This Thing Called the Future

by J. L. Powers

  He stops before a large tin pot. “Would you like some utshwala?” he jokes.

  I laugh with him. Young women don’t drink utshwala. It is for men and gogos only.

  He opens the refrigerator. “Lemonade or cold drink?”

  “Lemonade.”

  I watch as he pours for me. No man has ever poured me a drink before. It’s always me, serving Baba or my uncles and cousins. I like this feeling of being waited on, cared for.

  It is amazing how much you can tell about a person by one simple act. Little Man is different, I realize, watching him, noticing how comfortable he is in the kitchen, where most boys would seem helpless. He is not like other Zulu boys. Someday, when he is married, he will help his wife in the kitchen. He will not always want to be waited on, just because he is a man.

  The thought makes my cheeks warm, because of course, I am picturing him in my kitchen—nothing fancy, just a matchbox in Imbali, like we both live in now—but still, we are together.

  “What are you thinking, Khosi?” he asks, handing me the drink and realizing that I’ve been watching him.

  “Does your family throw a lot of parties?” I sip my drink, looking over the rim at him.

  “No. But I love parties!” His eyes shine as he grins at me, my stomach fluttering the way it does before an exam.

  “I’m not sure I like them,” I say, thinking of the drunk man outside.

  “You just haven’t experienced the right kind of party,” he says.

  “What’s there to experience?” I ask.

  “A good time!”

  It’s true, everybody’s having a good time. Except for me. Maybe Thandi’s right. Maybe I need to relax.

  Men’s voices, shouting and excited, filter into the kitchen where we’re standing. Little Man jumps up. “It sounds like a fight,” he says.

  Two drunk men are talking loudly in the middle of the yard, waving their arms at each other, one of them brandishing a stick. A girl my age is standing next to them, pleading as tears roll down her cheeks. It makes me feel sick inside to see her trying to soothe them.

  Little Man’s brother bursts into the middle of the fight and shouts, “Calm down, my man. You, sit down.” He pushes one of the men to a chair. He pushes the other towards the gate. “You, go home.” As the departing man exits through the gate, Little Man’s brother turns around and looks at the crowd, rolling his eyes heavenward. “Ji-sus!” he shouts.

  We watch the men as they disperse, one of them leading the crying girl towards a seat.

  I glance at the corner where my stalker was sitting some few minutes ago. He’s gone. My eyes dart here and there, searching every corner of the yard.

  I’d feel more comfortable if I knew exactly where he was.

  Suddenly, I realize I’m not safe here, not with all these drunk men wandering around and fighting. Even if Little Man is with me, he can’t protect me from everybody.

  “I should go home,” I say. “Let’s find Thandi.”

  We walk around the house until we see her, safely cuddled in Honest’s embrace. I motion to her, Let’s go, but she shakes her head.

  “I’ll walk you,” Little Man says, quickly. “You shouldn’t go home alone.”

  So we slip out the gate together.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  THIS WORLD AND THAT ONE

  “Even though you didn’t stay long, thank you for coming,” Little Man says as we hurry along the darkened street.

  “I wouldn’t have missed it,” I answer.

  We are only just around the bend in the street when we hear Little Man’s mother calling him. “Little Man! Little Man!”

  “Wait here, Khosi,” Little Man says. “I’ll be back.”

  The street is empty except for a few men smoking in the doorway of a shabeen somebody started in their dining room. One of them calls out, “Are you looking for a good time, little girl?”

  Hurry up, Little Man, I think, hugging myself and rubbing my arms, as if it’s really cold outside.

  A cat darts across the road.

  Is that a footstep echoing in the street behind me? I glance over my shoulder. The eerie silence fills me with a sudden sense of dread.

  “Little Man? Is that you?” I call.

  No answer.

  There it is again. Another footstep. Every time I breathe in, I hear it—the sound of somebody shuffling behind me, a low and easy gait, somebody who has all the time in the world. A cigarette bobs in the air, glowing in the dark, a fiery spark of life.

  “Who is it?” My voice is a thin wire in the dark night.

  A low chuckle ricochets off the houses around me.

  Sharp pang cramps sweat.

