by Olive Senior
That Rasta driver certainly drove as if he was filled with some spirit, with one hand either on the horn or flung straight out of the window in a salute to other taxi drivers or people on the sidewalks who called out to him, for he seemed to know everyone downtown. “Lion!” they shouted. “Zion!” he shouted back. His radio was thumping out what passed for music, my headache was pounding in time to the drumming, and he was singing along—“When I reach Mount Zion / I gonna—beating out a rhythm with his fingers on the steering wheel. He leaned his body into every curve, which he took at top speed, as I clutched the seat with both hands to keep from bouncing.
I wanted to ask him please to drive slowly, to turn down the radio, to stop singing, but I couldn’t bring myself to do so. After a while I found myself paying more attention to the passing scene than to the driver. We had left all the noise and confusion and crowded streets behind and were climbing up into the hills. Here the streets had nice sidewalks, all the houses were substantial and set far apart and had gates and thick hedges and beautiful lawns and fresh air. I would have enjoyed feasting my eyes on this scene had I not started to worry whether the driver could be trusted, if he was taking me to the right place, if he had put me down as the countrywoman I was the moment he saw me and was planning to take me somewhere to murder me for the few coins in my purse. Which then brought me to another worry, were all the twists and turns he made necessary? Was he prolonging the journey to increase his charge? For it suddenly occurred to me that I hadn’t asked him what the charge would be. I had heard enough of people taken in by the cheating city slickers. I was almost sick with worry by the time he turned down a street of even grander houses than those we had passed and shifted down to a crawl as he started to look for the address.
“What was the number again, Dawta?” he asked.
I was so flustered I couldn’t remember and had to fish in my purse for the letter that had the address on it. He didn’t have to drive much farther before he rolled up in front of number 30. Before I got out, my heart sank as I looked up at the black wrought iron gates that were firmly closed, and the freshly painted white two-storey house set some distance behind an ocean of flower beds and lawn.
The driver turned around to look at me fully then and he must have sensed something in my expression. “This is the place the Dawta want?” he asked in what seemed a kindly voice and he actually smiled, showing several gold teeth. I was surprised to see he was middle-aged, older than I thought from his driving, for I hadn’t looked at him properly when I got in.
I nodded. I paid him what he asked; it was almost half of what I had left. I was shocked at the amount, but still had no idea of whether he had cheated me or not. The street was empty as I got out of the taxi and watched it move off slowly, looking shabby and out of place. I went to the gate and gazed up at the house. I picked up a stone to knock on the metal mailbox attached to the gate to attract the attention of someone inside, for that is what we country folk did. But even though I raised my hand with the stone in it, I couldn’t for the life of me bring it down. It was as if I was suddenly seeing myself in slow motion. My unkempt hair pulled back and knotted at the back with escaping strands like steel wool. My plain cotton dress with my breasts straining against the fabric for it had gotten too small for me. I could see the large sweat stains spreading from under my arms and feel the dampness and rank smell. My feet were stockingless in my one pair of good shoes that weren’t that good anymore as I had bought nothing new for myself since I married. Surely these people inside would take me for a madwoman. Would they recognize me? I was only in my early twenties then, but I knew that my plain and careworn self was that of someone much older. How could Junie claim me? It struck me for the first time that day: what if she didn’t want to? What if she refused to come with me? What if she simply said no and closed her face? During the miserable journey to get there, I had not once thought about that. In the world I occupied, as it was then, children had very little say about what they did or didn’t want. Their job was to obey adults. But in my heart of hearts I knew that obedient and polite though she might have been, her own wishes would matter terribly to me. She had to want to come.
I felt so overwhelmed by everything my entire being began melting away, becoming insubstantial and faint. I knew I couldn’t go through with it. I dropped the stone and held on to the gate, my head bowed, trying to gain control of myself. It took a while, but I finally pulled myself up from that abyss and turned back to the street, with no consciousness of where I was, with no plan in mind. It took me a while to focus. When I did so, I was surprised to see the taxi parked on the grass verge on the other side of the street. It was a dead end, and I suppose the driver had merely gone to turn around. I cringed with shame at the thought that he must have been watching me. How long I don’t know. I had lost track of time. I walked towards him, still with a sense of remoteness, still outside of myself. As he reached behind and opened the back door I got in automatically.
