‘Well? Are you going to keep me waiting? Yes or no?’
She says yes. And from that yes comes a wedding and later the child in the photograph, too. A girl. In the photo she is not much older than eleven. She looks like Jean-Paul. Her face is round. Her eyes large. She is frowning. Her mouth pouts. She has Jean-Paul’s temper.
In the background of the photo one can see a blur of emerald green. Trees? Or Marie’s garden?
Sometimes when I visit him now, after all that has happened, I see that Jean-Paul is still living in a city, yes, but he has a room right at the very top of the tallest apartment building he could find. When he looks out of his bedroom window, all he can see is blue sky and clouds and, when it grows dark, the strange starless sky of city nights. He has to look down to see the cars and the bustle of urban life. The pedestrians and minibus taxis. They are like distant irritations. He has created a garden on the flat roof of that building, too, among the television aerials, crooked like scarecrows. A garden sown in pots and all sorts of discarded containers. Some are metal, some wood. There are even old tyres. And in them Jean-Paul grows flowers and vege tables: tomatoes, spinach, onions and all manner of greenery, thick like sea foam. A rural garden up in the urban sky. That is what my old friend has made for himself in his new home. That is where he escapes and talks to ghosts. Sometimes, on clear days, he stands on that roof and feels the warmth carried by the concrete and the breeze. He imagines that in the distance he can see his home country and, within its borders, his village. He stands and looks. Then turns away. No, he cannot go back. Even if they have forgotten his face, he has not forgotten theirs.
But such gardens were still far away that afternoon when Jean-Paul and I made our way to Fabric City and he told me for the first time of his wife who liked nothing better than fresh flowers cut from her own garden.
‘OK, everyone, have a good evening. I’m going out.’
David looks handsome. He is freshly showered and is wearing a red V-neck jersey and pressed black trousers.
‘Who are you going with?’
Peter is standing in front of David, blocking his access to the front door. He came home early today in a strange mood and has been drinking for the past three hours. In his hand there is a litre bottle of Castle Lager. It is almost empty.
David looks at his brother, confused and a little offended. ‘What do you mean, who am I going with? I am not five years old, you know, and you are not our parents.’
David smiles, but Peter doesn’t smile. His expression is tight and serious.
‘Are you going with Jeremiah?’
David shakes his head and looks exasperated. ‘Yes, I am going with Jeremiah.’
‘And where are you going?’
‘Oh, fuck off, Peter. This is ridiculous.’ David tries to push past, but Peter stands firm.
George and I are watching this from across the room from our seats by the kitchen table. We both look at each other. We have never seen the brothers behave in this manner before. George shrugs his shoulders.
David stands up straighter and grits his teeth. He is clearly extremely irritated but is trying not to show it. Peter, a little drunk, sways in the doorway.
‘We are going to a bar, brother,’ David replies, his voice a dangerous hiss.
The two brothers are staring straight into each other’s eyes. Identical twins, I think to myself, but so different. Peter’s eyelid is hanging even lower than usual because of the drink. He has taken off his work shirt and is standing barefoot, in just his vest and jeans. There is some sort of brown stain on his vest. David would never do that. Stand around in dirty clothes. I can’t look at Peter. He shouldn’t be speaking to David like this.
George shakes his head and lights a cigarette. I watch the tip of it glow red. George tosses the match onto his empty plate and leans back. His cellphone beeps and he picks it up.
‘Tell me, what sort of bars do you and your friend Jeremiah go to, hey? Not the bars on Long Street. So what bars?’
But this is one question too many for David. He pushes past his brother and slams the door behind him.
George opens his mouth to speak, but Peter holds up his hand to indicate no. No questions. Peter switches on the television and sits down on a crate. He turns up the volume so that talking is impossible.
I bite my lip. I do not want David to go out with Jeremiah tonight either. I want him to stay with me. But still, I do not understand Peter’s rude behaviour.
George is sucking on his cigarette and composing an SMS.
‘George?’ I say softly.
He gives me a look as if to say We are all on edge and goes back to his SMS.
Later, when David gets back I ask him in private: ‘Where do you and Jeremiah go, when you go out together?’
But David does not like my question. He is vague: ‘Where? Oh, here and there. Sometimes to, you know, a film.’
I am a slave to my curiosity. I need to know, even though I can see it is annoying David.
‘Come now, Chipo, no more questions. I need to sleep, OK?’
And then David stops coming home some nights.
I wake in the night. A thought is troubling me. The girl in Jean-Paul’s photo. The daughter. What happened to her?
Twelve
Another week. Another step closer to the World Cup. I have overheard whispering. People stand in groups in Mountain Dew and talk in low, nervous voices. In the queues at the taxi rank, they speak in their own languages – languages they know the locals cannot understand.
‘What should we do? Should we stay or go?’
As I pass the cafés and bars, young men, seated around tables on the pavement, debate in low, serious voices over their beer or Coca-Cola.
In my mind, I imagine what they are saying. Is it better to go now? Before any troubles? Should they just throw away everything? The new lives they have created?
We in the flat try to keep busy.
One night, David and Jeremiah stay in to play chess. Jeremiah is laughing. David has made a foolish error.
