It’s cold outside, but the chill means the stench rising from the long drop isn’t that bad. During the day, the heat bakes the human waste to a near boil so that the stink of it, coupled with the frenzied flies buzzing around, makes her light-headed. It was even worse in the earlier months of her pregnancy.
Upon Zodwa’s return, Leleti finishes her morning scripture reading and closes her Bible. The candlelight is forgiving but despite the soft glow it radiates, Leleti looks much older than forty-seven. Having given birth to Zodwa when she was twenty-nine, Leleti’s the oldest of Zodwa’s friends’ parents. Still, she’d always looked youthful, until her health deteriorated so rapidly that the weight fell off of her, leaving her skin looking like an oversized garment. Her hair, cut into a short afro, hasn’t grayed at all but her eyes are lined with worry and exhaustion.
She wordlessly hands Zodwa a mug of black tea and a stale slice of bread smeared with apricot jam, as the big dog rises from the bed and pads its way over to her. Leleti passes it a slice of polony, making it wait and take it nicely.
“Good dog, Shadow,” Leleti says, smiling, and Zodwa feels the usual resentment bubbling up.
It’s ridiculous that they have this hinja as a pet. They’re the laughingstock of the township, at least of those who aren’t terrified of the dog. Who gives meat to a dog when they can’t even afford meat for themselves? Still, Leleti loves the black beast and won’t hear a word against it, claiming it’s twice as loyal as any person she’s ever known.
Leleti herself doesn’t have anything to eat. She claims she’ll have the children’s leftovers when she’s at her job as a maid in Rustenburg more than sixty kilometers away. She has to be in the kitchen at 7:00 a.m. on weekdays so she can make the children’s breakfast before they leave for school. It means she has to wake up at 4:00 a.m. ahead of a long commute. Her madam has repeatedly warned Leleti that if she comes in late, they’ll hire a maid who’s prepared to live on the property and is more accessible to them. With today being a Sunday, Leleti can leave two hours later.
“Have you gotten Wednesday off to vote?” Zodwa asks to break the silence.
Leleti shakes her head.
“It’s an important day for our people and you should—”
“You think I don’t know that?” Leleti shoots back. “You think that it’s for fun that I do this job that you’re too good for?”
“I’ve never said I’m too good for it—”
“I’m telling you that you’re too good to be a maid. And don’t tell me how important Wednesday is! It’s the day I’ve been waiting my whole life for, but food is also important. Money is important. Who do you think brings that home?” Leleti shakes her head and then starts coughing, the outburst setting her off.
Zodwa hands her mother a handkerchief. As Leleti coughs into it, each racking spasm rocking her whole body, Zodwa looks away so that she doesn’t have to see the blood splatter darkening the fabric. She wonders how Leleti has managed to hide her sickness from her madam for this long. How much longer will she be able to do so?
The fit finally passes and the pacing dog settles down. When Leleti resumes speaking, her tone has lost all of its bite. “The hopes I had for you, my child. The hopes we all had for you. After your brother . . .” She trails off.
Leleti doesn’t need to finish the sentence; Zodwa knows exactly what her mother is thinking.
When Dumisa left for Johannesburg more than a decade before, his future looked about as bright as a black man’s possibly could during apartheid. He’d completed his last year of schooling in KwaZulu with top marks and secured a position as a junior administrator at Baragwanath Hospital in Soweto. The family rejoiced at the news.
There would be no manual labor for Zodwa’s brother. Dumisa would be the first man in the family who would go to work in a suit and tie, using his brain rather than his muscles, and as he prospered, he would pull his family up behind him as a reward for all the sacrifices they’d made.
That had been the plan and for the first while, everything had gone better than expected. Dumisa sent money home every month and soon could even afford to buy a secondhand car due to a promotion. His letters were filled with descriptions of the things he’d bought, the house he was saving for, and the many gifts he was setting aside for the family. He was the embodiment of the country’s hope for their black sons, and he was living the kind of life the rest of them had never dared to dream of.
But all that changed once Dumisa was recruited by the Inkatha Freedom Party Youth Brigade in Soweto. Within months of joining the resistance movement, he mysteriously vanished like so many anti-apartheid activists before him. The last person to have seen him alive reported seeing Dumisa being tortured by the security police for refusing to betray his comrades. The man spoke of his bravery and honor, and after that Dumisa was hailed a hero for his efforts on behalf of his people.
Leleti would have preferred a living son who was realizing his potential than one who’d died to advance the cause of the masses. Since her son’s body was never recovered, Leleti refused to accept that he was dead. There was no final resting place for him—no grave site where Leleti could find peace—and so she kept searching for him even as she built a shrine to him, adding a stone to a pile for every day that he was gone.
After Dumisa disappeared, it fell to Zodwa to live out the dreams everyone had had for her brother, but instead of stepping out from under his shadow into her own light, Zodwa has cast a deeper darkness upon herself and her family, one of her own making and impossible to escape: shame. For while teenage pregnancies are nearly commonplace in the township, they’re not something that happen to Khumalos.
