I was still reeling when Nafisa inevitably found me in her garden twenty minutes later.
She sat beside me on the bench – the one we had brought from our old garden – for a few seconds without speaking, waiting on me to speak.
“I’m not going to tell anybody,” I finally told her.
She smiled softly. “Oh, child, I didn’t even think you would. But you deserve an explanation.”
I was confused and curious, but I also wasn’t sure if I wanted to know more. “You don’t have to tell me anything,” I assured her.
That was only partly true.
“I think I do. You are very special to Rama and me. It’s sometimes difficult to name the kind of relationship we have. You’re like our best friend, but we’re also your guardians and your mentors. And you’re our daughter.”
“We’re family,” I said simply.
She smiled again, and her smile was wider this time. “Yes, we’re family. Family who share a profound bond due to the circumstances that brought us together.”
She paused for a moment as we both stared at a butterfly dancing around on her hibiscus. It was bright pink with white spots—something I had never seen before. The colour reminded me of the first dress I purchased with the money I earned from my first jewellery set, which Nafisa had sold on my behalf. My mother had never allowed me to own a pink dress. “It’s too childish, Nyhira. You have to dress like a woman.”
Buying that dress had made me feel like a girl, and I had loved that.
“I love you,” I said suddenly, fingering the necklace she had given me on my 12th birthday. I felt a deep sense of love as my mind filled up with images of all the milestones I had achieved while living with them.
Her smile softened. “I love you too, Nhyira.”
She didn’t speak for a few seconds, then she started. “My story with Rama is very unusual. We met when she had just lost her husband, and I was planning to leave the country permanently. I had just buried my grandmother and had no other family here.”
I was surprised by the first part. “I didn’t know that Rama was married before.”
“She was. Rama was married to Mr Anderson’s younger brother, Kobby.”
That disclosure was even more shocking. I had heard of Mr Anderson’s brother Kobby being mentioned a few times, and I had seen photo frames of him in our old house, but I had no idea that Rama had been married to him. There had been no photos of them together.
“That is —”
“Crazy? Yes, it is. They were only married for six months before Kobby was involved in a fatal accident on his way home from the mines. And after he died, Mr Anderson took over his life – his house, his mines, and his wife.”
“That’s horrible,” I exclaimed, shocked by the revelations.
“It was–” She paused at the sound of footsteps, and we both turned around to see Rama approaching. Nobody spoke until she reached us.
“I think we should do this together,” she said to Nafisa, giving me a nervous glance.
“You don’t have to look so worried; we’re good here,” Nafisa assured her and shifted further to the edge of the bench to make space for Rama to sit on my other side.
“I was going to let Nafisa handle it, but I think you should hear certain parts from me. Most of it doesn’t matter now, but it is all part of our story, just as you are.”
I nodded, giving her a small reassuring smile.
“Nothing will change the fact that we’re family. I was just confused and shocked at first. You don’t have to tell me anything if you don’t want to. We can just pretend it never happened.”
This made her smile, and she shook her head. “You deserve to know. You’re old enough to know now. And as for—well, what you saw—we can’t pretend it never happened. I don’t even want to. What happens the next time you walk in on us? Will we pretend still? Nafisa and I love each other in a way that may not be easily understood by most people, but you’re not most people. It was different when you didn’t know. Now that you do, pretending otherwise is an insult to the relationship the three of us have built over the years.”
She paused for a moment, looking out to the pink and white miniature roses that were slowly closing up their petals as the sun was setting.
“After Kobby died, I was forced to marry Anderson. He had squandered and mismanaged his portion of the inheritance their parents had left them, and when his brother died, he swooped in. Initially, he came in as a helper and then managed to convince his family and mine to force me to marry him. The idea was to keep the properties within the family. Even then, there were rumours that he preferred underage girls to women, so I didn’t want anything to do with him. He was the opposite of my Kobby, and the idea of being married to him chafed and made me anxious. But I didn’t have a choice. I was just a woman.”
I felt a pang, because I knew exactly what it was like to be “just a woman”—a woman whose choices are taken away even before she can walk. I was too familiar with the concept of being forced into marriage.
“I don’t remember the first two months after I lost Kobby. It was all a blur to me because I was just going through the motions of life, devastated. Then one day, while Anderson was away, someone came to see me, saying that she had a message from Kobby. When the maid told me what the visitor was claiming, I wasn’t amused at all.”
Rama laughed in memory, while Nafisa snorted.
“Trust me, Nhyira, I did not find it funny at the time. Why would anyone want to play such a cruel trick on me? I was equal parts angry and curious. Who was this woman and how did she know my Kobby? Was this another trick by Anderson to torture me?”
