Twenty - Seven -A Dresser.

Uwale rustled through the sheets and everything with the capacity to make a sound. Ekama’s wobbly dresser, a dark blue anthropomorphic shape shifter, stood in the middle of Ekama’s room, offering a display of everything Ekama would need to be fully dressed for the day. Ekama was telling her what shape she wanted her folded into for the journey.  

“A little lower.” 

Ekama told the dresser. Uloma watched from the bed, smiling to herself at the dresser's grumbling about having to go so low. The dressing table whispered in a hissing, whistling indignation as it brought itself an inch closer to the floor. 

“Drown that insubordination. You have too much attitude for a dresser.” 

Ekama shouted at it. The dresser whistled again and rattled furiously. Uwele swept through it, causing the rattling to appear more intense. 

“I can just chop you up for firewood and ask the Makayi family to conjure up a new dresser.” 

Ekama threatened, and Uloma couldn't help but smile at the emptiness of the threat. The Makayi family will throw a fit if one of their treasured crafts is destroyed, and they do not handle grudges well. Ekama caught her eyes in the mirror and sighed in an exasperated manner at her, rolling her eyes in the direction of her dresser. The dresser was now rumbling slightly, as if offended by Ekama’s threat. 

“Uwele, stop disturbing the poor dresser, and you two please make up, you always do in the end.” 

Uloma chided them. Ekama hissed, clenching her jaw. 

“Fine. But if she refuses to fold herself up, I am leaving her behind.” 

The dresser responded by immediately lowering itself to the floor. It twisted and creaked until it was the shape of a small cube. 

“That is more like it. Good girl.” 

Ekama laughed, picking it up. She gently placed it on the pile of things she was bringing with her on the journey. Uloma could not help the heaviness the action brought to her heart. Ekama was upturning her life, like everyone else, and none of them, not even her, knew what the future held. Cosmics, unable to see their own future because they did not have one, was very inconvenient at the moment. 

“Did you see Ogba when he was arm wrestling his brothers earlier? He looked like a warrior.” 

Uloma returned her concentration to her friend, only catching the end of the statement. She wondered why a young man's arm wrestling would resemble that of a warrior, not a child, but thought better about saying it out loud to her friend. 

“Are you still brooding over Eligwe?” 

Ekama asked and levitated off the floor. She floated to her bed that was there for Uloma’s benefit. The room was tame enough for Uloma to suspect it had been Uloma-proofed for her. She was not complaining. This was the one room in the whole house where she wanted to feel normal. The furniture here was sentient, but a small prize for a room that did not move or jiggle or flow. The bed adjusted itself to accommodate Ekama’s weight. It became denser in places where Ekama might occupy. 

“You are lost in your thoughts again. You know Eligwe will be fine, right?” 

Uloma nodded that she did know. 

“So, what is the problem?” 

Ekama asked, just as a look of mischief came over her face. She lunged at Uloma, tickling her. 

“Do you miss his kissy, kissy lips?” 

She pouted her lips and showered Uloma with kisses as she tickled her. Uloma shrieked and giggled, trying and failing to swat at her friend. 

“I have no idea what you are talking about.” 

She eventually managed, when Ekama relented. Pulling away from her, Ekama gave her an exaggerated look. 

“An open face lie. You look me in the eyes and tell me you were not sucking lips with that heavenly hunk.” 

“I said I don’t know what you are talking about.” 

Uloma answered, maintaining her sincere stare. 

“Liar.” 

Ekama yelled and jumped on her, returning to her tickle attack. 

When they had both exhausted themselves, they lay in each other's arms, with arms wrapped around the other. Uloma picked a lint from Ekama’s nose. 

“You were all so mad at me earlier.” 

She whispered, smelling the sharp, tangy scent of citrus in her breath. 

“You have to be more specific when this was. We are always mad at you.” 

Ekama’s breath smelled electric and static, even though she, too, had eaten the oranges with Uloma at dinner. She also smelled of an impending rain shower. Like morning, with blooming flowers and ripening harvests. Uloma wanted to snuggle into Ekama. 

“You wanted me to tell you everything, and then you didn’t.” 

She said instead. Careful to keep the hurt from her voice. Ekama ran her finger under Uloma’s eyes. The action made Uloma wonder whether the hurt she had hidden from her voice had somehow travelled to her eyes. 

“You identify a lot with the humans, so this analogy might help.” 

Ekama replied after a breathy pause, which tickled Uloma’s face. 

“When a human parent finds their children have hurt themselves, they sometimes react from fear and deep-seated anxiety. They worry that they were right, and their child had maimed or killed themselves. Because human parents always worry that they will lose the children they were given.” 

Her eyes searched Uloma’s face, the stormy irises racing like tornadoes. 

“I worry that I will lose you. You left me for a human. You chose them over us. And then you return, bringing this massive change with you. Every day, I think to myself, if you can keep her safe, you will never lose her again. And then you admit to us, in the most offhanded and flippant manner, that you were the thing the realms had feared for centuries. The one thing they pretend to forget about, because it is easier to forget. Uloma, how can I protect that?” 

Uloma felt Ekama’s hand ball up in a fist. The temperature in the room had dropped, and wind that wasn’t Uwele cycled them from above. 

“How can I protect you, if you are the thing we all need protecting from?”