by HJ Golakai
Vee had circulated an office email, detailing her full awareness of the rumours that she’d taken something under the table during the Paulsen case. Being magnanimous of spirit, she was willing to share her alleged gains with all and sundry. Economic downturn and rand value being what it was, though, the full extent of her muster was toasted sarmies and fizzy drinks, which had been delivered promptly at one o’clock. The staff had found it hugely amusing. For the first time ever, more than half of them had looked her in the eye, and with respect.
They let the room soak in silence, knowing awkwardness would nibble at the edges until it couldn’t be borne. Chlöe pretended to admire the decor, letting her gaze roam to the wall hangings. Vee had put up her favourite personal photos, her greatest hits, in understated frames. Pride of place was the first major assignment she’d done on xenophobic violence and an opinion piece from her early freelancer days which featured in a major editorial in New York. There were a couple of group snapshots of workshops Vee had attended, with eager young minds huddled around Elizabeth Blunt in the first, who Chlöe knew was a major deal for her coverage of civil unrest, and Christiane Amanpour in the second. Chlöe had seen all the photos many times before, but she lingered and pored over them. She knew her face was being examined, that Vee was curious as to why she, a beast with a brush, had barely made an effort to disguise the fading bruise on her jawline. Chlöe wanted her to feel guilty. She turned around suddenly and was gratified to catch a flash of remorse in Vee’s eyes, before she looked away.
“I didn’t expect you back today. Thought you’d ride out the week till Monday,” Vee cleared her throat, breaking the spell.
“I wanted to. Being a couch potato is dead boring. Gave me a taste of what I’d be facing if I had quit in a fit of pique.” A muddle of expressions flickered over Vee’s face at the concept, but she managed to restrain comment. “Anyway. I had to deliver this personally. I took a blood oath.”
Vee took the package. Her brows arched ever so slightly when she lifted the ripped flap of the envelope, which Chlöe hadn’t bothered to replace. Their eyes met for a heartbeat, then she pressed on, lifting out its contents. She shuffled through the stack, not poring over any particular one, her face a wall throughout. She set them aside and walked around the desk, a single one in hand. When they were standing side by side, Chlöe saw it was an 8x6 cm photograph.
“That’s my brother,” Vee said, tapping a corner. A man hunched on a stoop in what could barely be called a courtyard of a highly dilapidated building. The shot wasn’t too clear, but it looked like he was washing clothes in a large metal basin. Other people in attire just as bedraggled milled about in the corners.
I know, Chlöe wanted to say, but stopped herself. Something on Vee’s face, or the nothing on Vee’s face, shut her up. She let the stillness roll on and over, feeling it slicing the belly of some nameless thing open.
“This guy,” Vee tapped again, “he’s a helluva person. There was this time,” she settled onto the desk and Chlöe slid up beside her, “right after the war, when we finally got reunited. We were in the refugee camp in Ghana – Buduburam. It was no vacation spot, let me tell you. Overcrowded and unsafe. So my ma sent me to her half-brother who was married to an Ivorian, to live with his family in Abidjan. She didn’t say for how long, she didn’t even tell me beforehand I was going. We just went to see him for a few days while he was visiting Accra, then she told me what was happening and why; then she and my brother left without me and went back to the camp. I was too stunned even to cry. I should’ve broken down then and gotten all of it out of my system. My uncle was a nice man but he was one of those spineless nice ones, the type that ends up with bitchy wives. I don’t get why niceness in men got to mean you’hn got no common sense.
“They had a nice house, sent me to school, but that wife brought every evil stepmother stereotype to life. She had three children, and if she didn’t do her utmost to make them break me it was a wasted day. Her son, the eldest, had a thing for me and it used to boil her soul. Her older daughter was the witch she used to terrorise me. I stayed with them for almost two years, and nearly went mad. In that time my ma and brother wrote to me, but only came to visit three times. Money was tight. On the last trip Quincy barely said one word to me. I thought he was angry, that he didn’t understand it wasn’t my or his decision that I had to live there, that Mama was doing what she could to give us a normal life. Or that he couldn’t stand being dragged over the border to see his sister living large while they were still catching hell in Ghana.”
