by T. M. Clark
Tichawana shook his head. He went to his ikhaya and emerged with a bulging sack thrown over his shoulder. He didn’t even look to his mother’s ikhaya to say goodbye. He just walked away, blending into the night, which swallowed him in the inky darkness.
Sibusisiwe came out of Tarisai’s ikhaya, looking for Tichawana, but Bongani shook his head and pointed in the direction his brother had gone. She came and stood next to him. ‘Do not ever turn your back on that one; he is touched by the tokoloshe, and all the unsettled ancestors. He will slit your throat in the night if he can. The only thing standing between you and him is his fear of your father. Watch out for him. Perhaps you had best sleep with us for a few days, and make sure you have a hunting knife close.’
Bongani stood for a long time watching the place that his brother had disappeared. This time his father had seen through to Tichawana’s rotten character, to the evil that lurked beneath the surface, and he prayed to the gods and his ancestors that the evil never showed up in himself, because they had the same blood running through their veins.
* * *
Bongani’s head nodded forward and woke him from his troubled memories.
That same bad blood still ran between the brothers, despite his promise to his mother on her deathbed to try to look after Tichawana should he ever return. He had seen him only once since then, and that was enough to make Bongani’s blood turn sour in his veins: running along the edge of his father’s lands, a small pack and his AK-47 strung across his back, a signature red beret on his head. He was with the dreaded 5th Brigade men, and thankfully didn’t notice his brother hiding in the bushes.
He knew that one day he would have to face his half-brother again. Gone was the boy who left and in his place was a cheelo, as unstable as the child once was, but now with the power of an organised crime syndicate and a corrupt government behind him.
When his father died, Bongani would face one of the biggest fights of his life.
CHAPTER
3
Homecoming
Beit Bridge Border Area, Zimbabwe, 2010
The deluge came in waves.
Peta de Longe pushed on the lever for the wipers again, but they couldn’t go any faster.
‘Oh for the mother of God, why now!’ she cursed. She braked for the person walking across the bridge and wiped the condensation off the inside of the windscreen. ‘Get out of the way, you moron!’
The person walked slowly on.
She hit the hooter, but all that sounded was a pathetic blurp.
‘Come on, Nguni, just get us home.’ She patted the bakkie’s dashboard. ‘Just get me over this godforsaken Beit Bridge, through Zim customs and then we are on the home stretch. I promise I’ll have Tsessebe look at you when we get home to the reserve ...’
She laughed aloud that she was once again talking to her sister’s bakkie. Courtney would have reminded her that she was stark-raving mad, and would have asked what she’d do if the car ever spoke back. Technically speaking, the vehicle belonged to Joss Brennan, but he hadn’t claimed it, and eighteen months had passed, so she had gone and fetched it from Cape Town. Joss might have given up everything to do with her sister, but Peta hadn’t. She never would.
Tears filled her eyes. Eighteen months and still the anger bubbled like a pot of boiling sadza deep inside her.
She missed her sister. Despite their eight-year age difference, they had been the best of friends. Not even men or distance could sever the closeness. Only death had managed that.
‘Dammit, Court.’ Peta wiped her nose with the back of her hand and dug in her bag for a tissue. She glanced back to the road just in time to swerve and avoid the person, who now had his suitcase on his head serving as an umbrella. If she slowed any more she might stall, and then she’d be in trouble. She wound down the window.
‘Suka pangisa!’ she shouted, and hit the side of her door as if herding cattle. Move your arse.
The figure turned around. ‘Zama uku xolisa,’ a white face, partially concealed under the case, threw back at her. His Ndebele as good as hers. Try saying please.
She called out in English, ‘You want a lift?’
‘I’d rather walk. It’s a beautiful storm,’ he called.
Something about him was familiar.
A huge bolt of lightning struck close by and the street lights on the bridge went off.
