Chapter Thirty-Five
When I close the front door behind me, Esosasteps out of her room.
“There you are,” she sighs. “I’ve been—” She looks between me and Mom and frowns, likely sensing the tension. “Is everything okay?”
“Esosa, go to your room,” Mom says.
“Okay, then. I guess not.” She backs away while watching me. Her lips mouth, Are you okay?
I shake my head as she enters her room and shuts the door.
Silence extends for well over a minute. Mom paces around the living room with her head low, while I stand unmoving. Lately, we’ve had a lot of moments like this. I hate it.
“Math club.” She stops walking and looks at me. “Was there ever a math club?”
Slowly, I shake my head.
“All that time, you were at rehearsals for this play?”
I nod.
Neither of us says a word as she paces around again. My nails dig into my palm. Maybe I should fill the uncomfortable silence with an explanation or maybe, before anything else, an apology.
“Mommy, I’m sorry. Sorry for lying.” After a deep breath, I start with the explanation. “I auditioned for the musical and didn’t expect to get the lead. But I did, and it was exciting. I wanted to tell you, but… well, I was scared you’d make me quit.”
She stops moving. This could be a good sign, a sign she’s listening and maybe even open to what I’m saying.
“I couldn’t imagine quitting. Mommy, I love it. It’s… it’s not just about singing. It’s acting and dancing and performing. And it’s incredible.” My voice swells as my enthusiasm comes through. “It’s what I want to do with my life.”
She frowns, but I muster the courage to say more, to tell her the whole truth. I’m terrified of her reaction but won’t let fear stop me.
“Mom, there’s a school. It’s called Juilliard. It’s for performing arts. I can learn everything there, everything I need. That’s where I want to go. For university.” My heart beats fast. “I… I sent in an application.”
“You applied? For the school?”
“Yes,” I whisper.
“Without telling me?”
I nod.
She releases a loud, rough breath and shakes her head. “I can’t do this anymore. I just cannot. It’s too much.”
“Can’t do what?”
She throws her arms up. “This. This country. Trying to build a life here. Taking care of you and Esosa alone. I cannot do it anymore.” Her shoulders slump. “Your father should be here. He was better at all this than me. Better at interacting with your friends whenever they visited. Better at keeping the order. Better at parenting you and Esosa.” She rubs her teary eyes. “He was my balance. I don’t know how to stand steady without him. I am falling, failing without him here.”
“What? Mommy, no. You aren’t.”
“Twice. I failed my USMLE Step 1 twice. Back home, I was a doctor for over ten years, respected in my field. But here, I can’t even pass a common exam.” Her lips roll into her mouth as if she’s holding back a cry. “You do whatever you please as long as it makes you happy. You forget I came to this country too. That I lost your father too. That I am struggling and in pain and trying to keep this family together. That I feel alone. So, so alone.” She hunches over, her hands braced on her hips as she pants.
I’ve never seen my mom like this. I wasn’t even sure this version of her existed. When my father died, she cried and mourned, but her optimism made those moments brief. She helped me and Esosa through each day with her endless encouragement: It’s going to be okay. We’re going to make it through this. America will be a new start. We’ll be happy there.
It’s only now I recognize her optimism as false, a fragile strength she used to disguise her grief and fear. Why didn’t I see it before? How could I have been so blind?
“And as if all this wasn’t hard enough,” she continues, “in the past few months, you’ve skipped school. Dated a boy behind my back. Lied to my face repeatedly about your involvement in a useless play. And now you’re talking all this nonsense about going to a performing arts school.” She lifts her head and watches me sternly.
Guilty of everything she’s mentioned, I can’t open my mouth to say a word. What’s there to say, anyway? Sorry for being an additional source of stress in your life? Sorry for prioritizing my grief and struggle and failing to see yours? Sorry for being the daughter you no longer trust?
I could apologize for all these things, but I sense we’ve come to a point where an apology no longer matters.
“Since we came to this country, you’ve become someone different,” she says to me. “I hardly recognize you. This girl, the one standing in front of me, isn’t the girl your father and I raised. You are not the person your father knew.” She shakes her head. “If he was here right now, he would be more than just disappointed in you. He would be heartbroken by you.”
Those words have the force of a punch, hitting me so hard, I stumble back. Tears well up in my eyes and blur my vision until everything in the room turns to smudges of colors.
He was only ever proud of me. I can’t think of a time when he expressed disappointment in me. But now my mom paints the perfect scenario that would warrant his disappointment, and shame settles on me, a weight on my chest that makes my breaths short and quick. Tears soak my cheeks and keep falling.
“We’re going back to Nigeria,” my mom says.
“We’re what?” Esosa shouts.
My sister’s loud voice and the unexpected announcement make me blink hard. My blurry vision clears. The room comes into focus again. My sister is standing at her open bedroom door, her eyes wide with shock.
“What do you mean, we’re going back to Nigeria?” she asks.
“You both will finish the semester here, then we will leave for Nigeria during the Christmas holiday.”
“No. No. No. No,” Esosa protests.
“I can still get my job back there. We have family there—my sister and brother. They can help me with the two of you.”
“We have family here. Uncle Davis. Auntie Sara.”
“Well, I’m not in total support of their style of parenting—the way they let you children run around and do as you please. There’ll be none of that once we get home.”
“Home?” Esosa shouts, her voice shaking. “This is home. It’s been our home for months. We go to school here. We have friends here. We have lives here. We can’t just leave, right, Enore?” She looks at me for support but doesn’t find it.
Mom is right. We have to go back. Things were easier there. I knew the role I was meant to play and never deviated from it, never felt the need to be anything other than what was expected of me. The temptation for something more started here. I realized my passion here. I found the resources to nurture it here. I became a liar here. I disappointed my parents here.
Determined to make her case, even with no support, Esosa continues to protest. “I love my country and all that, but people are literally trying to leave Nigeria, and we want to go back? What? You have to be joking.”
“That’s enough,” Mom says, holding her hand up. “Enough. I’ve been thinking about this for a long time, and I’ve made my final decision. We’re going back to Nigeria in a few weeks. Start packing and say your goodbyes.” With that, she marches to her room and shuts the door.
“Seriously,” Esosa says to me. “You just stood there? You couldn’t say anything?” She walks to me and shoves my shoulder. “Not even a word? Do you realize what’s going to happen? She isn’t bluffing.”
“I know she isn’t.”
“Then why didn’t you say anything?” She wipes her wet eyes. “Huh? Why didn’t you?”
I shrug and walk away, quiet as I enter my room and close the door.