by Julia North
We follow her fat behind towards a long white washed prefab hut on the far side of the Mission. It has lots small square windows along the side and inside are rows of wood desks with brown chairs. In front is a big blackboard and white pieces of chalk and a big desk with a pile of red books. I have to keep my face strong to stop showing everybody how happy I am. So this is a school. Ay, I never thought I would go to the school now.
“Modetse, you sit here,” says Mama Zuma.
I tense inside as she says my name but walk proud to the desk where she is pointing. “Richard, you sit here, Bernard, you here.”
Trigger and Richard obey. Trigger doesn’t seem to mind being called Bernard, his real name and I look at him like he’s weak.
A tall boy with light brown skin enters and stands with Mama Zuma at the front. He smiles at us and then whispers something to her.
“Who is this idiot?” I say loudly to Richard. “He’s too young to be a teacher.”
“I’ve seen him before,” replies Trigger. “I think he’s an aid worker.”
“Fuck the aid workers,” I say loudly. “We don’t need them here. We can help ourselves.”
I hope that my words hurt and I see him close his fists, but he doesn’t look at us.
“Boys, this is Bengu. He’s from Kinshasa and is here to help me today.”
The boy looks full of himself. I look at his clothes. He has nice jeans and a blue Nike T-shirt. I look at them with jealous eyes. He must have the money. I hate him. What does he know of pain?
“Good morning,” says Bengu.
We stay quiet. Who does he think he is? I glare at him and he looks embarrassed, which makes me feel good. He looks sideways at Mama Zuma. She gives a small smile and then comes in front of us.
“Now, we’re going to start learning the Arithmetic,” she says. “We’re going to do the times tables. We’ll start with number one and before long you’ll be able to do right up to twelve.”
Mama Zuma takes out a piece of white chalk and draws big figures on the board. She shows us how to do one times one all the way up to twelve. I take out my book and write it down. It is easy and doesn’t take me long because I remember some counting from Umama.
Bengu comes down the aisle to check our work. He thinks he’s such a main man. I see Trigger put out his foot when he comes near and Bengu nearly trips. We laugh and he looks angrily at us.
“Stop being silly,” says Mama Zuma. She bustles over to look at my work.
“Well done. Twelve out of twelve,” she says. “You’ve got a head for figures, well done.”
She ticks her way through my sums with her red pen and my chest swells and grows warm. I look at Bengu with a proud smile, but he doesn’t smile back. Good, he must know he is not the only clever one.
Mama Zuma breaks my thoughts. “You keep going like this and in the not too distant future you could do the big exams for university entrance you know,” she says.
I just look at her. What’s this university business?
“I’m not going there. I’m going be Commander of the L.R.A.,” I say frowning at her.
“I hope not, Modetse. I hope you can do better than that.”
My mouth drops. Better than that? What does this stupid woman mean? There’s no better than that. I glare at her. She’s not L.R.A. She can’t understand. I’ll just use her and then I’ll escape.
“Hey, some girls are coming past,” whispers Trigger,
I turn and look as the group of girls come down the path. A girl wearing tight blue jeans and a red T-shirt with white letters reading “Coca-Cola” is leading them. She has light brown skin with a straight nose, big brown eyes, which slant like almonds, and full lips. She’s talking to one of the Pineapple girls and laughing with her. She gets closer and looks up at our window and straight at me.
“She looked at you,” sniggers Richard.
“Shut up,” I hiss. But I hope he’s right. I glance up at Bengu. I can see him watching her. She sees him and smiles. He smiles back. I want to smash his face in. How come he knows her?
“That Bengu likes her,” whispers Richard.
“I’ll fucking kill him,” I say.
The girl looks away from us and talks again to the Pineapple girl. They move down the path.
“Come, join us, girls,” shouts Trigger, banging on the window.
“Yes, come here,” shouts Richard.
“Leave them. We don’t want them here,” I say.
“Yes we do. You want the pretty one.”
Mama Zuma hits the desk with her wooden stick. “Boys, leave the girls now, they’re going to swim. You need to get on with the Arithmetic,” she says.
