Baking Cakes in Kigali

by Gaile Parkin

  Angel was confused. “I don’t understand. What does this bar have to do with it?”

  “We’d heard about what was happening at Mille Collines. Thousands were hiding there from the killers. Whenever the soldiers went to that hotel looking for inyenzi, the manager gave them beer to drink and they went away.”

  “So you thought you could do the same?”

  “Yes—but of course on a much smaller scale. And it worked for a while. Until that evening when I hid behind the wall of a garden across the road with my baby on my back and I watched them hacking his brother and his father to death, along with the people from in the ceiling and from behind the wood.” Françoise took another sip of her soda. She seemed unmoved by her own story, as if she had just spoken about buying potatoes at the market.

  “Eh!” Angel found the horror too difficult to imagine. Yes, she had lost her own children, unexpectedly, and her son’s death had been violent. But she had not watched either of them die. She and Pius had begun to prepare themselves to lose Joseph from the moment he had told them that he was positive, even though he was still fit and well. Even so, when the police had come to their door in Dar es Salaam to tell them what they had learned from their colleagues in Mwanza, the shock of his loss had been devastating, and it had taken them a long time to learn to cope with it. Then they had lost Vinas, too, and they had still not even begun to cope with that. They had not even spoken—really spoken—to each other about it yet. When they did, would Angel be able to do it in the way that Françoise did, without showing any emotion? Perhaps Françoise simply had no emotion left to show.

  “What did you do after that, Françoise?”

  “I sat behind that wall for a long time, praying to God to keep my baby quiet until the killers had moved on. Then I spent the whole night making my way slowly by slowly back to my mother-in-law’s house—because where else did I have to go? But when I got there at dawn, I found that the killers had already been there before us.”

  “Eh!”

  “Yes. So I fled up north to where a relative worked on a pyrethrum farm. I was safe there; nobody was going to try to kill me, because nobody there knew that I was guilty of trying to save lives. It wasn’t long before Kagame’s forces came and put an end to the killings. When it was safe enough to come back, I expected to find the bodies still here, but they had all been taken and buried in a mass grave somewhere. All I could do was clean up this place and begin again.”

  “Eh, Françoise, you have told me a very sad story,” said Angel, shaking her head. “But at least you survived.”

  Françoise rolled her eyes up in her head, slid down from her bar stool and drained her glass. Then she took a deep breath, and with one hand on her hip and the other on the bar counter, she said, “Let me tell you something about surviving, Angel. People talk about survival as if it’s always a good thing; like it’s some kind of a blessing. But ask around amongst survivors, and you’ll find that many will admit that survival is not always the better choice. There are many of us who wish every day that we had not survived. Do you think I feel blessed to live in this house with the ghosts of everyone who was killed here? Do you think I feel blessed to go in and out through that gate where my husband and my child were killed? Do you think I feel blessed to see what I saw that night every time I close my eyes and try to sleep? Do you think I feel blessed not knowing where the bodies of my husband and my firstborn lie? Do you think I feel blessed in any way at all, Angel?”

  Angel looked at her friend. For the first time ever, Françoise had shown emotion—and that emotion was anger. “No, I’m sure you don’t feel blessed. Survival must be a very difficult thing, Françoise.”

  “I tell you, Angel, if I’d been alone that night, if I hadn’t had Gérard on my back, I would have come out from behind that wall and said to the soldiers, I am that man’s wife, I too am guilty of protecting inyenzi, I too must die. I did not do that. But there are many, many times when I wish I had. If I had known then what survival was going to be like, I would not have chosen it.”

  “Eh! It’s a very sad thing that you’re telling me, Françoise.” Angel reached into her brassiere for a tissue, removed her glasses, and dabbed at her eyes.

  “I’m telling you because you’re my friend, Angel—and because you’re not from here, so I can be honest with you. It’s difficult for us to say these things amongst ourselves. But what I’m telling you is not something unusual. There are many survivors who feel like I feel. There are many who regret surviving, who would like to make the other choice now.”

