Purple Hibiscus

eyes. “Have you ever picked up the phone and called me to ask me that question, eh, Eugene? Will your hands wither away if you pick up the phone one day and call your sister,
gbo
?” Her Igbo words had a teasing lilt, but the steeliness in her tone created a knot in my throat.
    “I did call you, Ifeoma.”
    “How long ago was that? I ask you—how long ago was that?” Aunty Ifeoma put her fork down. She sat still for a long, tense moment, as still as Papa was, as still as we all were. Finally Mama cleared her throat and asked Papa if the bottle of juice was empty.
    “Yes,” Papa said. “Ask that girl to bring more bottled juice.”
    Mama got up to call Sisi. The long bottles Sisi brought looked as though they contained an elegant liquid, the way they tapered like a slender, shapely woman. Papa poured for everyone and proposed a toast. “To the spirit of Christmas and to the glory of God.”
    We repeated him in a chorus. Obiora’s sentence had a lift at the end, and it came out sounding like a question: “to the glory of God?”
    “And to us, and to the spirit of family,” Aunty Ifeoma added, before she drank.
    “Does your factory make this, Uncle Eugene?” Amaka asked, squinting to see what was written on the bottles.
    “Yes,” Papa answered.
    “It’s a little too sweet. It would be nicer if you reduced the sugar in it.” Amaka’s tone was as polite and normal as everyday conversation with an older person. I was not sure if Papa nodded or if his head simply moved as he chewed. Another knot formed in my throat, and I could not get a mouthful of rice down. I knocked my glass over as I reached for it, and theblood-colored juice crept over the white lace tablecloth. Mama hastily placed a napkin on the spot, and when she raised the reddened napkin, I remembered her blood on the stairs.
    “Did you hear about Aokpe, Uncle Eugene?” Amaka asked. “It’s a tiny village in Benue. The Blessed Virgin is appearing there.”
    I wondered how Amaka did it, how she opened her mouth and had words flow easily out.
    Papa spent some time chewing and swallowing before he said, “Yes, I heard about it.”
    “I plan to go on pilgrimage there with the children,” Aunty Ifeoma said. “Maybe Kambili and Jaja can go with us.”
    Amaka looked up quickly, surprised. She started to say something and then stopped.
    “Well, the church has not verified the authenticity of the apparitions,” Papa said, staring thoughtfully at his plate.
    “You know we will all be dead before the church officially speaks about Aokpe,” Aunty Ifeoma said. “Even if the church says it is not authentic, what matters is why we go, and it is from faith.”
    Papa looked unexpectedly pleased with what Aunty Ifeoma had said. He nodded slowly. “When do you plan to go?”
    “Sometime in January, before the children resume school.”
    “Okay. I will call you when we get back to Enugu to arrange for Jaja and Kambili to go for a day or two.”
    “A week, Eugene, they will stay a week. I do not have monsters that eat human heads in my house!” Aunty Ifeoma laughed, and her children reproduced the throaty sounds, their teeth flashing like the insides of a cracked palm kernel. Only Amaka did not laugh.
    THE NEXT DAY was a Sunday. It did not seem like a Sunday, maybe because we had just gone to church on Christmas day. Mama came into my room and shook me gently, hugged me, and I smelled her mint-scented deodorant.
    “Did you sleep well? We are going to the earlier Mass today because your father has a meeting right afterward.
Kunie
, get into the bathroom, it’s past seven.”
    I yawned and sat up. There was a red stain on my bed, wide as an open notebook.
    “Your period,” Mama said. “Did you bring pads?”
    “Yes.”
    I barely let the water run over my body before I came out of the shower, so that I would not delay. I picked out a blue-and-white dress and tied a blue scarf around my head. I knotted it twice at the back of my neck and then tucked the ends of my cornrows underneath. Once, Papa had hugged me proudly, kissed my forehead, because Father Benedict told him that my hair was always properly covered for Mass, that I was not like the other young girls in church who let some of their hair show, as if they did not know that exposing your hair in church was ungodly.
    Jaja and Mama were dressed and waiting in the living room upstairs when I came out. Cramps racked my belly. I imagined someone with buckteeth rhythmically biting deep