Shu sighs again. “Fine, fair. Enjoy church.”
“Thanks. Love you.”
She laughs and it’s a burst of energy. “You always gotta say it,” she says. “Why can’t you end a conversation without saying it?”
“Just say you love me too and hang up.”
“Yeah, you too.”
* * *
When Mum’s here, I join her at a small Pentecostal church in Croydon. There the pastor can easily make eye contact with any person from the pulpit and everyone knows too much about each other. When Mum’s in Ghana, I go to a church in central London. I found out about it because Shu goes here, not weekly, but “when I can, innit.”
I liked that they called themselves a contemporary Christian church and that hundreds attend each sermon, guaranteeing anonymity. I attended one Sunday, alone because I preferred mornings whilst Shu preferred the evenings, and liked it enough to keep returning. The sermons are taught by different preachers, so you never know who you’re going to get, and they’re all relatively young. They speak about Christianity in the era of social media and increasing peer pressure; they speak about being the love in a world often shown to be full of hate; they find ways to make the Bible relatable and I don’t leave feeling like I’m not enough of a Christian to call myself one. Each session is ninety minutes long and they encourage you to stick around after and meet people—if you like. I prefer to get home to Dad.
I take a seat on the ground floor at the end of a row and settle in.
* * *
I can hear Dad talking as I let myself in from church and I think maybe Dawoud has come even though he’s not due, but when I step into the living room, there’s no one but Dad there.
His eyes are wide, and he’s speaking in Twi. I can’t grasp what he’s saying because it’s too broken. I hope he’s speaking to me, but, no, he’s staring into the corner, a blank patch on our living room wall, and talking to someone who is not there.
“Dad?”
He doesn’t stop talking and staring.
“Dad? Who are you talking to?”
The corners of his mouth pull down. He blinks and slowly extends his arm, as far as he can, to point at the empty space. “My … my sis … ter,” he says.
“Auntie Mabel? Is she here?”
“No. No. Re … Rebecca.”
I swallow. My aunt Rebecca died in Ghana when I was three years old.
“No, Dad,” I say softly. “She’s not here.” I wave into the space and repeat myself, but he continues to frown and point at the blank wall.
He leans his head back and still staring says quietly, “My sister Rebecca.”
I go over to him and gently shake his arm. “Dad?”
He blinks and finally looks at me. He looks at the wall and then to me again. He closes his eyes and a tear runs down his cheek.
I hold his hand. “Sorry, Dad,” I say quietly. “I … I’m sorry.” I dab his cheek with my coat sleeve and then kiss his forehead. I sit there, cradling his shaking right hand with both of mine until he falls asleep.
I leave the room and pull my phone from my pocket. My hands are shaking as I call Dr. Appong’s direct line. I tell him about the hallucination, and he assures me it isn’t rare for the medication Dad’s on, but for my peace of mind, he’ll come by tomorrow to check on him.
“Not today?”
“I’m not in the office today, I’m afraid.”
“Right! Sorry, it’s Sunday. I forgot again. I’m sorry. It’s just…” I pinch the bridge of my nose to block the fresh tears. “Will tomorrow be too late?”
“Maddie, everything is fine.” His tone is reassuring, with confidence bolstered by decades of medical practice, and patient. Or it could be pity. I still remember the frown on his face the day he came to see Dad and asked where Mum was. I told him it was just me at the moment and that’s when he gave me his direct line. When he left I swore I could see him shaking his head as he walked away. “You say he’s not displaying any other symptoms?”
“No, he’s a bit tired though.”
“That’s normal. You don’t need to worry. You can call me again if something else happens, but he should be okay, all right?”
I nod, then remember to say, “Yes, thank you.”
* * *
Dr. Appong was right. When Dad wakes up, he doesn’t seem to remember anything, and he’s as fine as he was the day before. The memory clings to me however, through the afternoon, through dinner and up until the night. I called James, but he didn’t pick up, then I sent a WhatsApp to Mum, but she hasn’t replied.
I lay awake in bed thinking about before Dad was ill. It’s been eight years, so it takes me a while to remember. To remember I used to leave Dad to his weekends because that’s how he preferred it, and I would spend Saturdays and Sundays with school friends I don’t see anymore.
Dad and I never spent that much time together, nowhere near as much as we do now. With Mum in Ghana every other year and James adopting himself into other families, I grew up alone. Dad left me to it because he knew he could. I was the well-behaved one.
But if I’d realized how much that pressure would build inside me, the slow descent into a dull existence, days blemished with concern for my dad and whether I’m looking after him properly—well, I would have stayed out late some nights, lost my virginity at sixteen instead of still having it, developed a fondness for alcohol, sat at bars, smoked weed, danced at clubs, and turned strangers into friends.
The truth is, it took a while for me to get comfortable around Dad, without Mum there as a buffer. He worked as a security guard for a private school in Wandsworth, which meant he was home in the evenings, but he would sit at his desk reading a newspaper or watching TV and I’d be in my room. That was normal for us. We aren’t a sit-down-and-have-dinner-together kind of family, except for some Christmases.
Last Christmas, Mum stayed in Ghana and James went away with friends, so it was just Dad and me. We watched The Grinch in comfortable silence. Dad suffers from diabetes, too, but I unwrapped a chocolate and popped it into his mouth. Mum called us in the evening and James the following day. I thought I would mind that we weren’t all together for Christmas, but really, it just felt like any other day.
* * *
Mum doesn’t call until Tuesday when I’m sat on a bench at the South Bank, facing the river.
“Darling, did you go to church on Sunday?” Mum asks. “What was the message?”
“There were a few,” I answer. “Queen Vashti was about people-pleasing, Mordecai about surrounding yourself with people who are loyal and honest, and Esther about having faith in the scariest of times.”
“Good. I like the sound of that,” she says, satisfied. “Remember to meditate on the scriptures of Esther. It’s a great passage. So…”
“Have you met someone yet?” I mouth the familiar words along with her. A conversation with my mum rarely passes without this question. “Since last week?” I roll my eyes. “No, I haven’t.”
“Did you not talk to anyone new at church?”
“No.”
“Why not?” she asks. “You tell me it’s mostly women at your work, but are there no men at your church?”