  “What do you want?” My voice collapses on the final word, within the ache of that word “want.” What is it that I want? To be left alone by all these men with their terrible desires!

  Another laugh, orange sparks flying up into the black night as he takes another drag on his cigarette.

  Shivering and sweating. Hot and cold all at once.

  “Leave me alone,” I shout. I had promised I would assert myself the next time a man tried to attack me. I had promised. Promised I would never feel so weak and helpless again. But now these words seem like a terribly thin defense against a man’s strength, slim shreds of cloth easily ripped by nimble fingers.

  All I have are my legs and this hope that I can outrun him.

  So I hit the dirt, praying as I run. Oh God, I promise I’ll never go to another party if I make it home.

  My feet slip on the gravel and I fall down, breaking the fall with my hands and scrambling back up with something that feels like desperate strength.

  God, please help me. I promise I’ll never lie to Mama again!

  And now I see him behind me, the crocodile grin, one rotten tooth in the center of his mouth.

  And now I smell him, the stale stench of a man who has been drinking utshwala and beer since this afternoon.

  And now I remember the promise he made. I’m not done with you yet, Ntombi. And the thing he said to me last week: I will come for you just now, Ntombi.

  God please please please don’t let him rape me.

  Flashes of Little Man’s image in my head. His easy grin. His dark laughing eyes. What would he think if I got raped? Even if he likes me now, surely he wouldn’t like me then.

  “I just didn’t want to dance,” I call back at this man who accosted me at the tuck shop, who wanted to come to my house, who wanted to come inside. I’m sobbing, sudden and fierce. “Please, I’m just a young girl. Don’t do this.”

  Silence from the drunk man stalking me. But he keeps his pace up, near enough to grab me. Each time I look over my shoulder, he grins at me, like he’d reach out and grab me if he really wanted to. Or like he’s waiting to do it.

  In my dream where this man was chasing me through the empty streets of Imbali, it was Babamkhulu who helped me.

  So I call on him now.

  Babamkhulu, I know you’re here. You helped me in my dream. Now I need you in real life.

  The man reaches out and grabs my arm, his fingers slipping and sliding down and settling on my wrist. Fear crawls over my feet and up my legs, a snake in the darkness, slithering down my esophagus, coiling its body around the lining of the stomach.

  I yank my wrist back, screaming, “Leave me alone!” My throat aching from all the tears I’m holding back. His hand, stronger than mine, as he keeps me close. “Babamkhulu! Help me!”

  “I know what you want,” he says, his voice low and even. “I know what you want, and I’m going to give it to you.”

  Hot and wet, tears spurting up, out, down my cheek. “I want you to leave me alone.” My voice begging.

  We’re close to Thandi’s house. I can see the edges of the gate, just around the corner. Please, Babamkhulu, if I can just make it there—

  The man tugs at my wrist, winding me in towards him, crushing me up against his body, his arm wrapping around and squeezing my waist so hard it hu
rts. Like a crocodile, using its thick tail to press me down.

  If he rapes me, God, please don’t let him have HIV! I don’t want to die!

  Dim whispers from a voice inside my head. Or is it outside? Am I the only one who can hear it shouting? A male voice. The voice of an elderly man. Knee him in the groin. Now.

  I jam my knee where I know it’ll hurt and whirl away as he groans. Swinging Thandi’s gate open, cutting the palm of my hand on the ragged edge of the gate, this other voice urging me on. Slam it. Run. Around the corner, behind the house. Pant breath tears.

  Please don’t let him follow, Babamkhulu.

  I rest my head against the house, waiting. Breathing. Listening for the creak of the gate that would indicate he’s entering the yard.

  Drops of sweat dribbling down my forehead. Salty tears trickling into my mouth.

  I wait for what feels like a long time and hear nothing. I lick the blood forming in a jagged line on my palm, the rusty nail taste filling my mouth. Glance around the corner, quick quick, searching for the glowing cigarette in the darkness.

  Nothing but night, and a dog barking in the distance.

  Please let me make it home, I pray, and that ghostly whisper assures me, You’re safe.

  Tip-toeing to the gate, I ease it open, looking left and right.

  Nothing. Nothing but shadows.

  I listen. Rustling as the wind blows trash across the dirt road.

