No Sweetness Here

Foreshadowing consists of hints, clues, and other indicators of what may come to pass in the story’s plot. In this story, it is heavily foreshadowed that Kwesi has a dire fate. In the first paragraph, Chicha talks about taking him away. Maami Ama pleads with her not to make such jokes. She repeatedly asks rhetorical questions about the future: “[W]hat will I do, should something happen to my child?” (56). By the end of the story, it’s clear that Maami Ama will have to find the answer to this question. Chicha even tells Maami Ama, “Nothing will happen to him. He is a good boy,” a reassuring statement that sets up the coming revelation that being a “good boy” is not enough to protect anyone from fate (57). Other characters also raise rhetorical questions that imply dark futures for Kwesi. Maami Ama’s spiteful mother-in-law asks, “What did you want to do to him?” (69). It is an unfair question, but such questions intensify a sense of doom hovering over Kwesi’s fate. Meanwhile, Chicha’s clock is always in the background, ticking away seconds of Kwesi’s life.