Chinua Achebe – “Things Fall Apart” (ch. 7 the end)

Without ever being told that, Nwoye knows when Okonkwo comes back that day that Ikemefuna was killed. He doesn’t cry, but just something goes limp inside him, like on the day when he was returning with his family from the farm. This is normally a joyous occasion, when even the youngest children come to help, if not with digging then at least with collecting firewood for baking yams, which taste so much better on the farm than eaten at home. As they were making their way back, they heard a crying baby in the forest. This was probably a twin. Twins were considered an ill omen, so they were put in earthenware pots and left in the forest to die. Women stopped talking and quickened their steps, and Nwoye felt similarly limp inside like now, after his foster brother’s murder.