“Ohhhh, angry: always angry.” Suubi was feverish.
Exactly, because its entire world hinges on that one cub.
Suubi gasped, anticipating tragedy.
Then one day, Ntwire’s child misbehaved. When Kintu, our grandfather, saw him, he chastised him like any parent would do to his own children. In truth, Kintu did nothing much to the boy; he just nudged him like that. But the boy, ppu! He dropped dead—just like that.
“From a nudge?” Suubi was sure her grandmother had said it was a slap one time.
Who knows what ailment that boy suffered?
“And this was during the reign of Kyabaggu the Valiant? Tell me about Kyabaggu.” Suubi was more interested in the kabaka than in Kintu.
Kyabaggu was a fighter namige who fought a lot of wars. In fact, it is said that when the Nyoro heard his name—the Nyoro were our greatest enemies at the time—they cried out in fear. He wanted to make Buganda even bigger, to swallow Bunyoro and all those tiny little kingdoms around Buganda. He subdued the Ssoga many times but because of the Nile he failed to annex Busoga to Buganda.
“How did the Nile stop him?” Suubi knew the answer but she still asked. This was her favorite part.
It was treacherous and took a long time to cross. When it flooded, the Nile would yira-yira, rumbling like Kiyiraaaaa, Kiyiraaaaa, Kiyiraaaaa.
Suubi would join in singing, Bwowulira enyanja bweyira, yira, yira, nyabo!
So many times, her grandmother carried on, Kyabaggu subdued the Ssoga and appointed chiefs to rule them on his behalf, but as soon as he left to return to Buganda, the Ssoga would rebel and kill his chiefs. When he went back to Busoga, the cowards would disappear into the bush. As soon as he left they sneaked out and killed his chiefs again. That is why we say—as obstinate as the Ssoga.
“What did Ntwire do when his son died?”
Child, what does a leopard do when its cub is taken?
“Ohhhh! It will not stop until it gets its cub back!”
Exactly! Ntwire, in his anguish, decided to flee Buganda. But as he left, he looked back at Kintu and said, “Kintu, I am leaving Buganda. One day, you and your descendants will search for me to undo your suffering but you’ll never find me.”
Kintu, knowing how hard it is to break a foreign curse, apologized and implored and pleaded and begged, “Ntwire, please, stay. I’ll give you whatever you ask for.”
But Waa! You know how vindictive foreigners are—Ntwire was inexorable.
So when he left, Kintu visited a medicine man, you know, to protect himself and his family. The medicine man told him to make sure that any child that comes out of him should never be slapped on the head: that Ntwire was poised to play the same trick. That is why in our clan we do not slap children on the face.
“That is why?”
Yes, because of Ntwire’s curse.
“Then what happened to Kintu?”
Soon enough, his life unravelled. His children died. His wife committed suicide and he lost all his wealth. When Kintu died, he did not join the family spirits. He is still trapped here with us.
“But every story must end happily; Ntwire must be punished for being unforgiving and Kintu should be rescued and taken to the land of the spirits!”
Oh yes; you see, Ntwire thought that by trapping him on earth, Kintu would miss being a spirit—you know, not worshipped or offered sacrifices?
“Yes.”
But because Kintu is still roaming the world, he is able to see Ntwire’s wrath coming and often he protects his children.
“Ahhh! So Ntwire did not win?”
No, every time he tries to harm Kintu’s children, Kintu is there to protect and to soothe. Up to this day Kintu is still protecting us, his children.
Suubi smiled at the story. How she had lapped it up—imagining Kintu blowing restlessly in the wind on the lookout for his children. How she had hated Ntwire, a devil on the prowl, looking for ways to harm Kintu’s descendants!
Now she searched her mind for any other reminiscences from her childhood but there was only blankness. Her grandmother was a morsel of memory hidden in a crevice somewhere in her mind. It felt as though someone had come with a broom, swept away all her childhood recollections, but missed her grandmother’s voice. She could not even remember why she lived with her in the first place or when she left her. She could find no face, no house, no daytime activities, or even dreams from that life in her memory: just the voice telling that story and the tree they sat under when the sun glared.
