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before he was retrenched in the confectionary factory where he worked and began to use the car for
kabukabu,
ferrying baskets of decaying tomatoes and half-rotten yams from distant places for market women. Dad was wearing his favorite milk-colored French suit, and his hair was dyed and neatly combed. He was pointing out different places to Yemi as he drove, but Yemi was as surly as an unhappy dog and only twisted his handkerchief around his fingers.
    “This road used to be the only road that ran through Lagos. It was narrower than this then, and very few cars plied it.” Heturned to Yemi, leaning his neck back, his eyes darting to the road in front and back to look at him.
    “Even back then, CMS Grammar School was already in existence. It is the oldest school in Lagos; that was why I was so happy when you got in.”
    Yemi was silent. I was embarrassed for Dad, but Yemi was always making me feel this way. Creating big silences never embarrassed him. Street hawkers were poking cones of ice cream and multicolored candy sticks into the open window of the car for us to buy, but Yemi only glared at them.
    “That used to be Fela’s former house and nightclub; it was burned down by soldiers from Abalti barracks,” Yemi said to me. It was the only time anything had excited him since we left the house. He was interested in music and was learning to play the guitar, which was a sore point between him and Dad.
    “You cannot fight the government—he was harboring miscreants in his club, and his girls were smoking marijuana and moving around half naked all over the street. He should have known that you cannot challenge soldiers and get away with it,” Dad says.
    “He was fighting for the people with his music,” Yemi insisted. “The soldiers threw down his mother from a six-story building, which was what led to her death.”
    “A stubborn child always brings disgrace and sorrow to his parents. This is why I keep telling you children to always listen to me and your mother because we want the best for you.” Dad said this in a tone that suggested the argument would go no further.
    Yemi became silent again and only stared into the lagoon that we were driving past, from which a decayed smell of shit and garbage wafted into our nostrils.
    We could hardly find a place to park the car as we approachedthe Bar Beach. There was a large crowd of people on foot walking toward the beach. There were hawkers carrying plastic buckets filled with block ice and soft drinks, screaming, “Buy cold minerals, cold 7 Up, and Pepsi here.”
    Dad took my hand and Yemi’s hand, but Yemi snatched his hand away and made to walk ahead of us. Dad shouted at him to stay close to us.
    The robbers were already tied to tall metal drums buried in the sand by the time we got to the beach. They were tied so tightly the blue nylon rope was cutting into their skin. Their leader, Lawrence Anini, was puffing a cigarette. He held the cigarette with his teeth because his hands were tied by his side and blew out the smoke through his nostrils and one side of his mouth. Sweat was running down his face, which looked ashen, as if coated with a thin film of powder. He was wearing a deep frown. As the cigarette burned down and he spat it away into the sand, people began to scramble to pick up the cigarette butt. A police guard picked it up, pinched dead the burning end, and put it in his pocket. I heard someone in the crowd say that the cigarette was a good luck charm; he said anything from the body of a dead man was powerful, but Dad only sniffed.
    Soon the soldiers who were to carry out the execution arrived in an olive green truck. Policemen wielding horsewhips created space within the crowd, and the soldiers began to take crouching positions before the robbers. A woman screamed that someone had snatched her purse, which led to a discussion among some people in the crowd.
    “Can you imagine? In a place like this somebody is stealing. You know the best thing for thieves