Page 25 of You Made a Fool of Death with Your Beauty

Feyi felt her knees buckle slightly and she could hear Joy’s voice in her head, clear as day.

Oh, bitch. You’re fucked.

Chapter Seven

The drive up the mountain to Alim’s house was ridiculously gorgeous, as if it had been copied and pasted from a postcard. Feyi couldn’t stop staring out the window. She’d made the mistake of glancing at the rearview mirror, but then she’d accidentally made eye contact with Alim, which left her flustered beyond measure. Nasir was telling his father about his latest client, a kid from San Francisco boasting of some new app that he was convinced was going to change everything. Feyi had heard the story about five separate times before, so she tuned out and watched the trees instead, the slope of the hills falling, the people they were passing. She could still see the ocean from the road, a blue rippling sheet of water lapping at the land. Often, Alim would honk his horn and wave an arm at someone who’d wave back at him, shouting greetings over the sound of the yellow Jeep’s tires rumbling against the road. Feyi was holding her phone tightly in one hand, not sure if it would be too tacky or touristy if she just started taking pictures. She had tried shooting Joy a text before they loaded up the car, but the airport Wi-Fi was spotty and it didn’t go through. She checked her phone to see if she was getting any service, but it stared emptily back at her.

“Feyi?” she heard Nasir say, and snapped her head up.

Alim was watching her in the mirror with those murky eyes of his. Feyi looked away from him and at Nasir instead.

“Sorry, what?” she asked.

“I was asking if you good?”

“Oh! Yeah, I’m great.” She gestured out of the window. “This is amazing. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Alim made a sharp corner, throwing a question over his shoulder. “This is your first visit?”

“Yeah, I’ve never been to any of the islands before. I didn’t know you could even get mountains like this so close to the sea.”

Nasir noticed the phone in her hand and grinned. “You can take pictures if you want to. I know Joy’s waiting for all the updates on the ’gram.”

Feyi stuck her tongue out at him. “I don’t have any service.”

“There’ll be Wi-Fi at the house. You can upload them soon as we get in.” Nasir twisted in his seat to point out a massive tree to her, its trunk whorled and wider than any arms could reach. “No one’s allowed to cut that down. They say it holds the spirits of ancestors.”

Alim glanced at his son, curious. “You used to make fun of all that, calling it obeah business.”

Nasir shrugged. “I was a kid. I thought it was cool to be skeptical.”

“And now?” Feyi asked.

“I think it’s nice to believe in something,” he answered, watching as the tree receded into the distance. He continued pointing out landmarks and details to Feyi as they drove up the mountain. The road became more and more narrow, snaking precariously, and then they turned down a side road, the Jeep’s wheels bumping over the dirt. Trees formed a thick canopy above them, sunlight glimmering through in fragments. Feyi held her breath as she looked around—it felt like a fairy tale, like they were passing through a gate between worlds. After a while, the road evened out, ending in a pair of black wrought-iron gates that towered above the car. Feyi gazed up at them as Nasir popped open the glove compartment and pulled out a remote that swung the gates open with a quiet hiss. Alim drove the car through, and Feyi’s jaw dropped. It looked like a dream. She couldn’t even see the house from the gate, just a long driveway lined with trees filled with pink and white flowers, hummingbirds darting through the air, monkeys peering between the leaves, and the sun washing gold over everything.

“I know, right?” Nasir was watching her, pleased with her reaction. “It’s really something.”

Feyi reached her hand out from the window and watched as petals fell over her skin. “This is surreal,” she said, her eyes wide. “There’s so much land!” It stretched out farther than she could see, lush and green, a kingdom unto itself.

“Family land,” Alim said. “Our blood is in it.” He drove up a bend in the driveway as a kaleidoscope of butterflies wheeled past the car, and the house pulled into view, a breathtaking tropical modern structure that was all cascading expanses of uninterrupted glass and dark timber, three stories high.

“Whoa,” Feyi gasped. “That is gorgeous.”

Alim glanced at her through the rearview mirror. “Thank you,” he said. “I wanted to live in something open, as close to the air as I could get. The architect did well.”

“Wait till you see inside,” Nasir added. They parked under a steel-beamed trellis dripping with bougainvillea, and Feyi stepped out of the car. There was entirely too much to look at—her eyes could only snag on the details a few at a time: the soaring birds of paradise along the pathway, the albino peacock watching them from the grass, the side door inlaid with mother-of-pearl. Alim and Nasir took off their shoes as they entered the house, and Feyi quickly followed suit, dropping her sneakers on the teak rack next to the door. The ground floor was a stretch of black polished concrete, spilling into an open living area littered with sculptures, couches, and art. She spun around, taking it all in.

“You look like a kid,” Nasir said with a laugh.

Feyi made a face at him, then stopped in her tracks, staring at a drawing that took up most of one wall. “No way.”

Alim watched as she walked up and lifted her hand, her fingers a breath away from the glass protecting the art.

“You have a ruby onyinyechi amanze original?” she asked, glancing over at him.

When Alim smiled at her, her chest fluttered in response. “I thought you might like that,” he said. “You Nigerians always know each other’s work.”

Nasir came up and stood beside her. “I don’t get it,” he said. “There’s too much empty space, shouldn’t it be filled up?”