Suubi jerked from the past and noticed that the taxi was not moving. Passengers were restless—some sucking their teeth, some scowling, everyone was peering outside to the back of the van. Suubi looked to see. A passenger had refused to pay the same fare as people traveling all the way to Lubaga because his was just half of the journey. The broker was blocking his way saying, “Me, you shall give me my money, sir.”
Suubi shook her head. There is always someone taking a stand and making everyone’s journey more miserable, she thought. Who does not know that taxis inflate the fare whenever there is a shortage? The driver turned off the engine, stepped out and banged his door as if to say: We are taking no nonsense from anyone. Seeing the driver coming around the van, the passenger handed over the money and everyone heaved a sigh of relief.
2.
At last, Mmengo Town, the last capital of Buganda Kingdom, came into sight. It was a compact town with only four streets. Whenever she got to this point, it struck Suubi that Namirembe Hospital kept Mmengo Town on life support. Despite the return of the kabaka from exile, Mmengo had not shaken off the mournful look of the decades when the kingdom was outlawed. A row of shops on the left slid along the road. The buildings that came into view were old—not in the proud ornamental way that the Kasubi tombs boasted of a heroic past, but with an embarrassed air, as if a grand plan had gone horribly wrong. Suubi wondered whether other people saw the town that way too.
The van stopped outside Namirembe Hospital and most of the passengers alighted. A few people going to Lubaga boarded the taxi and the hill started to slope. The Bulange, which housed the kabaka’s offices and the Buganda Lukiiko, came into view on the left. As the taxi approached Balintuma Road, Suubi called, “On Balintuma.”
The taxi stopped and she stood up to alight. As her foot touched the pavement, her heart flipped and then shattered. Suubi knew immediately. It was Ssanyu.
This was the second attack. The first happened eight years ago on the morning after Suubi’s graduation. She had lain half-awake in bed when a sensation of being “locked”—she could not open her eyes or move or scream—came over her. Yet she could see a young woman standing above her bed looking down at her. The woman looked exactly like Suubi only she was so emaciated that it was surprising she could stand at all. Her skin was dry, taut, and scratched. Her hair was in thick tufts. She even wore Suubi’s floral blue dress with an elasticated waistband, yet Suubi had discarded that dress ten years earlier.
“Who are you?” Suubi had tried to ask.
“Who am I, who am I?” The woman was very angry. “I am Ssanyu, Ssanyu Babirye, you chameleon! Stop telling lies.”
“What lies? I don’t know you,” Suubi tried to say but could not. Somehow the woman had heard.
“You’re my Nnakato.”
Suubi tried to shake her head to say that she was not a twin but could not. And how could Ssanyu hear her thoughts?
For a while she struggled to break free but not a muscle twitched, her eyes would not open but her heart pumped in her ears. It felt as if she had been buried alive. Ssanyu Babirye stood over her like a snarling guard dog.
Then she snapped out of it and sat up. There was no one in the room. She jumped out of bed and ran outside. For a long time she stood in the driveway, staring back into her room. Had she dreamed it? But she was awake when it happened. For weeks afterwards, every time Suubi remembered the face, she was gripped by panic. But as months went by and it wore off, she started to doubt what she had seen: it
must have been a bad dream.
Now Suubi ran. Ssanyu Babirye was real and she was behind her. She hoped to get home before Ssanyu struck and locked her immobile again.
She crossed Balintuma Road and dashed past Esso, between the shops, past Mohamood High, heading toward the Christian Medical Centre. At the shortcut to Namirembe Cathedral, the road dipped and all she could see was the horizon. Then the high roof of the old colonial house near the school for the handicapped rose. Resolute not to look behind, Suubi chased the road ahead, but it seemed to run further. The colonial roof so dominated the horizon that her house, dwarfed, did not materialize immediately. Suubi’s heart jolted, her legs wavered, she doubted she would make it and terror overwhelmed her. That was when she glanced behind. Ssanyu stood in the road. It was just a glance but in that moment, Ssanyu emptied her heart onto the road.
