Chanda's Secrets

by Allan Stratton

  Mama and I have one last look at Sara. We rest her favorite toy beside her, a striped sock puppet with wobbly button eyes. Then Mama holds me and Mr. Bateman nails down the lid.

  The coffin slides into its trailer. Mama, Jonah, and I take our places in the Chevy and the funeral procession heads to the cemetery.

  12

  THE CEMETERY IS A ROCKY FIELD on the outskirts of town. It only opened last year but already it’s almost full. Sara’s being buried in the northeast corner, about a ten-minute walk from Esther’s parents.

  We drive through a gate in the barbed-wire fence, past a metal sign announcing township bylaws for behavior: no screaming, shouting, or other indecent behavior; no defacing or stealing memorials; no grazing of livestock.

  The winding dirt roads are filled with potholes. Last rainy season, hearses got stuck in them. So did the tow trucks that came to pull them out. Today, as the Chevy bounces along, I’m more afraid the bouncing may break Sara’s coffin.

  We pull up to the site. We’re not alone. There’s a row of eight fresh graves, the earth piled high at the head of each hole. Mr. Bateman says we’re the third one down. Funerals are already in progress on either side. In the distance I see the dust of other processions driving through the gates. Mourners hop off pickup trucks and search for their dead. A fight breaks out over who’s supposed to be in holes five and six.

  Meanwhile, our priest climbs to the top of Sara’s mound and delivers a scripture reading about eternal life. I want to believe in God and Sara being with the ancestors. But suddenly I’m scared it’s just something priests make up to take away the nightmares. (I’m sorry God, forgive me. I’m sorry God, forgive me. I’m sorry God, forgive me.)

  The priest starts the Lord’s prayer. “Raetsho yoo ko le godimong.” Everyone bows their heads except for me. As we join the priest in chanting the prayer, I stare at this field covered with bricks. Each brick marks a grave. A date’s scrawled in black paint. There’s not even room for a name. The dead have disappeared as if they never lived.

  This is what Sara will have.

  “Sara,” I whisper, “forgive us.” I know we can never afford to buy her a headstone, but I want to save for a moriti; I want her to have a grave marked with its own little fence and canvas top, her name soldered in wire at the front. I want there to be a gate and a lock, too, so I can leave toys for her without them disappearing.

  Mama says moritis are just another way to make the undertakers rich. Papa’s and my brothers’ lost their canvas tops years ago, and the fences bent out of shape the moment the graves collapsed in the rainy season. But I don’t care.

  On the cattle posts, my great-great-grandparents’ graves are marked by river rocks. It doesn’t matter, though, because families are together, and everyone knows where everyone’s buried going back to forever. But here the dead are buried so helter-skelter they get forgotten. Their memory vanishes like tufts of milkpod on the wind.

  The priest finishes his prayer and makes the sign of the cross. Mr. Bateman’s men lower Sara’s coffin on ropes. One by one we file up and throw in our flowers. Then everyone but Mama, me, Jonah, and his brothers-in-law drifts back to our place for the burial feast.

  Jonah’s brothers-in-law fill the grave with dirt. When they’re done, Jonah collapses across the mound. He wails like a baby. Mama strokes his hair. I hate him. He got drunk while Sara was sick. If he didn’t care then, why does he pretend to care now? And why does Mama comfort him?

  I look at the clouds until Jonah steadies himself. He gets up and wipes his eyes on his tie. Mama brushes the dirt from his jacket and pants, and we head home to join the rest of the mourners.

  By the time we arrive, the yard is full, everyone talking to each other over goat stew and cornbread. Mr. Bateman has passed out programs. The cover has a photo of Sara in her coffin and a Bible verse: “Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not, for of such is the Kingdom of Heaven.”

  The priest calls the gathering to order. He gives a short speech and turns to Mama, who thanks everyone for coming. After that there’s a million hymns led by Mrs. Tafa, who thinks she has a calling for the stage. The yard is alive with singing and clapping. We’re hugged, and held, and rocked. Then things blur, and before it seems possible our visitors are gone, except for Esther who’s helping to clean up, and Mr. Bateman who’s clearing away his tent.

  Everyone’s moved on. Everyone but Sara. She’s frozen in time. Alone in the ground. One and a half forever.