Leleti shakes her head now. “What is the use of freedom if you are not going to grab the opportunities that I fought for—the opportunities that Dumisa fought for—so you could have a future? You may as well be a maid if having babies is the best you can imagine for yourself.”
Zodwa hangs her head.
“And for what, my child?” Leleti asks. “Where is the father of the baby? There is no man here who loves you.” Her voice breaks. “The good Lord knows that you do not even want this child.”
It’s the first time her mother has said such a thing and it pains Zodwa to hear the terrible hurt in her voice. She wants to reach out to her, to show Leleti a display of the love she feels for her—an indication of how sorry she is that she’s disappointed her—but her mother’s scorn has built this wall between them. No gesture that Zodwa can think of could knock it down, not even the truth.
Especially not the truth.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Delilah
26 April 1994
Johannesburg General Hospital, Johannesburg, South Africa
Hello,” I greeted the ICU nurse. “I’m here to see Father Daniel, the priest. He was brought in just over two weeks ago with a gunshot wound. This is the soonest I could get here,” I said, aware that I was babbling but unable to do anything to stop myself. “I’ve actually come straight from the airport.”
“Oh no. You weren’t caught up in the bomb blast, were you?” she asked, an expression of concern on her kind face.
“What bomb blast?”
“A car bomb went off at Jan Smuts two hours ago. I heard about it on the news,” she said, nodding at her little radio.
“Two hours ago? That must have been just after I landed.”
“Well then, I’d say your guardian angels are working extra hard today. What’s your name, dearie?”
“It’s Delilah. Delilah Ferguson. I’m not a family member, if that’s what you want to check,” I said, peering over the counter to see if there was an official visitors list, “but I know he’d want to see me, which is why I rushed back from Zaire as soon as I heard the news. Please could you let me in? Just for a moment. I promise not to stay long.”
“I’m afraid that won’t be possible, Mrs. Ferguso
n.”
“Here’s the thing. I’m going to be honest with you,” I said, preparing to bare my soul to a complete stranger and tell her the details of how Daniel and I were connected in the hope that it would make her more sympathetic to my plight. “He—”
“I’m not trying to be difficult, hon. There’s only one visitor allowed at a time and another priest is with him now keeping vigil in case the last rites are required.”
The last rites.
“He’s that bad? There’s no chance at all that he’ll come out of the coma?”
“Miracles have been known to happen,” she said, absently fingering the cross around her neck. “But, yes. He’s still in a critical condition and has yet to regain consciousness.” She nodded behind her at a window cut into the wall allowing visitors a view of the ICU.
All the beds beyond were occupied, and there were almost a dozen patients hooked up to all different kinds of life-saving equipment. Only one had the curtain drawn around it, though it stopped short of enclosing the space completely.
Through the open sliver, I could see a priest standing next to the bed.
He was slightly stooped with age and his head was bowed in prayer. He clutched a Bible in his hands, but even as I watched, he set it down and then reached over, drawing the patient’s hand into his own, weaving his rosary beads between both their fingers so that they were bound together.
The tableau struck me so fiercely that I felt a stab of pain in my chest. As much as my religion had once been a part of me, as much as it had once defined me, I was no longer a part of that world like Daniel was, the world of faith and God and the church. I’d been cast out and was now an impostor whose lost soul could only diminish the effect of any miracles being worked.
As though feeling himself being watched, the priest lifted his head and turned toward me. Our eyes met for a second before I turned and fled.
CHAPTER NINE
Ruth
25 April 1994
Clifton, Cape Town, South Africa
I’m busy packing when Vince walks into the bedroom. His eyes are bruised with lack of sleep. “I went to the hospital to pick you up but they said you’d checked out early.”
“Yes, well. You checked out of the marriage early, so consider us even.”
“Ruth.” He groans. He looks awkward just standing there a few feet into the doorway, like he’s been marooned in currents he no longer knows how to navigate. He anchors himself by putting his hands into his pockets. “You don’t need to move out right away, you know. There’s no rush.”
“I know when I’m not wanted.” Even as I say it, I’m aware that I sound like my mother: martyrish. “Just give me an hour to finish packing and I’ll be out of your hair.”
“Can I ask where you’re planning to go?”
“No.”
The truth is that I don’t know just yet. My options are severely limited. I once had four rental properties but only one remains, the proceeds from the sale of the other three poured into bad investments that I hoped would replenish the dwindling coffers. I’ve always had money but have never been very good at managing it. Of course, Vince knows nothing about any of this. It’s a point of pride that I’ve never needed his money. Until now, that is.
Ten months remain on the lease of the last remaining property, an apartment in Camps Bay, so selling it or moving into it aren’t options right now, and though I have plenty of acquaintances, I don’t have the kinds of friends who’d take me in, nor the kind who I’d want to see me tossed to the curb like this.
I’ve been hoping for a sign, something to point me in the right direction, but the universe is mute at the moment; it’s probably as dumbfounded by my predicament as I am.
“Look,” Vince continues, “why don’t you stay until you can find something more permanent? I’ll move into one of the guest bedrooms until then, make myself scarce.”