‘Five moves, my friend. Five moves and checkmate! A world record!’
He is laughing so hard his eyes are watering. It looks like he is crying.
Choirboy hangs his arm around his friend and, still laughing, pulls him close. He looks like he is embracing David, like he is pulling David to his heart.
Jeremiah rhymes with ‘love thy neighbour’. The Bible commands, ‘Love thy neighbour as thyself’. Mama read that passage to us, and other passages too. Not often, but when she did we were expected to pay attention. I remember her sitting with her Bible on her lap, quietly reading to herself one afternoon. She was already sick but we didn’t know it yet. But I see it now, looking back. I see her skirt held up with a belt that every few months she was forced to tighten by another notch. Old Trafford was gone and she made a meagre living selling rock buns at the bus terminus. She was sitting on the large plastic bucket with a lid that she sold her buns from. It was a good day – she had sold almost all of them. The rest would be our dinner.
She is sitting in the half-light, reading by the window. The breeze causes the onion-skin pages to rustle. She has not taken off her woollen hat or jacket. She is cold all the time. She is tired. Outside, the evening noise has begun. Music is filtering through open doorways – gospel and rumba imported from the Congo, as people try to dance and drink away their sorrows. But Mama is reading. And as she reads, she weeps.
These are difficult weeks. The sky seems permanently overcast. So do our moods. Sometimes Jean-Paul will fall into one of his depressions. These last longer than before. Three, even four days. I worry he will disappear for good, like water sucked down the plughole.
I have no one to talk to when Jean-Paul’s door is closed. David is always with Choirboy when he is not working, and Peter and George only have time for their women and the television.
I don’t know how my brother coped before this television came into his life. Sometimes I think he needs it to pump
oxygen into his lungs.
‘We work hard. We need our rest,’ he says defensively.
Then he tells me to fetch him a beer from the fridge, quick-quick. If Jean-Paul isn’t working, he makes a point of adding, ‘since you’ve got nothing to do’. I don’t know how he thinks his dinner gets made and his shirts washed.
‘Maybe Mr Congo needs a head doctor,’ George said the last time Jean-Paul was under the weather. But I told him straight that there is nothing wrong with Jean-Paul and that George shouldn’t talk that way about his elders. Then I added that Mama would be vexed if she heard him being so disrespectful. That always tends to shut George up. I don’t think he likes the idea of Mama’s spirit looking down on him, disappointed by his lax manners. Also, Jean-Paul always pays me, no matter what. He is a man of his word, and that deserves respect.
After I have finished my chores, and if Jean-Paul is locked in his room, I try to keep myself busy by watching what is happening on Long Street. Once or twice I have taken myself back to the art museum. When I go, I talk to David in my head or I think of clever things to say about those paintings and lumps of metal so that, next time we go, he will know that I have more than samp for brains. George doesn’t mind where I go these days, so long as I don’t spend money. He says we’ve got to save in case the manure falls from the sky in July after all.
‘We need to prepare for the worst.’
The worst sounds like thirst. Every day these past six months, my thirst for David has grown worse and worse. David says there are horses that live in Namibia, the country north of South Africa, who have learnt to live in the desert with nothing but stones to eat. But I am not such an animal. I need more.
‘Let’s go to the science museum. Please, David.’
And my heart lights up as though a thousand watts of electricity run through it when he agrees. That is where we are walking to now. To the museum. I want him to touch me. He is standing right beside me, so all I would need to do would be to lean a little to the left. But I am afraid that then he will know all that I have brewing inside. What I have stirring feels more potent than any batch of Mama’s Seven Days beer. I turn to look at the cars. When I watch their wheels as they pass, how fast they spin, I become dizzy, then frightened. David is still talking. Recently he has said that he would like to become a teacher.
‘Secondary school.’
School sounds like fool. Sin sounds like spin. Christians believe that sin sends you spinning down to hell. That is what they teach in Sunday school. If you just take his hand, Chipo…
The robot’s red man turns green. We cross. The sign of the cross is supposed to protect you from evil spirits. Mama did believe that. It can bring luck too. Before Manchester United played, Mama would make the sign of the cross. It gives you quick access to God.
When I was six and George nine, George believed he could run super-fast. For two whole months, he made me time him as he ran the length of our street and back again.
‘How… fast?’
‘Seventy-two.’
‘What? That’s slower than last time. Learn how to count properly.’
He had seen a programme on television about a bionic man. Then, when he came third on sports day, he stopped believing.
Inside the museum there are many wonders, like the rare bones of dinosaurs and dead animals stuffed so that they look alive but frozen in time. But all I can think of is David. He is talking about this and that. He points to the skeleton of a giant fish. It hangs across the entire ceiling, big as a shack.
‘That’s a whale. Largest mammals on earth. People called them Leviathans. They travel past Cape Town on their way to Antarctica.’
There is a small chamber. When you sit inside it you can hear whales singing to one another. Their songs sound full of longing.
‘Did you ever want to study at university, Chipo?’
‘I wanted to be a nurse, or a social worker.’
‘You could go back to school, you know. You would make a fine social worker.’