We ignore her. She’s not in charge of us. Stupid teacher! Trigger and Richard keep banging on the window as the girls move away down the path.
“Why can’t we swim with the girls?” says Trigger.
“Yes, why not?” we all shout.
“I think you boys know the answer to that,” says Mama Zuma lifting her eyebrows at us and pulling a face.
The girls wiggle their bums as they walk away. That pretty one did look right at me. Where’s she from and why is she here?
“We must find that pretty one and take her to the bush,” says Trigger. “Then you can have her.”
“Don’t being stupid. I don’t want her,” I say, but my stomach jumps. I see Bengu watching us. He knows I like her. I bet he’ll try and stop me.
“Hey, Hotshot,” says Richard running up to me a few days later. “I saw that girl with Mama Zuma. It’s her daughter.”
“You sure?” I say as my heart sinks. The doctor won’t let his daughter be friends with us.
“She’s called Tula. She goes to the school in Kampala but now her mother says she must come here. I heard her shouting at Mama Zuma.”
“What’d she say?”
“She wants to go back to the city and not be on the stupid Mission.”
“Fuck her, the only thing stupid is her! Let her go back,” I say with clenched fists.
The roar of an F20 truck starting up makes me jump. I turn around and catch my breath. It’s that Tula, sitting in the front with Bengu laughing. Her head’s thrown back and I’m sure they’re sharing some secret joke. Maybe they’re laughing about us?
“Where’re they going?” says Richard.
I try to hide the anger in my eyes and just shrug as if I don’t care.
“Bitch –she’s probably happy because they are going,” I say, and pull up my top lip.
“I’ve seen that Bengu go in the truck before,” says Richard. “He always comes back.”
I stand up angrily and walk inside. Bengu’s older and handsome and can drive. How can I compete with him?
Richard follows me inside and pokes me playfully in the ribs. “Don’t worry, Hotshot. She fancies you better.”
“Fuck off.”
I lie down on my bed, put my arm across my eyes and pretend to sleep. Inside I’m boiling with anger and dream about cutting Bengu into little pieces. My nighttime dreams jump back into my head. Last night it was children’s hands chasing me. It was horrible. My whole head filled with their screams and I had to get up to walk in the cool night air to breath. I wish that I could just paint out these memories. They are killing me.
“You okay?” says Richard. He sits on the end of my bed and looks strange. After a while he mumbles, “I can’t sleep.”
I see he has a worried frown on his face and looks pale. “Is it bad dreams?”
Richard nods and moves his finger around the red cross on my grey blanket. He looks like he wants to cry. I sit up.
“I have them too; every night.”
He looks up at me and smiles. “Really?”
“Yes. I think we all do.”
“Trigger’s better,” he says.
“I’m sure Trigger’s a traitor,” I spit. “That’s why he doesn’t have bad dreams.”
“I think it is because he spoke to Dr. Zuma,” says Richard.
&n
bsp; “Fuck Dr. Zuma, Richard. All we need is drugs. I’ll tell Nurse Sophie I’m in pain and then we can get painkillers.”
“That’ll be good. You must limp more then. You’re walking too straight now.”
I smile. “I know. My back is feeling strong. Soon I can escape.”
“Do you really want to go back?” says Richard with a funny look in his eyes.
I narrow my eyes and look at him. Is he also turning traitor? What’s the matter with these boys and this camp?
“Of course,” I say. “Don’t you?”
“Of course.” He nods, but I can see in his eyes he doesn’t mean it and inside I feel sick. Richard’s changing. I’m losing all my friends. My mind fills with hatred for the doctor and these people. They’re destroying our love for the L.R.A. We must get out.
Chapter 13
Richard and Jabu’s AK bullets hit their plates, but they both hit near the side and were not good like me. Mobuto grunted at them and didn’t smile. He showed for Sipho to fire next. I held my breath as he loaded the AK. He walked with shaking legs to the place and squeezed the trigger. The bullet jumped from the gun and the plate moved.
