Azanian Bridges

by Nick Wood

  The conversation drifts to my stay in the hospital – they are curious no doubt, and I tell them stories of electric torture and medication sjamboks. I have seen little of this myself, but then I have not been to the wards at the back of the hospital. Yet.

  They grow quiet when I mention Dr. Van Deventer and the Box, though – Nombuso gives me a strange look, asking me to confirm the Box does indeed work.

  “Yes,” I say, “Not perfectly, it’s a bit blurred and vague, almost like background noise with jerky faded video images, but I gather from the doctor’s response, it was real enough.”

  Nombuso looks at Jill, who nods slowly. “Checks out with some intel I’ve heard recently,” Jill says.

  I have no idea how she knows these things. Perhaps voices have spoken with her; spirit voices escaping from the Box.

  As for me, their voices fade and return too, as if someone is playing with volume control. Only Nkulunkulu, God Himself, is capable of doing that, so it must be that He has come to Earth now to share my fate. Inside me, I feel the purring of a great Beast in my stomach, making me smile with pleasure.

  Thulani is saying how the Box might be a weapon, a communications bomb that could blast through the apartheid wall. I struggle to make sense of his words, because I have no sense of bombs brewing in my head, nor walls, just the peace of God that is spreading through this room and time itself is slowing.

  Nombuso looks at me. “So,” she asks, “will you steal the Box for us?”

  I laugh and laugh. She shakes her head, but it looks as if it is moving in slow motion. She is leaning forward to look into my eyes and I see her bosom stretch against her white T-shirt.

  “I’m taking you back to the hospital, but please keep quiet when I sign you back in, Sibusiso – and just go straight to bed. I will pack some sandwiches and chicken in your bag, should you get hungry during the night.”

  “Sure,” I say, “for God can live through chickens too.”

  “Please, Sibusiso, whatever you do, don’t say anything – just keep quiet, all right?”

  I nod, wondering why my head and tongue feel clumsy, but perhaps all becomes clumsy, in the presence of God.

  I find myself outside, unsure of how I got there. Nombuso places the helmet over my head. I feel some dampness on my face and my bag is heavy on my back.

  “Whatever you do, don’t let go, okay?”

  “Surely,” I say.

  “And what did we ask you to do?”

  “Steal the doctor’s Box,” I say.

  The words and the wetness wake me from this strange and slow state of bliss.

  Nombuso taps my bag. “No more biscuits in here, okay Sib? And please, for God’s sake, hang onto me!”

  It is for more than the sake of God that I hang onto Nombuso for the long, slow, beautiful ride back to the lunatic asylum.

  Chapter 8

  Martin’s Relationships

  The phone rings and I assume it is Dan, so I dawdle out of the kitchen where I’ve just fed Jacky. It’s a Saturday, so I’m up later than usual, just after eight.

  Still, it’s an early call for the weekend, so I let the phone ring until the auto-message kicks in; perfunctory, almost abrupt - and certainly meant to discourage.

  “Van Deventer here, please leave a message.”

  “Hello –?” The voice is feminine, hesitant and unsure of itself: “Marlene here, I was at the PsycSoc protest meeting and you gave me your card. I – uh –”

  I snatch the phone out of its base.

  “Hello, hello, Martin here.”

  There is silence. My voice cutting across the auto-message seems to have stunted the flow of her words even more.

  “Hello, um Marlene, are you there?”

  “Uh, hello, Doctor...”

  “Call me Martin,” I say, “Just Martin.”

  “Hello, err, Martin, thank you for giving me card. I’m hoping it means that you uhm, maybe want to meet up – and not that you think I’m mad?”

  I chuckle: “Ja, of course! That’s once we’ve bumped into each other, sort of, I just thought it might be nice to be in charge the next time, if that’s alright with you I mean...” Shit – I’m a man who’s still kak with words for women.

  She giggles softly: “Maybe, depends what you mean by ‘in charge’, of course...”

  Warmth stings my face: “Just that I’d like to meet on purpose, nothing more, and only if both parties are agreeable.”

