Badu Quashie

Sunlight filters through the slats of my veranda, drawing thin gold lines across the sacks of cocoa husks stacked by the door. I inhale their bitter–sweet scent before stepping into the dust of Bantama Road. Market women are already shouting prices, though half their crates sit untouched. Since the mine layoffs, even tomatoes move slowly. I weave past them toward the workshop I opened eleven years ago, a small space where discarded fabric becomes bright baskets and footstools. The sign outside wobbles in the harmattan breeze, paint flaking like tired confetti.

Inside, my nephew yawns above the sewing machine. Two months of unpaid electricity bills hang over us, yet the whirring needle comforts me. I am forty now, old enough to recall when Kumasi, Ghana, felt like a drum that never missed a beat. Back then I thought hard work alone could keep rhythm. These days the drum skips: fuel prices jump overnight, cloth suppliers demand payment in dollars, and customers calculate dinners instead of décor.

A woman enters holding a broken straw bag. Her eyes carry dust from the long walk, but she speaks softly: “Can you mend this? My mother left it to me.” The tear is deep; new straw would cost less than my time. Still, I nod, thread a needle, and begin stitching. She watches each pull, as if the bag is a heartbeat I might restart. When I finish, she offers coins that wouldn’t buy a plantain. I wave them away. The gratitude in her smile fills the shop more than money could.

After she leaves, my nephew asks why I work for free. I touch the mended edge. “Because stories last longer than profit,” I say, though the words scratch my throat. Night arrives early in the rainy season. As I lock up, thunder rolls over Kejetia’s corrugated roofs. I walk home past shuttered stalls, humming a tune from childhood. Tomorrow I will face the empty ledger again, but tonight I carry the echo of that woman’s thank-you, a small light flickering against the dark. Hope flickers yet stays.