“The truth, Suubi,” Ssanyu begged.
Though she stood at a distance, Suubi heard her words clearly. Ssanyu still wore Suubi’s old blue dress. She still looked like she would drop dead anytime.
“Tell Opolot who you really are. Please.”
Somehow this begging Ssanyu hurt more than the angry one. For a moment, Suubi was overcome by darkness, as if she had died. Then the darkness lifted and she reached for the electricity pole nearby for support. The pole felt warm and smelled of oil. But then she became too weak to stand and slid down to the grass. She leaned against the warm wood of the pole and closed her eyes. This had to be death.
After a long while, Suubi opened her eyes and looked back again. Ssanyu was not on the road. She stood up and looked around but Ssanyu was nowhere. Buoyed, Suubi turned and marched past a woman who had come to ask if she was OK. She distantly heard the woman say, “She’s short-circuited that one,” but Suubi ignored her. She walked back to where she had seen Ssanyu standing and shouted, “Tell Opolot what truth?”
After a short pause, when Ssanyu did not materialize, Suubi started to walk home. She looked around for the woman who had seen her madness: she was gone. The youth across the road looked straight ahead, the man on a bicycle was in a hurry, the schoolgirls might have seen something, they seemed nervous. Suubi waited for them to look back but they did not. Relief washed over her.
As she turned into her driveway, she was overcome by sneezing again. She sneezed so hard that her head felt it would split. As she lifted the wicket to walk in, she stuck a finger in her ear and shook it violently—the dreaded hay fever! She was still clearing her throat and sniffing when she opened the door.
3.
BULANGE VILLAGE, 1980
Whoever had dumped Suubi that April evening brought her early, for Kulata was not home to throw the child back. Kulata, who worked in Owino Market, arrived home at around six o’ clock. At her doorstep sat five-year-old Suubi dozing like a chick dying of coccidiosis. On hearing Kulata’s footsteps, Suubi looked up. Her eyes sat deep inside the sockets. She had no cheeks. The shape of her head was the shape of her skull. Kulata recognized her as her dead sister’s child and sucked her teeth long and hard. She took Suubi’s hand as if it were a diseased chick’s wing, dragged her down the corridor to the back door, and dumped her below the steps. She then walked back and opened the door to her room. Thankfully, she needed the light coming through the doorway, otherwise she would have closed her door.
After drinking a glass of water, Kulata raised her voice. She demanded to know how the child came to her doorstep. When no answer came from the other tenants, she threatened to throw Suubi on the garbage bin. An irritated woman quipped, “Are you waiting for permission?”
Kulata burst into tears.
“Do you know why they picked on me?”
The tenants did not answer. “They” were her family.
“Because I don’t have a child.” She blew her nose. “Did they ask why I don’t have children? No.”
Now the tenants, some wearing concerned faces, some not bothering to pretend, came out of their rooms to hear the story.
“They presumed I didn’t know how to make them,” Kulata carried on. “Last time I went home to visit, they tried to force that child on me but I said no, I have problems of my own. Today they waited until I was away and dumped her here like garbage.”
The tenants, now slightly sympathetic, swore they had not seen anyone abandon the child.
“If she is your blood,” one of them said, “there is nothing you can do. Give her food while fate makes up its mind. Look at her: she looks half-dead already.”
“What is she suffering from?” another asked.
“Who knows?” Kulata said. “She looked like that when she was born. Perhaps because she was the runt.”
“She is a twin?”
“She is the Nnakato. Babirye was born full of life, but then suddenly ppu,” Kulata snapped her fingers, “Just like that, she went. Then my sister also died. We waited for that one to die but wa! She is still here, blinking.”
“What about the father?”
“The father?” Kulata made a contemptuous face, as if to ask: How can anything like that have a father?
“Hmm?” a woman prompted, anticipating a salacious story.
“I tell you my sister chose a family with the kind of madness that goes beyond having children with. And I am saying badly wired, short-circuiting, fuse-blowing mental kind of madness.” Now she drew closer to the tenants and whispered, “The father, Wasswa, hacked his twin Kato to death.”
