Another Justified Sinner

by Sophie Hopesmith

  Kondwani spoke some of this back to the nurse. She nodded. She wrote something down and walked away.

  ‘What did she say?’ asked Stephanie, anxiously.

  ‘She talk to doctor.’

  They lived out the time as best as they could, in their different ways. Stephanie’s foresight meant she had a book in her rucksack. She read this very slowly, as her mind drifted on to different things. Kondwani entertained himself by talking to all the patients, hearing their life stories, offering sympathetic noises, touching pregnant bellies. Marcus just stared up at the ceiling and saw his past life spin into substance out of spider webs and blocks of shadow. Why had he run from it? Hadn’t he been happy? Hadn’t he been a success?

  The doctor finally entered in a parade of handclaps. He shouted something jubilant at Kondwani, who dashed over from the dialysis room. ‘He says he read on internet… Mosaquine no good!’

  ‘On the internet?’ spluttered Stephanie. ‘But that’s… He’s a doctor, right?’

  ‘Yes, doctor. Nurse read at internet café. Drug side effect. Head side effect…’ He searched for the word: tripped it off his tongue, syllable by syllable. ‘P-sy-cho-sis?’

  ‘You pronounce it “ko”. Psy-ko-sis. And you don’t need to say the p. It’s a silent p. So, that’s what they think it is? Psychosis?’

  ‘I’m not psychotic.’ Marcus rolled his eyes. ‘We’re listening to a doctor in a third-world country who sent his nurse off to the internet café to look something up. I don’t think we have to automatically believe this diagnosis.’

  The doctor said something more to Kondwani. Kondwani translated: ‘One in ten people dream strange. No sleep. Yes?’

  Marcus paused. Then nodded.

  ‘Oh god, that nightmare you had… When you shouted out.’ Stephanie glanced around herself, frantic. ‘Could that have been a side effect?’

  Kondwani continued: ‘More symptom. Sadness. Worry. Headache. Dizzy. Vomit. Memory all bad. Want to die.’

  ‘Suicidal?’

  ‘Probably. And see things. Pictures. Not real things.’

  ‘Hallucinations?’

  ‘Yes! Those. Like with Malawi gold.’

  ‘Yes, like Malawi gold.’

  ‘Oh god,’ groaned Marcus. ‘I think it was the tablets. I think they’re right. Oh fucking hell – those fucking tablets.’

  ‘All right, Marcus, it’s OK – calm down.’

  ‘But… Why didn’t they tell me any of this?’ His eyes swivelled up. He felt pathetically small just lying there, cramped into the corridor corner. He felt outraged by the impudence. He felt so embarrassed.

  ‘Oh!’ said Kondwani. The nurse had handed him something. ‘This…’ It was the nurse’s printout of the information.

  Marcus snatched it and started to read. His vision blurred over. He couldn’t believe it. They didn’t even prescribe this junk in EU countries anymore: the UK had for some reason continued to hand it out to tossers like him, who didn’t have the mental aptitude to handle a daily pill… What an idiot he was! What an idiot! He shook in the bed and struck out at himself.

  ‘That’s not going to help. Why are you so angry? It’s all right. We’ll get you some other drug. There are lots of other ones. We can pay for a stash of it with your money and then claim it back with the medical cover. It’s fine. Really.’

  ‘This is all I need! Some poxy fucking psychosis! I’m getting out of here.’ He swung his legs over the bed.

  ‘No, no, no. Just stay here a bit longer. They need to do blood tests. We need to check that it’s all out of your system.’

  ‘I haven’t taken it for…’ He paused: poised on the bed, with his hands gripping the metal. ‘How long have I been gone?’

  ‘You left the camp two days ago.’

  ‘Is that long enough for it to have left my system?’

  ‘I don’t know. I mean – if it’s a weekly pill…’

  ‘Oh right. Yes. You’re right. Oh fuck. So today is…’

  ‘Wednesday.’

  I always take it on a Sunday. It’s still going to be in my system, isn’t it? Oh fuck.’ He started to shake. It was like some bizarre horror movie, with the monster inside you, its claws in your blood.

  Stephanie and Kondwani persuaded the hospital staff that Marcus was safe to leave. They both had a hunch that the environment was whisking him up into another mental episode.