‘Oh dandy, now to get through customs in the dark. This is going to be interesting,’ she muttered to herself, then raised her voice again. ‘If you won’t accept a lift, the least you can do is use the footpath. I need to pass.’
The man stopped and put his case down by his feet.
‘Lady, you—’ He didn’t get further. He lifted his suitcase onto his head again and continued to walk slowly across the bridge. It was as if he had self-edited his reaction and chosen to just say nothing.
Peta coasted behind him, lighting his way with her headlights, unable to pass him. There was no one behind her – it was almost eleven o’clock and no sane person crossed the border at this time, except people like her, in desperation to sleep close to Beit Bridge to enable them to get back to customs quickly in the morning, if needed. The post was open twenty-four hours a day, but it just got too hard late at night, and the bribes you sometimes had to pay became too large. The translocation trucks holding her purchases from the stock auction had been waiting on the South African side since four o’clock that afternoon and she had tried everything to get the border inspectors to pass her animals through the veterinary check, but they had been late getting to the border, and now they were stuck there awaiting first light for their quarantine inspection. Then her babies would come through to Zim and be processed. They had a law that animals were to be given priority to cross through first to minimise the impact of travel, but not everyone was sympathetic, and often the trucks were stuck for hours in the forty-degree sun.
Tonight, it poured. God knew they needed it; the season had been long, hard and dry, and the suicide month of October had arrived with its normal brilliant blue sky and hot sunshine. But tonight the heavens had opened, and had stayed open, the storm beating down its rage mercilessly.
She saw the man in front of her stumble on something, and his case wobbled precariously, before he righted it again. He continued his snail’s pace across the bridge. She wound down her window again.
‘Just get in the bakkie. You and I are the only people at the border. It’s not like I’m going to beat you up or anything. And I trust that you will not hurt me either. Just get in.’
He stopped and turned to her, then trudged to the passenger side. She leant over to unlock the door as he tossed his luggage in the back. He opened the door and folded himself into the seat next to her. The cab was filled with the scent of a man. He wiped the water from his face with his already wet sleeve before turning to her.
‘Hello, Peta,’ he said. ‘It’s been a while.’
‘Oh my God! Joss?’ she said as she looked at the bushy beard. His long dark hair hung in rat’s tails. She would have recognised him anywhere now that she could actually see him. They had grown up together, swum in the water reservoirs in the game reserves and been part of each other’s families when they were children. She had last seen him at Courtney’s graduation. She’d seen a boy then, but now a man was taking up the seat next to her.
‘Of all the people in the world ... What are you doing here? Courtney asked you to come home months ago. She wanted her best friend to hold her hand, but you weren’t there. You never came back.’
‘I couldn’t travel at the time. I spoke to Courtney on the phone. She knew it was impossible. She said she understood—’
‘Of course she said that. She was dying. She didn’t want you to feel bad.’
‘I know. But I’m coming home now,’ he said quietly.
‘You should have been here for her.’
‘I wish I could’ve. But life doesn’t always allow us to do the things we want when we want,’ Joss said. ‘Peta, what
more could you ask of me? I spoke to her even on the day she died, you know that.’
Tears fogged up her sight and she sniffed loudly. She let the clutch out a bit too fast and the car stalled. ‘Shit!’ She tried the ignition, but Nguni just chugged and refused to catch. ‘Shit! Shit! Shit!’ She beat her hands on the steering wheel.
‘Pop the bonnet,’ Joss said as he climbed out.
‘What? So you’re a mechanic now?’ She waited while he poked around underneath the hood.
He knocked on her window. She opened it a smidgen to hear him.
‘Try now.’
She turned the key and the old girl kicked over.
Joss closed the bonnet then pushed it to make the latch fasten. He walked back to the passenger side and climbed in.
‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘I seriously didn’t want to be stuck on this bridge and have to walk back to the South African side for someone to come and fix that.’
‘You should have a more reliable vehicle.’
