Ada's Room

RIVERHEAD BOOKSAn imprint of Penguin Random House LLCpenguinrandomhouse.comEnglish translation copyright © 2023 by Jon Cho-PolizziCopyright © 2021 by S. Fischer Verlag GmbH, Frankfurt am MainOriginally published in Germany as Adas Raum by S. Fischer Verlag GmbH, Frankfurt am Main, 2021First American edition published by Riverhead, 2023The translation of this book was supported by a grant from the Goethe-Institut.Penguin Random House supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin Random House to continue to publish books for every reader.Riverhead and the R colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATANames: Otoo, Sharon Dodua, author. | Cho-Polizzi, Jon, translator.Title: Ada’s room / Sharon Dodua Otoo ; English translation by Jon Cho-Polizzi. Other titles: Adas Raum. EnglishDescription: New York : Riverhead Books, 2023.Identifiers: LCCN 2022054552 (print) | LCCN 2022054553 (ebook) | ISBN 9780593539798 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780593539811 (ebook)Subjects: LCGFT: Novels.Classification: LCC PT2715.T66 A6613 2023 (print) | LCC PT2715.T66 (ebook) | DDC 833/.92—dc23 eng/20221122LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022054552LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022054553Cover design: Lauren Peters-CollaerCover images: (hand) Nataliia Prachova / iStock / Getty Images Plus; (lightning bolt) Tarchyshnik / iStock / Getty Images Plus; (door handle) Darul Ulum / iStock / Getty Images Plus; (cloud) Vectorchoice / iStock / Getty Images Plus; (broom) Icon_Craft_Studio / iStock / Getty Images Plus; (raindrops) Suesse / iStock / Getty Images PlusBook design by Alexis Farabaugh, adapted for ebook by Maggie HuntThis is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.pid_prh_6.0_142996256_c0_r0 For Tyrell . . . finally! Se wo were fi na wosan kofa a yennkyiSankofa, Adinkra symbol of the AsanteReturn and retrieve! It is not tabooTo return for what has been forgotten.Learn from your past. ContentsTHE FIRST ORBITSAdaAmong the ToothlessAmong the DeceivedAmong the LuckiestAdaBETWEEN THE ORBITS∞THE NEXT ORBITSAdaAmong the LuckiestAmong the DeceivedAmong the ToothlessAdaEPILOGUEMe. We.Acknowledgments: From Germany EditionAcknowledgments: For North American Edition_142996256_ AdaTOTOPEMarch 1459During the longest night of the year, blood clung to my forehead and my baby died. Finally. He had whimpered in his final moments, and Naa Lamiley had caressed his cheek. How lovely, I had thought, that this would be his final memory. She lay beside him, the child between us, and her head rested next to mine. Naa Lamiley’s eyes shimmered as she assured me it would not be much longer now, “God willing.” She whispered because all of our mothers were sleeping on the other side of the room, but Naa Lamiley’s voice would have given out at any moment anyway. Together, we had cried and prayed at my baby’s side for the last three nights. I could barely hear her, and I understood her even less. While she caressed him, she had stared at me, as if surprised by my confusion—though the words How would you know? never left my lips. In an already unbearable situation, this moment was particularly absurd. Naa Lamiley always knew. But in that moment—it was quite literally a matter of my own flesh and blood—I did not want to seem clueless to her. To distract myself, I scratched my forehead. I scratched and forgot I had blood under my nails.The few candles Naa Lamiley had gathered and placed before the doorway flickered.“It was this way with Kofi, too.” She breathed softly, as if she did not wish to disturb my son while he was dying. Shame on me. This was not so long ago. The ensuing silence resulting from my shame and her sympathy accompanied us through the final tortured breaths. The candles wept.Outside, Naa Lamiley had prepared a tiny pad of palm leaves to lay him out in the moonlit courtyard. She spread a white cloth over it. There would be no grave. The boy did not even have a name; he was only five days old. And yet he had tarried longer than my first child. Also a boy. He had opened his eyes immediately after birth, looked around, and evidently not liked what he had seen. That little one had left us before I could even take him in my arms.Naa Lamiley squeezed my hand once, briefly, then shifted to her knees and stood. I wanted to as well, but with great effort, I managed to make it only halfway—a squat. It was about time to carry out his body—I remained on the floor. She bent over one of the flames—I remained on the floor. She blew one candle out, then the next, then another. Finally, she lifted the baby’s body and carried him from our room. I remained on the floor. The darkness comforted me.Through the open doorway, I watched how Naa Lamiley weighed my baby in her arms, how she lay his body gently down onto the palm leaves, how she adjusted his head lovingly, pressing his lips together. How she blinked her tears away. I leaned back against the wall, closed my own eyes, and dozed off.By sunrise—his body was still warm—the older women, toothless and spitting, had assured one another that I had best forget about it all as quickly as possible. They sat together on the bench directly in front of our hut, watching the morning unfold. The one whose eyesight was poorest nodded emphatically in Naa Lamiley’s direction as she pronounced that I was still young and could, God willing, bear at least three more healthy children one after another.“Or”—Mami Ashitey cackled, shaking her broom—“perhaps all three at once!” And as if this were the best joke of all time, they began to laugh in unison. Their rib cages shook, and their eyes wept tears of laughter. I bit my lip. Did they not know