The First Wife

by Paulina Chiziane

  Lu is missing from this meeting.

  “To what do I owe the pleasure of this evening visit, girls?”

  “Sister Rami, it was Tony who summoned us. Do you know why?”

  “Me?”

  “I’m surprised. It’s the first time he’s called us. Something must be going badly.”

  “I don’t see any reason for surprise,” I say.

  “Yes, there is a reason,” Saly says. “At first, it’s the men who seek out the women. The moment we’re safely in the pot, it’s the opposite. This man Tony’s a man with a wandering eye.”

  “Lu’s missing,” Ju says, “can it be she’s not coming?”

  My rivals are anxious and come out with a torrent of questions. I don’t answer their anxieties. I’m the only one who knows the reason for this encounter, but I’m not saying anything. Deep inside me, I feel the glee of anticipation because I’m privy to information that the others don’t have.

  We make small talk while we wait. Conversations continue at length, while others come to an end. We talk about the fevers the children get as the weather changes. We talk about how some of them are naughty. Others are successful. The boys are rebellious. They have a lot of girlfriends and don’t study enough. They’ve taken after their father. The girls are diligent, loving, delicate, harder working at school. They’ve taken after us, their mothers. We talk about putting on weight and going on diets. We throw carefully sifted words backward and forward to each other. We’ve got money. We’re becoming refined. Big headed. We pay each other compliments. Pink suits you. Thank you. High heels enhance the elegant way you walk. Thank you. Your skin, your perfume, your makeup, aquamarine on a burnt sienna base. Thank you. Your nail polish matches the color of your skirt perfectly. Thank you.

  I’m dressed in blue. I like blue. I was wearing blue when Tony first met me and fell in love with me. I like my hairstyle, which is like that of the Beatles’ backup singers. I always leave a fine lock of hair falling scantily over my brow, almost hiding my eyes. It was at the time of the Beatles that I met Tony. I also like those tight-fitting clothes and short skirts that are back in fashion again now, except that at my age and with my weight I can’t wear them anymore of course. But in my youth, I would walk along the seafront, showing plenty of leg, hand in hand with my Tony.

  I think to myself. Whoever invented women’s fashion must have been a man. He invented high-heeled shoes so that a woman couldn’t run and escape his grip. If he’d thought of her, he would have invented boots and moccasins, flat-heeled shoes so that she could walk, run, and hunt for her victuals, like the amazons. He invented clinging skirts to force a woman to keep her legs tightly closed. If he’d thought of her, he would have invented some nice wide skirts, so she could walk in a relaxed fashion and her under-parts enjoy a bit of cool on summer days. Instead of all this, he invented tight, audacious clothes, so that he could delight in contemplating the undulating curves of any woman and climax with a mere look.

  Here in the twenty-first century men dress us in armor plating from the era of Don Quixote and tell us we’re beautiful. Panties. Girdle. Bra. Nylon stockings. Short skirt. Slip. Full skirt, blouse, a light coat to accentuate your ladylike air. Headscarf, scarf, necklaces, earrings, bracelets. Rings. Hair in buns. Rollers. Hairpins, hairgrips, hairbands, and a wildflower behind the ear. A love charm. And men? Just a pair of shorts, pants and a shirt. Free to jump, run, and hunt. Lord, what a difference!

  I feel like telling all women: Beauty doesn’t lie in the color of your clothes. Or in the softness of your hair. Much less in the harmonious contours of your body. You feel beauty with your eyes closed, when you migrate to the moon in the serpent’s flight.

  Tony arrives, hot and flustered. He doesn’t greet us, and seems angry. He lights a cigarette and smokes furiously, flooding the room with tobacco smoke. We remain cool and silent like the sea just before a storm. He takes an envelope from his pocket and passes it to me to read. I open it. I read. It’s a short letter of farewell. A short, beautiful letter. And it contains an invitation to a wedding, signed by Vito and Lu, who are getting married this weekend. I put the letter back in its envelope and hand it back to Tony, who returns it to his pocket. A quiet growl brings us back to reality. We look at him. His expression is solemn and impenetrable, like that of a wild animal.

  “What have you got to say about this?”

