And Shingi's mother? It is my big painful duty to tell you that . . . I run out of words and don't know what else to write. I put my pen down and reason even if she's not his real mother, but his mother's sister.
Shingi going to be back home one day; he is going to bring heap of money home; I want them tight lyrics only. No stiffness. If his family ever know this is what have happen things will get funny and Shingi have to explain to everyone how everything happen – he is going to have to tell his family how he nearly lose plot in London, make friends with bums, get into drug and lose graft. That story is not going to fly off Shingi's tongue. What will MaiShingi say?
I go inside his room. His suitcase is locked. I pick it up and fling it against wall once and it burst open; things fly onto the floor. The money too. There's now only £360 of it. I spend whole hour going through papers trying to find his mother's address.
When you is trying to write tight letter, it's like hanging fat dictionary by rope and cracking the old whip on it until them words fall out onto the floor. Them wrong words keep falling out and you have to keep sweeping them away and then whip your head some more until the right word fall out. That's what happen when I start writing to Shingi's mother. In the end me I don't write letter that is too long but I keep it tight and small.
My head go into sixth gear now because me I have to say something to Shingi. You can never know what to say to someone that is fighting for life. What do you say? That's the first question that perch on my head like big bird. I have not see him and I have not say one word to him since that evening. That make me feel heavy. I have to say something today.
I buy Shingi two bananas and two apples but I don't know what to say. So I go lie on my bed and rehearse for when I finally find courage to go into hospital. Maybe he will be asleep and can't hear me. But I have to talk. Say something so the heart stop feeling so heavy; tell him everything is going to be sweet and swanky in the end.
I let them things come out like you do when you is good old friend. Me I will talk about everything. Crack them jokes like we used to do in them good old days.
I will talk about how brave he is. I will tell him about the story that I read when he was still OK; that story in the Metro about how English people used to go and jump off some cliff.
If you was fit to walk, I know you would have walk to Dover cliff and make one brave jump and end all this in neat way, I will crack joke.
I have check at the back of St Matthew's Church and the bad news is that there is no holy maul there, I will laugh like we would have do if he was fit. He is old friend Shingi. We is going to go kak kak kak about everything when it have come to pass; things going to be OK, I know. Comrade Mhiripiri have been exposed now; I don't have to find US dollars no more. No more fighting over money and all. I only have to step back home now.
Maybe some fat nurse is going to float in to check all is OK. Maybe I will go quiet until she go out of the room. Then I want to make the comrade feel swell inside if he can hear me. I will talk about them good old times and all. Like the time he start his graft in Parliament and bring home copy of Private Eye magazine that some big man forget in the toilet. By the time he get home, the comrade have learn heap of words and already showing off, calling Members of Parliament 'm'learned friends'. But another week have not even pass when he come back moaning about some big battle he have in the gents' toilet with one joist of poo. He swear it can support roof of the House of Commons.
That one was jazz tune that you was spinning me, no? I will joke now. If he try to get his attention to the soft ingredients involved in the making of them m'learned friends' meds then he will know it is impossible for them to make poo that can be put to such powerful use as he suggest.
It has to be one of them your graft mates that secretly dump that log, I will laugh at him. That is if it's not you.
I want to ask him how the hospital people will take him to toilet.
Some of them things coming out of you, I'm sure is going to be like caveman's club, both in shape and size. Maybe now we have find better replacement for holy maul, me I will go kak kak kak to myself. Maybe his finger will move.
What kind of food you want me to bring for you?
Maybe all them fruits that I keep bringing will keep piling up because he don't eat them.
I can bring some steak or porridge if you want? Or roast pheasant with the old goose liver and spiced chutney and all that kind of fancy stuff? I will try every button; with them Parliament people, you never know what kind of tastes grow on them in Parliament. He is still M.P.
I take one of them bananas from the side of my bed and start eating it.
Now I have to talk about how I have already fix him. I have even make photocopies of the letters that I post yesterday. We is going to have good laugh about this when it's over. I have to practise reading the letter.
P D N F – Please Do Not Fold
Dear Mother
Time and ability plus double capacity have force my pen to dance automatically on this paper. I hope this letter find you in good health, if so, doxology.
Well, everything here is just half lemon half sugar, to make it Schweppes lemonade. Me I am as healthy as Harare North dog. You will understand if you come here and seen how well fed them dogs is.
Me I have good news. My long time here now pay me back. I'm confirm to you that I now work for the House of Commons. It is House of Parliament here. Tell Aunt MaiAngirayi. Me I see important people. Even the prime minister. Maybe now you can say that you is mother of Member of Parliament!
Me I love you spontaneous and as I sit perpendicular to the ground and parallel to the wall I only think of you, since you is good mother even if you are not my real mother. I love you more than my shoes love my feet. I will send pair of top-notch English shoes.
