You should know, it started with the
hack of flesh then the spurt of blood.
He sat watching, calmly, the fountain
of skins splayed over the Butcher’s
table like petals on a conjugal bed.
There was silence. There was noise as
the cleaver came down. Then there
was silence. And there was a
rendezvous of both as if to form a
rhythm. He dipped a slice of flesh in
his blood-filled cup, grinned, then
opened his mouth to scrunch the girl’s
ear. Whether it was the right or the
left, he didn’t know. Though he was
sure it was fried. He felt dull and
dowdy as he swallowed. But the sweet
taste of human flesh is always
rewarding.
He raised his face to look at his boys.
Shovels digging into the earth. He
could hear them gasp as they plunged
into the sands. A sudden calmness
washed all over him, he sighed. Her
torso was being buried now. The
rustling of trees interrupted the rites.
Gentle breeze blew the trees as they
danced as if to clink. The sky was
furrowed with bunches of clouds
imitating human slowness. The air
seasoned with a feast. He stood up.
He could now see the rippling surface
of the earth being shovelled into a
small hill. From where he stood to the
mole hill extended like a map beneath
him. He heard the birds perching and
something in him turned. He felt
watched. By who? By what? He wasn’t
sure. They were at least three miles
from the road, they should have heard
something.
The Butcher offered him the other ear.
He saw blood dripping down the curvy
part attached to the head. He turned it
down with a wave of hand. The
Butcher threw it in his mouth and
gulped it down. He looked at the
butcher and there was surprise
written all over his face. He shook his
head and thought, Savage.
He shifted his gaze to the girl. She was
quiet, still, and noiseless. Her eyes
were restful as the unstirring calmness
of the moon. No, not the moon, he
thought. The dead will be a better
analogy. But she was dead, no analogy.
Her body lay in the safe embrace of
the sands. Flecks of sands crept over
her mouth. She had a nice smile, her
smile could charm the dead to life, he
thought. Ah ah, see it work for you
now? He chuckled as he felt a tinge of
his own dark humour. He called one of
his boys, told him to dust off the sands
on her mouth.
“Why can’t we call a cargo a shipment
and a shipment a cargo?” he asked the
Butcher. The Butcher looked at him
strangely like a bewildered zoologist
seeing an animal for the first time.
The Butcher thought for awhile then
shrugged. “I don’t know,” he said. The
Butcher confirmed his doubt, he was
dumb. But he was worried that there
were many things that don’t add up in
life. Why do we call goods transported
by cars shipment? And those
transported by ships cargo? He
pondered over it too then hissed it off.
Ultimately, he was satisfied with the
distraction. When you’ve a girl like
that in front of you, with her essentials
sliced off, you need to go away, even
for some seconds. The essentials will
fetch some real money, though.
The boys were rounding up the burial.
The shovels made scratching sounds
that irked him with each passing
excavation. He tried to remember her
name. Victory? Victoria? There was no
way of knowing now. No, he
remembered. It was Victory. The other
girl, with Chief, is Victoria. He sighed
again, Victory huh?
The boys used their shovels to level the
earth. The girl now completely buried
without the niceties of funerals. No
black clothes. No flowers. No tears. No
condolences. The lofty forest protected
her from the burden of humanity that
came with such occasion. The boys
spat on her grave and wiped beads of
sweat off their faces, imprinting
themselves.
“Boss, wetin may we do with the
cloth,” one of the boys asked as they
placed palm fronds on her grave.
“Burn am. Bring the pants, that one na
bonus,” he said as he approached his
car.
