My Sister, the Serial Killer

Chapter 47 ushers in the novel’s climax: Muhtar unexpectedly wakes from his coma. How much he remembers of Korede’s confessions and what he will do with this knowledge becomes the crux of the book’s final section. The following chapter recounts Korede’s memory of being separated from her mother as a child and feeling utterly abandoned and alone. By conflating the past and the present, two separate yet similar moments of high anxiety in Korede’s life highlight the timeless nature of her tension-fraught relationship with and toward her sister. Korede remains incapable of affirming her own separate identity. She is still not complete without Ayoola’s presence, as shown by the way Korede crawls into Ayoola’s bed when she can’t fall asleep.

As Muhtar reveals he knows about Ayoola’s crimes, Korede experiences a profound sense of existential panic, inextricably linked with the context of keeping her sister safe. Not only has she been deeply concerned about Ayoola’s potential sociopathic nature, she now has to face the possible consequences of her own acts of ritual confession. Korede, as narrator, projects herself as sane and troubled by her sister’s apparent madness, even though she is complicit in covering Ayoola’s crimes out of duty and love. Yet certain moments, such as Korede’s brief thoughts of getting rid of Muhtar to hide their secrets, call her true motives into question. Perhaps Korede has been a willing participant all along.

In Chapter 58—entitled “Friend,” unlike the previous chapters about Muhtar, which have been entitled “Patient”—Muhtar reveals that he does not intend to betray Korede’s confidence. He becomes the first person who accepts Korede and her terrible confusion as part of her tragedy in belonging to such a family, but he points out that protecting Ayoola might not be good for either sister—not to mention the men Ayoola might kill in the future. He urges Korede to save Tade from her sister, and in Chapter 60, he invites Korede to observe him being cruelly firm yet ultimately morally fair toward a son whose irresponsible behavior Muhtar cannot support. Like a true friend, he shows Korede how to do the right yet difficult thing. 

Chapters 48, 49, and 50 concern Ayoola and bear symbolic titles that illuminate her character. In Chapter 48, “The Game,” ostensibly about the game of Cluedo Ayoola wants to play, the author also delineates how Ayoola toys with Tade, her next intended victim. She insists on including Korede in the time she spends with Tade in their house, so Korede can witness Tade’s embarrassing displays of mindless affection, which prove Ayoola’s claims that he is just as shallow as other men. Ayoola wants to torture her sister because she knows that Korede loves him. Although she cherishes her sister and wishes to protect her from her wrong assumptions about Tade by revealing his true nature, Ayoola also enjoys having the upper hand. She knows that without Korede to protect her, she would not be able to kill.

Chapter 49, “Seventeen,” reveals Ayoola’s first kill. Somto’s appearance and actions—he “had been so…slimy—always licking his lips, always touching her” (88)—almost justifies her sister’s decision to murder him before Korede sees the body, even after Korede joins Ayoola at Somto’s place and sees the brutality of Ayoola’s actions. The “Maneater” of Chapter 50, in contrast with the 17-year-old killer of the previous chapter, has become much more adept at setting traps for the men she wants to kill. Ayoola has graduated from a potentially accidental and justified killer to a deliberate, premeditating serial killer.

Chapter 56 further highlights Ayoola’s complete absence of regret. When Femi’s sister accosts them in tears, looking for answers, Ayoola licks her ice cream and uses her free arm to pull Femi’s sister into an embrace. Korede notices that Ayoola is starting with resignation at her melting ice cream. Although her actions seem to offer sympathy, they actually show how profoundly disinterested she is in the suffering of others. She has long forgotten Femi.

Braithwaite adds one more piece to the mosaic of Korede and Ayoola’s relationship to their father, when Korede remembers a deeply disturbing situation time when her father was prepared to hand over the very young Ayoola to his partner in crime, so he could seal a deal he was making. Korede felt a fierce desire to protect her sister then, and her desire to do so in the present is rooted both in family conditioning and in a deeply rooted fear for her sister’s safety. To protect her sister, even Korede would kill if necessary.