ALL YOUR COLORS ARE BEAUTIFUL

“Even darkness holds light to those who are alone.

To those who carry their wounds as paintings before gods.”

—Adaugo N.

 

AMBER

As a child, this is what you know. 

That your father has a steely band of anger woven into his soul, and it manifests as scorching fury on dark days. You learn how to hide from him, how to shut his thunder out. When you press into your mother’s soft body, you know the gentle heave and shudder of her sadness. But there are good times filled with sunlight and birdsong. And on these days, your father’s laughter echoes, and when night arrives with heat or chill, you sit with your parents and listen to them talk. 

When you’re not in school, you help your mother put together fabrics which she buys from Aba to sell in Uyo. You always fall in love with the colours of Ankara, Okrika, Brocade and Adire. So many colours: indigo, brown, orange, green. It makes sense that the first time you see crayons, you want them more than anything else in the world. The first thing you ever draw is your mother’s face, or what your four-year-old fingers manage to sketch as one. 

Sometimes, she shows your drawings to visitors or neighbours with glowing pride, “Abasi mmi o! Look! Look at what my son has created with his hands. Is God not wonderful? To have blessed a child with this gift?” 

Da Vinci mmi, your mother calls you. You do not know who or what Da Vinci is. But you like the way it sounds coming from her. This makes you smile so much that the next time you draw her, you colour the place around her left breast with a love-heart of intense amber, yellow like the rising sun. 

 

EMERALD

One day, you overhear Mama Nedu—one of the neighbours, talking to your mother, saying, “Is it not better you leave this man to deal with his demons by himself? Or are you waiting until he kills you for your son?” 

The night he comes back home smelling of alcohol because he lost his job as a driver, your father flings a kitchen knife at your mother. The day before this, she gives you a present for your tenth birthday. It is a brand-new Bible with a shiny emerald hardcover. For hours, you stay up with a reading lamp, going over the fine print of your favourite passages, getting mellow from the pristine smell of the pages. 

Your parents always argue. It’s routine. But that night, your heart leaps and plummets after you hear the clang of steel on the wall and your mother’s screams which come after it. “I wasn’t aiming at you,” your father mumbles in the prickly silence that follows, still seething. “I wasn’t aiming at you.” 

After your father slinks away, your mother makes you pack your things. “We’re going to stay at your grandmother’s for a while. He threw a knife at me o! This man will not kill me in this house. God forbid!” 

A week of peace later, there’s a call for a family meeting. This is where your father appears, with an air of forced resignation. He makes a show of apologizing to your mother, wringing his hands and speaking like the words leave a bitter aftertaste on his tongue. It’s a strange version of him—calm and subdued, and you’re frightened because it’s something you’ve never seen before. 

It doesn’t take long, this…reconciliation. Your mother maintains a passive countenance for most of it, as if she has as much power as one in a foggy dream; your father just stares at the space between his shoes and acts like he’s being force-fed paracetamol. They sit side-by-side, in a way reminiscent of erring kids before a stern headmaster. Your aunties and uncles take turns to talk, dispensing pieces of advice with the gravitas of courtroom judgments. 

Never challenge your husband. 

Treat your wife well. 

Remember, your child will learn from you.

In the end, everyone cheers when your parents share an abridged embrace. It’s the last time you’ll ever see your father touch your mother so tenderly. 

 

RAVEN

When it happens, you’re in SS2. You know something is wrong when your Vice Principal calls you into his office to see your Aunty (your mother’s sister) and her husband. 

You don’t ask why they have come to pick you up, instead of your mother. You don’t ask why they drive you to their house. You don’t cry when they tell you that “You have to be strong.” It is futile of them. Your mother’s murder makes it to the pages of a local newspaper. A seasoned police superintendent dispatched to the crime scene, throws up right outside the window of your parentsʼ bedroom. It is that gruesome.

People ask in hushed whispers, “What could make a man kill his wife like that?” 

They’ll never find your father, the police. Some people say he’s on the run, gone out of the country even. Some say he’s taken his own life. In the local papers, the police state that the case is still under investigation.

The sky is an endless stretch of gloom on the day your mother is lowered beneath the earth. It mirrors the turmoil in your heart. You’re glad when the rains fall, covering up the grief spilling from your eyes. Afterwards, the tremors that wrack your soul devour you gently; pieces of yourself fritter away with every teardrop shed. But there’s something else—something as dark as the raven that circles the cemetery, that truly consumes you. It has always been—this thing, although it lay powerless beneath folds of your mother’s warmth. But with the upheaval of your shattered world, it waxes stronger, latching onto your consciousness like a lamprey, feeding, fattening. 