“De I-an-I not dere then?” he asked as I got in and shut the door.
“No”, I said.
“Where the Dawta want to go to now?” He had turned around and was looking at me.
I stared at him, my mind still a blank.
“I-man a forward a bus station, seen?”
I nodded, glad to have the decision made for me. As the car moved off, I found myself sobbing, loud dry sobs. I stuffed my handkerchief into my mouth to stop, and eventually the sobs ceased. I sat, ashamed, for I could see the driver glancing at me in his rear-view mirror from time to time. I noticed that he had turned down the radio and this time he did not sing along. He seemed to drive at a more sober pace too, as if to accompany my mood.
It wasn’t until we were back in the crowded section of town near the bus station that I came to my senses and realized that I would barely have enough to pay for this taxi ride, and once I did so, I certainly wouldn’t have enough to pay for a bus ticket to take me back home.
I had no idea what I would do, and what is more I didn’t care, I didn’t care what happened to me. When we got to the station, the driver turned around and watched as I drew the notes from my purse and fumbled with the coins to make up the amount to what he had charged me before. I held out the money to him. He didn’t take it. Instead, he gave me a searching look and I thought he was going to ask for more.
“De Dawta going far?” he asked. I told him.
“Clear to there?” He made it sound as if I came from the end of the world. I nodded.
He thought for a bit and shook his head. He said, “Is all right, Dawta. I-man was coming back down here anyway.” It took me a while to understand he wasn’t charging me. I stared at him in disbelief. “Jah-jah seh, Not one of my Idren shall go hungry and beg for bread. The I can see you have a heavy burden to bear. Go in peace. Selassie-I.”
I was so confused I’m not sure I thanked him properly as I got out of the car and shut the door. For just then another passenger came up. The driver turned and smiled at me and nodded. I held up my hand in farewell and stood there long after he had driven off, buffeted by the flow of people, struck by the first act of kindness anyone had shown me in a very long time. Then I got hold of myself and pushed through the crowd to find my bus. Before I got on I bought a coconut from the vendor and drank the water, but though he cut the nut in two and offered me the jelly, it couldn’t pass my throat. I was lucky to get a window seat again, and as the bus pulled out I put my head against the woodwork and, despite the rattling and the shaking, I closed my eyes and slept all the way home.
This is the part that really shames me, even now. Throughout that long, awful day I never gave a single thought to my other children. But even before I opened our gate I could hear the uproar from the house. I had no idea what time it was as I didn’t have a watch, but I knew it was late. The house was in darkness. I called out as I walked through the door and was met by instant silence, and then shrieks of “Mama come” and the children exploding around me, all arms and legs.
Ken came out carrying the baby, who was bawling her head off, but she too stopped as soon as I reached out to take her.
“Ken, what’s happening?” I demanded. I knew my guilt and anxiety made me sharp with him.
“Nothing, Miss. Is so they been carrying on all day. From you leave.”
“They’re not hungry?”
“No, Miss. Miss Millie come over and we feed them. They not hungry, Miss.”
“Mass Sam came?”
“Yes, Miss. But him gone again, Miss.”
He must have felt the hardness of my gaze, for he added, “Him just change him clothes and gone from morning, Miss.” He paused, and then finished lamely, “And him don’t come back yet, Miss.”
“He didn’t ask for me?”
“No, Miss. I tell him you soon come, Miss.”
I looked at Ken, suspicious that he was laughing at me, but somehow I didn’t think he was. I was suddenly too tired to question him further.
I was flooded with guilt. I had never before left the children for so long and I hadn’t prepared them for my absence. I silently cursed myself, wondering why I couldn’t be thankful for what I had, instead of setting off on foolish quests. I inhaled the baby’s sour smell and hugged her to me so tightly she started to scream.