I remember Jean-Paul’s client. The one from Ghana who wants to be a nurse.
‘May I tell you a secret?’
A secret? My heart stirs.
‘Of course, David. You know I can be trusted.’
‘I know, Chipo. In you, I feel I have found another sister.’
‘A sister…?’
‘Jeremiah and I are planning on going back to university. To the University of the Western Cape. UWC. We met some students. They came to the restaurant and told us about applying. Anyway, this time I will apply to do literature and education. Like I always wanted.’
‘That’s wonderful, David.’
Sister? Like a sister? Is that what he said?
Sister. Spinster. On the way home, David stops in front of a shop window. There is a T-shirt for sale. Its slogan reads: ‘A Woman Needs a Man Like a Fish Needs a Bicycle’. On it there is a drawing of a fish pedalling a bicycle.
‘I can understand why some women feel that way,’ David says, standing in front of the window. ‘Most men are not worth the trouble.’
‘If I were a fish I would want you for my bicycle.’
David looks at me, surprised, and laughs.
‘You are a true eccentric, Chipo! Come, I had better get you home before George worries.’
Later in the afternoon David comes home with a carrier bag full of second-hand books from Clarke’s bookshop. Poetry and a collection of plays. Writers I have never heard of. David arranges them very carefully in a pile.
‘I am going to start with Athol Fugard’s The Island. No man is an island. That is a famous expression.’
‘David. I would like to, the thing is, what I was trying to say earlier, outside the shop—’
‘I have met this girl at the restaurant, Chipo. A student on the course. She told me what they are reading. I thought I would start. Jeremiah says it’s good to be prepared, and I think he’s right.’
My blood runs cold. A woman?
‘Is she… What is her name?’
‘Patience.’
Patience is a virtue.
‘Is she, is she pretty?’
‘What? Yes, I suppose.’
David’s cellphone rings.
‘Hello? Hi, yes yes. See you tonight. Wouldn’t miss it. One second… Chipo?’
I have locked myself in the bathroom. From inside I hear David say, ‘Oh, she’s gone. I wanted to ask her about my black trousers…’
Mismatch.
Misread.
Misrepresent.
Misaim.
Misfire.
Misspent.
Mistake.
Mistake sounds like break. Sometimes we break something by mistake.
Thirteen
The student. She is all I can think about. Patience rhymes with? Sounds like? Patience is a virtue. What does she look like? Talk like, laugh like, smell like? She talks into his ear. Smiles. He smiles back. Thinks about burying his nose in her neck. That evening I burn the rice and do not stir in the peanut butter. When I wash the dishes, one slips onto the floor and cracks. I stop and leave the pots and remaining dishes in a dripping heap. He didn’t mean to hurt you, Chipo. That is what I try to tell myself as I pick up the broken pieces and drop them into the bin.
I go and stand by the window. Everyone is out, as usual. They ate and left, leaving Tortoise to do their cleaning. George is at the restaurant, where he is working night shifts this week. Peter is no doubt in a bar. And David? Where is he?
Patience is a woman of lax virtue. What kind of woman throws herself at waiters in restaurants? The kind who exposes an immodest cleavage.
From the window I can see it. The night they met. Is she white? A murungu who likes her chocolate dark? No, David would never go for that. She is an African, for sure. A local girl with an appetite for exotic amakwerekwere flavours? Or could she even be from Zimbabwe? A homegirl like me? No, not like you, Chipo. Nothing like you. I see them now. She has asked him to meet her at a bar. Somewhere in this
city. Maybe even on Long Street. Her. David talking to her. She will be sitting at the bar, drinking like a prostitute. Skirt very short. He will admire her jacket. Her legs. Her skin. I see it. I know it. David mouthing the words into her neck, ‘Hmmm, mambokadzi, you smell so good. Let’s see each other again tomorrow.’
By the time David finally comes in, tiptoeing like a thief, I feel as though a hand has squeezed all the blood from my heart. I can no longer think in sentences. Only words. She. Him. Them.
The next morning, I cannot speak. Do not dare to feel. My heart feels soaked in vinegar. I dress and wash automatically. Make breakfast. I do not greet David when he wakes. As soon as I can, I leave the flat to deliver Jean-Paul’s clothes.
After the last delivery, I decide not to go back. I need to walk. I think about George squeezing mango juice for the General’s wife on that last afternoon, when the General’s jealousy came trembling across the tiles to the servants’ quarters. He threw her out. Threw her out for humiliating him and forcing him to expose his jealousy. Jealousy sounds like melody. There is no melody in my heart. Only a violent, noisy hopelessness. No one will ever marry you, soooope.
A memory. There is shouting outside. I am twelve. Two boys, primary-school age, are fighting in the dirt, pulling at each other’s school shirts. They both fall into a heap, and the smallest is punching the other boy’s chest as their soccer ball rolls away from them and their school bags spill their exercise books.
‘Ha, you are last, so you must marry Chipo!’
‘I will not marry Chipo.’
‘Yes, you will. That was the bet. And you are last!’
The small boy looks at the other, looks at me and kicks dirt into his friend’s face.
Zebra Crossing Page 10