“Yes. I was with an African American before that. Very beautiful nurse. It was the same thing. Not ready for commitment. I later found out she had two other men.” Eze sounded irritated. He turned to the television, as though to find a target for his annoyance. “Can we turn this thing off?”

Obinna, eager to pacify Eze, reached quickly for the remote control. A news presenter was talking about the G-15 summit in Accra, showing footage of the opening dinner, most of the leaders in long formal gowns.

“These leaders’ summits are useless,” Eze said. “All those women talk about is the latest breast enhancement surgery and pedicure and all those girly things. And they’re always plotting to increase pregnancy grants and menopause grants, as if women don’t already have enough biologically based grants.”

Obinna murmured something nonsensical and turned off the TV. Eze got up. “I have to pee again!” he said. When he returned, he sank heavily into the sofa and said, “I actually came back to Nigeria to try an herbal treatment for my enlarged prostate.”

“Herbal treatment?”

“There’s no real treatment for prostate issues. Modern medicine has simply ignored the health problems that affect only men. Did you know that all the major medical research uses women’s bodies as the standards? So the dosage of most medicines we take are based on women’s bodies, which are of course smaller than men’s bodies, so we might actually be undertreating ourselves.”

“Really?” Obinna asked, a bit taken aback both by the turn the conversation had taken and the vehemence in Eze’s voice.

“Yes!”

“So what is this herbal treatment?”

“A relative told me about it. I’m on vacation, so I thought I might as well try it. I have nothing to lose. The prostate issue is not a joke. It takes me half an hour to pee, and it burns like hell, and I’m too young to have this.”

“Sorry, Eze.”

“Thanks, my brother.” Eze opened another can of beer and said, teasingly, “So this is why you don’t work, too much money. And you told me it was because you wanted to take care of the children.”

“It is. Or it was. Now they are in Primary 3 and they are old enough, but Amara won’t let me work.”

“What do you mean ‘won’t let you work’?” Eze asked, eyes narrowed.

“I’ve been out of the job market for so long that the only positions I can get now would be entry level, and she says it will look terrible for someone of her position if her husband has such a low-level job.”