I was suddenly overwhelmed by it all, by my hunger, my tiredness, my frustration, the smell of urine and damp, the eerie shadows cast over that dark little house by the one oil lamp that was lit. I felt as if I had seen a possibility of light but then had been dragged back down into a kind of darkness, and for once, and I swear it was only that one time, I was glad that someone had escaped it.
With the baby still in my arms I sank onto my bed. The two other little ones crept into the bed too and curled up tightly against me, their hot, sweaty little bodies stuck like glue. I eased my shoes off and stretched out with my back against the headboard, unable to stop my tears falling, thankful they were too young to understand.
24
I WAS MISTAKEN AS usual, wasn’t I? Many years later when Shirley was grown up and angry with me about something, she brought it up, the whole business of my going off. This was just before she left for New York, and her behaviour was getting as erratic as Junior’s had been. Shirley had gone from placid to flying off the handle for no reason, saying anything that came into her head, no matter how hurtful. This from the child who had been the most loving and thoughtful of all of them.
“She’s the only one you cared about,” she flung at me. “‘Celia this’ and ‘Celia that.’ That is all we ever heard. Nobody else mattered to you. Not even Pops.”
“But—”
“Mama, don’t say a word! You know it’s true. You could never accept the fact that you gave Celia away.”
“Wha—?”
“No, let me finish. Celia was like a little ghost haunting you, haunting me, all of us. She left a hole in my heart too, you know. My sisi! How could she have left me? But after a while I got used to it, pleased that it was just the three of us now, Junior and Lise and me. Celia was some big girl who came to visit and was fun when she was there, but I no longer ached to have her back when she left. And it would have been all right if you had left it alone. But no, you couldn’t help holding her up as a shining star to us. Every day of our lives. It was ‘Celia this’ and ‘Celia that’—”
Shirley was crying now. Tears were running down her face, but she made no attempt to wipe them. I was torn between stopping her outrageous accusations and comforting her.
“Celia could do no wrong while the rest of us could do nothing to please you. You have no idea how sick of Celia I was.”
“But you loved Celia. You idolized her!”
“Well, I did when we were little. Then I couldn’t stand her. I hated her. I wanted her to die. Then you’d care about me.”
Shirley stopped talking and opened and closed her mouth abruptly, shocked at what she’d said. But it also stopped her crying. She took the handkerchief I handed her and wiped her eyes and blew her nose. Then she sat on the bed, looking so sad while I just stood there, unable to move or say anything, my mind all stirred up. Then she sort of roused herself and got up and looked in the mirror and started to turn her head this way and that. At the time she wore her hair in a very short and curly Afro, and she had just had it cut. I knew she was trying to gain time. When she spoke again it was in a much quieter, thoughtful voice.
“I’m glad I’ve got to know Celia now we’re older. Otherwise I would have gone through life hating her. She’s my best buddy now. But how do you think I felt, all of us felt, when we were growing up to have everything we did compared to her? Knowing there was room in your heart for only one person. Have you any idea what that did to us?”
I was trying to think, having no recollection of ever calling Celia’s name aloud, once she left home. Where did Shirley get this from? Maybe when I got a letter I would read it out loud to the others, and her father of course would tell us all about her after he’d been to visit. But me holding up Celia as a model to them? How could I have done that, since I hardly saw her? I suppose I might have mentioned how well she was doing when Shirley or Junior failed something in school. Or what new things she had just accomplished. But it wasn’t as if I was going on about her all the time. That was unfair and I told Shirley so.
“Ha,” she said, “not to mention you sneaking off to visit her all those times and leaving us alone in the house. With nothing to eat all day. Me and Junior and Lise. Alone in the dark. What kind of mother is that? And you carry on about Pops leaving us.”