The tenants gasped, “Oooh,” as if it were a chorus.
“Asked: Why did you kill your twin?” Kulata carried on whispering, “Because they were coming for him. Who was coming for him? They. That kind of madness.”
Everyone’s face turned and stared at Suubi as if her father killing his twin was written on her body. Kulata continued to whisper, “The following day, thankfully, Wasswa committed suicide. And to me that was the best solution because what do you do with that?”
The tenants did not answer.
“The last I heard, this child was taken on by the grandmother, Wasswa’s mother, but as the saying goes: When it rains on a pauper, it does not stop to allow his clothes to dry. The other day I heard that the grandmother had also died and I said to myself, what kind of misfortune does that family have? I did not expect this child to be still alive. I mean, look at her.”
“Uhm uhm,” a man shook his head and whispered. “She won’t live. Don’t worry about it.”
“Is it true that dead twins collect the living one?” someone asked.
“If they do,” Kulata answered as she made to enter her room, “then Babirye had better hurry up because I am not going to be saddled with this one.”
Fate being fate, it started to rain. Suubi sat out in the rain without flinching. Kulata pretended not to see it until a tenant came to get Suubi in a manner suggesting that she was not a beast like some people. Before the woman got to Suubi, Kulata shouted, “Are you going to sit under the rain until you melt?”
Suubi stood up. For a gaunt child, her step was strong and steady. Despite being sunken, her eyes too were alert but no one noticed. She stepped into Kulata’s world.
It was dark. Kulata lived in a single room in an unfinished house. The window was boarded up; sunlight from the corridor was thin. Soon, however, Suubi’s eyes adjusted to the dark. In one corner of the room were pans, plates, and other kitchen essentials. In another were basins, soap, and bathroom objects. The other two corners accommodated Kulata’s bed, screened by a net curtain. All the spaces along the walls housed bits and pieces of some sort. In the middle of the room were two basket stools, but Suubi sat on the floor. There was no ceiling above. Two electrical wires snaked along the beams to the wall and came down. One ended in a hanging socket, the other in a switch also unattached to the wall. Both were covered in dust and cobwebs. On another beam, a suspended wire ended in a lamp holder without a bulb. Kulata saw Suubi looking up.
“Don’t you ever touch the electricity. Except when Babirye calls,” she laughed. “Electricit
y hurts but it’s a tidy way to go.”
The following day, Kulata took Suubi to Mothers’ Union Nursery School. She asked the teachers to keep her all day.
4.
As time passed and Suubi started to walk around the house, then the village, she discovered the world that was her new home.
The first thing she found out was that all the tenants disliked Kulata. However, they invited Suubi to their rooms. Sometimes, they asked her to run errands for them and gave her food. Suubi loved it when they chastised her. It made her feel like she was a proper child, like she belonged to them rather than to the corridor like a stray cat. Kulata locked her room in the day. She never left food for her. After school, Suubi came home to the corridor. Mostly she roamed the village, returning home just before Kulata arrived.
Bulange was a lethargic village, littered with modern but unfinished houses overgrown with shrubs or matooke gardens. In their unfinished state, the houses looked like ruins in a dying village. There were a few elderly houses, built between the 40s and 60s, which boasted of good days gone by. Tenants said that some of the old houses belonged to Kabaka Muteesa II’s elite men and the families who first bought into British administration; others belonged to the landed gentry.
The landlady insisted that in the early 70s Bulange had verve and ambition. At the time, the village was fast becoming an affluent residential area. The old houses belonged to the landowners and the unfinished structures mostly to their sons and a few people they sold to. But then Idi Amin came and one by one, the men erecting modern houses disappeared. Her own husband had disappeared in 1977. Sometimes, she pointed at the incomplete houses naming their owners and the dates they had disappeared and she would cry.
The landlady was fat. Though her fatness was an illness—her limbs had shrunk beneath rolls of fat—the tenants were unsympathetic. They whispered that it was rather paradoxical for a widow to be fat. In return, the landlady called them cockroaches. She said that when they first came to her for a room they were courteous and humble.
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