  No one replies. What answer can we give? The inevitable ensues, the news is like a dam bursting. He accuses us and pursues his line of questioning as if we were the real authors of what had happened. Fear rules. We exchange alarmed looks.

  “You all knew about this. You knew and didn’t warn me. In your weekly meetings, you laughed at me behind my back. You made your plans to escape and betray me. You plotted against me, you killed me little by little without my being aware, I was blind, blind, blind!”

  He lets out a sigh, and then another sigh. His confident tone of voice is transformed into a moribund murmur, assailed by the pain of loss. His eyes half closed, he listens to the voice that comes from deep inside him. The departure of the woman he desires is a tragedy, a roll of thunder, death, a tempest.

  “You’ve betrayed me!”

  We exchange looks of alarm.

  “You knew about this all along!”

  No one answers. His eyes sweep over us, looking for proof of our complicity.

  “Come on, girls, talk!”

  There’s dismay. There are many women. Shoals of them. Tons of them. In each man’s hand, they explode like stars in a firework display. There are millions of them. If one dies, another is born. With so many others waiting for a little piece of Tony’s heart, what’s the reason for so much hurt?

  “But there are so many, Tony!” Mauá says by way of consolation.

  “You are mine, I conquered you. I bought you like cattle. I domesticated you. I molded you according to my desires, I don’t want to lose any of you. And you, Rami, should be at my side in the management of my cattle, because that’s why you’re first wife. You should guide the others in the steps they take. Ensure the conjugal fidelity of each one. But you stood there with your arms folded and allowed everything to pass. You were against me, me who led you to the altar steps and gave you the status of queen over my womenfolk. In your women’s meetings, only your own interests seem to count.”

  Tony talks a mile a minute. There’s a hint of foam at the corners of his mouth. Tears are welling up inside him. Deceived by one, deceived by all. Putting up with one woman’s impulses is deadly, putting up with five is hell. A horse whinnies with joy when free of its load. A good Samaritan appeared and wants to relieve him of his hell. Why does he react like this? These men are difficult to understand.

  “Who’s going to be the next one to deceive me? Is it you, Rami? Is it you, Saly? Is it you, Ju? Ah, Ju, I know you’re faithful to me. You always wanted me as your husband, certificate in hand, in front of an altar and wearing a veil. You who deviated from your own life’s path for my sake, are you going to betray me as well? I have no doubts at all about Mauá. You are beautiful, Mauá. You’re a Makua and a mermaid from the island of perdition. When you pass by, everyone marvels. You’ll leave me, I know.”

  Mauá opens her mouth to say something but then remains silent, observing the magic formula for dealing with alarming situations: Keep quiet, don’t speak, don’t raise your eyes to see.

  “Lu’s fiancé has the same name as my youngest son. Is that a coincidence? Or was her romance going on before the child was born? Is it mine?”

  A volley of poisoned arrows has been aimed at our chests. And our blood is flowing, thick and black, along the pathways of this world. We are all huddled together like ostriches. With our heads tucked under our wings. The day has arrived for us to free the roots of the baobab tree from the soil. The tree with the good fruit will remain. There are more than enough fruit trees whose fruit are as sour as lemons. But why are we so sour, dear God, why? Women are gentle shade when well watered. When the soil
is damp, women offer the world a green that is softer than velvet. Than silk. But in this home, all we have is salt and sourness. All we have is pain and thorns. This soil is a desert. This home is torment.

  “And the other children, are they mine? The ones from Rami may well be, at least the first ones. From Ju, all of them probably are. This poor woman doesn’t have eyes for any other man in life except for me. From Mauá, I don’t know. From Saly, I also don’t know. Even with Rami, maybe none of them are mine. A woman who allows herself to be kutchingered when her husband’s still alive isn’t worthy of trust. Any trust at all!”

  I feel like abandoning this home, right now! Traveling through this life, directionless. Seeking out new terrain. But they say badly kept trees die when they’re transplanted. My wings are broken, I’m scared of flight.

  He gazes at his right hand. He turns it over and over, as if he were in front of a palm reader.