“Where was your dad?”
Vee shook her head, sighing. “That’s a whole other story. Anyway, when they left I nearly died. I just knew they weren’t ever coming back, that they had seen for themselves I was fine and they were going to leave me with those people to be their maid for the rest of my life. I felt doomed. Then a few months later my brother just showed up out of nowhere. He came in the afternoon, when my uncle and aunty were at work but we were back from school. He told my cousin, the boy, to help me pack my things, and he sat with the two girls to make sure they didn’t run to use the neighbour’s phone to call their parents. Then he gave my cousin a letter for my uncle, and we left. We took so many buses, I couldn’t keep track. Finally we got off the last one, and we were back in Ghana. He and my ma were both working and had left the camp by then. We managed to move from the crowded house they were in to a better place. He worked all those months to save bus fare to come get me. He was seventeen and I was twelve.”
Chlöe nodded like she understood, but really she didn’t. She liked her own brother only sometimes and her sister, well, that bordered on bloody never.
“He’s not the guy he used to be. He went home during the last years of the war and …” Vee stared ahead, her face morphing into another indescribable arrangement. “He became active in the faction politics of the Taylor heydays. Let’s just say he came down on the wrong side of it. Hasn’t been right, since then. He wanders around like an aimless person, half the time none of us know where he is till somebody gives us news about him. Right now he’s squatting in this rundown apartment building, I don’t even know if you could call it that, in Freetown. You see this lil girl?” She spread out the stack and plucked out another shot. “She’s my niece. He had her with a Guinean woman. She’s four and barely knows him. I do; I know he stays away because he thinks her life will be better if she grew up without him there to mess her up. But the mom isn’t coping so well on her own.”
“That’s why you’re broke half the time. ’Cause you’re helping uncles build houses and sending cousins to school and taking care of this.”
Vee exhaled, more tired than exasperated. Chlöe couldn’t get it. White people were different, nuclear. Your money was your money. With the likes of her, you didn’t dare turn your back. “That’s why I need Lovett. Lovett can dig up a whole graveyard to get results, damn the consequences.”
“Oh. Okay.” Chlöe nodded some more.
“When you ask about certain things, Chlöe, be sure you’ve made room to receive. Consider what you’re asking and more than that, if the person’s ready to give it to you. Me, my ownah life dah spider story. One looong tale of never-ending happenstance. Things you can’t unhear once it’s out there.” Like how I have a weapon belonging to a woman who’s now dead, her fingerprints all over it, tucked away in a corner of my closet. “I’m just saying.”
“I hear you.” Chlöe hopped off the desk. “Gladys.” She gave a slow, evil grin.
Vee fought a smile. “Okay. So you’re gonna go there …”
“You serious? I’m gonna live there, and run for president. Of Gladysville.” Chlöe hooted. “That’s your real name? Your parents looked at you when you were born, you, and said, ‘Aww look at our little blommetjie Gladys’? Gladys?!”
“Aaaay, can you stop saying that word? My headache’s coming back.” Vee stuffed everything back into the envelope. “It was. Was meant to be.” She gave a dismissive wave. “Whate
ver. It’s sorted out forever. And it’s less terrible when it’s in context. My parents never legally married, but Mama agreed to us carrying Johnson if our first names were her choice. The woman’s always been obsessed with Quincy Jones and Gladys Knight. Thank God she only had us two; she could’ve run through the whole Motown line-up.”
“My head’s spinning. You’ve got a lot of stuff going on, Gladys. I also now know that you speak French – I knew somehow you were pretending! How can you pass up the chance for us to talk about these office creeps when they’re standing right there?”
Vee flapped another wave. “Look, if I –”
Two quick raps, the door creaked opened and Saskia Schoeman pushed in, nudging a chair out of her path so gruffly that it nearly tipped over. “I’ve been asked to – gracious.” She digested the office wall by wall, studying its every crook and corner in a manner that made Vee’s skin creep a little, like she was committing it to a mental vault reserved for targets she intended to destroy one day. “Oh my word. Who knew there was anything like this back here?” She turned to Vee, flicking her eyes up and down the length of her. “You’re one for surprises.”
