tea. Your world had been both chaotic and serene; you did not hear them walk in.
“Can I get your back?” They ask. You gleefully oblige, handing them the jar of shea butter. Kissing your neck, they warm the butter between their palms and when they settle those palms on your back, it feels like moisturization and love. They go beyond your back to spread the extra shea butter around your hips. Bending over gently, they kiss the small of your back. You sit in front of your dressing mirror teacup in hand, covered in love. Blissful, warm, cozy, physically satisfying pleasure.