  “I’ve lost my middle finger. My hand is no longer the same. It’s lost its shape. Lu was my middle finger. I’m not the same person anymore.”

  “But we’re still here,” Saly exclaims. “We’re here. Are four women enough for you?”

  “Yes, they’re enough. But what will everyone say? All the men will laugh at me. Everyone will doubt my virility and I’ll be a laughingstock. They’ll say I’ve entered the andropause. That I’m losing my potency. That I left the cage door open through incompetence.”

  I begin to get worried. His anger is going to find an outlet against me, I know. I’m the one who’s going to have to put up with all the raving that’s bound to come, it has always been like that. He’ll come to my arms and sing his age-old song. Rami, it’s your fault. You were here, but you allowed me to fall in love with the others. You didn’t keep a grip on me. You let me travel through other pleasures and I got lost. You allowed me to taste other charms, and I ended up becoming a polygamist. Why didn’t you bewitch me, Rami? You allowed me to fall under other spells. Why didn’t you put a spell on me, Rami, why didn’t you bewitch me? Oh, what a wretched fate. If I’d bewitched him, what would his family have done to me?

  “Rami?”

  “Yes, Tony!”

  “It’s all your fault.”

  “I already knew that.”

  The air I breathe has become acrimonious. The string always breaks at its weakest point. It’s the cycle of subordination. The white man says to the black man: It’s your fault. The rich man says to the poor man: It’s your fault. The man says to the woman: It’s your fault. The woman says to her son: It’s your fault. The son says to the dog: It’s your fault. The dog barks furiously and bites the white man, and the white man once again angrily shouts at the black man: It’s your fault. And so the wheel turns century after century ad infinitum.

  “I’d never understood women,” he says between his tears. “The pain of love is harsh, but women put up with it day in, day out. Women only have one man and when they lose him, they never know whether they’ll get another one, but they take their pain. I’m going to be left with four women, but I can’t take it. A man wasn’t made to suffer, I can’t bear it, I can’t take it, I’ll die. But things aren’t going to stay like this, no, oh no!”

  He goes over to the cabinet and pours himself a drink. He drinks. He puts the glass down and leaves. He gets in his car and drives off at high speed. We guess what’s going through his mind. There’s going to be a festival of violence unleashed on Lu, that’s what we all predict. I phone Lu to warn her. We lean on the windowsill. We watch Tony getting into his car. Clutching the steering wheel with all the aggression in the world. Dear God, he’s so furious, he’s going to kill someone. He shoots off at high speed without any respect for the law of the road, priorities, or pedestrians.

  I’m overcome by a wave of panic. Good God, he’s going to kill someone! And if he kills Lu, I shall suffer remorse for the rest of my life, morally I shall be the author of her death. I take Mauá’s car and head off in pursuit. I reach Lu’s block and rush up the steps two at a time. The door’s wide open. I look inside. I can’t hear shouting or even voices. I clutch my belly. I feel dizzy. Lord! I came to give my help expecting to find a scene of violence, and all I meet is silence. Could it be I’ve got here too late? I tremble. I go in.

  The two of them are sitting face-to-face in the lounge. I see Tony. Instead of shouting and blustering, he sits there stiffly, looking at her. I’m appalled. He looks spellbound, bewitched, and he’s crying like a child. His heart pounding anxiously. Imploring. His male pride detached and floating in midair. All that’s left of the man is a lump of flesh begging for pity. Dear God, I’d rather watch anything in life than my Tony humiliating himself for the love of another woman, before my very eyes. I’d rather he behaved like an injured male, I’d rather he yelled, beat her, bit her. But he’s like a castrated bull. And he gazes at her with that look of an ox defeated by the plow. Lu’s spirit is ascending. She’s the angel floating on high. She’s left for other embraces, she’s gone for good. After a long silence, he opens his mouth and beseeches her.

  “Why are you leaving, my darling Lu?”

  “Because the time has come.”

  “You’re mine!”

  “Where’s your certificate of ownership?”

  “I paid the bride price.”

  “That’s not enough.”

  “Give me back the bride price I paid.”

  “Certainly. Double, if you wish. But before that, give me back all the happiness I gave you.”