  Nothing. He’s gone.

  But as I turn to head down the hill towards home, someone reaches out and grabs me from behind.

  I scream.

  “Relax, Nomkhosi.”

  “Uncle Richard!” I’m so frightened, the only thing I can do is gasp his name.

  “You see why you shouldn’t be alone after dark.” He twirls me around to face him. “Your grandmother was worried. She sent me after you.”

  “Gogo, worried?” I try to make my voice cheerful but it shakes. “She knew where I was. Why would she be worried?”

  “She dreamed that Babamkhulu was shaking her awake, telling her that you needed help. She woke up shouting—she said it was so real, his hand on her face.”

  “That is very strange.” My voice cracks. “But I’m okay.”

  “She’s not ready for you to be gone in the evenings,” he says. “And she’s right. You should be home, like a good girl. I don’t approve of you going out at night like this. Did you see that man lurking near the Nenes’ gate? I asked him what he was doing and he just hurried away. Just think if you had tried to go home by yourself! What could have happened to you, Khosi?”

  “I didn’t see him.” Blood drips from my palm onto my bare leg. I clench my fist closed so that Uncle Richard doesn’t see it.

  “I thought you said Thandi’s baba would walk you home.”

  “He wasn’t there.” I look back at Thandi’s house, hoping there’s a light on in her bedroom at least, something that will confirm my lie and make Uncle Richard believe I was telling the truth. But the entire house is dark.

  “I’m glad you came to walk me home, Uncle,” I say, emphasizing each word. I’m just that lucky he didn’t find out I was at a party instead of at Thandi’s house. “Ngiyabonga.”

  Ngiyabonga, Babamkhulu, I thank my grandfather inside my heart.

  I know he saved me tonight.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  VIRGINITY TESTING

  The next morning when I take my bath, I’m surprised to see dark, purple bruises all over my body, like I was in a big fight.

  I guess I was.

  I’m still counting bruises when Auntie Phumzi arrives. Through the bathroom window, I hear Zi shrieking when she sees Auntie’s youngest girls. I peek out through the open window and watch the three of them run through the yard, laughing, ignoring Inkosikazi Dudu, who stares at them from her front porch. Beauty’s dressed in a very short white beaded skirt, her chest bare. She’s wearing dozens of blue beaded necklaces that dangle between her breasts.

  Oh, wow. Auntie’s taking her to get her virginity tested!

  I hurry into my clothes because I’m pretty sure Mama and Auntie are about to have a king-sized battle and I don’t want to miss it!

  Sure enough, they’re arguing when I get to the dining room, where Mama is resting on the sofa.

  “There is no way I would give permission for Khosi to have her virginity tested,” Mama is declaring.

  Her eyes flash from Auntie Phumzi to me. I start to open my mouth—I want to go, just to see what it’s like—but she shakes her head at me.

  “If you don’t care about Khosi’s purity, why would she care?” Auntie Phumzi asks.

  “Phumzile, they’re only fourteen,” Mama snaps. “I don’t think it encourages purity just because some old women ask girls to spread their legs so they can judge if they’re still virgins or not. It’s barbaric.”

  Auntie’s voice rises in anger. “No, Elizabeth, it’s our culture.”

  “Anyway, I expect Khosi to be a good girl, no matter what,” Mama says, her voice indicating she’s tired of this fight already.

  “It’s not just virginity testing, Auntie,” Beauty says. “We sing songs about purity, and we dance, and they teach us what it means to be a wife and a mother. They teach us to respect ourselves.”

  Girls from school have told me all about the process: how they lay down behind four sheets, how they open their legs while an old woman inspects them. If she says they’re a virgin, they get a certificate. Sometimes, they’ll arrange a huge celebration, with hundreds of girls dancing and singing and celebrating their virginity.

  “We sing to Nomkhubulwane, the Earth Mother,” Beauty continues. “You know, she is the one who helps young girls stay pure.”

  “Nomkhubulwane is a pagan festival.” Mama shakes her head. “This isn’t for my Khosi. We are Christians.”

  “We are Christians, too, Auntie,” Beauty says.

  Auntie Phumzile looks severe. “It doesn’t matter that Khosi is Christian, she is misbehaving. This virginity testing may be just the thing to set her straight.”