  Angel thought about what Françoise meant. “Are you talking about … suicide?”

  “Yes.”

  “That is not a good idea, Françoise.” “I know. As Catholics we know that we will go to Hell if we suicide ourselves.”

  Angel looked away, unable to speak. She closed her eyes and pressed her tissue to them. Françoise went on.

  “And what’s the point of going to Hell after we die? Because we already live there now. It wouldn’t make things any better for us—and in fact it would make things worse because we’d be stuck there for eternity. At least if I stay alive I can hope for Heaven. I will certainly not miss the opportunity to die if it comes my way again.”

  Angel shook her head and was silent for a while before she spoke. She put her glasses back on. “Françoise, my friend, you have educated me today. These things have not been easy for me to hear, but now I understand better. Thank you for telling me.”

  “No, Angel, I am the one who must thank you. Thank you for being someone who has ears that want to hear my story and a heart that wants to understand it. And thank you for sending a big group of Wazungu to Chez Françoise.” Françoise flashed her teeth in a wide smile, and Angel found herself smiling back. What they had spoken about had already been put away, like potatoes that have been brought home from the market and placed inside a cupboard in the kitchen.

  “I’m sure it will be a very good party, Françoise. Those Wazungu will enjoy themselves, and they’ll tell others to come here.”

  “Eh, and when they see your beautiful cake they’ll tell others to come to you.” “Let us hope.” “Yes. Let us hope.”

  IT was shortly before noon when Angel eased herself out of a packed minibus-taxi at Kigali’s central station. The sun was extremely hot now, but Angel did not have to meet Odile until twelve forty-five, so there was no need to make herself any hotter by hurrying. She walked slowly up to the traffic circle at Place de la Constitution and headed in the direction of the post office, looking for a place where the road was safe to cross. She passed the row of men who sat on chairs placed on the unsurfaced roadside, each behind a small desk and typewriter, preparing documents for the clients who stood over them dictating or issuing instructions. Beyond them she was approached by a few money-changers, the overflow of the large crowd who operated outside the post office. “Change, Madame?”

  “Non, merci.” Actually, she did want to change some money—the hundred-dollar note that the Canadian had given her—but she wanted to do that at the bank, even though she would get a much better rate from the money-changers on the street.

  She crossed the road and made her way back around another section of the outer perimeter of the traffic circle, turning right into Boulevard de la Révolution. On the corner was the Office Rwandais du Tourisme et des Parcs Nationaux, where people went for permits to visit the gorillas in the rainforest in the north. She was not sure why anybody would want to do that, but it was popular enough amongst Wazungu.

  The Boulevard was wide and shady, lined with tall eucalyptus trees, and Angel appreciated its coolness as she approached another, smaller traffic circle, the Place de l’Indépendance. Here she found a young man sitting at the roadside selling secondhand shoes. She greeted him in Swahili and he returned her greeting, jumping to his feet. The shoes were laid out neatly in pairs on the ground. Angel scanned them keenly, searching for the perfect shoe to complement her dress for Leocadie’s wedding. Alas,
there was nothing here that would do.

  “Are you looking for something special, Auntie?”

  “Yes, but I don’t see it here. It must be yellow or orange, or at least white. Smart-smart.”

  “Wait here, Auntie,” instructed the young man. Shouting instructions in Kinyarwanda to a boy who stood on the other side of the road, he raced up the road on his bare feet, whistling, shouting and gesturing frantically.

  The boy on the other side of the road eyed Angel and then, bending to pick up what lay at his feet, he crossed to where she stood. He bent again, and placed his bathroom scale at her feet.

  “Deux cents francs, Madame,” he said.

  “Non, merci,” said Angel.

  “Cent francs, Madame.”

  Angel shook her head. “Non, merci. Non.” The degree to which her skirt strained across her buttocks and thighs already told her as much as she wanted to know. Why should she pay a hundred francs to stand on that scale and find out a number that would only add to the weight that she carried? The boy moved his scale away and squatted down sulkily next to it, eyeing Angel to make sure that she did not try to make off with any of his friend’s shoes.