“I initially went looking for Kobby himself, but when I got to the town, his obituary was posted everywhere,” Nafisa continued, making me gasp and turn to her with rounded eyes.
“You? You were the woman with the ‘message’?”
She smiled. “The one and only. Kobby and I had met four months prior in Accra through his friend Ofori, who had introduced me as a ‘golden hand’ to him. I had helped Ofori locate the mother lode at his mine, and since he was friends with Kobby, he connected us so that I could do the same for him. At the time, I had never seen a vision as clearly as the one I did when we shook hands. I had not intended to read him, but I saw death in his near future when we shook hands. I told him that I could help him find the mother lode, although doing so would lead to his death. I didn’t know what would kill him or when he would die; I just knew that him getting richer was not a good idea.
He was spooked for a few seconds, but then he laughed. “Well, something must kill a man. I honestly just want to find it. The thought makes me giddy.”
I was intrigued. He was genuinely more interested in finding the mother lode than the wealth it would bring. He was excited at the prospect of finding it.
I did not know how soon the tragedy would happen, but then I saw something useful in another vision — he had died because he told the wrong person about his good fortune. And I thought that perhaps if he kept the information to himself after he hit the mother lode, everything would be fine. So we arranged a visit and met at his gold mines, and I showed him where the mother lode was. I thought that would be the end of our association, but a month later, I had another vision, a clearer one – I saw who had killed him, but by the time I got here to warn him, he was already dead. It had taken me a while to find out where he lived and travel here. But I got here two whole months too late.”
“Anderson had come to visit when Kobby returned from his meeting with Nafisa at the mines,” Rama continued, “and Kobby, in the heat of excitement, told him about his big break. They hadn’t even reached the mother lode yet, but things were looking extremely promising. He invited Anderson to the mines to see his progress. A few days later, he was dead. Only six months married, and I was a widow. I was distraught by the loss and upset that his family wanted to replace him so quickly with his brother. And then this woman came, claiming that she had a message from him. I was so angry. I had bottled up so much of the anger at everything that was happening in my life, but here was someone I could unleash my anger on. A stranger who wanted to play cruel games with me. I told the maid to bring the woman to me.”
Nafisa shook her head lightly, fingering one of the necklaces around her neck.
“I was upset too—upset with myself for being too late. I had taken a liking to Kobby, and seeing his obituary had saddened me. Usually, in such a case, I would have just prayed for his soul and left. However, I heard enough local gossip about his widow’s current situation to change my mind. I did not want the bastard to enjoy the fruits of his wickedness without any repercussions, so I came to help her. And then I saw her.”
She stopped, smiling in memory, before she shook her head and continued.
“For me, it was love at first sight. I had just come to warn her about her brother-in-law, but I stayed because I couldn’t leave her with Anderson.”
Rama smiled at Nafisa, then turned to me. “When she told me what had happened with Kobby, I believed her, and when she offered to help, I accepted it. Anderson had murdered his brother before he hit the mother lode, and nobody else knew where it was except Nafisa. When Anderson heard of the witch who could help him become richer, he jumped for it.”
“I told him that he needed to do some rituals, and that required me to be at his house a couple of times a month,” Nafisa continued. “I was helping him find more gold than his neighbours, so he believed me. I used that time to plan with Rama and spend time with her.”
“A year later, I convinced him that it was in his best interest to marry Nafisa. By then, he had had two near-death experiences. He was spared both times because Nafisa saw it in a vision and warned him. As much as he was afraid of her, his greed was greater than his fear. He wanted to use her gifts for his gain and saw merit in the plan. He gave me the task of convincing Nafisa,” Rama laughed.
“At the time, Rama was pregnant, and I wanted to be with her through it all. It was the best solution. So when he asked to marry me, I pretended to be angry at the mere idea for a short while and then accepted. I gave him my rules for the marriage, and since he wanted me as a wife for wealth and protection, he accepted every one of them.”
Rama looked at Nafisa with soft eyes. “Unlike Nafisa, it took me a while to fall in love. I don’t remember exactly when I fell for her, but I don’t recall what it feels like not to be.”
This was definitely not what I had expected when I rushed home today, but it all made sense. I had always wondered why Nafisa married Mr Anderson. She clearly didn’t like him, and he was afraid of her. Knowing the truth cleared up many questions I had always had about my family but decided not to ask.
“I’m glad you had each other,” I finally said. “And I’m glad I had you.”
Nafisa took a deep breath. “There’s more you need to know.”