  She chuckles, louder this time: “Are you a lawyer as well, Martin? I was just thinking you meant a coffee or something like that, but perhaps I’m wrong?”

  “Perfect.” I lean against the hallway wall, wilfully stopping the flow of stupid words. Jacky comes in from the kitchen to lick my toes. I have only a short towel dressing gown on.

  “So when do you want to meet up?” She asks.

  I wince. Jacky has moved up to lick the healing scab on my right heel.

  “Is late morning – about eleven – too soon?” There is a brief silence and I push Jacky away with my left foot, cursing myself, wondering if I sound too desperate, too needy.

  “Sure,” she says, “I can’t stay too long, though, about an hour or so, so where do you want to meet up?”

  “How about here?” I ask impulsively and then curse myself again; stupid, stupid, van Deventer, much too voorbarig.

  There’s an even longer silence and I rack my brains for a diplomatic way to retrieve my words, to rescue the conversation.

  “Okay,” she says, ‘I see your home address is on here, presumably it’s your private practice?”

  “Yes,” I say, unable to say anything more.

  “Eleven o’clock fine?” she asks.

  “Yes,” I manage, although my voice sounds squeaky, even shrill to my ears.

  “See you then, Martin.”

  She hangs up and I put the phone down, wondering why - despite my ease with therapeutic conversations - personal conversations have become increasingly difficult.

  I push Jacky away from my heel again, suddenly aware of the impact of Marlene’s soft, feminine tones, as well as her agreement to come here.

  I have an erection pushing uncomfortably against the folds of my dressing gown.

  Talk about voorbarig.

  I’m alerted by Jacky’s barking and glance up at the clock; it’s five minutes to eleven. I’ve barely made it back from Choose ‘N Cash with a stale pecan pie, clumsily arranged on a flat white plate. I leave it in the kitchen and stroll through with stiff nonchalance; Jacky is snuffling at the front door and wagging her long tail.

  I open the door and Marlene stands there with her hands coyly laced in front of her, tight jeaned and with a floaty sky blue blouse teasing at her slight figure underneath. The slight breeze fans across us.

  Jesus, it’s been a long time.

  I invite her in, my left hand crooked low in front of me to hide the bulge in my trousers, which feels like Mount Fucking Everest.

  Marlene stoops and pats Jacky, seemingly at ease with animals. I guide her down to the lounge: “Tea or coffee?”

  “Six Roses please, if you have it, Martin.”

  I escape to the kitchen and re-boil the kettle for the fourth time, which simultaneously allows my erection to deflate. I gather two mugs of tea, plates, a knife and the sticky pecan pie onto a tray and saunter through.

  Marlene is leafing through my coffee table paperback, a soiled and banned copy of Fanon’s Wretched of the Earth, seemingly tossed nonchalantly alongside Tidhar’s Osama. I hope it’ll impress, although I also hope she doesn’t ask me much about it, as I’ve failed to get past page thirty of the Fanon.

  She doesn’t say anything, though, just closes the book hurriedly and twists round in her seat to face me. I see her eyes are half-closed, her mouth half-open. I place the tray down, sit next to her and in one easy, soundless movement she presses up against me, wraps her arms tightly around my waist, her face close, almost level with mine. I feel her nipples and firm breasts pressing agai
nst my chest - she is not wearing a bra – and the pressure within my trousers surges again.

  I groan and quiver as she kisses me. She must have seen my erection and decided there was no need for pecan pie.

  I step backwards towards the bedroom, not wanting to do anything with Jacky around. The dog is already growling with sudden jealous dislike, but I push her away as Marlene and I stagger into the bedroom. I manage to swing the door shut on my dog with a shaking left hand; as it slams shut with a resounding bang I hear a startled yelp.

  I turn to find Marlene teetering on one leg, dragging her jeans awkwardly off with one hand. Not the easiest of clothes to escape from; she couldn’t have anticipated this.