  “Leave me my children and go.”

  “What paternal rights do you want, if you were never a father in any sense of the word?”

  “We built this home together, Lu.”

  “Home? It’s a dove’s nest at the top of the pine tree. Along comes the storm and the eggs get carried away by the wind. Your hurried kisses were like morning dew, they didn’t even moisten the tongue.”

  “I’ve got so much love to give you, Lu. So much love. If you want, I’ll leave the other women and just be with you.”

  “Really?”

  “Oh, Lu! You’re leaving such emptiness behind. You’re taking my heart with you. And my heart has so much love for you, don’t go!”

  “Yes, I’m going.”

  “I’ll kill you!”

  “Kill me then. What are you waiting for?”

  “Why are you leaving me, Lu?”

  “I want to be a legally married woman with a ring on my finger. I want to be led to the altar steps with a veil and everything. Give me all that, and I’ll stay.”

  Tony searches for an answer to parry this blow. Never before had he felt the pain of rejection. He goes back in time and recollects. Lu wound round his body like a serpent. Her ardent body enveloping him in the struggle of love and death, until the game balanced out in a tie, two-two, four-four. He recalls the sighs, the pauses, the passion. Now another man is going to take possession of that body. He becomes emotional and starts talking nonsense. His voice sounds like a toad’s call. An old toad who has lost the best of his vocal tones serenading out on the marshes.

  “How are you going to love someone else if I give you everything that is best? You have a house. Clothes. Food. Home. Children. A husband for a week in every four. Why are you leaving, without even consulting me? What bad have I done? Can’t you see I love you, Lu?”

  “I love you too, can’t you see?”

  “Ah, you wretched woman! Go if you want, you’ll never find another man like me. You’re going to remember me because you’ll be unhappy. You’ll miss me, you’ll see. You’ll beg to come back to my arms on bended knee, and when that happens, the one who’ll spurn you will be me, you ungrateful strumpet!”

  He tries to give her one last punch in the face. A farewell blow. To get his revenge and turn her into a bride with a swollen eye on her wedding day. His arm is a weapon. He closes his fist like a sling. He punches. But the gesture is slow and weak. His attack is silent, uninspired, without spirit. She dodges him and the fist is lost in the air
. He holds both her arms and shakes her like a bush. But Lu is a spider. A scorpion. A wasp. She’s the one who attacks. She gives him a deep, vampire bite on his fat arm, which draws blood. He lets her go with a howl: Murderer!

  It’s a miracle, but he doesn’t react. He feels the bite on his most sensitive side, that of the heart. The wound burns. The wound bites. The wound covers his weeping body with a red blanket. In despair, he raises his eyes to the sky, whose deep gray night contains tones of purple. He looks at the draft of air carrying bits of red dust. The red of his blood. He seeks help from Saint Valentine, who is lost somewhere up there along the heavenly pathways. But the sky is red. The clouds are red, and have formed a red barrier that has made Saint Valentine’s image invisible. I look at Lu with surprise and rage. Her love never equaled that which was dedicated to her. But love is much stronger when one parts, just as the last kiss is the greatest of all kisses.

  I take off my headscarf and turn it into a bandage to staunch the flow of blood. My God, it’s a deep wound and is going to leave a scar. The mark of her teeth is a tattoo to remember her by. Each time he looks at it, he’ll sigh: Lu, my darling Lu, whom I loved so much and who left for someone else’s arms.

  I feel an immense pain, as if that wound were mine. I’m overcome by a wave of jealousy, he loves this woman Lu more than he does me. So be it, I accept. Love is sublime, it can’t be manipulated by human hands. It comes, it touches us and marks our heart with deep scars. Love is a superior emotion, it flies loftily and perches wherever it wishes. Love is independent, it cannot be bought, it cannot be sold. It’s a breeze that comes and goes, enters the breast and settles there without asking permission. It is born and dies wherever it pleases. It’s the magical tone of a rustic flute that enchants and causes the soul to soar. It refreshes like the waters of a spring and fortifies the spirit. When it feels it is necessary, it can be more violent and destructive than storms. Love is a diamond. It is as ephemeral and eternal as a speck of dust.