The ceiling fan spins a lazy, rhythmic shadow across the posters of Kit’s bedroom, but the familiar creak of the mattress is missing. When he shifts to check the time, he does not roll; he drifts. His back isn’t pressing into the cotton sheets, and the duvet is a tangled cloud hovering an inch above his chest. He is weightless, a balloon tethered to nothing but the lingering scent of his grandmother’s lavender water.
Outside, the morning heat is already rising over Lagos, thick with the smell of exhaust and frying akara. Today is the funeral, the day the house will fill with weeping cousins and Uncle Femi’s heavy-handed advice. Not today, Kit thinks, his heart hammering a frantic rhythm that should be dragging him down. Instead, the panic only makes him lighter. He feels the strange, golden levity of his grandmother’s final breath working through his own blood like carbonation.
He reaches out, fingers brushing the cool hardwood of the bedside table to steady himself. He tries to stand, forcing his weight downward with a desperate, clumsy lurch. His heels make contact for a fleeting second, but the floor feels like a repelling magnet. Slowly, his toes begin to detach from the wood. A fresh gap of air opens, and his feet finally lose their grip on the earth.