“I like to keep it fresh.” Vee ignored Chlöe’s nudge to her ribs. “What can we help you with?”
“There’s an impromptu meeting for management. We’re reworking the office organogram to accommodate the new shuffles in duties. Seeing as you’ve … managed to elevate yourself in that direction, please make sure you join us. Your creative input would be so valued.” Saskia sniffed. The pursing of her lip drawstrings, sharp and quick, left her mouth looking like a sphincter. The look on her face was telling: loosely translated, Nico and Darren had both insisted on Vee’s presence at the meeting and she’d been outnumbered. Saskia was strategic, and for now she’d stand down till she regained an unchallenged position of power. She threw one last look around, gave a curt nod and waggled out.
“Meet me here after?” Vee asked gently.
“Well.” Chlöe shrugged, eyes averted. “You don’t have to. Seeing as you’re practically one of the top dogs now. Don’t be breaking rank on my account.”
“Top dogs? Around here? Pshh,” Vee scoffed. “When do we ever not gossip after a meeting? Hey, afterwards let’s take a stroll to Urban and scare the baby Jesus out of that spineless Charisma. Runnin’ her damn mouth about us, msshw.”
“Cool beans,” Chlöe grinned. “Hey.” She grabbed Vee’s arm before she ducked out. “Keep your cool in there, okay? Remember, since you told a software zillionaire to jump up his own ass and die, we don’t have much chance of becoming the stupid housewives of Stinking Richville.”
Vee made a fist and thrust it out. Chlöe bumped hers against it.
Chapter Thirty-eight
“You’re not impressed.”
“No, I am! Very. This is a helluva spread, Ti, thank you.” Vee reached over and squeezed his hand. “Though finding you in my lounge in the middle of the night nearly scared me half to death.” And this banquet might finish me off. She edged aside a platter of minute steak, boerewors and bacon to scoop more of the medley of chopped fruit and yoghurt in her bowl.
Titus rolled his eyes a little, dimple twitching. “It’s not even nine. But yeah okay, dumb move. Considering the break-in, I probably should’ve thought it through before I used the spare key to get in and set up a surprise. I just …” he squeezed her hand back, “… wanted to cheer you up.”
“You have! It’s a great surprise. Barring that I almost pepper-sprayed you –”
“And stabbed me. And had the armed response company bust in here and haul my ass to jail.”
She giggled. “Despite all that, I appreciate the effort. And the joke.”
And a table of punchlines it was. He’d cooked up breakfast for supper – the full works. He’d bought twin lamps in the shape of candles – real candlelight gave her bittersweet memories of a childhood spent in regular blackouts; she’d never found it romantic. A plump clutch of spinach instead of roses dressed the centrepiece vase – as far as she was concerned, the tradition of giving inedible, dead plants to women as a sign of affection was incomprehensible. He’d assembled all her quirks on one dinner table, just to make her smile.
Vee squeezed his hand again. The breakfast-for-dinner thing was great occasionally, but she was leery of heavy, meaty meals composting in her stomach after seven p.m. The novelty lamps had those extra fine bulbs that broke at the slightest provocation; where was she going to store them? Upon closer inspection the spinach looked to be Swiss chard, which she wasn’t a fan of at all. None of that was she going to mention. She squeezed his fingers yet again.
“You’re trying too hard. And you’re about to break my hand.” He shook his head to stop her. “Yeah, come on, this was a bad idea. I envisioned funny-edgy, and this is more like funny-shoot me in the face. We both know my humour trends to the corny side, which doesn’t always translate.”
“Titus Wreh. Stop it.”
He took his hand away, but only to balance his elbows better on the table as he leaned in to look at her more intently. “You stop. I feel like a jackass. You should let me. I know better than this. I’m soooo much better than this.” He waggled his eyebrows suggestively, dimple pinching into the bottom corner of his mouth, making her giggle again. “But seriously. This …” he gestured at the spread, broad shoulders sagging, “… isn’t me. None of it’s me, or you. We don’t do this.”