“Me?” I said. For I was truly confused. I never “carried on” about their father leaving. Never. That was untrue. As far as I recall, I left them only the one time. I never tried to visit Celia again. At least, I don’t think I did. So how did this get multiplied in Shirley’s mind to the point where she was recalling several visits so many years later? And how could she have known of that one abortive visit when I hadn’t told anyone? She soon answered that question. Millie—to whom I had given a not very truthful account of my day, since I had to tell her something. As far as she was concerned, I had gone to take Celia something, something she urgently needed. Millie for once didn’t ask questions, and I could see she didn’t believe a word of it, but I didn’t care. The whole experience left me feeling so ashamed that I vowed never to tell anyone.
“I heard you talking,” Shirley said, “the first time you left us. Talking the next day to Millie. So I knew you had gone to Kingston. To see her.”
“But that was the only time.”
“Mama.” She turned to look at me fully and spoke extra slowly as if to an idiot. “It wasn’t one time. It was many. You just left. You never said where you were going. Never. But I knew, didn’t I? Where else did you have to go?”
That shut me up then, for it so encapsulated my narrow little life. The woman with nowhere to go and nothing to do but beat herself against the cage holding a daughter captive. Only to return defeated time and again. I was so busy with that thought that I never got around to challenging Shirley about all these other phantom visits she had me making. She no doubt took that belief to her grave. I have thought a lot about this, don’t think I haven’t. But I can truly recall only the one time.
25
MAYBE IT DID GRIND us down as a family, after all, caused the first fracture that broke us apart. Shirley’s strange behaviour the day they drove off with her older sister should have been a sign. This was meant to be just another visit with those people, it had been going on for a year or two now, their taking her for the holidays. She always came back for school. But after this time, she never came back, for they offered to send her to boarding school, and paid for it, so it seemed natural that she should spend most of her holidays with them and often the holidays were spent abroad. How could we deny her the opportunity? And so it went. I never saw her as property, no I never did, but they came to own her more and more.
On this occasion the Reverend Doctor and his wife came in thei
r jolly way, all charms and smiles and lollipops and colouring books for the other three, sometimes more substantial gifts, clothes, shoes, and games. Gifts for the ones they hadn’t chosen. Celia as usual was packed and waiting, as if she couldn’t wait to leave.
The goodbyes were said. He opened the back door of his big American car and she got in without a backward glance. He shut the door. She was so tiny she vanished from sight. He went around to the other side to open the door for his wife. The wife looked over at us and smiled and got into the passenger seat. He returned to the driver’s side, got in, and started the car. They both stuck their hands out the windows and waved to us—me, Shirley, and Junior and my husband with Lise on his shoulder.
The car had already started to move slowly down the road when I heard a wail from behind me and saw this little figure running after it, crying out, her arms outstretched. “No no no,” she was calling, “Junie, Junie,” as she stumbled along, her little feet pumping as she tried to keep up, calling her sister by the name we used at home. Suddenly through the rear window I saw Celia’s face, she must have climbed up onto the seat to look out. She wasn’t waving or smiling or anything, just staring at Shirley running after the car, her round face getting smaller and smaller as it picked up speed. As it disappeared round the bend, Shirley threw herself down in the middle of the road and howled with sorrow. I hardly noticed as her father picked her up and tried to comfort her, the blood beginning to ooze from her cheek where she had bruised it on a stone. For all my consciousness was travelling in that car. It was dragging me along until I felt stretched to breaking.
Why Shirley was so upset this time I did not know. Whenever Celia left in the past I would tell the others “Soon come” until “soon come” became a kind of mantra for anything promised. Did Shirley pick up subliminal signals we missed? It took us a while to get her to calm down. I guess I did not understand her heart was breaking. The thing is, Shirley in turn broke little Junior’s heart, you might say. I can see that now. For up to then they were inseparable, almost like twins. But from that day she began to turn against him, showing him an angry face more often than not, choosing to ignore him or show her impatience, for no apparent reason. You could see the boy’s bewilderment, the hurt at these times. He, too, became withdrawn. But after a while this period of estrangement seems to have worn off, and I heaved a sigh of relief that everything was back to normal.