  “Misbehaving? My Khosi?” Mama sounds indignant.

  “I didn’t want to bring this up,” Auntie says in a terrible voice, and now she’s looking at me, and Beauty’s looking at me, and their looks are accusing, “but Richard called me. He says that when he arrived at Thandi’s house, it was completely dark. He doesn’t think Khosi was actually there studying.”

  Now Gogo and Mama are watching me too. “Why would he say that?” I ask, doing my best to look completely innocent, perhaps even offended. Instead, I feel tears creeping into the corners of my eyes, my body betraying this lie.

  Auntie continues. “Khosi will get into trouble with this thing of sneaking out and lying. Maybe she went to meet men. Maybe she has a boyfriend. Is that what you want?”

  Nobody but Beauty notices the tears squirting out of my eyes. I wipe them away quickly and give her a shaky smile.

  Mama speaks again and this time she sounds really, really angry. But she isn’t angry at me. “Phumzile, you’re my older sister and so I respect you. But this is the last time I’ll say it: No. I will not send Khosi to a virginity testing. I won’t have her prancing around in a little white skirt, showing off everything to every man she meets along the way.” Mama flicks her hand towards Beauty and the outfit she’s wearing. “You don’t think that gives men ideas? That’s too much dangerous, especially with these stupid men out there who think they can get rid of HIV if they rape a virgin.”

  Maybe Mama’s trying to shame Auntie but all she does is make her mad. “You’ll regret this, Elizabeth.”

  “No,” Mama spits. “You’ll regret this.”

  When Beauty and Auntie leave, however, Mama turns to me. “Khosi, is it true? Did you sneak out to meet men last night?”

  Gogo’s even quicker than me. “Shame, Elizabeth! Has Khosi ever lied to us?”

  “Ehhe, you’re right, Mama.” Mama puts her head in her hands, like it aches. “Ngiyaxolisa, K
hosi. We won’t speak of this again.”

  For Mama and Gogo, the discussion is over. But I know I lied to them. I know I did sneak out to meet men. Well, not men exactly, but Little Man.

  When Beauty and Auntie drive away, I find the little girls in the bedroom. “Let’s go outside and play sangoma,” I suggest.

  The four of us sit in a circle on the cement in the front yard. I gather stones and a few sticks together. “Who wants to be the sangoma?” I say.

  “Me, me!” Their hands shoot up in the air.

  “We’ll have to take turns.” I turn to Zi. “You can pretend to be the sangoma first.” I indicate the sticks and stones I’ve gathered. “Here are your ‘bones’ to throw so you can read what’s wrong. Who wants to be the first patient, coming to see the sangoma?”

  We’re still playing when Little Man wanders past our yard. He jogs up to the fence and waves me to come over and talk. “Hey, Khosi!”

  “You girls wait here.” I let myself out of the gate and sit on a stone wall nearby. He leans against it, looking casual and soooo handsome. In just the last month, he’s grown much taller than me. Now, instead of looking eye to eye, he looks down when he smiles at me.

  “Where did you go last night?” he asks. “I came back thirty seconds later and poof! you were gone, like magic. I walked all the way to your house but I never saw you. I was so worried.”

  “You remember that man at the party that was giving me a hard time?”

  Little Man’s eyes darken. “He’s been giving you a hard time for months now.”

  “He followed us from the party. He started chasing me.” I hold out my hand to show Little Man the cut across the palm. “I barely escaped him.”

  Little Man is inching closer and closer, until we’re almost touching, his knee close to my thigh. He reaches out and caresses my palm with his finger. Bumps spring up all over my arm. “Don’t ever walk alone,” he says. “It isn’t safe.”

  “Who’s going to walk with me everywhere I need to go?” I ask.

  “I will.” He sits beside me, his arm rubbing mine.

  My heart is thumping so loud, they can probably hear it in Botswana. But even I know that it isn’t a realistic offer. Little Man can’t go with me everywhere I need to go. There are hundreds of men all over Imbali who might harm me. I read in the paper recently that one in four South African men admitted to raping a girl. Imagine that! One in four! How could anybody possibly protect me? Only God and the ancestors can keep me safe.