Please Do Not Disturb

by Robert Glancy

  I was surprised when Hope came out to the car park. I hadn’t seen her up close for years and the sight of her made me sad. Her skin, once a shiny pearl, now soaked the world into its greyness. Her sparkling eyes were now dull stones. What happened to us? It was a strange conversation. When she grabbed my hand, it had been so long since a woman had touched me that it felt forbidden. When she spoke my old name – Sefu – it was as if she’d electrocuted me, it sounded illicit on her lips, this name I’d never even told my first love. This name Tafumo whispered in his sleep, bubbling up from within. She was warning me about threats I was already aware of and the moment our hands unclasped, my sadness became almost unbearable. And wanting to stretch our time together, I offered her a lift to her tree.

  ‘No,’ she said, flustered. ‘I like to sit there. I didn’t know anyone . . . knew. I thought it was my own place. Do you still follow me? How do you know about my tree?’

  She was terrified of me. She used to look at me like this when I was violent, when I blamed her for everything. That fear never dies. It lives in everything I touch. This woman I loved, this woman I ruined, this woman I beat. I beat her; beat this woman so many times bruises lay below her skin like storm clouds. When all along it was my lies that tore us apart. In my youth I believed secrets contained power; now I know they’re poison. Poison that prevented Hope getting pregnant, killed our love, killed Rebecca and now pollutes my life. Nothing will make you lonelier than a lie. My lie sliced me in two. Two names, two lives, two wives, two of everything in a life that was still so empty. I wanted to wipe the fear from Hope’s eyes, explain all the things I was thinking, but my clouded brain could only muster, ‘I didn’t mean to startle you. Just happened to see you there. It looks peaceful. Everyone needs a place to hide sometimes.’

  Like drying mud, her expression hardened and just before she left, she said, ‘I don’t hide from anyone.’

  As I drove home my mind cluttered with thoughts: thoughts of Tafumo, of Jeko, thoughts of Hope, thoughts of Sean and our meeting, of the anger that rose up when Sean told me I was a disgrace, that I wasn’t educating my people – that truth – that anger that propelled me to lash out and fire him. I’d had no intention of firing Sean, I’d only planned to scare him a little, to get him in line so that he wouldn’t rouse David’s paranoia, so that he was one less problem to deal with. But when he had shouted at me, when he dared question me, my anger flared.

  Ezekiel opened the gate, the security camera winked. I went to see Solomon who was asleep. I sat on his bed, wanting to lie down and let his breathing drown me to sleep, but a pain gripped my stomach and I rushed to the toilet and sat expecting a great evacuation. Nothing came. Sitting there, trousers puddled around my ankles, I saw my milky reflection swim in the tiles; the tiles Tafumo had gifted me.

  I flushed the toilet, pulled up my trousers, and placed my ear on the tiles. Once the belch of the plumbing ceased, a hum continued. It was a sound I heard sometimes in the Listening Room in the Ministry, the soft static of a microphone recording empty space. I went to the garage to get a chisel and a hammer then returned to the bathroom. Quietly I chipped the grout between the tiles, then levered one off but there was nothing below but pasty cement. After pulling up many more tiles my floor looked like a crossword puzzle. I worked until my arms were drained of strength and then I lay down, the tiles cool on my back, waiting for energy to return. Out of habit, my tongue pried the sodden cavity of my molar but the dentist had pulled the nerve and no pain came. So I took the small penknife I kept in my pocket. Unfolding the blade, I laid it gently into the soft skin of my forearm, pushing down until it bit. The pain offered a fresh jolt of energy. I stood and walked into the warm silence of my wardrobe, got to my knees and extracted the folder from under the floorboard. The fog of sleep, which normally clears after a few minutes, now clings all day, drowsy and persuasive, seducing me back into slumber. Staying on the floor, elbow propping up my head, I heard Ruby cleaning downstairs. I wrote until I couldn’t stay awake any longer, laying my head down and finally falling asleep. Ruby must have found me there; when I woke, I had a pillow under my head and a sheet over me.

  Charlie

  Click . . .

  ‘Sean, did you know dung beetles prefer herbivore poos to carnivore poos?’

  ‘Sorry, Skipper, I’ve not got time to talk, you caught me on a bad day.’

  ‘Is that why you are sleeping on our couch again?’

