Page 76 of Death of the Author

“Where were you?” Chinyere asked, giving her outfit a once-over. Her words had their typical bite, but her voice was raw and more muted than usual.

Zelu sat in a chair beside her brother. “In the lobby.” She looked at Tolu, and his expression made her stomach flip. “Hey, you all right?” He glanced at her and shook his head quickly. She reached out to grab his arm and squeeze.

“When are we going to go out there?” Amarachi asked impatiently.

Uzo scoffed. “Why do you want to go out there so badly?”

Zelu did a double take at her youngest sister. She’d shaved down the puffy ’fro she usually sported; her hair was short now, making her look so much smaller. The skin under her eyes was puffy from crying.

“Everyone is waiting,” Amarachi said. “I want to get this over with.”

“We can take as much time as we want,” their mother said. She stood up, brushing down her long black skirt. She looked composed and regal. “We have the place for the entire day.”

“But Amarachi is right,” Auntie Constance said, standing too. She wore an exquisite dress made of black lace. Auntie Constance had jumpedon a plane from Dallas the day after their father died and had been at their mother’s side ever since. “We shouldn’t keep everyone waiting.”

Zelu saw her mother’s lip tremble for the briefest moment before she pulled it between her teeth. She said nothing, pushing her shoulders back and looking at her children.

“Mom, are you all right?” Zelu asked.

Their mother breathed in through her nose and released it slowly. Then she turned toward Zelu and gave her the tiniest smile. “Let’s go.”

Auntie Constance linked arms with her sister and they moved toward the door together. Chinyere followed behind, then Amarachi and Bola. Zelu walked slowly, holding Tolu’s and Uzo’s hands. Uzo’s fingers began to tremble, and Zelu saw tears gathering in her sister’s eyes. “Breathe, Uzo,” she said, giving her hand a squeeze.

“I don’t want to go out there,” Uzo said.

“Me neither,” Tolu muttered.

Zelu hadn’t thought this far. All she’d wrapped her mind around was the fact that the wake was happening. She’d been to funerals for loved ones before. Her classmate in third grade, Eileen O’Malley, who’d been hit by a train. The next-door neighbor, Mr. Kowalski, who’d had a heart attack when she was sixteen. Her college friend Duck Jackson, who’d been shot on a street corner on the South Side her sophomore year. Her favorite uncle, Tony, who’d died of pancreatic cancer seven years ago. But this was herfather. The kindest, most trustworthy, most confident man she knew. And he was her greatest link to the Igbo people of Nigeria. A walking encyclopedia of information and attitude, but also a whole vibe in and of himself.

She remembered him at a family Christmas party where all the men his age had gotten up when the DJ, who was just her cousin, put on a record of an old Igbo traditional song. They started dancing a strange dance in the middle of the room.

“Mom,” Zelu had said, tugging her mother’s sleeve. “Is that a masquerade dance?” Her mother had just laughed knowingly.

Now her family moved through the packed receiving room and towardthe double doors that led to the viewing room. Their mother knocked and the doors were opened by the funeral director and his assistant. Tolu and Uzo pressed closer to Zelu and, though she had to concentrate harder on staying balanced in her exos, she was glad. As they went in, the director and the assistant asked everyone else to stay back for a moment. The doors were closed behind Zelu, Tolu, and Uzo, and suddenly everything was quiet. She heard Tolu gasp, and Uzo started full-out sobbing again. Zelu didn’t look. The room was spacious, with rows and rows of red cushioned chairs. All facing forward.

“Come on, you guys,” Chinyere whispered.

The three of them crept to the front of the room, huddled together. Zelu kept her eyes cast to the floor, but she could still see her father’s white casket in her peripheral vision. She did not want to look. To look would brand a horrid image into her memory. She didn’t want it. She was going to get it anyway.

“Can we make him look... happier?” she heard her mother say. Her mother’s voice had never sounded so tight. “Look at his face, o.”

“I told them the same thing,” Chinyere said.

“M-maybe they can still do something,” Auntie Constance said. “Excuse me! Mr. Panagopoulos.”

The funeral director, a tall man with shiny black hair, joined their mother and Auntie Constance in front of the casket. Zelu helped Uzo sit in one of the chairs in the front beside Bola. Chinyere and Amarachi were opening the doors now and welcoming people in. Zelu turned to the casket slowly, then brought her eyes up. There was a large space in front of the casket, for people to walk up and observe. The carpet leading up to it was bloodred. A lace cloth hung from the edge of the casket. White, clean, light. Her heart was pounding so strongly that she could feel it behind her eyes.

Finally, she looked full on at the corpse of her father. He was wearing a brilliant white silk Isiagu and matching pants. On his chest was his wooden ikenga, the horned figure sitting on a stool with a knife in its right hand,which he’d kept in the living room. This object had always been a fixture in Zelu’s life. You couldn’t walk into the room without noticing it. As tradition dictated, it was now broken into pieces.

When her eyes reached her father’s face, her limbs seized up. Her mother and Chinyere had been right; his mouth was pulled downward into a deep scowl. He looked angry and dissatisfied. Her father’s resting face had always been kind, happy, content.

“What the fuck?” she whispered. Her mother and auntie were talking firmly to the funeral director, who was shaking his head and holding up his hands. Chinyere was on the other side of the casket. She’d removed her black silk scarf and used it to cover the bottom half of his face. She tucked it in a bit more.

“We did the best we could,” Mr. Panagopoulos was saying. “Sometimes one’s face just settles in a state and that’s what it will be.”

Zelu couldn’t breathe. Her father had never looked like that in his life. This could not be how his face would remain forever. This was not him.

More people were coming in. In a matter of moments, the room was full. Msizi appeared from the crowd and took her hand.

---