‘I do. Nguni belongs to you. Courtney left it to you in her will. I flew down to collect it, as her friend was moving out of their share-house and couldn’t store it any longer. I scheduled my visit to coincide with trucks coming through Beit Bridge with some new animals, only they’re stuck—’ She stopped herself. Her life was none of his business. She concentrated on negotiating the end of the bridge and manoeuvring into the waiting bay on the Zimbabwe side.
‘She never told me she left me Nguni. Man, she loved this old bakkie.’
‘That she did,’ Peta said as she climbed out of the bakkie, slammed her door and waited for him. ‘Eish, anyone would think you became a sloth not a commando when you left.’
‘Something like that,’ he mumbled.
She locked the vehicle and strode into the single-storey building, leaving him to walk slowly in the rain. During the day, the area was a hive of activity, with boys running here and there and car guards asking for payment to watch that your vehicle didn’t get stolen or broken into while you waited. People would hustle to get to the front of the long queues that stretched around the outside like a colourful python. But at night, the queue-mongers went back to their shacks and homes to sleep, and the lines eventually abated, and only those stupid enough to hit the border late stood looking at the empty counters inside.
Peta went to the nearest window and rang the little bell. ‘Woza. Woza!’ she called loudly.
‘Coming,’ said a voice from the back, and a fat man ambled through. He took his time sitting and adjusting his chair. Finally, he put his hand through the heavy bars, probably once designed for security but required more now to keep irate customers on their own side of the counter, and said, ‘Passport and registration papers.’
Peta handed her documents to him.
‘Thank you,’ he said, already studying them under the yellow lights that fluctuated from dim to dimmer as the old diesel generator throbbed loudly outside. ‘You travelling together?’ the man asked, nodding at Joss, who was standing by the door shaking the water out of his clothes and hair.
‘No. Just happened to get to the bridge at the same time,’ Peta said, choosing her words carefully. Despite her surprise at seeing Joss, she wouldn’t give a border authority any power over her by delaying her nightmare trip more because of him.
‘Sorry for your loss,’ he said as he read through the papers that had the bakkie in Courtney’s name, her birth and death certificates, lawyer’s letter and police clearance stating that Peta could take the car into Zimbabwe. The man stamped her passport with an exaggerated thump, and wrote out an import certificate for her vehicle. ‘You waiting on anything else?’
‘Three trucks coming through from South Africa in the morning. Buffalo, rhino and one Karoo stallion,’ she said as she passed him copies of more papers.
‘I cannot pass clearance until the trucks come into Zimbabwe, but my nephew Eric, he will take care of this in the morning for you. I will tell him to watch for them when they come across. We will see you again next time.’
‘Thank you,’ she said, just as Joss came up behind her.
‘Passport and registration.’
‘Passport. My bakkie and trailer are stuck on the South African side.’
‘What is in it?’ the customs official asked, now looking at Joss with a curious expression.
‘Nothing interesting. They just can’t find how to export my custom vehicle,’ Joss said. ‘They needed to get someone else to come and have a look at it in the morning.’
‘Typical you,’ Peta said quietly. ‘Finally come home and you bring a shiny customised vehicle to Zimbabwe.’
Joss smiled, but said nothing.
She watched the man behind the bars look at the passport. Its blue British cover was very different from Peta’s green one, another reminder to her that the life Joss had chosen hadn’t necessarily aligned neatly with Courtney’s at all, especially since he wasn’t even carrying the passport of his birth country.
The man looked at Joss. ‘You have been to many-many places. A man well travelled. You planning on taking a room at the motel? It’s going to be overflowing tonight with all this rain.’
‘Guess so. I don’t know how long they will take to clear my vehicle,’ Joss said.
‘I hope it is not going to be a long-long wait,’ the man said.
‘It’s just time,’ Joss said.
‘Where is home?’ the official asked.
‘Yingwe River Lodge, near Binga.’
‘Good fishing in Kariba.’
‘I hear so. I haven’t been there for a few years.’