  ‘Exactly, yes.’

  ‘Did you know cicadas stay underground for ten years then only live for a day?’

  ‘Sounds like my muse? Gestating for ever and only lasting a moment.’

  ‘What’s a muse?’

  ‘It’s what I need to finish my book.’

  ‘Can’t you just buy one of these muses?’

  ‘I tried that but it didn’t work out. Turns out she’s frightfully expensive.’

  ‘Are you excited about the safari? Safaris are the best and the worst. They start with so much excitement but then they end with a dead animal. And how excited are you about the Big Day? Do you think it will all go well this year?’

  ‘Never rule out the farce factor.’

  ‘The fart factor?’

  ‘Farce, Charlie, farce, although one must never rule out the fart factor either. Africa does farce like Italy does pasta or Amsterdam does dope.’

  ‘What’s dope?’

  ‘Go ask your father.’

  Click!

  Charlie

  The Mirage minibus was full of guns, beers and sandwiches. Mr Horst, who normally shouted at black people, was actually talking to Truth politely, ‘This your first safari?’ Truth shrugged, ‘I know guns, I can shoot.’ But Bel said, ‘We don’t have insurance, you can watch but you can’t shoot . . .’

  Truth took the rifle from Horst and said, ‘Stop acting like my mom, Bel,’ but I could tell by the way he held the gun that he didn’t have a clue what he was doing.

  As Bel had a quiet word with Truth, I asked Mr Horst what not having the right insurance meant and he whispered, ‘Means the boy doesn’t have the balls to shoot a buffalo.’

  On the way to the safari lodge, Ed drove us to a watering hole and everyone glued their faces to the glass, screeching each time they saw an animal. They acted like they’d never seen an antelope before.

  Even when some ugly warthogs strutted about, tails shafting up from their bottoms, the dancers squealed, ‘This is so real.’ Next a group of giraffes came strolling by, moving their long legs in treacly slow-motion. And when some elephants plodded in for a bath, everyone in the bus got crazy-excited, looking at the lovely elephants with their wise old faces and old man’s bums.

  The animals were great but the watering hole looked sort of sad, drier than I’d ever seen it, little more than a black puddle. That was because of the drought. The drought was a beast, Ed said, thirsty as hell, that sucked the water out of everything, turning the earth to dust. But Ed also told me that I wasn’t to worry because Tafumo was going to bring a great rain, which would drown the drought and save us all. So that was good.

  As we drove on, Dad explained to everyone that we couldn’t have a whole entourage stomping about scaring off the animals. So we stopped at the safari lodge to drop off Bel, the bodyguards and dancers, who sat in the cool tent drinking beers, as we got ready to go. Mum hated me going on safari but Dad said it was all good experience, which was what Dad said whenever we did anything Mum disapproved of.

  As guns were loaded and water bottles filled, I looked across the park, wondering if we’d get a kill. The grass rippled like a giant was running his hand through it. Then, as if the tall grass had woven itself into a man, a shadow broke from the savannah; slim and slow he moved like a leopard towards me and I shouted, ‘Fantastic! Howzit?’

  His arm shot up, face cracking into a bright smile. ‘Hey, Charlie! Howzit!’

  When we shook hands we did it the cool Bwalo way, grabbing each other’s forearm, his skin rough as a rhino. He wore a T
-shirt with Team IBM ’93 on the front, shorts, and no shoes. Fantastic was the most important man on the safari, the scout. He was the greatest in all of Africa. Mr Horst said Fantastic could track the day-old fart of a flea.

  Fantastic led the way, touching broken twigs and sticking his finger in poo, Truth behind him crinkling his nose, then Willem and Sean, followed by Mr Horst who whispered to Dad, ‘Fantastic does that shit for show, eh. For the tourists.’

  But I think he does it for real because not long after, we were looking down the wavy distance at a herd. One of the bulls was huge, with its black-rubbery nose and horns curled like question marks. Though Mr Horst called himself the Great White Hunter, Dad said only a third of the description was correct: the bit about him being white. Mr Horst took three shots and none of them killed the buffalo, which was getting really mad.