Me I have to pen-off here because I have to cook.
Sleep tight and don't let them bedbugs ever bite you.
Yours faithfully, your son
Shingi
PS: I will send money next month.
Your room is still full of disorder, I also want to tell him. I pick your passport from floor in your room. I have it for safe-keep. Also the mobile phone. It have been on charger for days because no one disconnect it since you get hit. I remove it from socket and take it for safe-keep too.
I also want to talk about how I bust his suitcase looking for his mother's address but I can't because I have see them heap of letters from his family; some funny stuff. Especially from Shingi's Uncle Sinyoro. He is the one that used to pay Shingi's school fees and other things that MaiShingi can't afford. He is now Senior Officer in Ministry of Education but behave like retired colonel – grumpy and not tolerate different opinion. Shingi have tell me that he is also now divorced Christian and is quiet man living alone like hermit and always speaking polite with strangers, pharmacists behind counter or vegetable vendors. But under them sheets he is brutal bastard who frighten his wife and children, killing cats that eat his biltong.
There's heap of vex letters from Education Officer and it seem like it's because Shingi have write letters calling him stiff-necked believer. So Sinyoro get busy wetting himself with vex throwing rough mouth at Shingi and all that kind of stuff. Some of them letters inside Shingi's suitcase talk funny things like how Shingi's grandmother is concerned that Shingi need to be cleansed of bad spirits. She don't see it that Shingi pretend to be possessed sometimes because that's his style for scaring people.
25
All I need now is £240 then I can buy £500 ticket straight and square. Before the sun is up I will have land back home. Uncle don't deserve his money back since he do nothing about Mother.
I come from graft hunt and bump into Dave as soon as I walk inside the house. I don't want to talk to him. I don't want to kick fuss about him. Even when he spend most of the time lying in room downstairs doing weapons grade farts all day.
'Hi,' we say to each each when our eyes clash. He march to me with big purpose and give me one o
f his flyers.
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'I give you one day to go and then no more.'
Dave look at me like I am throwing away help.
I go to my room; I light cigarette; I go to the kitchen again; I look out of window and there's family of them Romanians that live across road. They is looking at me through they window like I am on TV. I drink Coke. I can't sleep, and in the morning the bad news come, give our door one kick and the door burst open; the news stand cackling into our house: this is hopeless case, is what the hospital think about Shingi.
I have not see Shingi yet; maybe hospital people start asking funny questions and end up saying I'm illegal in this country. That's they style.
Maybe Shingi now just like someone that have been whip by stroke – mouth hanging, dribble coming out. I can't eat all day; I go to bed early.
He's back in our house. In wheelchair. He can't talk. I feed him because now he can't even move one finger. I take him to toilet.
Again.
Again.
And again.
I wipe the comrade's bottom so many times, shove his body around and wash his soiled pants until this turn into strong argument for banning of food. Even the toilet seat break in half and now there is three pieces of it. But I can't stop feeding him; food is where all problems start.
In them sagging depths of his wheelchair, silent and staring at the ceiling all day, Shingi and his scraggy beard fill up the whole house. I have clean him up now; I try my best.
In the morning I get up and make porridge. Dave is still around even when I have give him warning.
'You need life skills to budget your money now if you have no job,' he say while I'm busting my head trying to figure out what to do about Shingi. He go on yari yari yari I have got life skills; yeee I can do my sums right when I get paid social benefit and make sure things balance.
I eat my porridge and say nothing.
26
I don't buy bananas for Shingi because he won't eat them now I know. I eat all those that have pile up in my room. All of them.
Shingi's mobile phone start ringing and it's them his London relatives' number flashing on the screen. I ignore it; I don't know what to tell them now about all this big news. Soon they start to blame me for everything and say I come to Harare North to sponge off Shingi, cause havoc in his life and now look what happen?
There is letter for Shingi. It's from home. I take it to my room and open it. It's from some uncle who is rural farmer that the government have resettle with dozens of other families on some farm in Triangle district. He wonder if Shingi can send him only one Land Rover Defender as it will go long way towards helping with carrying things at the farm because right now his one-year-old likkle girl don't even have food to eat.
What kind of style is this? Straight and square, I write back warning uncle to 'stop embarrassing yourself. You know what the reaction of m'learned friends in Parliament will be if I start sending them Her Majesty's Land Rover Defenders to my tribesman, don't you? Even if I am careful, Land Rover Defender is not something that you can thief and put inside your pocket like mango, is it?'
But after I remember that he have got likkle hungry girl I think of Tsitsi's baby; I send him £100 for the small girl. Why people always use small children to make you feel like maggots is eating you inside, I don't get the score.
