————- IN 1889 A PALM OIL TRADER ON LAGOS ISLAND WOKE TO FIND HIS WAREHOUSE ON THE MARINA REARRANGED. Every barrel had been opened
Drained
And refilled with an oil his suppliers did not recognize. It smelled of iron and night-blooming jasmine. It would not burn.
It would not pour. When tilted The liquid inside moved several seconds after the barrel did. As though it was deciding whether to cooperate with gravity itself.
His laborers refused to enter the building. They said the shadows on the warehouse floor were pooling in the wrong direction Gathering toward the center of the room like something was drinking them in.
He entered alone. He was inside for eleven hours. When he came out his hair had turned white and he spoke a language that sounded like Yoruba played in reverse.
Each syllable arriving before the one that should have preceded it.
He used it only once. To dictate a letter to a recipient at an address his clerk could not find on any survey map of the colony. He resumed trading the next morning. He never sold the oil.
It’s still in the family. It has not aged. It has not settled.
When the house is quiet They say it emits a pleasant hum. ————-