  The hospital staff, however, were disappointed to see them go. They’d all been getting along so well. Stephanie slipped the doctor some notes from her bag, to soothe over any ill feelings. The doctor took them with relish and held them close to his chest, as if cradling a newborn.

  The atmosphere in the car was tense and terrible. Stephanie found her mind drifting again. She did not feel weighted in her body. She looked down at her hands and could not see the connection.

  Kondwani was smiling his usual smile, but his hands shook on the steering wheel. He could feel the strain of Stephanie’s body, and he did not know how to help her. He had grown to like this strange and skinny white woman. But he had never known anyone so fragile and coiled. And now, if that wasn’t bad enough – as if he didn’t sense that she was burrowing herself into one of her moods – he had this psychotic in the back of the car. A man who, at any point, could leap up and bite his neck. Or crush his skull with a rock. Kondwani kept glancing into the rear-view mirror.

  Meanwhile, Marcus was struggling. He couldn’t decide upon the least psychotic-looking pose. He sat with his arms crossed, but this seemed a tad surly and aggressive. With his legs flopped forward, he felt like a sexual predator. Even worse was the face: did he smile, like a manic, or risk looking blank like a sociopath? And woe betide if the corners of his lips drooped downwards, or his eyes accidentally watered from the winds.

  Kondwani was first to break the silence: ‘There is no doctor in these villages.’

  Stephanie roused from her head travels. ‘Sorry?’

  ‘If Marcus die. What if Marcus dead before Dixon run?’

  ‘Well,’ considered Stephanie, blinking. ‘That’s just how things are, Kondwani. There aren’t enough hospitals. There aren’t enough doctors.’

  Marcus leaned forwards. ‘And the hospitals you’ve got aren’t much cop, if I’m honest.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘For god’s sake, watch the road, Kondwani – or we’re going to end up back at one. It’s an expression – “not much cop”. It means it’s not very good.’

  ‘We poor. Who cares?’ He sniffed, hurt. ‘But I change it. For our village.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘Get Madonna to build a hospital on top of it?’ quipped Marcus.

  Kondwani swiped his hand through the air. ‘No, no, no. Serious, now. Government train people to care in village. Like doctors. Give drugs. Eleven weeks. Train and you get money, yes? More money than charity give.’

  ‘Oh yes, I’ve heard of this.’ Stephanie nodded, slipping back into her body. ‘They’re called Health Surveillance Assistants, I think…’

  ‘Yes!’ Kondwani clicked his fingers. ‘Yes. I want to be that.’

  ‘But Kondwani, I think you need to be a secondary school leaver.’

  ‘What now?’

  ‘You need to have finished school. Big school.’

  ‘No, no, no. Two years.’

  ‘Oh. I thought… Well, even so: did you do two years of school?’

  He shrugged. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Kondwani…?’

  ‘They want two years of big school. I have two years of big school.’

  ‘I’m not sure that’s how it works.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘All right. But why?’

  ‘Money. More money for family.’

  Stephanie winced. ‘Yes. I can see that.’

  He glanced at her. ‘You not happy.’

  ‘If you get through… If you complete it… Of course I am happy for you.’

  ‘I am most clever man in village. I not miss school.’

  �
�Yes, but secondary school. Big school.’

  ‘My father pay. He find money.’

  ‘Yes, but how long were you there…?’

  He smacked the roof of the car and unease pervaded everything. ‘It no matter. Stop now.’

  ‘Kondwani, I’m sorry.’ She smiled, although her eyes stayed static. ‘I’ll just miss you, that’s all.’

  An involuntary smile twitched at his mouth. ‘Really? Is that why you not happy?’ He leant over and kissed her cheek. ‘Princess Stephanie.’ A rumble of laughter. ‘Ahh, we have fun, yes?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Marcus leant in again. ‘In all seriousness, I think it’s a great idea. The village needs a clinic. It’s living in the Stone Age… It’s backward.’

  ‘Marcus.’ Stephanie whistled through her teeth. ‘You’re not helping.’ She turned around to face him. ‘You’re volunteering in a developing country, one of the poorest in Africa. What did you expect?’

  ‘What you expect?’ repeated Kondwani. It was one of his favourites. He liked the tone of it.

  Marcus flopped back again. ‘Just something more… You know, a drive to improve. A drive to get better.’