27
I wander through them streets of Brixton, Stockwell, Oval and Kennington, idly kicking them empty fizzy drink cans around, and allow things to bleed out of my head. His east London relatives, they call again. I don't answer. I'm not ready. If Shingi have tell them that I was Green Bomber and I tell them what happen now, soon they cause big problems for me and all that kind of style.
I get home and another letter have land from some gold-panning uncle who want Shingi to invest £5,000 in his gold-panning project. He is sure this is good investment that will birth US$100,000 per year. He wait at Shingi's mother's house for reply.
Now I can sniff sniff that the whole of Shingi's clan have come together to celebrate Shingi Parliament graft. Them old villagers, grumpy goat traders from the outbacks, and them 200-year-old grandmothers have maybe gather at MaiShingi's house. Even though she's not his real mother.
This kind of thing meant to be deal with by Shingi now look.
I write and remind this uncle that gold-panning is illegal and urge him to consider what kind of example he give to his small children by ruining them our riverbanks and filling rivers with poison chemicals. 'Also pass the message to everyone who is there that I have big doubt that Mother need the company of them people who have nothing to do except to sit all day fishing for food in every one of she smiles,' I tell him.
I kick myself because I have post that letter because I am worryful. That uncle, what is he going to think of Shingi now? When morning come I have to wire him £100 to keep him sweet or otherwise he take it out on Shingi.
28
I sleep. I wake up. Me I sleep. I see Shingi in one dream. I wake up. I sleep.
This Shingi thing now sit tight inside me. I also have to catch some graft soon.
I catch bus again to go look for graft. I have not eat none of the porridge or steak that I have cook yesterday because there's heaps of worry inside my head.
Once on the bus me I squeeze into the corner and I see my face reflect on the window. It is clenched tight like old demon's. I look down on floor; I am frightened I will see ghost of Shingi looking back.
I get back home and now there's letter from MaiShingi; she is telling me about tragedy that nearly befall them. To celebrate Shingi's success in Parliament, she buy she husband's father big bokkle of the old brandy. He have also hobble into she house from nowhere. While sitting under the peach tree at the back of house without no supervision, the old native down the 750ml bokkle in less than one hour, stumble into kitchen dribbling, frightening woman and small children, mumble and pass out. He get revive in hospital where he spend the week recovering.
We should thank the Lord that grandfather have survive. But please keep the news under wraps as I don't want to find myself in embarrassing position if them papers and TV people get wind of it, especially considering that I have friends in Parliament that have relatives that can handle they drink, I write back. Stupid old hen, she reply with hospital invoices, pharmacy receipts and many other vexing expenses like bus fares that is required for grandfather to head back to his home. I want to point out that she forget to add VAT to she invoices and that She Majesty's Treasury Department want she to reveal she VAT number before any payment is given, but I don't. This is Shingi's mother. I go to Western Union and wire she £100.
My trousers is dirty; in the morning me I go inside Shingi's room and borrow pair of trousers. I borrow his hat too. I go to Brixton Market. I buy two mangoes. Maybe I should go see Shingi.
You family; this has get out of hand now. Big nuisance, I want to tell him. But I run out of ginger before going to hospital.
Shingi's London r
elatives, they leave two messages on phone looking for Shingi. Me I don't know what they want. Will phone you. Me I am busy, that's the text message I send to them this time.
I get back and there's another letter from home. It's from Shingi's Uncle Sinyoro. The one that play big brother to Shingi's mother. The cat killer. Now he is writing this long letter asking why Shingi is writing stupid letters to his mother. He think that he is giving Shingi some dressing-down, you know that kind of style: yari yari yari I have big concern for you over there . . . When are you coming back home? . . . Stop this silly talk about being in Parliament . . . I will arrange for air ticket for you with Air Zimbabwe . . . he go on and on. Now, some nincompoop bureaucrat in jacket and tie, clutching sheaf of paper, is easy target to shoot down. I write to him to inform him that 'Uncle Sinyoro, me I come back home on the 44th of the month. Fill this on them your forms and tick all them correct boxes.' That drain the oil out of his head and leave him with no ginger because he never write again.
Then some old aunt of Shingi's she also drop one and start with grand kind of speech telling Shingi he have grow up into big man. Now she ask if he is able to help she keep up with them payments for funeral insurance because she think she is growing old and don't want troubling anyone if she suddenly drop dead. She say she will pay back the money and that nearly make me go kak kak kak because me I have hear this number before. Try another trick, old hen.
Downstairs Dave and Jenny is now causing racket, over what I don't know. I go down and tell them straight and square, 'I don't want to see you inside this house no more. I don't want to see nothing that belong to you. Take everything.'
My head is full of things. Shingi's family is doing pee into my porridge. MaiShingi have stretch my patience now; in the past week she have write another letter demanding money for things like java skirt, small TV, food for every clansman and his dog, the list get endless.
Harare North Page 17