Choice

Somi Ekhasomhi
‘Our husbands are the cloth with which we hide our nakedness’

I do not reply, it is usually better not to, when she talks like this, Anyway, I know she is not
finished yet.

‘Our husbands are the cloth with which we hide our nakedness’ she repeats. ‘no matter who
you are, no matter what you have, when you don’t have that cloth people will point at you and
say, there she goes again, naked, and you, you will be ashamed’

I drop the melon seeds I’ve shelled into the jar on the table, the husks I drop on a wide blue tray
which I believe is much older than I am. It has been present in the family ritual of shelling melon
seeds since I can remember. We are seated at the kitchen table, my mother and I, shelling
melon seeds for egusi soup.

My mother insists on shelling her own even though like me and thousands of other women in
Lagos she could get them already shelled from the markets. Her mother, who still farms them,
brings them to her from the village, my mother then dries them in the backyard spread out on
wide plastic trays until she is satisfied with them. Then the shelling begins.

We are all out of the house now, married. I, my sisters and my brothers. Which is why these
days my mother shells melon seeds alone. My youngest brother got married last year, his first
child is due in a month, and my mother wants to shell melon seeds enough to cook the soup for
the big baby dedication party she has planned. Has my brother consented to this party, I
wonder.

‘No matter what a woman is, she has to realise that the most important thing she came to this
world to do, is to nurture’ She pauses and drops the clean melon seeds into the jar. ‘She
nurtures her husband and her children because their success is a measure of her success’

I stare out of the window over the kitchen sink. The windows are closed because the air
conditioning is on. It is sunny outside and the clothes my mother insists cannot be trusted to
the washer and dryer are hanging on the line, the whites are so white they seem to flash white
light as they blow in the breeze, maybe she’s right I think. My whites are not as white as hers,
and I use an ultra modern washer and dryer.

‘Whatever your man does, no matter how dirty he gets himself, dust him, clean him up, raise
and keep him. Do you know why?’ She pauses and looks at me. ‘Because even if you could have
done better, you didn’t and now he is the one you have.’ She pauses again ‘and believe me
having him will shield you from what the world has to say about you.’
What does the world have to say about me now, I wonder, that my husband of eight years told
me that he was going on a business trip, but instead was in a hotel with the woman he used to
go out with ages before we met, who dumped him for a richer man, who was now a gay
divorcee, who had only crooked her finger for him to go running to her.

What if I hadn’t been invited to redo the interior decoration of the dining room at the
Mayflower Hotel? What if I hadn’t gone there to take a look at the place? What if I hadn’t seen
my husband having dinner with this woman when he was supposed to have been miles away in
South Africa? What if I hadn’t asked the hotel manager who the couple were and had been told
that they had been staying there for a week? Then I wouldn’t know. I’d still be missing my man
and he’d still be in the hotel with her, not in the house waiting for me to come home so he
could follow me around with ‘I’m sorry eyes’, waiting for me to say something, or do
something.

I haven’t said anything, I don’t know yet what to say. Have I ever known of a man who didn’t
cheat on his wife? I’m not sure. Did I really expect different from my husband? I don’t know. I
can’t believe how much it hurts though, now that what I know I have been dreading for years
has finally happened. I can’t believe how angry I am. I want to hurt him. But what can I do?

‘If every woman should leave her husband when he does the things that very likely all men do’
My mother continues, ‘there will be no marriages.’ She sighs. ‘I know how much you love your
Daddy, but he wasn’t a perfect husband. If I had done some of the things you’re contemplating
now, you wouldn’t have had a daddy to love.’

When I get home I am told by the gateman that my husband has taken the children to the club.
I don’t mind, I do so want to be alone, I take all my white linen and put them through the
washer and dryer. I want them to come out as white as my mothers, maybe because more than
anything I want to prove to myself that her way is not always the right way, that sometimes I
can do things my own way and not be wrong.

I hear the car in the driveway. I hear the children’s voices. I come out into the dining room and
watch as the twins run into the house, at six and a half they are as active as fire crackers and as
noisy. Sophia sees me first and hurls herself at me, Daniel follows immediately. I swear they
compete in everything. John runs in after them and grabs hold of my legs, he is a quiet boy, my
Johnny and very sensitive, he is only three.

My husband comes in last, carrying Daisy, our baby. I can’t believe how looking at him hurts
me. Daisy coos at me, I smile back. Then I disentangle the forest of arms and legs around me
and go upstairs. I am suddenly so sad and so tired.

He follows me upstairs. Did I know he would? I am standing by the window in our bedroom,
when he enters.
‘What do you want me to do’ he asks, he is sorry, he has said over and over again. He has been
sorry since I walked up to that table and said, ‘I didn’t realise that this was the business you had
to do in South Africa?’

He had been so shocked. I almost smile as I think about it.

I haven’t replied him. He walks up behind me. I move away before he can touch me.

‘I’m sorry’ he says. I know if I turn around I’ll see tears in his eyes. ‘Men!’ I think. ‘How pathetic
they are! How they can grovel to get what they want but how quickly they go out of their way
to lose it again.’

I touch the window curtains; they are very good cotton, from Italy, my mother-in-law gave
them to me. ‘I should wash them’ I think. ‘They are slightly dirty.’

My husband goes to sit on the bed and holds his head in his bands, he is crying. I ignore him for
a while before I go to sit beside him. I know I will forgive him. I know I won’t leave him. Not
because of my mother or what she said. I am not afraid to be a woman alone. Not because of
the children even though they would seem to be the obvious reason, not because of anything
people will say about me. No, I am going to stay with this man for one reason only. I love him.