That’s just the thing. I don’t want him to make himself scarce. I couldn’t bear living in the same house, knowing he’s in another bedroom because he won’t share ours.
“No, but thank you. I’ve made plans.” I don’t look at him while I’m saying it. I concentrate on folding up a few blouses and my silk kimono to stop myself from throwing myself into his arms and begging him to reconsider. Well, that, and beating the shit out of him for abandoning me like this.
He comes to sit on the bed, and the suitcase dips along with the weight of him. I turn and head back to my dressing room just to put some distance between us.
Vince’s voice is muffled when it comes from behind me and his tone is falsely cheery. “Listen, there’s another option that I’d like you to consider. I spoke to the doctor, the one who treated you at the hospital, and he wanted me to talk to you about checking yourself into a treatment facility.”
“Rehab?” I laugh. “Forget it.” Been there, done that. Didn’t stick. “I don’t need rehab.”
“Not rehab.” Vince clears his throat. “A mental health facility.”
I can’t have heard right. I clutch the negligee I’m folding and march back into the room. “A mental health facility?”
He nods, looking nervous.
“You mean a loony bin? You think I belong in a loony bin?”
“It’s not a loony bin. It’s a facility for people—”
“Who are crazy,” I scoff.
“—who are emotionally fragile and need a bit of time to regroup.” Vince talks over me.
“For God’s sake. I’m not ‘emotionally fragile.’” It would sound more convincing if my voice didn’t crack like I’m about to fall apart.
“You tried to commit suicide, Ruth.”
“No, I didn’t!” I shout, gratified to see him wince. “The whole thing was staged, and yes, it was a stupid thing to do, but someone should fight for this marriage, since you so clearly don’t give a shit about it.”
Vince runs his hands through his hair. “My therapist said you’d do this. Become manipulative and direct blame at me to try and move it away from yourself.” His eyes leave my face, alighting on one object and then another as he avoids catching my gaze.
“Your therapist? You’re seeing a therapist?” I can’t help it, I laugh.
“Therapy has helped me with a lot of my issues and I think seeing a professional will help you too. There’s so much from your past that you’ve never worked through—”
“What’s that got to do with any of this?”
“I think that’s why you drink, Ruth. To drown your feelings about all that, and perhaps if you spoke about it—”
“Then what?” I snort. “I’d magically go back in time and everything would work out? Please, it’s ancient history and no good can come from wallowing in it. And you don’t need a reason to drink beyond having a raging thirst.”
The phone next to the bed suddenly trills and I dive to pick it up, desperate for a distraction. The man’s voice on the other end is excited, and I listen with growing relief as he imparts his news.
When I replace the receiver, Vince carries on as though the conversation hadn’t been interrupted. “Please consider it. I mean, you have the time—”
“I’m afraid that’s where you’re wrong,” I say with grim satisfaction.
The call from the estate agent couldn’t have come at a better time. I’ve been trying to sell my childhood home for the past few years but until now there haven’t been any takers. The property was left to me when Ma died, and though I never lived on it again after eloping on my twenty-first birthday, I couldn’t bear to part with it for sentimental reasons. Thirty years after Ma’s death, those reasons aren’t as clear as they once were. Also, it’s amazing how sentimentality goes out the window when misfortune knocks at the door.
The universe has come through for me without a moment left to spare; I have my sign and know exactly where I need to be.
; CHAPTER TEN
Zodwa
27 April 1994
Magaliesburg, Transvaal, South Africa
Dawn announces itself with a blush on the horizon just as Zodwa reaches the high school’s perimeter. She’s tried not to think too much about all that she’s missing out on beyond those gates but being at the threshold brings it all back: the classes at which she excelled; the friends who admired her and the teachers who were proud of her; the inconsequential chatter about boys and fashion amid the serious political discussions and heated debates.
Zodwa casts aside thoughts of what might have been and joins the voting line snaking out the school gates. A gogo stands in front of her; she’s gnarled like an ancient branch and hunches over her knobkerrie walking stick, which seems to be the only thing keeping her up. Her eyes are clouded with cataracts but still they shine with excitement. Through their intermittent chatting in the queue as dawn ripens into day, Zodwa discovers that the old woman is ninety-four years old and lives in a village half an hour away.
“The people from the white church in Fouriesburg came this morning to fetch us. Yoh, they had such nice vans, like taxis but white-people taxis, that even had heaters.” She hugs herself, savoring the warmth of the memory, as she smiles a gap-toothed smile. The wrinkles around her eyes deepen into crevices.
After four hours of shuffling forward in tiny increments, Zodwa sees the old woman beginning to exhibit signs of strain. “Gogo, we must find you a chair.”
“No, my child, we must find you a chair.” The old woman laughs, nodding at Zodwa’s heavily pregnant belly. “Besides,” the gogo says, attempting a lively two-step shuffle, “I want to stand so I can jive a bit. Today is the first time in all my nearly hundred years that I will get to vote for one of my people to be president. Today is the day to dance.” She throws her head back and laughs, toppling forward in the process.
If You Want to Make God Laugh Page 3