“Get it, Bilole,” said Mobuto.
Bilole marched over and I saw there was a small hole on the end of the plate when he came back. My heart cheered. I looked at Sipho and raised my eyebrows with a smile.
David was next. He stood stiff and pushed his AK firm back into his shoulder. He squeezed the trigger. “Thwack,” the bullet flew out and the metal plate fell over. David’s shoulders relaxed. Bilole went over and showed a thumbs up to Mobuto.
Mobuto grunted and looked at us with hard eyes. “You’ve done better than I thought,” he said. “Now you can go back to the hut. March, quick.”
We marched behind Bilole’s fat body back to the wooden hut. Inside I felt warm. I was glad I was the number one shot. We had all hit the plates but no one had done as good as me.
“Commander Mobuto will see you at supper in two hours,” said Bilole. “You’ve been here three days and passed the tests. You can eat in the hall now and have new clothes. There’s a pack next to each bed. You must unpack and meet me outside in thirty minutes. Move!”
We saluted Bilole and went to our beds. My body had started to shake again for the glue but I tried to just think about my good shot.
“You did well,” said David, patting me on the back.
I tried not to look like the rooster too much. “Thanks,” I said.
“Are you from the city?”
“From the East side by the rubbish dump,” I said, and my voice cracked. Thandi was back in my mind. I shivered. Pray to God she was okay and that she’d been able to find some food. I cleared my throat and asked, “Where you from?”
“Not too far from you. I was at the squatter camp on the West side. Did they catch you on the dump?”
I shook my head. “I was in the city. We had just bought the KFC and they chased me.” I pulled a face and looked down. Thandi’s frozen cry was alive in my ears. I shook my head to try to chase it away. The pain inside from her was too deep.
David stared hard at me and asked. “How old are you?”
“Twelve. You?”
“Thirteen.”
I nodded. “Sipho’s only eleven. Enoch who they killed was also with us. He was only nine years.” I looked away for a bit and shuffled my feet.
“It is bad,” said David, biting his bottom lip.
“Hey,” said Sipho. He came over to my bed and sat on the end. “You shot well, my brother,” he said.
I nodded. His face was pale and his voice was small.
“I’m glad you hit the plate, Sipho,” said David.
“Me too.” Sipho nodded. His eyes clouded over and he looked at the floor. “I hate this place, Modetse,” he whispered.
I nodded. I think he was thinking of Enoch and I understood his pain. My mind filled with Enoch’s screams and I shivered. These men did not play games. We had to do as they said or they would feel nothing to kill us.
Richard and Jabu talked in the corner and did not look at us. They were not friendly boys these two and my mind grew hard as I looked sideways at them. I would not talk to them either. At least I had Sipho and David wanted to be my friend.
“We had better unpack,” said David. “Bilole will be back soon.”
I lifted up my brown rug sack at the foot of the bed and took out some underpants and two camouflage T-shirts. There were a pair of khaki shorts, a toothbrush and two pairs of brown socks. I put them folded on my bed and looked at them with wide eyes. I had never had clothes like this with no holes in them. There was a water bottle with mesh around it and a wire basket under the bed to keep the things in. I pulled it out and packed mine good.
“It’s best to think like a soldier,” said David as he packed his basket next to me. “That’s the only way to survive. You must hide your thoughts and feelings.”
I looked at him with raised eyebrows. He was a clever one with an old spirit and I was lucky he was my friend.
“You are right,” I said.
I finished my packing so that I was ready for Bilole.
“These are good clothes, hey,” said Sipho as he packed his basket. He watched how I did it and then did it the same. Good, he knows I liked things neat like in our pipe house. Umama had always taught me that. I looked over at Richard and Jabu and pulled my lip. They had thrown their clothes in the basket so it was all messy. Their bed covers were not even straight.
“I need the glue,” said Sipho in my ear.
I turned and saw his hands were shaking. “Me too,” I said. “But there is no hope. You must try not think.”
“It is hard,” said Sipho, and his eyes filled with tears. “I am too scared.”