  13

  BY MIDAFTERNOON IT’S TOO HOT TO BREATHE. The day should be over but it isn’t. And Mama and I should be under a tree but we aren’t. We’re waiting by the roadside with Auntie Lizbet for the pickup to take her back to Tiro. Mama and Auntie Lizbet have big straw hats and are sitting on kitchen chairs that were left outside. I’m cross-legged on the ground shading my head with an old piece of newspaper.

  Some people say, “Misery loves company”; I say, sometimes company is misery. Instead of talking, we fan ourselves with paper plates from the burial feast and listen to the piercing drone of the cicadas. Each second takes forever. We stifle yawns. The silence is heavier than the heat.

  Every so often Auntie Lizbet sighs and taps her foot: “No sense you folks waiting out here on my account.”

  “No, no, we’re happy to,” Mama replies quickly. I wish she wasn’t so polite.

  Just when I think I’m going to yawn so wide my head’ll turn inside out, the pickup turns the corner. Mama helps lift Auntie Lizbet onto her feet.

  “I’m glad you could make the trip,” Mama says.

  “I know my duty,” Auntie Lizbet replies stiffly. She waits till the driver’s hoisted her onto the flatbed and the pickup’s started to lurch forward. Then she leans over the open side wall. “It’s a terrible price your Sara paid.”

  “What?” Mama says.

  “As you sowed, so you reap, sister. ‘The sins are visited upon the children.’ Hear the spirits of your ancestors. Repent. Beg forgiveness of those you wronged and dishonored.”

  The pickup kicks up dust and stones. It disappears around the bend. Mama stands in the road, like someone’s kicked her in the guts. She staggers to a stool. I know I should leave her alone but I don’t. I run up and kneel beside her.

  “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine,” she whispers.

  “What did Auntie mean?”

  “Nothing.” She closes her eyes and holds up her hand.

  “Please, Mama, open your eyes. Don’t make me disappear.” Her eyes flash wide, but my voice is a river. Words pour from my heart. “Why does she hate us? Why does our family hate us?”

  “They don’t.”

  “They do. They didn’t come to the funeral. Why? I know the excuses, but why? And when Papa died—why did we stay here? Why didn’t we go to Tiro?”

  “I’m too tired to argue.”

  “I’m not arguing. I just need to know. Who was dishonored? What was the sin?”

  “You ask too many questions.”

  “I have a right to know.”

  “I’ll tell you when you’re older.”

  “That’s what you said when Papa died. Well, I’m older now. Sixteen. When you were sixteen you were married with babies.”

  Mama looks away. I wrap my arms around her waist. She cradles my head and rocks me. I hold her tight. Finally, when I’m still, she tells me the truth. “They hate us because they say I bring bad luck. They say your papa and I dishonored them.”

  Her voice may be quiet, but the words are strong and clear—as if the story has rolled around inside her head for so long, it’s turned to smooth hard stone.

  She says the curse goes back twenty-five years. Her parents—my Granny and Grampa Thela—were good friends with the Malungas, who owned the neighboring cattle post. The families arranged for Mama to marry the Malungas’ oldest son, Tuelo.

  Tuelo was handsome and strong. It didn’t matter. Mama loved Papa. At a harvest celebration, the two of the
m ran off to Papa’s cattle post. My mama-grampa and the Malunga men took up torches and machetes, determined to kill Papa’s family and bring Mama home.

  There was nearly a bloodbath. But Mr. Malunga found a way to save face. Mama had two younger sisters. Tuelo would get his pick. Also, the bride price would be doubled, but paid by Papa’s family in cattle.

  Lives were saved; they were also changed. Papa had to restock his family’s post. This was hard since Mama came with nothing. So his brothers turned him into a kind of servant. After sixteen years, he’d had enough. He told them he’d repaid his debt, and demanded his share of the harvest. They refused. That’s why we came to Bonang.

  There were troubles for Mama’s family, too.

  Her two younger sisters were my aunties Lizbet and Amanthe. Auntie Lizbet was older, so she expected to become Tuelo’s wife. This suited her fine, since she was secretly in love with him. But Tuelo chose Auntie Amanthe instead.