  Neither had I, but with eternal optimism I had chosen trousers with loose ties to maximize speed of removal, just in case. I have them and my scants off just as Marlene finishes removing her jeans and frilly black thong.

  I enter her from behind in a desperately eager rush, almost blind with pleasure; she braces herself against the bed with her hands.

  Through the haze of pleasure, I notice dimly that I have not removed or turned around the picture of Suzette at the Umgeni Bridge from the bedside cabinet.

  Shit... Marlene is soft and moist inside; ohh, Goddd, who caressss!

  I ejaculate with a burst of pleasure – and with the faintest of feelings that something is not quite right.

  Sibusiso is different.

  I sense it as I look at the young man on the other side of the desk, eyeing me carefully behind his slightly lowered head and eyelids. His hair is a little thicker, his body a little straighter in the chair than this time last week.

  Still, the wound on his head gapes at me – this time a little more openly, a little more rawly – although on the surface it looks more blunted, more healed. Inside me, though, I have no direct sense of that.

  He lifts his head and raises his right eyebrow at me: “Something wrong, Doctor?”

  That’s it; he takes more control of the space, as if a little more assured of himself here.

  “Not at all, Sibusiso,” I lean forward, pleased, placing my open hands on the desk space between us. “You seem a little more animated today.”

  He looks at me blankly.

  “...a little more active,” I supply, knowing he would have gobbled the corresponding Zulu word, should I have been clever enough to have supplied it. As it is, I am still suffused with residual pride at having told him to ‘hlala phansi.’

  “I feel my spirit returning to me,” he says, and a slow smile breaks his face open.

  I am pleased; progress indeed. “What’s made the difference, do you think, Sibusiso?”

  He shrugs: “Perhaps the pills, perhaps the words with Jabu, or new friends beyond these walls, perhaps all this and more.”

  I notice he does not mention us.

  “Tell me more,” I am leaning forward now, silently egging his spirit up into his face and mouth.

  But this seems to disturb him. He sits back and his smile is only a faint whisper on his face; instead, his eyes have clouded over. “I see more to life now than Mandla’s death,” he says, shortly. He stretches back in his chair and swings his gaze slowly around the room.

  I mirror him just a bit, easing off my intensity by withdrawing my hands from the table, which were perhaps too eager, too grasping? Go slowly, Van Deventer, the man is recovering from PTSD and a severe depression, so coax gently, don’t wheedle.

  He is standing, moving around the room, looking at other pictures on the wall. I wonder what he makes of these neutral photos, pictures of sea, of mountains, of forests, with nothing human or controversial in them. Perhaps I should treat them as informal Rorschach blots and see what meanings he projects onto them.

  “What do you see in that picture, Sibusiso?” I nail him with that question to the picture of Cathedral Peak spreading in front of him, from the Drakensberg Mountains, not too many miles from here.

  He turns to glance at me: “The Ukhahlamba Mountains, it is not far from my father’s home and his father before him and his father...” He turns to face me fully. “Until long before the white man came.”

  His psyche has become colonized with identity politics that split us again, raising space the size of a mountain between us. I stand and move around the desk to ensure there are no other physical barriers between us.

  He folds his arm across his chest and stands firm.

  I hesitate and stop, a few paces off. “You miss your father, then.”

  The political is ever personal. His eyes mist over and he turns his back on me, afraid again to share his vulnerability and pain.

  I know now what he responds to. Some psychologists aspire to the blank slates of analysts, looking for the projections of patients, revealing little. Sibusiso will give little, unless he receives. And he is smart enough to know what is real, what is not. I am realizing there is not even a hint of psychosis in his presentation – if anything, he sees the world too clearly.

  “I miss my father too,” I offer, knowing leaking personal details is an anathema to many psychologists, but I sense Sibusiso will only respond to the real details in any relationship. I feel strangely relieved, offering up such a raw and truthful sentence, for there is a part of me that feels like a prostitute, providing ‘relationships’ for money. I want to be more than a psychic receptacle.

  He turns around to look at me. “Where is he, Doctor?”