  Within minutes, the shoe-seller was back, panting towards her with two other men in pursuit, each carrying a large sack over one shoulder. They rushed towards her, each desperate to be the first to reach her, and spilled the contents of their sacks at her feet, talking non-stop in Kinyarwanda. Scrabbling amongst his wares, one retrieved a white shoe with a high heel and a strap across the top secured at the side with a gold buckle. Angel could see at once that it would be too small for her. She shook her head.

  The other man produced a bright yellow sandal that would fit Angel well enough. She took it from him and examined it thoughtfully. The colour was good, but the heel was very flat, making it too casual for the wedding. She handed it back, shaking her head.

  As both men continued to scrabble about for the perfect shoe for her, Angel became aware of a child’s high-pitched shouting, rapidly gaining in volume. Looking to her right, she saw a very small boy hurtling towards her, clutching something gold and shiny to his chest. Reaching her, the boy drew to a halt and, gasping for breath, held up what he had been carrying. It was a pair of gold pumps, clearly second-hand but still smart, with a heel that was not too high and not too flat, in a size that would fit Angel and look beautiful with her wedding outfit. Having regained his breath, the small boy was now babbling ceaselessly up at her in Kinyarwanda.

  “What is he saying?” she asked the original shoe-seller in Swahili.

  “He says his mother is selling that shoe for a very good price, Auntie. He wants you to go with him to pay his mother. She is selling on the street just before the pharmacy.”

  “Thank you. Please thank these other gentlemen for me and tell them that this boy has brought me exactly what I’m looking for. I’m sorry that I cannot buy from all of you.”

  The young man smiled. “No problem, Auntie. Maybe next time.”

  Angel took the small boy’s hand and allowed herself to be led to where a woman sat at the side of the road with a few pairs of shoes laid out before her. They negotiated a reasonable price, and Angel handed over some money from her brassiere while the woman placed the shoes in an old plastic bag. Seeing somebody with money to make a purchase, several sellers of pirated music cassettes approached Angel, but she waved them off with a smile and crossed the road to the entrance of the Banque Commerciale du Rwanda, where a bored security guard checked that her plastic bag did not contain a gun before allowing her to enter.

  Once inside the plush modern building, she made her way around to the foreign-currency section of the bank. As usual, there was a large queue of people waiting at the Western Union money transfer section, but the other cashiers were not too busy. She stood behind the stripe on the floor where people were supposed to wait until the cashier was free. There was just one customer busy at the window ahead of her, a large man in West African attire who was waiting patiently for paperwork to be completed. At last he signed, took his own copy and, thanking the cashier, walked away.

  Angel approached the window, removing the hundred-dollar note from its place of safety inside her brassiere. The cashier was still busy putting the previous client’s paperwork together with a paper-clip and had not yet looked up at her. When he did, his eyes lit up above his reading glasses and a large smile spread across his face.

  “Angel!”

  “Hello, Dieudonné. How are you?”

  “Eh, I’m very well, Angel. And how are you?”

  “Fine, fine. How are your mother and your sister?”

  “Oh, everybody is very well, thank you. And how are your children and your husband?”

  “Everybody is well, thank you, Dieudonné.”

  “Eh, I’m happy to see you. You’re lucky that you came just at this time, because in a few minutes I’ll be on lunch.”

  “Yes, I thought so. I’ve just brought some dollars to change into francs, and then I’m meeting a very good friend for lunch, a lovely Rwandan girl.”

  “That is very nice.” Dieudonné took Angel’s single banknote and began counting out a large pile of Rwandan francs.

  “Dieudonné, it would make me very happy if you would join us for lunch. I like my friends to know one another, and I’m sure that you two will like each other.”

  Dieudonné laughed as he handed the money over to Angel.

  “Then I would like to meet her! But I have only one hour for lunch.”