  Truth looked the most scared but, running alongside, I assured him that although buffalo had a great sense of smell they actually had terrible eyesight and bad hearing, so we were safe as long as we were upwind from him. But part way through my explanation, maybe Dad and Fantastic realised we were downwind, because they were suddenly really rough with me, dragging me so hard that I grazed my knees. And when we stopped running, I had two bloody knees covered in grit.

  Finally, Mr Horst shot the bull dead. That was the saddest part. When a bull that had been happily grazing with his family was cut up into hairy chunks. Fantastic butchered it expertly. The bull’s neck was twisted like a thick root, eyes pretty as a cow, its pouring blood churning the dirt into dark soup. I was going on about how the hair looked like broom bristles but Dad looked so unhappy, so I said, ‘Don’t worry, Dad, you didn’t hurt my knee that much.’ Dad gave me a weird hug and that was when Truth threw up and Horst laughed about what a pansy he was. When Fantastic asked if he could keep the bull’s balls, Horst smirked and said, ‘Sure, put a little lead in your pencil, eh.’

  Dad called Ed on his walkie-talkie and he drove the minibus to us. We threw the bits of bull into the trailer and returned to the lodge, where Truth went off with a bodyguard who kept rubbing his back, as all the dancers poked at the bull and said, ‘Jezzz-sus! That’s like, so gross.’

  Then, amazingly and incredibly, Sean met up with an old friend, right there at the safari lodge, which is like in the middle of the bush, in the middle of nowhere.

  So Sean kept shouting, ‘OIA, only in Africa! Only in Africa! OIA!’

  Sean’s friend caught a lift with us and on the way back we were stopped by soldiers who waved their guns about, and Dad said, ‘Everyone keep calm.’

  Sean

  Bloody safaris. Can’t stand them but time away from this frazzled town was in order. There weren’t enough hours in the day to fit in all my fuck-ups and being far from Stella would be good. Also it allowed me to interview Truth and, being officially unemployed, this was now my only source of income. But when I sat next to him on the bus, Truth grunted, hiding in the shadow cast by his cap. He didn’t peel his eyes from his phone as my unanswered questions bounced off him. Only thing he said was, ‘I wanna make a difference.’ I couldn’t stop myself saying, ‘By giving CDS to starving kids?’ The ever-hovering Bel took me to the back of the bus and said Truth wasn’t in the mood, and I kidded her, ‘I thought it was going great.’ Professional to a fault, she responded with an automatic and un-heartfelt apology.

  I stayed in the back of the bus, sipping beer. It was noon, hottest part of the day, the scorched centre, and town reeked of tar, paint and bananas. Even the beggars had retired to the shade of the jacaranda tree. Only the women kept working – keeping the country fed as men played politics – pounding mealie in big drums, like a diorama setting the day’s rhythm, pestles jacking in syncopation, tossing them up and driving them down.

  When we arrived at the lodge, as they sorted water and guns, Bel approached with a servile smile. ‘Can you not include any of this safari stuff in your piece?’

  ‘But I was hoping to write an entire article about what Truth is wearing. Where did he get the powder-blue safari suit from?’

  ‘From Armani,’ she said. ‘Is it too bright? Will it blow your cover?’

  ‘I was more worried the animals might fall about laughing.’

  Hands on hips, she waited for a straight answer. I said, ‘Fine, I won’t write about it. But how will you stop the Australian tornado filming it?’ She hesitated, determining if she could take me into her confidence again, then pulled a plastic cube from her pocket. ‘He can’t film without a battery.’

  When we left the lodge, Wayne was hopping about screaming like a child. I walked behind Fantastic, feeling fat and pathetic. Looking at my belly, then at Fantastic’s gleaming blackness, lean as jerky, I marvelled that we were even the same species. If Fantastic was evolution’s optimal design, I was its offcut. And it wasn’t long before Fantastic lived up to his name and Horst was squatting, fondling his gun like a shining cock. In the second just before the shot the world seemed to hold its breath – as if it knew it was soon to lose a soul, even the savannah seemed to stop swaying – then Horst pulled the trigger and birds burst from trees as the herd heaved into the grass in dark waves.

  Horst had botched it. Fantastic told me a perfect shot acted like a blade, spinning through one shoulder, smashing the spinal cord then exiting the other side. Horst hadn’t even hit a limb; the worst sort of shot, as it left the buffalo furious yet still capable of running you down and expressing its fury with a bloody good goring.