At night, you dream of strangling your father till blood gushes out his throat, you dream of pounding his head with a pestle until it cracks wide open. 

 

 

CARAMEL

Life moves on fast.

Her name is Adaugo. It’s in the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, that the celestials above intertwine her path with yours. You first meet in the library, and it’s the way she laughs—full and true, that tugs on your heart. She’s glorious when her face opens up in a smile, like a miniature sun at dawn. For the first time in a long while, you are able to sketch something on paper. You draw her face, in all of its golden-brown dazzle. 

Loving her is easy, so much so that you say the both of you are like fragments meant to merge. She agrees. One cold, wet morning, in a frisson of longing, you send her a WhatsApp message: Give me all of you, Ada. All your bright colours and haloed demons. She replies with laughing emojis: Demons kwa? Sito, zukwanu ike! 

Three bittersweet years in Nsukka, and she becomes the luminous sunspot in a world you’ve only seen through darkness. Now, you know how to paint the perfect symmetry of her face, the pink lush of her lips, and the caramel allure of her skin. Whenever she runs her slender fingers in awe over your works, she wonders aloud why you are not in Fine & Applied Arts. You always shrug and laugh.

The first time you fight for real, it fucking hurts. Like hell. After she insults you and you almost hit her, everything is sundered. The days you spend apart from each other pass by in a haze of motions where time becomes inconsequential and only the pain performs, raw and clear, hollowing you out.

After you finally make up (bowing to the concerted pressures of friends) you make love as if you’d never do so again. It frightens you, your passion for her. The mere thought of a life without her is either as vague as the memory of a mirage, or definite like the dull pulse of your heartbeat.

You finally tell her the truth about your parents. This is in her room, every inch of it plastered with wallpapers of perfect houses and pop stars. You are glad that she doesn’t ask any questions. Talking alone is tough, like pulling a string of jagged needles up from your stomach and out through your throat. After she absorbs all you have to say, she only squeezes your hand before enveloping you in the silken warmth of her body. In this silent act of crushing tenderness, there’s much more communicated between the both of you than with a thousand words. 

There’s only love. 

With her, everything that was once bleak and muted begins to shimmer in the burnishing beacons of hope and love. With her, the thing that festers underneath your skin begins to loosen its hold on you, begins to shed off caked black skin. 

 

AZURE 

Four years go by, and now you’re married and she’s wearing a maternity gown. Unity Park is where you are at the moment. A verdant swath of land nestled between an avenue of churches, a financial district and a State House of Assembly complex. In this position the park suffers neglect, so you warily watch a homeless man sleeping on one of the stone benches, his head placed on a pillow of meagre belongings. It’s still beautiful, here, if one only keeps their eyes on the greenery and concrete walkways. A gaggle of kids play with glee on the sandy lot, their excitement sparkling in the wind. 

“Soon, we’ll bring our child here,” Ada purrs. 

You make a sound of assent as you kiss her neck, gently. 

The gown she’s wearing is of Ankara, with a psychedelic pattern of flowers that you had helped her design after she complained of how boring most of the gowns in stores were. It’s beautiful. Like her. Like the setting sun. Like the life ahead of you both. She turns to face you, smiles and clasps your hands within hers. Her fingers are fleshed mush, numbing yours in their softness.

“You know you can always talk to me, Sito.” 

“What? Oh, yes. Okay.” 

“So, talk to me na. What is it, enh?” 

Your mouth opens and closes. You sigh. 

“I want to be a good father, you know. God, I don’t want to be like my…” 

Her face opens in a smile and you’re overwhelmed by the sheer effect of it. Eyes twinkling, she squeezes your hand and places it on her swelling belly, within which life grows. A life you both made. 

“Look at me, Sito-Abasi. Look at me. Everything is going to be fine. Hmm? And I know without a doubt, you’ll be a great Dad. You’re a good man. Our child will adore you because you’ll be the love you never had in your time. We’ll be fine, nke m. Let’s just hope that this baby looks more like me, okay?” 

You laugh and squeeze her hand. The thing that wedged its presence within your chest begins to loosen a little. Just a little. Later, as you walk with her towards the parked car, your eyes are drawn up. To Uyo’s evening sky—a darkening azure mottled by warm hues of pink and gold.

This is the last beautiful sunset you will see. 

 

PEACH

Last days never seem so. 

