The Gift

Dan buys Colleen a wedding gift.

The Gift

Colleen felt Dan’s bare chest rising and falling beneath her. She played with  the soft hairs surrounding his right n****e recalling the frenzied groping earlier and then after a shower, slower lovemaking ebbing into sleep.  Three, long, Danless nights she had spent nestling against her spare pillow, pretending that it was Dan.

Last Monday she had stood beside Dan in front of the local magistrate. Dressed in her green party dress, white high heels and a small white cap she had bought at Levantis, she had told the magistrate that she would take Dan as her legal husband. Behind her, Elizabeth acting as her witness had echoed her words. The magistrate had declared Dan and her to be wed. So it had been done.

That afternoon after a reception at Elizabeth and Colleen’s place Richard drove the newlyweds to the Falaj. There they would spend their first married night together.

An hour later the two lay cuddled together. Lovemaking done for the moment they waited for sleep. While waiting they talked about the day. One point troubled Dan. “You should have had a ring” he told Colleen. “It doesn’t seem right without a ring.”

Colleen patted his right arm. “It’s alright Dan. We’ll have one in Canada. It’s the love that matters.” She kissed his left cheek. “Sleep now.”

Dan tried to sleep. He lay beside Colleen listening to her soft breathing. Again and again he asked himself the same question. What kind of a man was he that he could not buy his wife, a ring for her wedding day? A failure; that’s who.

Dan rose with the sun. Trying not to disturb Colleen, he pulled on shorts and a T-shirt. Shoving his feet into a well-worn pair of red, rubber flip flops, he opened the back door. Picking up the trash can he lugged it around the house to the road. There he met Bob Green who was also manhandling his trash can.

“Morning, Bob.”

“Morning, Dan, so how’s married life?”

“Okay so far.”

Bob grinned. “Wait till the babies start coming.”

“By the way Bob; do you know the name of a good jewelry store in Kano?”

“A good one?  Hmm. Try Swiss Gold Shop near the Ruwi Market. I heard it’s respectable. Pricy though.”

“Alright. Thanks.”

***

Colleen frowned. “Are you certain that you want to do this Dan?”

“I am.”

“You don’t have to buy me anything.”

“You should have something to show how much I love you. What will your parents say if you don’t wear something showing that you’re married? What will they think of you? Of me?”

“I thought we were supposing to be saving money for our trip to Egypt?”

“We are but this is special. Anyway I can take it from my remittance.”

“Dan, you are my gift. I really don’t need anything. Anyway we can buy wedding rings once we’re in Canada.”

“Well, we’ll have a look anyway.”

***

The orange and white taxi pulled up beside the Gidan Barka next to the Unity bank close to the Central Market. Apart from the red curtain the only other thing that was visible through the windows was its name emblazoned in large gold painted letters.

Colleen paid the driver four nairas. “Na gode mallam.”

The driver nodded. “Thank you, madam.”

Stepping out of the cab Colleen peered at the white walled shop with deep red curtains.

“Swiss colours anyway. Do you think it’s really Swiss” she asked Dan.

“Probably Lebanese I would think.”

“So why Swiss?”

Dan shrugged. “The Swiss are rich. Swiss banks are brimming with gold. So people think Swiss gold is the best.”

“Is it?”

“In Switzerland? Yes. Here?” He shrugged. “Who knows.”

Colleen and Dan stepped up to the large red shrouded door.  Dan pushed it open to be met by a green uniformed security sitting on a stool and holding a Kalashnikov submachine gun. The guard beamed a friendly greeting. Smiling back and trying hard not to look at the gun, Dan and Colleen stepped past him.

A young man in a gray babariga and black and white cap stood behind a display case. He bowed “Good morning sir, madam. May I help you?”

In the low display cases were ornaments; pins, brooches armbands and rings. Colleen and Dan slowly walked pass, eying each.

“I’ll take two of those said Dan, pointing at the pins. He then pointed at the armbands “and three of those.”

Colleen elbowed his left shoulder. “Behave yourself.”

They continued browsing. Halfway down the length of the counter Colleen noted a small sign. Crosses.  Odd, she thought. Why would they be selling Christian symbols. “You sell crosses” Colleen asked the clerk, imagining the Crucifixes she had known at home.

“Not Christian Crosses, madam. Agadez crosses. We bring them in from Niamey. They are made by the Taureg in the desert.”

Four inches long, three inches wide, filigree top, two arms reaching out.

“What quality gold?” asked Colleen.”

“Eighteen karats; you cannot expect much better in the desert.”

Opening the drawer he took out the cross and let Colleen hold it. “It comes with a gift box,” he added.

“I have heard of Agades Crosses,” said Dan  “A very old tradition among the desert tribes isn’t it?”

The clerk nodded. “The Agades Cross is Pre �" Islamic, pre-Christian; possibly even from Roman and Carthaginian times. Amongh Tauregs a father will give one to his son when he attains manhood.

“How much” asked Colleen.”

“Sixty nairas, mallama.”

Colleen looked at Dan. “What do you think?”

“Well, it’s different.”

“Apparently it comes with an old saying,” said the clerk. “My father taught it to me, many years ago.”

 “I give you the four corners of the world because one cannot know where one will die.”

He spoke the words in the same soft tone that he used for any other possible buyer of a cross.

“That’s lovely” said Colleen. She looked at the cross and then at Dan. He nodded.

Holding the cross against her chest, she looked at herself in a mirror. Satisfied she handed it back to the clerk. “We’ll take it.”

The clerk bowed.

***

Dressed in a pink nightie Colleen stood in front of her dresser mirror, holding the cross. “Next month I’ll buy a chain for it,” she told Dan.

Dan looked up from his book “Admiring your cross?”

“It’s our cross, Dan; not just mine. Every time I wear it, I’ll think of how much I love you.  When we get married in Canada I’ll wear it for all to see. I promise you.”

“Like a wedding ring?”

“Yes.”

Lying beside her Dan, Colleen thought of the months ahead. In two weeks they would fly to Cairo. Two weeks after that they would return to Nigeria to complete the new school term. At the end of June they would go home to Canada. There at Saint Patrick’s Church in Hamilton, Dan and she would be wed in front of their families. On her wedding dress she would wear the cross so that all could see how much Dan loved her. She closed her eyes and slept.