  ‘With what money?’

  ‘Look, they still believe in witchcraft, for god’s sake. It’s weird.’

  ‘They don’t all believe in witchcraft.’

  ‘Most of them do.’

  ‘Well, anything can be witchcraft. Science is like witchcraft to me. Religion, philosophy.’ She tried to move the conversation on. ‘Kondwani, you know these Health Surveillance Assistants… A lot of them don’t even get bicycles. There’s not enough. You’d have to do what Dixon does. You’d have to run around the villages by foot.’

  ‘I am muscle enough! No?’ He flexed his muscles and they laughed. He added: ‘I am not old.’

  ‘I know you’re not,’ she said, softly.

  ‘My children will laugh.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘They see dad run to villages, red and hot and this belly.’ He grabbed it and gave it a shake. There wasn’t much to shake but he liked to see Stephanie laugh, her pale lips giving way into teeth. ‘I sweat now. This weather! Bad.’

  ‘Now it’s my turn: what do you expect?’

  ‘Marcus…’

  ‘Isn’t this just Africa? It’s hot. It’s fucking hot.’

  ‘Why angry?’ bellowed Kondwani. ‘You big psychopath.’

  ‘I am not a psychopath.’

  ‘You are! Doctor say so. You big, crazy psychopath.’

  ‘I am not a psychopath!’

  ‘Please.’ Stephanie’s voice was tired and world-weary. ‘We’re almost back now. Can we just calm things down? And by the way, Marcus, we’re in Malawi. You shouldn’t just say “Africa”’.

  ‘I not drive you. I leave you in hospital with cockroach and rat. I tell you, this is rainy season. This is rainy season but no rain. We need rain. We have rainy season with no rain.’

  ‘OK, I get it. Rain.’

  ‘It rain in “Africa country” too, you know. Psychopath.’ He was really enjoying the sound. He liked to practise new words. Bonus points if it was something that could antagonise stupid white people.

  ‘I remember it was the opposite problem last year,’ recalled Stephanie. ‘I remember the rain just suddenly coming and pouring down and never seeming to stop. For so long, there was nothing, and then there was this… torrent.’

  ‘It sounds like you’re never satisfied, basically.’

  ‘The rains aren’t meant to be so unpredictable, Marcus. The rainy season is meant to be this steady, continuous rainfall. Not absolutely nothing and then a downpour that floods everything. All the crops died. It was terrible.’

  ‘Never like this when I boy,’ growled Kondwani. ‘Never like this.’

  ‘Oh, we’re here.’ The turning was coming up. Thank goodness. The medication had turned Marcus hostile and bellicose. Sharp words could pierce Stephanie like wasp stings. She couldn’t wait to get out of the car. Kondwani was sitting too close. She didn’t know what it was; she was getting worse… Just this horrible fixation, such disreputable daydreams. She was better off steering clear of him.

  Darkness crept towards the village as the car pulled in. People were gathered in the porch. Some stood up and pointed at the car lights. A couple called out his name. ‘Marcus!’ ‘Good to see you again, Marcus.’ A few kept back in the shadows, wearily casting their eyes over him, now seeing him as the man who crossed lines. There was no greater societal sin.

  Marcus tugged at Stephanie. ‘I just want to get into bed.’

  ‘Don’t you want to say hello?’

  ‘I can’t deal with this right now. I’m not even wearing trousers. Please just take me to bed.’

  Philippa walked towards them, while the others stayed back. ‘Marcus,’ she smiled, but her body held back. She twitched briefly at the pants. ‘We’re so glad you’re back safely.’

  He nodded, embarrassed. He twisted his body to the side so there was less of him to see.

  ‘He wants to go to bed. He’s really tired.’

  ‘Of course.’ Philippa waved her hands towards the sleeping quarters. ‘We can talk everything through in the morning. Good night, Marcus.’ He didn’t reply. He was trying to ignore the Christmas fairy lights, which had been strung up in his absence. He passed a shiny plastic tree on the way to the bedrooms.

  Stephanie went to go with him, but he resisted. ‘I’m fine, honestly. I just need to get some sleep.’

  ‘You’ll remember to tie up the mosquito net and everything?’ Her eyes screwed up, worried and uncertain.

  ‘Yes, of course. I’m not feverish or anything right now… Honestly.’

