The Girl in the Road by Monica Byrne

friend Hussein lives. He has good pistachio ice cream. Why I’m obsessed with it, I don’t know. I like creamy green foods. Then we’ll leave for Kano in Nigeria, and then on to N’Djamena, in Chad, where this road called the Trans-Sahelian Highway ends. Then we’ll follow this yellow line through Chad and Sudan until we hit this purple line, the Cairo-Gaborone Trans-African Highway, and follow it into Ethiopia, and make a detour to Lalibela, and then we’ll make it to Addis Ababa. That’s where we all part ways for the season. Muhammed will go to his family in Hawassa and I’ll go back to my job as a tour guide. I do that half the year and then I do this the other half of the year.
    I pointed to one of the dots on the map. What’s this one, again? I asked.
    Niamey.
    What’s—I pressed my finger and made the lamination crackle—this one, again?
    Lalibela.
    What’s—
    You can’t read, can you?
    I shook my head.
    You need to learn to read. Then you can sound out all these names for yourself.
    I didn’t go to school, I said.
    It’s not your fault, he said. But now that you’re with us we have to start making improvements.
    At that moment, you slid open the cab window and out came your legs like some beautiful spider unfolding its body. You were still unsteady on your feet. Both Francis and I were transfixed at watching you move. You said, What are you looking at?
    Nothing! cried both Francis and me.
    You saw the map in Francis’s hands.
    Long way to go, you said.
    It should be about three months, said Francis with much officiousness.
    You said it would be six, I said to Francis.
    Francis gave me a warning look.
    Three on official time, six on African time, you said. So it goes.
    I sensed that Francis was a little hurt, but he made the best of it, as he always did. He said, Mariama doesn’t know how to read. I think three to six months is an excellent amount of time to learn to read, don’t you?
    You asked, What schooling have you had, Mariama?
    None, I said. But I can cook and milk goats.
    Francis said, She was probably a slave. Slaves don’t go to school.
    Some do, you said, but you were talking to yourself.
    Then you looked out across the land as the sun rose. I was tentative at first, but then I shuffled over on my knees and joined you, just far enough so as not to crowd you. You, and me, and Francis—we were all quiet, all watching. The land was changing. The trees were thinning out, spindly and exquisite, and the earth was colored bronze and sage. I felt solemn, like we were passing into a more ancient country, whose history covered the ground like a fine gold dust.
    Golden women gathered at wells with golden buckets to be filled with liquid gold. I tried to slow down each instant to an hour and commit each woman to memory. I made it a game of high stakes, telling myself that if I didn’t remember them, no one would. One woman was wearing a dress with frills at the shoulder. One woman had skinny arms and teeth like those in a goat skull. One woman was tiny, her hair in plaits.
    I memorized each one. I anticipated each one before I even saw her and then I thought, I know you. I’ve always known you. I knew you the moment before I saw you.
    One woman waved, and so did the baby strapped to her back.
    One woman was as beautiful as the sun and moon combined.
    One woman slipped backward and I didn’t see her rise.
    I began to feel sleepy. I wanted to stay up so that I could keep seeing everything there was to see. But instead I crawled onto the pallet and my eyelids began to slide up and down of their own accord. I fell asleep.
    I was woken up by your voice, saying, Child, child, as if you were disappointed in me. You told me to get up for a minute. In the bright daylight I saw you pull out a big green cloth, like a scarf but thicker, like a blanket, and laid it down on the pallet. You patted it down until the surface was even,