  Injured and baffled, it swayed, then slowly turned its head towards us. Its horns were immense, black eyes staring down the distance to where we squatted. On my first safari, Stu gave the best advice: Don’t worry about the animals, just watch Fantastic. He’s a stone-faced tracker, so the only time he’ll look scared is if something bad is about to happen. I saw the infinitesimal twitch on Fantastic’s face as Horst botched the second shot. This time the bull charged, hooves chomping the distance between us.

  Buffaloes are terrifying but not nimble; they stay the course, lowering their horns and shunting their bodies down the line. We had plenty of time to move, so when the bull stopped and looked up: we were gone. Fantastic pointed to trees up ahead, ‘If we’re missing him one more time we will run up those trees.’ But Horst barked, ‘I’ve got this,’ and took aim. The world paused. The shot, sounding like a snapping branch, hit the bull’s behind. Twisting in a sad-funny way, it tried to flick off the pain, to outrun its own backside, stumbling then vanishing, swallowed by savannah. Fantastic flinched again. There’s only one thing worse than watching a buffalo expand as it charges towards you and your own spectacular death: and that’s losing a buffalo. Fantastic whispered, ‘This is not being good.’ I wondered if that euphemism was the last thing I’d ever hear. Fantastic gathered us close and advised Horst, ‘Mr Horst, now it is time for the rest of the group to go to safety, over there, a long way away to the trees. I am worried that the bull is no longer in sight, this is being dangerous for everybody.’

  I was nodding like a madman, already grabbing Charlie to walk away, but Horst said, ‘Hold your fucking ground, you lot. Trust me, I have this.’

  Fantastic shook his head slightly, not enough to get into trouble for defying Horst, but just enough for me to see we were all in grave danger. Stu said, ‘Come on, Horst, you and Willem hold your ground, I want to take Truth and Charlie to a safer spot and . . .’

  ‘This is a safari,’ said Horst. ‘Truth is loving it.’ Truth looked so scared I was sure he was swallowing his own vomit but he nodded like an idiot and said, ‘I’m cool.’

  Dead cool, I wanted to shout, as I realised that some sort of humid machismo was permeating these men, a sweaty madness had set in, and we were all going to have to stay here when we should be running for our lives.

  Willem said, ‘Nah, come on, Eugene, the rest of the herd will soon find this bull again and they’ll group up to protect it. Then we’re in real trouble. Let’s you, me and Fantastic just track from here, let the
other . . .’ Horst looked at Willem, in that terrible way that an older brother can, and Willem, who was far bigger and stronger than Horst, backed down, like a turtle retreating into its shell. And I realised that Horst had bullied us all into holding our ground. Charlie was just out of earshot, as I whispered, ‘You better fucking shoot it dead this time, Horst, or you will have a lot of blood on your hands.’

  He snorted. ‘Yah, yah, you pansies need to calm down and watch the Great White Hunter at work,’ as he got himself in position and the rest of us tried to stand back, away from where we thought the buffalo might be. Stu and I shared an anxious glance as we all waited for the bull to move again, to give away its position. We stood and listened, listened to every sound, listened so hard I thought I could actually hear the sun scalding my skin, heat fizzing in the grass, bugs skittering in the soil, but the buffalo didn’t budge. We formed a tight knot, backs to each other, looking out in every direction, searching the area for movement. Tiny flies dive-bombed our faces, supping at the moisture from our wide-open eyes, as time stretched into something agonising and unbearable. I wanted to scream at Horst for putting us in danger and, as heat beat against my head, I sensed that there wasn’t a bull out there at all. But that Horst’s baboonery had so enraged Mother Nature that she’d condensed her fury into a dark ball of vengeance and here it came, rolling through the grass to crush us. The world began to shake: the bull was charging. Fantastic’s arms spread like wings, holding Charlie, Stu, Truth and me in place. Every fibre, every impulse, screamed to run, but Fantastic was right: we had to keep in as small an area as possible, until we knew where the beast was. The rumbling got louder, then the savannah yawned open and, like a whale cresting the surface, a flank broke out of the grass then vanished. It stopped, realising it hadn’t hit anything, then, just like that, trotted out, not ten feet from us, facing away. He was so close I saw blood pour like ink down his hide. He turned and looked at us with an almost casual curiosity, at these strange crouching beasts.