Titus stared at her a long time. The glow of his eyes warmed her inside out, the very part of him she’d fallen in love with first. It was so cheesy, falling for the hot guy with the dreamy hazel eyes, but she hadn’t been able to help it. The amber splinters in his eyes throbbed in the lamplight, catching and flicking light intermittently so his irises resembled a slowly spinning spoke. She tried to conjure up a single winning feature on Joshua’s odd, not-classically-handsome face at that moment and couldn’t.
“You remember how we met?”
She threw her head back and snorted, trying not to laugh and bring yoghurt up through her nose. “Oh God, don’t start …”
“The year was 2004, Christmas-time. The city: Monrovia, aka Ground Zero, the ramshackle but slowly recovering capital of bloody unrest.” He spread his hands in front of her face like a magician building up to his coup de grâce. “There I was, driving round town minding my own business, weaving through traffic like a responsible citizen –”
“Swerving left and right in your Mitsubishi 4X4 like you owned the road.”
“– when a reckless endangerer of life cut me off near SKD Stadium, hitting my fine car with her rusty duazet. She then proceeded to bounce serious grombo in the street, cussing me out like market woman.”
“Hhmm, the lie-lie version of this story improves every year.”
“I wasn’t even pissed off. Too busy thinking ‘daaaaaamn’. Then you picked up a rock and busted my windscreen, plackow! Completely unprovoked …”
“Hehn? You refused to pay for the damage and tried to flee the scene!”
“So we had to exchange details. I did my research, found out you lived not from where I did and hunted you down when we got back to the States. I’ll never forget the look on your face when I showed up on your doorstep!”
“You stalked me. But you were willing to forget the damage to your car if I had a burger with you.” She chuckled. “That was the best burger I ever had. Still is. Wow. I was such an angry person. Why did you like me?”
“Nah, not angry. More like … iridescent. We were amazing together.” He touched her cheek and withdrew his hand. “What happened to us?”
She sighed and pushed her plate away. “I don’t know.” She put her face in her hands, then lifted her head. “Okay, I do know. I was scared and insecure. Your family is prestigious and mine isn’t. I resented it. We were moving too fast. Sure, we’d been together for four years, but suddenly it felt like I was being strangled.”
He flinched, but didn’t look away, like he wanted to hear all of it.
Vee squared her shoulders and gulped. “I didn’t want to be that person. The girl who’s finally got it good and she’s ungrateful. I tried to talk myself out of it. Then I tried to find a way to tell you. Then the engagement kinda just happened, and we moved to a new country together. And then …” she took a shuddering breath, “… the miscarriage …”
“Vee …” He tipped her chair gently and dragged it closer to him.
“I didn’t mean to lose our baby.”
“It just happened.” The spokes of the amber wheel slowed as his eyes misted. “It just happened.”
Nodding, she leaned into him, resting her face against his bicep, his body heat blending with hers, steadying her. “But the worst part was …” She faltered, and he massaged her neck, urging. No matter how often in the past year they’d picked over the carcass of the mess they’d made, going from screaming matches to resigned narrations and everything in between, he never turned away. And she’d never said the worst out loud. “I didn’t want it. I didn’t want it and I was too terrified to tell you and have you beg me to keep it.”
He pulled back and blinked at her. “How come you never …”
She choked on a sob, shaking her head over and over, shutting off the memory attached to all of it, the one that still tortured her till she physically ached. “I wanted it out of me, but I couldn’t … So I just hated it and prayed and waited. Till one day the pain started …” she grimaced, still able to feel every gruelling second of it. “I was in shock. All the way to the hospital, my only thought was that I didn’t want to die. I never once thought about … it dying. And I couldn’t get past the guilt, that I only fought for myself. I wanted to kill you, for leaving me here to feel like a bitch by myself.”
She sobbed into his shoulder until her tears ran out. They stayed huddled across the table, foreheads and noses touching, breathing each other’s air. The stone was rolled away, the anguish resurrected and buried; as the moments passed they looked at each other with new eyes.