On her second week home, Borogie dressed Bubel before the sun had fully climbed above the trees. She had been planning the visit for days, speaking of it casually at first, as though it were simply another household errand, but Matou had noticed the anticipation in the way her mother prepared.
The night before, Borogie had chosen Matou’s cleanest dress and laid it carefully beside the sleeping mat. At twelve, Matou was old enough to bathe herself and choose what she wished to wear, so before dawn she quietly washed, rubbed shea butter into her skin and slipped into the dress her mother had set aside. Borogie then combed her hair into firm, even rows while she sat patiently between her knees. She had also shaken out Bubel’s small shirt, inspected its collar, and set aside a pair of shorts that had been patched so neatly the repair looked almost decorative. Before dawn, she heated water, washed Bubel, rubbed shea butter into his skin, and dressed him carefully for the journey.
“Do not move too much,” Borogie warned, holding Matou’s chin steady as she parted another section of her 4C hair. “You have been in Bakau too long. You have forgotten that hair requires patience.”
Matou winced as the comb pulled through a stubborn knot. “In Bakau, they do not pull my head off to make me beautiful.”
Borogie laughed. “Then perhaps that is why you came back with your head still full of stubbornness.”
Bubel, already dressed, sat nearby eating the last of his porridge and watching them with interest. “Mama, make her hair like Khadjel’s.”
“You have not seen Khadjel’s hair recently,” Matou reminded him.
“I remember it.”
“You remember everything except where you leave your sandals.”
Bubel looked down at his feet and immediately realized he was wearing only one.
Borogie sighed. “Go and find the other one before we leave you behind.”
The threat sent him scrambling through the room, lifting mats and looking beneath calabashes while Matou laughed. His missing sandal was eventually found beside the goat pen, where he had abandoned it the previous evening while trying to climb the guava tree. By the time they set out, the morning had opened fully over Farato.
Borogie carried a basket on her head filled with gifts from the compound: a bundle of fresh vegetables, groundnuts, a small calabash of dried fish, and a few eggs wrapped carefully in old cloth. She had also packed food for the journey, though the distance was not impossibly long. In those days, a journey was never measured only by miles. One could wait for transport, walk between stops, be delayed by rain, greet relatives unexpectedly or find oneself invited into a compound to ease oneself. A wise woman with children, carried something to eat.
Matou held Bubel’s hand as they followed the narrow sandy path from their father’s compound towards the main road. The sheep tried to follow them at first, bleating in protest when Borogie turned and shooed them back.
“Look at your children,” Borogie told Matou. “They think you are leaving them forever.”
“They know I will return.”
“Do they?”
One sheep continued after them stubbornly until Bubel ran back, waving both arms. “Go home! She is our sister, not yours.”
Matou laughed so hard she had to stop walking.
The road from Farato towards Jeshwang carried Matou backwards through time. Every turn seemed to release an old memory she had not known she still possessed. They boarded a lorry near the market, squeezing onto a wooden bench among women carrying produce, men heading towards town, and children travelling with relatives. The engine grumbled beneath them before the vehicle jerked forward, throwing Bubel, who was seated on his mother’s laps, against Matou’s side.
He grinned. “Again.”
“This is not a game,” Borogie said, though she too was smiling.
As Farato began to fall behind them, Matou leaned towards the open side of the lorry. The air struck her face, warm and dusty, carrying scents of grass, wood smoke and distant rain. The road stretched ahead through villages and open spaces where cattle grazed lazily beneath scattered trees.
She remembered travelling this way as a smaller child, before Bakau had become the place where her days were counted by chores. In those days, she had known the road only as something that connected people she loved. She remembered sitting on Borogie’s lap, half asleep, while Nata held a sleeping Khadjel against her chest. She remembered Yerro climbing down from a lorry to help push it free from deep sand. She remembered Bubel as a baby tied securely to their mother’s back, his head rolling gently with each bump.
The memories returned with such tenderness that she felt a pain she could not entirely separate from joy.
Borogie noticed her staring and asked, “What are you thinking about?”
“This road,” Matou replied. “It looks the same, but it feels smaller.”
“Roads do not become smaller,” Borogie said. “Children become larger.”
Matou considered this and nodded. “I remember coming this way with all of you. Nata used to hold my hand so tightly.”
“She was always afraid you would wander off.”
“I never wandered.”
Borogie gave her a knowing look. “You once followed a woman selling oranges because you liked the colour of her basket. We found you halfway to another compound.”
Matou laughed in disbelief. “I do not remember that.”
“I do. Your father nearly lost his mind. Nata cried more than you did.”
At the mention of Nata, Matou’s smile softened. She had looked forward to seeing her sister since the day she arrived in Farato. Their mother had spoken carefully about Nata’s return to Bukari’s house after three months of recovery. She had not said much more, but Matou understood enough to know that her sister was still unhappy.
“She does not like living with him,” Matou said.
Borogie adjusted the basket on her head before answering. “Marriage is not always about liking.”
“Then what is it about?”
“Duty. Patience. Families. Sometimes affection grows. Sometimes it does not.”
“That does not sound good.”
Borogie sighed. “You are still young.”
“I am twelve.”
“That is still young.”
“Old enough to know when someone is unhappy.”
Borogie looked at her then, seeing not a child repeating gossip but a girl who had learned to recognise suffering because she had lived close to it. She rested a hand briefly on Matou’s knee. “You are right. Your sister is unhappy. But there are some unhappinesses a person must decide how to carry.”
Matou turned back towards the road. She did not agree, though she knew better than to argue further. In her mind, unhappiness was not a load one should simply adjust and carry. Sometimes it should be put down.
Bubel, who had listened without fully understanding, asked, “Is Bukari bad?”