  Auntie Lizbet blames this on why she never got to marry. (Mama’s too kind to say so, but the real reason is Auntie’s club-foot. Building huts, fetching water, and chasing children keeps wives on their feet, especially at cattle posts. The men in Tiro were just being practical. Or maybe they didn’t like the idea of being stuck with a toad. Those are hard truths for Auntie Lizbet to swallow. Instead, she blames her life on Mama. Does bad luck make people miserable? Or do miserable people bring bad luck?)

  Anyway, right after the wedding, Auntie Amanthe got pregnant. The baby got stuck inside. They had to cut into her belly to get it out. Auntie Amanthe bled to death; the baby was stillborn. At the funeral, Mama was shunned. Auntie Lizbet said what people were thinking: “It should have been you.”

  After that, whenever anything went wrong Mama got blamed: she’d shamed her parents and dishonored the ancestors. Traditional doctors came to Granny and Grampa Thela’s post to take away the evil. But no matter how often they came, Mama’s sin was too great. The next time there was a problem, Mama was blamed again.

  Mama strokes my hair. “That’s why we didn’t go back to Tiro. I wouldn’t live in a place where people said we got what we deserved.”

  We sit still for a long time. Then I say: “Granny and Grampa don’t really believe in spirit doctors, do they?”

  Mama thinks about this for a long time. “There’s what people believe,” she says, tapping her head. “And there’s what they believe.” She taps her heart. I look down.

  Mama lifts my head and cups it in her hands. “Everyone believes in something,” she says. “Well, here’s what I believe. There’s no sin in love. What your papa and I did was good. It brought you into the world. And I wouldn’t change that for anything.”

  PART TWO

  14

  IT’S JUST BEFORE DAYBREAK. I’m sitting on the floor at the foot of Mama’s bed. I’ve been doing this for three months now, ever since the funeral.

  Three months. Sara’s funeral feels like yesterday and forever all at once. When I come home from school I still expect to see her. In my head, I know she’s gone. But in my heart, well, that’s something else again.

  Everything’s changed. Once I knew every pore of Sara’s face. Now I don’t know anything. I stare at Mr. Bateman’s Polaroid of her in her coffin. It doesn’t look like her. Or does it? I can’t be sure. Why can’t I remember? What’s wrong with me?

  Friends are no help. Whenever I think life’s back to normal, one of them will ask, “How are you doing?” and the pain roars back. It’s like when I was up north in the delta, learning to pole a mokoro through river reeds; the minute I’d relax I’d hit a patch of roots and capsize.

  “People who ask ‘how-are-you-doing’ aren’t friends,” says Esther. “They’re scab-pickers. Nosy little scab-pickers. What they really want is to know you feel bad so they can feel superior.”

  “That’s not fair.”

  “It’s true.”

  Nights are the worst. I have horrible dreams. Such as: Sara is dying, but if I get her to the hospital right away she’ll be all right. I try to strap her in my bicycle basket, but she keeps falling out, and when I go to pick her up she slides through my hands. Time is disappearing, Sara is dying, it’s all my fault.

  I wake up in a cold sweat, but being awake is no better. I toss and turn, panicking about time and life and what is the point of anything. Mostly, though, I hurt myself about Sara. Why did I hate her for screaming? Why did I wish she’d stop? Why didn’t I rock her more? Did she think I didn’t love her? Did she think I didn’t care? Is that why she died? Is it my fault? My brain cramps so bad I want to rip off the top of my head. That’s when I get up and sit beside Mama.

  The first time I did it, the night after the funeral, she was awake too, in her rocking chair. “Go back to bed,” she said. “You’ll feel better if you get a good night’s sleep.”

  “So why don’t you go back to bed?” I asked.

  “I’m waiting up for Jonah.”

  “What makes you think he’s coming?”

  “Don’t talk that way.”

  “What way?”

  “You know what way.”

  I didn’t say another word. I’d guessed right, though. Jonah didn’t show up that night or the night after. In fact, the whole first month after the funeral he only came by three times. Each time he was so drunk I think he stumbled here by accident. Mama never asked where he’d been—I doubt if he could have remembered—she just aimed him for the bedroom.

  Sometimes I’d see him when I was out doing errands. He’d be tossing dice on a corner sidewalk or face down in a gutter. I always ignored him. Even if Mama missed him, I was glad we were rid of his stink.