‘Eish, a few years,’ Peta muttered next to him. ‘That’s an understatement.’
The man shook his head. ‘Too many young people leaving their home, their country. I wish you much luck, and I hope you can find a way to live in Zimbabwe again.’
Peta smiled. The old man was probably thinking Joss was trying to return to a commercial farm that had been taken by the resettlement program, where land was given away because of a political agenda, to move the votes around. Once Zimbabwe could feed her people, but not any more. Now, because of the controversial land redistribution program undertaken by the Mugabe government, there were very few knowledgeable farmers left on the land, very few to organise and grow Zimbabwe’s food. Instead, aid flooded in to feed her country’s starving people. There were a few farms the war vets had now abandoned, and settlers had moved onto the land. Most were not actively farming but squatting, perhaps subsistence farming. In other places, they were beginning to crop farm in earnest. Some found gold or other minerals, and created micro-businesses despite the dreadful economic crisis that still faced the country. Each person trying to survive and move forward. It was an interesting time to return home.
‘Ngi ya bonga. Kuhle uke bu se inkyaha,’ Joss said.
The old man passed him the passport and touched his hand to his forehead in an unexpected salute. ‘Go well, Inkosi Joss Brennan.’
‘I guess our next stop is the motel. Just hope there are rooms available,’ Peta said as she climbed into the bakkie. ‘I could do with a seriously hot shower and a huge plate of chips.’
Joss nodded. ‘Thank you for the lift, Peta. I do appreciate it.’
Peta started Nguni. ‘Hey, at least if I have car trouble in the morning I know where to find you.’
He smiled.
She shook her head. It was wrong that someone like him seemed so nice, and yet his friendship with her sister had taken such a bad turn. She couldn’t remember exactly what had changed between them, only that, at the end, when Courtney was ill, he didn’t come home. But there was no way she could remain bitter towards Joss, it just wasn’t in her nature. She’d said her two cents on the subject, and now it was time to let it go. There were only about four thousand white people left in Zimbabwe and their paths were sure to cross over and over again, especially as his safari lodge in Binga was so close to the national parks she watched over.
She waved to the guard
s hunkered down in their rain gear as they lifted the boom, and continued slowly down the road, the rain so heavy she could barely see. Eventually they came to the only motel that was worth trying to get a bed at. She would rather sleep in the back of her bakkie than get bed bugs from the others.
The Beit Bridge Hotel wasn’t grand, but it looked inviting and obviously had a generator as it had power, while the buildings around it didn’t. The lights beckoned. Peta parked and they walked inside.
‘Ah, Miss Peta, nice to see you again,’ the night porter behind the counter said. He was a slight man, dressed impeccably in ironed white shirt and black pants.
‘Thank you, Phineas,’ she said, reading his name tag. ‘Can we have two rooms, please?’
‘Uxolo. There is only one room left, but it’s a big room, with two big beds,’ Phineas said.
Joss looked at her. ‘I’ll sleep in the bakkie—’
‘Don’t be stupid. I’m just tired, cranky and hungry. At least we’ll both get sleep tonight. It’s going to be an interesting day tomorrow, and we both need our strength.’ She turned back to the night porter. ‘That will be fine. We can share the room.’
Joss put his money on the counter. ‘I’ll pay for this one, my treat,’ he said.
‘We can go halves. No way it’s getting out that you paid for a room for me.’ She placed her money on the counter.
‘Peta, other than tonight, if I ever pay for a room for you, believe me, it will be in a nicer hotel than this—’
Phineas took the money from him.
Peta put her half into Joss’s hand. ‘Just take my share and shut up.’
Joss took the notes and stuffed them in his pocket.
‘Second floor on the left,’ Phineas said as he gave them each a key. ‘I will bring your bags.’
‘I can manage mine,’ Peta said as she lifted her small bag and slung her briefcase strap onto her shoulder. She looked over at Joss’s full suitcase.