  “No problem. I’m meeting her nearby, at Terra Nova, opposite the post office. They have a buffet, so we can get our lunch quickly.”

  “In fact I go there quite often. Shall I meet you there in ten minutes?”

  “Perfect.”

  Angel tucked the wad of francs into her brassiere and headed out of the bank with her gold shoes in their plastic bag. She made her way back down the shady Boulevard, greeting the shoe-seller with a smile as she passed him, and then rounded into Avenue de la Paix before crossing the road at the post office, where the crowd of money-changers assailed her.

  “Change, Madame?”

  “Madame! Madame! Change?”

  “Non, merci.”

  She entered the yard of the outdoor restaurant where a waiter was settling Odile at a white plastic table in the shade. She smiled when she saw Angel, standing up to kiss her left cheek, then her right, then her left again.

  “How are you, my dear?”

  “I’m well, Angel. Thank you for suggesting that we meet here for lunch. Usually I just eat at the restaurant at work, but it’s nice to take a break like this, especially at the end of the week.”

  “It’s nice for me, too. Usually I eat at home with the children, but I thought it would be nice to spend some time with my friend away from her work—and away from my work, too. The children are safe without me because Titi is there.”

  A waiter brought a cold Coke for Odile, levered open the bottle and poured it into a glass. Angel asked him for a cold Fanta citron.

  “Odile, I hope you don’t mind. I’ve just bumped into another friend of mine, and I invited him to join us for lunch. He’s a very nice young man. Very nice indeed.”

  Odile smiled nervously. “Angel! What are you trying to do?”

  Angel smiled back. “I’m trying to introduce two of my friends to each other. I want them to know each other; that’s all. They are under no obligation to like each other.”

  In any event, though, Odile and Dieudonné had liked each other, and Angel found that extremely satisfying as she sat in her cool living room later that afternoon, fanning her face with a Cake Order Form and appreciating the looseness of her kanga and T-shirt. Her bare feet were up on the coffee table, her ankles swollen from the heat and the busyness of her day. The girls were working on their homework with Safiya upstairs while the boys were out in the yard with Titi, kicking their ball around half-heartedly in the heat.

  Half dozing, Angel assessed that, overall, it
had been a successful day: people had admired her prison-escape cake; she had gained a new perspective on the matter of survival; she had found exactly the right pair of shoes for Leocadie’s wedding; and, best of all, Odile and Dieudonné had found plenty to talk about over their plates of delicious matoke, rice, fried potatoes, cassava leaves, carrots, beef and chicken.

  There were two troubling aspects of the day, however, and it was these that now prevented her from succumbing fully to sleep. The first was the unsettling comment that Françoise had made about living life in Hell and then being stuck there again after death. That was an idea that would not simply lie down and sleep. The second troubling thing was what had happened when Angel had returned to the compound after lunch. As she had slid down from the back of the pikipiki where she had sat sideways with one arm around the rider’s waist and the other clutching her gold shoes in their plastic bag to her breast, she had noticed immediately that Modeste was holding a semi-automatic rifle.

  “Modeste,” she had said, paying the driver of the pikipiki, “what are you doing with that gun?”

  “It is not mine, Madame. It belongs to Captain Calixte.”

  “Eh! Captain Calixte?”

  “Yes, Madame.”

  “Where is he?” Panic had begun to pound at the walls of Angel’s heart.

  “Inside, Madame.”

  “But did I not tell you that if he came here looking for Sophie, you must tell him that she is out?” “Yes, Madame.” “So why is he inside now?”

  “He is not visiting Mademoiselle Sophie, Madame. Mademoiselle Sophie is out. He is visiting Mademoiselle Linda.”

  “Eh? Linda?”

  “Yes, Madame.”

  “Is Linda at home?”

  “Yes, Madame.”

  “I see. It’s good that you didn’t let Captain Calixte into the building with his gun, Modeste.”

  “Yes, Madame. Madame said that I must not if he came again.”

  “I’m glad that you remembered. But now I’m worried about Linda. How long has Captain Calixte been inside?”