  The last time I saw him was different. I’d traded our eggs and vegetables for some milk and sugar at Mister Happy’s food stand and was heading back by the rail lands. Along the road there’s a chain-link fence with barbed wire on top to keep out trespassers. It doesn’t work, though; people just crawl underneath. They sneak into the boxcars on the side rails for sex. Every so often cops clear the place, but an hour later the traffic’s back.

  At any rate, I was near my turnoff when I saw Jonah, his arm draped over Mary’s shoulder, heading to one of the trains. It was one thing seeing them drunk together at the shebeen. But to be shaming Mama out in public—No!

  I scrambled under the fence. “Hold it right there!”

  When they saw me coming, they tried to hide their heads and change direction. Only they didn’t know where to turn. Their legs got tangled. They collapsed in a heap.

  I lit into Jonah like a jackal. “Listen, you. If you want to leave my mama, go right ahead. But at least have the guts to tell her first.”

  “Don’t talk to your step-papa like that!” Mary sputtered.

  “I’ll talk to him any damn way I please,” I said. I whirled back on Jonah. “You think you can just walk away. All Mama’s questions—her whys—the hurts from not knowing—none of that bothers you, you piece of dung.”

  “You have your nerve, girl,” Jonah quivered.

  “I have nerve? You step out with your slut in broad daylight and I have nerve? Papa wouldn’t have left Mama—not ever—but if he had, he wouldn’t have disappeared like she never mattered. That’s the difference between him and you. Papa was a man. You’re a pig.”

  “I don’t have to listen to this!” he hollered. “I do what I want.”

  “Hah! You do what your prick wants!” I gave him the finger and strode off, embarrassed to death at what I’d just done.

  Like I said, that was the last time I saw him. In fact, it’s the last time anyone saw him. He’s disappeared for real. Even Mary doesn’t know where he is. I think we’d have heard if he’d turned up dead, so I guess he’s alive. Maybe he’s at his family’s cattle post, or hustling booze at some squat out of town. Who knows?

  There’s rumors, though. A week after he disappeared, Mama and I were in the yard hanging laundry.

  “Where’s that man of yours been hiding himself?” Mrs. Tafa called over the
hedge. Her voice was all honey—sticky for dirt. She’s queen of the scab-pickers, that one.

  “Oh he’s busy at this and that,” Mama replied, so calm she didn’t even drop a clothes-peg.

  “Glad to hear it,” said Mrs. Tafa. “I didn’t believe the rumors.”

  What rumors? I wondered. I’m sure Mama wondered too, but she had too much pride to let on. “Oh ‘the rumors,’” she laughed. “Rumors, rumors, rumors. Some poor fools have nothing better to do than gossip.”

  “Why, that’s the Lord’s truth,” Mrs. Tafa agreed, as if Mama wasn’t talking about her. Then she made a remark about her kettle boiling and hurried indoors. I was so proud of Mama for putting Mrs. Tafa in her place that I gave her a wink. She pretended not to notice.

  “My joints are giving me a hard time today,” she said, nursing her elbows. “Could you finish up? I have to lie down. Maybe take some devil’s claw root.” Her voice was kind of lost. As if, deep down, the truth had finally hit that Jonah wouldn’t be back.

  Since then, Mama’s hardly waited up at all. Some nights she may pace in the main room, or wander through the garden. But mostly, she curls into a ball on her mattress, clutching a pillow. Sometimes she doesn’t get up for a day or two. She’ll just lie there, eyes shut, rubbing her temples.

  The first time I saw her like that was scary. I told her I was going for a doctor, but she grabbed my wrist. “Don’t you dare!” Her eyes blazed. “There’s nothing the matter with me. It’s just a headache.” Then she fell back on her mattress.

  I’m used to her headaches now. And she’s right. They’re nothing to be worried about. If I had everything to think about that she does, I’d have them too. So instead of troubling her with doctor talk, I try to stay cheerful and do the chores she can’t.

  As soon as the rooster crows, I go to the coop, feed the chickens and collect their eggs. Then, while I make the breakfast, I get Iris and Soly dressed, and lay out a few things for lunch. That leaves me an hour to work in the garden before heading to school. If Mama still isn’t herself when I get back, I go to the standpipe for water and make supper. Laundry, housework, and cutting firewood I save for the weekend.