“No,” Borogie replied immediately. “He is not a bad man.”
“Then why does Nata not like him?”
Matou answered before their mother could. “Because good people are not always the right people for each other.”
Borogie glanced at her sharply, surprised by the sentence.
Bubel frowned as he tried to understand. “Like when the goat is good but belongs in another pen?”
Matou burst into laughter. “Something like that.”
The lorry rattled and groaned over the uneven road, stopping often enough that the journey soon lost any sense of speed.
Busumbala came first. A few passengers climbed down there, gathering their bundles and calling farewells to those remaining inside. Others took their places almost immediately: women with baskets of vegetables, men carrying tools, a mother with a sleepy child tied to her back, and two young boys who squeezed themselves onto the edge of the bench and spent the next stretch of road arguing over whose elbow occupied more space.
From Busumbala, the lorry continued towards Old Yundum. The road was long and dusty, and whenever the vehicle gathered speed, reddish-brown powder rose behind it and drifted through the open sides. Passengers covered their noses with the edges of their wrappers. Matou wiped Bubel’s face several times, laughing when the dust turned the sweat on his forehead into thin muddy streaks.
At Old Yundum, the driver stopped beneath a large tree while the conductor shouted the destination to those waiting nearby. Some passengers descended to greet relatives or continue along smaller paths leading into the village. Others boarded carrying sacks of groundnuts, bundles of firewood and woven baskets that had to be tied securely to the roof. The conductor complained about the weight, but still found space for everything.
The lorry moved on towards Lamin. By then, the sun had climbed higher and the coolness of Farato had disappeared. Heat gathered beneath the vehicle’s metal covering. Bodies shifted on the narrow benches, trying to make room where none existed. A baby began to cry. An old man asked the driver to stop because he needed to urinate, and the request quickly encouraged several others to admit the same need.
“Driver, stop small,” a woman called from the back. “We are human beings, not sacks of rice.”
The lorry came to a halt beside a stretch of bush. Men walked one way, women another, each trying to find enough privacy behind shrubs and trees. Borogie used the pause to open the food she had packed. She gave Matou and Bubel pieces of bread, roasted groundnuts and small portions of boiled cassava wrapped in leaves.
“Eat slowly,” she warned them. “The road is still long, and I will not have you asking for food again before we reach Serekunda.”
Bubel had already filled his mouth. “I will not ask,” he said indistinctly.
Matou laughed. “You are asking with your eyes already.”
They ate while the passengers gradually returned. Someone was always missing when the driver wanted to leave. The conductor shouted into the bush, threatening to abandon anyone who did not hurry. An elderly woman finally emerged, tying her wrapper and muttering that young men had no patience.
At Lamin, the surroundings began to change more noticeably. Compounds appeared closer together. There were more roadside stalls, more bicycles and more people waiting for transport. Children stood near the road selling groundnuts, oranges and small packets of water. The lorry stopped again to take on passengers, though it already seemed impossible that anyone else could fit.
Still, they fitted.
They always did.
From Lamin, they continued towards Abuko. The road narrowed in places and the lorry slowed whenever animals wandered across it. Goats refused to move until someone climbed down and chased them away. Cattle crossed with the slow confidence of creatures that believed the road belonged to them. Passengers began conversations with strangers and ended them like old acquaintances. They spoke about the rains, the price of rice, illness, marriages and the difficulty of finding good land closer to Banjul.
Matou listened quietly, looking from face to face. Journeys, she thought, made temporary families out of strangers. People shared food, complaints, rumours and discomfort, then disappeared from one another’s lives at the next stop.
By the time they reached Tabokoto, the morning was nearly gone. The road grew busier with every mile. Lorries, bicycles and carts moved in both directions. Traders walked beside the road with basins balanced on their heads. Mechanics worked beneath the shade of makeshift sheds, their hands blackened with oil. The sounds of voices, engines and metal striking metal gathered until the countryside’s earlier quiet seemed very far away.
Some passengers descended at Tabokoto, relieved to stretch their legs after hours on the wooden benches. Others climbed aboard, carrying goods intended for Serrekunda Market. One woman had a basket of smoked fish whose smell immediately filled the lorry. Bubel covered his nose dramatically until Borogie tapped his knee and whispered that he should not embarrass people over the food that fed them.
The final stretch towards Serrekunda felt the longest. The sun stood almost directly overhead, and the vehicle moved slowly through increasing traffic. Houses pressed closer to the road. Narrow paths disappeared between crowded compounds. Shops displayed cloth, cooking utensils, shoes and sacks of grain. Everywhere, people seemed to be moving, calling or bargaining.
Although they had left Farato shortly after dawn, it was well past noon when the lorry finally entered the confusion surrounding Serrekunda Market.
The market was alive in every direction. Traders called to customers. Conductors shouted destinations. Women argued over prices. Porters carried loads through narrow spaces, warning people to move aside. The smell of dried fish mixed with ripe fruit, sweat, dust, spices and exhaust fumes.
Borogie gathered the children close before they descended.
“Hold Bubel’s hand,” she told Matou. “Do not let go, no matter who calls you or what you see.”
They climbed down carefully, retrieved the basket, and crossed through the crowd in search of the lorry travelling towards Jeshwang. Even after the long journey from Farato, they had not yet arrived. Another vehicle, another conductor, another crowded bench still lay between them and Nata.
When they finally found the Jeshwang lorry, Borogie settled the basket again and helped Bubel climb inside. Matou took her place near the open side and watched Serrekunda Market move around them like a restless tide.
Only when the second lorry pulled away did familiarity begin to return.
The roads, the compounds, the turns she remembered from childhood slowly revealed themselves.
Jeshwang did not announce itself with a sign.
It announced itself through memory.