  “Martin,” I say, wishing to retrieve lost territory quickly and to push on, as if – colonizing?

  “Where is he... Doctor?”

  He will not yield ground easily.

  “He lives in Durban.”

  His face frowns: “A car’s drive away for you, surely?”

  “Sometimes there is more than space that separates us, Sibusiso.”

  His arms unfold and his restless hands find room in the pockets of his loose orange institutional trousers. I am too sophisticated to interpret this as evasiveness, as the body language people would have us believe. Instead, I am sure he is just unsure what to do with his hands. I am aware my own hands are clasped in front of me.

  But he is smiling again: “Indeed... Martin, we are now close physically, but still you know little of the details of my world.”

  “Then tell me,” I say.

  His eyelids narrow momentarily. “Wouldn’t you rather see, with your own mind?”

  I am confused, for just a moment, until I remember my – that is – our EE machine, with a brief surge of excitement.

  “You want to try the Box again – and are willing for me to read you this time?”

  He pulls a hand out of his pocket, splaying the five fingers on his right palm in front of his chest. “Five seconds Doctor, that’s all you’ll get. Perhaps more next time, if you make good use of those seconds.”

  It is better than nothing. An ideal opportunity to test whether our Box has been properly fixed, to test whether ‘local is lekker’ and good enough. This time though, I will lock the door.

  Sibusiso has brushed past me and sat down again. I catch the faint whiff of a body deodorant, faintly feminine to my nose.

  I turn and rummage for the key in the top left drawer and then click open the latch lock holding the test cupboard secure. I bend down to the bottom shelf, flicking some MMPI forms off the Box pushed out of sight against the far right hand corner. My house is not safe, the hospital has guards – and no one will suspect I brazenly keep the replacement locked and hidden here.

  I swing it round with pride and place it delicately onto the desk.

  Sibusiso’s eyes widen, “It’s different!”

  “I broke it by accident, but we managed to fix it. I’m sorry, but that is why I cancelled our last appointment.”

  He eyes me, but I am too afraid to tell him what really happened. I have no doubt he will clam up if he knew the SB were after the Box too. I keep my face open and candid.

  Psychologists can make bloody good liars.

  His gaze flickers do
wn to the Box and I secure the headgear.

  He looks across to me as I sit, head caps in place. He holds his splayed right hand up again: “Five seconds, Doctor!”

  I nod and pull the lever.

  I am struggling, fighting hard, body and breath wrapped tight by people hauling me out of the back of a van. I catch a glimpse of an aging black man, face crumpled with emotional pain, standing behind the people pulling at me, his hands wringing in distress. Still, I feel betrayal biting through my body.

  I blink and notice Sibusiso has removed his head cap.

  “What did you see, Doctor?”

  “Your father,” I say.

  He nods – and this time, he cries openly.

  And so it is; that we talk about fathers.

  It is late at night by the time I pluck up the courage to call my own father. The phone rings three times and I hover the receiver close to its base, almost hanging up.

  Almost – but not quite.

  Always encouraging others, it is time to practice what I preach.

  “Ja, di’s Hettie van Deventer hier.”

  “Ma?”

  “Martin...”

  I haven’t called in three years. She seems at a loss for further words, but has said my name with such feeling; I feel a wave of guilt wash over me.

  Still, it’s not all my fault.

  “How you doing, Ma?”

  “Martin...” she says again. For a moment I think Jacky is whimpering at my feet and glance down, but then remember she’s in the lounge with Marlene.

  It must be my mother. “Hi, Ma,” I say again.

  “Why are you only phoning us now?” Her Afrikaans is terse; it’s as if she has cloaked her tears in an angry and brusque question. I admit to myself it is a fair question too.

  “Jammer, Ma, but I wasn’t sure what to say to Pa after our last fight.”

  “Three years Martin, three years...”

  We’re a proud and stubborn family indeed.

  I shift uncomfortably on the hallway stool, wondering what to say next. I had thought of role-playing in advance or scripting a few questions, but that seemed too staged, too false.