This Wednesday is as normal as any. You wake, and turn off the phone alarm. Then you try to remember what kind of crazy dreams you had last night before shaking your head off it all. You take a deep breath and turn to watch the swell of her body stirring slightly. You’ve grown used to her turning multiple times in bed out of sheer discomfort. After giving her a kiss, you stretch and go into the bathroom. Brush. Use the loo. Sing in the shower. When you’re done, she’s up already. “Good morning, baby.” The orange T-shirt you put on has the word “Dàkkádá” on it, under a large white handprint. The new maid (You keep forgetting her name – Ndidi? Nneka?) has already boiled water for tea. The poor girl almost set the kitchen on fire last week, using the gas cooker, so you resort to toast the bread by yourself. On TV, a bunch of men argue about some economic policy. You almost nod off and spill your tea. You groan, remembering that there’s a lot of work to do in your art studio. 

“Sleep still dey your eye, abi?” Ada says, watching you from across the parlour. 

You smile. “How I suppose sleep well for night when you just dey turn-turn for bed anyhow. Tomorrow, you go tell me make I buy you okro soup and ice-cream around 2AM.” 

Ada laughs, her body shakes vigorously. You know she is almost due. Now, she looks like she’s hiding a rather large pumpkin beneath her peach nightgown. Anytime soon, you remind yourself. You’re nervous, but you and Ada have been preparing for this, reading, learning, going for joint counselling sessions—the whole nine yards. Before you leave, you tell her you’ll be coming back later to take her to the hospital. For her doctor’s appointment. Her honeyed voice floats from the kitchen, “Okay. I’ll be waiting. Take care.” 

Maybe, if you knew what would come, you’d place another kiss on her neck before you leave. Maybe, you’d not leave her alone, but take her and run far, far away from everything. 

As you drive the Toyota Camry her parents gave as a wedding gift down to the main road, you hum to Keith Urban’s Blue Ain’t Your Color playing on the stereo.

It’s 11:37am when your iPhone vibrates in your pocket at work. Her contact photo and number pulse on the screen. 

“Hello. Adaugo, I’ll be on my way soon. I’m just—” 

“Sito.” Her voice is tense. “There’s a man here to see you.” 

“What? Me? I’m not expecting… Who is it?” 

“He says… He says he’s your father.” 

 

 

ASH 

He says he’s your father. 

Uyo is a blur of orange tricycles and buses as your car hurtles down its roads. You try to stop the frantic pulsing underneath your temples, but your mind keeps going back to the dark places you thought you’d left behind. Your mother’s body. Her blood and brains all over the walls, all over HIS dark skin. And the oath you swore on her grave with pure teenage hate. 

When you barge in through the front door, he’s there, right on the couch, calm as a steel mast. For a moment, you’re a child again, and he’s merely in his living room, glowering at the TV. 

He sees you and smiles like he has a toothache. “Ah, Sito. Abadie? How are you? Your wife just told me you would be coming back.” 

Nine years. Nine years since you last saw him. Your father has not aged well. The man that once made you believe the very ground beneath him trembled from his steps is now a balding wreck. A network of wrinkles spread around criss-cross over his ashy skin. His yellowed eyes try to meet yours, veined hands put forward for a handshake. 

He’s talking, but there’s something wrong with your head. It has become the kettle the maid uses to boil water every morning. The one that steams and shrieks when the water is hot enough to scald a man’s skin. You can’t hear anything. 

If you just wait. Breathe. Breathe again. Close your eyes. Listen. 

Your father will tell you how the Devil made him do it and now he’s finally found salvation. Whatever that means. He’ll cry as he speaks, going on about how much he needs your forgiveness, and how he’s ready to turn himself in and answer for his crimes. He’ll tell you how much he’s changed. You won’t care. There will be tears and bitter words and you will ask him to leave your house before you call the police. You will call the police, and in the wake of this, even this, you will survive. 

But. 

You don’t pause, or breathe, or listen. A true storm never stills; it only rages. All these years, you’ve entombed the thing without a name, burying it underneath love, hope and promises of a better life you’ve earned. Now, you unshackle the thing, letting it unfurl in all its dark nuclear might. You let it take over you. 

“You killed her! Murderer! How dare you come into my house?”

“Don’t talk like that to me, Sito! I am still your father!” 

“Get out of my house! Now!”

“Listen to me, Sito. I have spent every day since regretting what happened that night. I loved your mother—” 

“Shut up! Shut up!” 

“I am your father, Sito. Before I take myself to the police, you will listen to—” 

It is here that Ada wades in, ever the pacifier. She reaches for your father’s hand, touches him. “Sir, please. You have to go now, please.” Maybe your father thought she was just the maid. Maybe he was still just the prick he had always been. But when he pushes off Adaʼs hands, he does it with so much force that she stumbles backwards and falls heavily on her side. She screams out in pain. 

Your father is dead as soon as you crash into him. There is something that shock does to people, where it delays basic instinct and dulls reflexes. This is why your father doesn’t even block. He dies wide-eyed, confused by your rage as if he’s never seen anyone get so angry so fast.