  ‘All right, then. Well. Good night.’ Within seconds she was just a pair of shoes, clip clopping into night-time. He listened to the sound of her peter away. Then he faced a delicious near-silence: far better than the shock of true silence or the shriek of cacophony. Wordless voices swelled out on the veranda. He let it babble all over him.

  In a short while (impossible to know how long), he heard voices in the corridor: more distinct, this time. He could just about make out what they were saying.

  ‘I’m not sleeping with a psycho.’

  ‘We think he’s all right now, Toby.’

  ‘I mean it; I’m not sleeping in there with him. He’s fucked.’

  ‘All right. We’ll see what we can do. All right? Anyway, let’s move along from here, or we’ll wake him up.’

  Somehow he fell back asleep and then it was morning. Another day to live out. He thought about breakfast but the shame nailed him to the bed.

  There was a knock on the door. The door creaked open. Annabelle.

  ‘Stephanie wants to know if you want any breakfast.’

  He cleared his throat, uncomfortable. ‘I think I need some more rest. I mean – I feel too tired to get up.’

  ‘I could bring in your breakfast if you like.’

  He thought about it. ‘Yes. Yes.’

  She waited for a please, but it didn’t come. Biting her tongue, she went off to get his breakfast. Stephanie wasn’t in the habit of allowing people to have breakfast in bed, but at the same time, she couldn’t face having him there today. She was still so tired and wound up. ‘Yes, all right,’ she said to Annabelle. ‘If you’re OK bringing it to him…’

  Annabelle went into the room with the breakfast tray and perched next to him on the bed. ‘How are you feeling?’

  ‘All right.’

  ‘You’ve given us some brilliant drama,’ she grinned. ‘But don’t feel embarrassed. If you are. Because other things have been happening, too. Want the gossip?’

  He didn’t. He hated gossip. But he wanted the drudgery to earth him, to cut out the live wire inside him that kept frothing and sparking.

  She chatted to him, idly. He liked the way her face moved when she talked. It relaxed him. He felt his eyelids flutter. There was a gentle drift into a low sensory state.

  When he awoke
, it was dark, and Annabelle was gone. He thought he might have slept through the day. He couldn’t remember the last time he had slept through the day. He panicked. Then he heard some sounds outside, the clatter of plates. Dinner?

  He rose out of bed and dressed himself, then pattered out on to the veranda, where people were laying down plates and getting themselves seated for food. The chatter stopped, and people didn’t know what to say. They nodded at him, but wary. Stephanie said: ‘Oh Marcus, you feeling better?’

  He said: ‘Yes, I am – thank you. Listen, I want to go to the school tomorrow, if that’s all right. I need to say goodbye to the children. I want to go home.’

  But before she could answer, they heard the sound of screaming.

  Chapter

  Eight

  For two months, people dropped dead like flies. Death smells like stewed fruit, sour milk, wet wood. There was a strange feeling to everything, like resolution unpixelating. Life holds you up to the light elements of the universe and exposes you as monumentally small and susceptible, in a constant wait for your fate.

  The scream had been Ben’s. His was a hollering scream, a wailing scream, a something-from-the-pit-of-your-guts scream. The sort that shudders through tunnels and bubbles up mud. It felt like insect wings and cobwebs. It had the brute strength of elephants. It was a hard sound to forget.

  A villager dead from meningitis (so it turned out to be). And what happened was this: Ben came across a body that was cold but not too cold, lips pale as candyfloss but not yet blue. Nobody knew why she had crawled out of bed, why she had dragged herself by the hands and knees into their yard. People debated it over breakfast, coffee breaks, the ever-churning pizza oven.

  It worked out strangely well for Marcus. Everybody seemed to forget his psychotic wanderings; his peculiar puberty ritual, his symbolic rite of passage (at the tender age of twenty-nine). There was a new conversation on their lips. People recited facts that they had read online: the average life expectancy, the HIV crisis, the changing seasons. It tainted them all, and a foreboding hung about them, like the very air itself was made up of malevolence and trickery.

  One day, he saw Stephanie sitting on the veranda, quietly watching – what? What was it? She was staring at something intently. Occasionally she would sigh and gather her shawl around her. She’d probably call it a ‘pashmina’. But Stephanie was definitely the kind of woman who wore shawls.