“Stop it,” I said. “Don’t cry or they will kill you like Enoch.”
We jerked as footsteps came to the doorway. Bilole appeared and shouted, “Outside!”
We marched behind him across the waving yellow grass towards tall green pine trees. The fresh smell of the pinecones cleared my head and I took in a deep breath. Bilole took us past many rows of long wooded barracks on the side of the camp where big soldiers stood in front. They jeered as we went past but I kept my eyes forward. Fear prickled over me like a porcupine when one soldier pretended to shoot me with his AK. He laughed at me and kicked the dirt after us.
Bilole led us around the back on one long building, past some chickens and roosters and to a big veranda. We went inside the hut. There were many long grey steel tables inside with rows of rough benches in front.
“Go sit on the benches there,” commanded Bilole.
We obeyed and all moved to the benches in a bunch. I ended up next to Richard and Jabu and frowned. David and Sipho were the other end.
Richard looked at me. “You shot well,” he said.
“Thanks,” I said, surprised that he was now being my friend. “I’m glad you also hit the plate.”
He nodded and asked. “Where did they get you?”
“By the KFC in Arula,” I said. “You?”
“In the bush on the west side of the dump,” said Richard. “Jabu was near there too.”
I nodded and clenched my jaw. I did not want to remember how they got me. It made me pain too much to think of Thandi. Jabu grunted and said nothing. I looked over at his muscles. He was not thin like Richard with his sores.
“Did you live on the streets?” I asked.
Jabu looked at me with his deep eyes and shook his head. “The squatter camp with my father and brothers. They caught me when I went into the town.”
“Oh,” I said, and smiled inside because I was right. He wasn’t from the streets. His eyes went sad when he said this so he must miss his family. I stared at him and he felt my gaze and glared so I quickly looked away. He shifted in his seat. I saw his fist had clenched. Maybe he was also angry at this place.
Bilole came in front with a big iron pot. He put a big spoon of chicken stew on the steel plates i
n front of us. Nkunda came behind him with a dish filled with big pieces of brown bread. He threw a piece on each plate.
Richard stuffed the stew into his mouth like a hungry mongrel dog and then looked up at me and grinned.
I spooned the stew into my mouth and grinned back. It was good to taste the hot food.
“There are more boys over there,” said Richard through his full mouth, and pointed with his finger to the other side of the long hut.
I followed his eyes. There were four boys who looked like they were thirteen or fourteen laughing with each other. “They look like they’ve been here long time,” I said.
Jabu looked over at them and nodded. “They don’t look feared.”
Nkunda had joined them and all of them laughed like they were sharing a joke.
“That one is bad,” said Jabu showing one boy with his eyes, “I know these things.”
I looked at the boy soldier. He was tall and had braided hair and dark skin that shone like ebony. Jabu was right; his eyes were empty and hard like they had no feeling. I think his spirit inside must be dead. We stared at him and then Nkunda shouted, “Badboy –take the bread over that side.”
Richard, Jabu and me looked at each other and lifted our eyebrows. He had the right name that one. Maybe Jabu was also clever like David.
Bilole came over and glared at us with his hands on his fat hips. He banged his stick on the steel table and shouted, “Eat faster. It’s time for the movie.”
We obeyed and I took big spoons of the stew and big bites of the bread. It felt so good in my mouth. It was a long time since I had food like this and it helped to stop my body crying for the glue. I wiped the last of the stew from my plate with the bread, stuffed it in my mouth and then jumped up from the bench. I pushed past Richard and Jabu so that I could be with David and Sipho. Sipho gave me a small smile.
Bilole was waiting by the steps. We lined up behind him and marched with stiff bodies to another long wood building. We went through big doors into a large room with one small white light.
“Sit on the floor there,” said Bilole, shoving us over.
I shuffled behind David with Sipho behind me and sat on some grass reed mats. Richard and Jabu sat next to us. In front was a big white wall. There was a buzzing sound as Bilole fiddled with something on a machine behind us. I heard heavy steps and then Commander Mobuto marched in. He stood in front of us with his legs apart.