He hurt Ada, the thing in your head screams. He walked right back into your life just to hurt Ada. 

You hit and hit and hit your father’s head on the floor until he stops flailing and there’s blood on the patterned tiles and the thing in you roars with malevolent joy and Ada screams “Jesus!” but you don’t hear her and you still don’t hear when she cries and begs you to stop, stop, you’re killing him, Sito please stop and it’s only when Ada wails in pain, crying for your help, that you stop and stare at what you’ve done, right before you throw up. 

 

 

CRIMSON

Your head is ringing, a shrill sound reverberating inside you with piercing insistence. 

No. No. No. 

The storm within your head clears, and only then do you realize where you are and what you’ve just done. Your clothes, flecked with blood; your father’s blood, puddling under his broken skull; his lifeless eyes, frozen in a broken head lolling to the left, where Ada lies. Ada. 

“Ada? Ada!”  She barely stirs, her eyes closed. You feel her body for a pulse, the faintest thrum of life. Sure enough, it is there. You cradle her head and the blood on your fingers sticks to her hair, redder than the crimson paint you’d used earlier in the studio. You look at her face. At your hands. At your father, lying dead. At what you’ve done. 

No. 

It is when you try to lift her, that the maid appears as if on cue and gasps, taking everything in. 

“Help me! Please, help me let’s carry her out,” you plead in desperation, but the maid gives you a look of such horror before she bolts, shrieking like a banshee. 

I’ve just killed a man. I’ve murdered my father. 

Ada might miscarry. Might die. Because of me. 

And the baby… 

You try to breathe, but there’s a dead body in your living room, and a terrified maid running wild. You know there’s a whole lot of consequences lined up, waiting for you—none of them good, but now, only one thing matters. 

Ada. 

You drive fast, stepping on the accelerator like it’s a matter of life and death, and why not? This is a matter of life. Two lives. You don’t care if you’ll spend the rest of yours in jail after this. You will face the world later, not this moment. 

Now, you have to save them. You know nothing else. 

What you know is the hammering in your chest that worsens with every second ticked beneath your skin. What you know is Ada’s head, lolling to one side, her face reddening in the heat. When the outline of the specialist hospital comes into view, you turn and pray that she doesn’t die on you. That she’s still hanging on. Your last words to her burst out of you in desperation, rolling off your tongue like a dying man’s prayer. 

“Ada, please. We’re almost there. Please, stay with me. We are almost –” 

You barely notice when the white Hilux truck swerves into your lane, but you hear the crash. You feel the impact and the crunch of metal, the splinter of glass, the startling sounds of disaster. This is how your car veers off the road, before crashing into the gutter, right in front of the hospital.

RAINBOW

Now, this is what you will never know now that you are dead, Sito. 

That Ada dies, too, just mere minutes after they pull the two of you out of the wrecked car. And that even in the aftermath of this storm you let loose, hope will bloom like wildflowers in spring. It’s a miracle, people will later say, even though it is quick thinking on the part of strangers, pedestrians who pulled all of you from the crash to the doctors on duty thatsaves the one precious life. That, and a decisive C-section conducted within a golden hour. But yes, it’s a miracle that the baby lives. Your baby. A girl. 

Her name will be Rainbow, just like you and Ada had agreed on. Partly because you often told Ada that your first child together would be the beautiful fusion of all your colours, all your dreams, all your hopes; and because of this, now that she’s become the arch of life appearing in death’s wake. Of course, she takes after her mother, so much so that for days, people troop into the hospital nursery, just to wonder how one baby can wield such stunning radiance. That seraphic beauty, coupled with a profound intelligence, will set her out from the crowd. Rainbow will also inherit the magic of your fingers and your loving perception of colours, asserting herself as an art prodigy, way before she becomes a full adult.

For years, raised by Adaʼs doting parents, she will weave the memories that could have been from the pictures of you both. Pictures that will ignite a deep sense of loneliness, grief, and of being incomplete. This loneliness will inspire ephemeral paintings of colourful birds and ordinary families, causing critics to adore her creative interpretations of flight, home and freedom. With breathtaking quality and depth, Rainbow’s masterpieces will dazzle the world, selling high at Sothebyʼs and Christieʼs, resting on the walls of homes and public spaces, inspiring cult-like adoration on social media platforms. 

You should be proud of her, Sito. Ada would be so proud of her, too; this girl that is magnificent beyond anything you could ever have dreamed. But what does she even know yet? 

Now, barely even a week old in this insane world, tiny Rainbow is diapered, swaddled in warm blankets and sleeping, sleeping like an angel. This remarkable life that she’s set to live—a life she will forever owe to you and Ada— this, right in the white-walled nursery of a hospital, is where it begins.