I hugged my album, hugged it and thought of that Reverend Pastor. It was in this way that I finally fell asleep.
The Commission of Inquiry
I was hoping that Reverend Pastor would forget about his nonsense from last night, but the man is persistent, he was back in our yard early this morning to collect my laptop. I heard him outside my pygmy room talking to Mama Agnes and my surrogate father, urging them to wake me up so he could ‘get down to business’. It was Mama Agnes who came for me; I pretended to be asleep, but it was no use; her knocks got progressively louder and more urgent, until I had no choice but to call out sleepily, ‘Mama Agnes, is that you? What’s happened?’
She tried the door, but I had bolted it. ‘I’m not dressed,’ I said, although I was in my pyjamas. But even this could only stall her; she insisted that I come out, that the Reverend Pastor was here and needed my computer. Those were her words, ‘needed my computer’. Needed what? If the man was so desperate for a computer he should have got his own!
I took my time dressing, making sure to slide my Mac underneath my sheets, next to my Red Album, before finally stepping out. They were congregated right outside my door, my surrogate father’s arms folded across his chest, Mama Agnes looking up expectantly, a smile spreading on her face, the Reverend Pastor grinning stupidly behind her.
‘Eh, where is it?’ he said, stepping forward, his hands stretched out. Even at that hour, he was prim and proper in a Canali suit. Did he have a wardrobe of them or what?
‘This is unnecessary,’ I said, turning to Mama Agnes. ‘If we want to know where the boy is, all we have to do is ask him. I have already sent him a Facebook message.’
‘My way will be the faster,’ buzzed the fly. He just would not stop bzz-bzz-bzzing! He squared his shoulders. ‘It will take only a few hours to determine the boy’s location. My guys are already waiting – they will do the job and have your computer back to you by this afternoon.’
‘Yes,’ said Mama Agnes.
‘Stop your nonsense, boy,’ said my surrogate father. ‘Give us the thing, mani. Camun.’ And he beckoned for my laptop.
My precious Mac! Inherited from Dumo, back when he still considered himself my mentor and was only too happy to help me find my purpose. A real, mean machine, was my MacBook, a 2003 model, with a 13-inch screen I took care to wipe down regularly; a beauty, and damn expensive, too.
‘No,’ I said, because I had run out of persuasive things to say.
‘Ah!’ cried Mama Agnes, and I felt a pang, then, in my chest.
‘Heyi, wena, we don’t have time for your nonsense, just give it here, where is it?’
And with that, my surrogate father tried to push past me into my lodgings. Once again, he was bent on humiliating me, this time in front of other people. I stepped in his way, stopping him in his tracks.
‘You know this is the reason Bukhosi ran away in the first place, right? You are bullying the boy, again. Why not simply ask him where he is? That’s what I’ve done, and I’m going to wait for his reply, like a normal person. He will tell us where he is. It’s as simple as that!’
‘Do you know how serious this is?’ buzzed the fly.
‘What you are proposing is illegal,’ I said. I didn’t know whether it was illegal or not, but it certainly sounded so. ‘How exactly are you going to use a privileged conversation online to find out where Bukhosi is? It is illegal. Illegal!’
I was quite shrill by this time, and feeling rather nauseous, and was on the verge of swatting the fly. I spun around to storm back into my pygmy room, but so blinding was my rage that I tripped on the step and was sent sprawling.
‘Are you all right—’
I got up swiftly and, without turning around, slammed the door and bolted it shut. My poor toe was throbbing. I limped to my little put-me-up bed, sat down and took deep breaths. I heard them talking in hushed tones, but luckily, they dared not come knocking on my door again. Eventually, they left. I should have handled things better. I shouldn’t have been hostile to the Reverend Pastor, not in front of Mama Agnes. But I had lost myself, if only for a moment. I had felt quite ill and it was as if … It would win me no favour, I knew. Mama Agnes would not let the matter of the laptop go. I set about writing my fake Bukhosi a message at once, asking him where he was – I had thought of that idea off the cuff earlier when the Reverend Pastor questioned me – and waited for two hours before scripting his reply.
It was late morning by then. I unbolted myself from my lodgings and limped into the house, calling Mama Agnes. I found her in the sitting room, beating the sofa cushions against each other, the mukwa oil cloth on her shoulder. She looked up when I walked in, giving me a strained smile.
‘I have heard back from Bukhosi!’ I announced.
This got her attention. She dropped her cushions, grabbing my Nokia from my hand. ‘What is he saying, where is he, did he tell you where he is?’
‘Yes, Ma. Just like I told you he would! He says he is staying in Berea with some friends, as you can see.’
‘Berea,’ she muttered, scrolling down the Facebook message. ‘What would he be doing in Berea, is this where this girl lives? He could go to my sister Nto in Kempton Park, at least then we’ll know where he is …’
‘I don’t know if he’s with any girl,’ I said. ‘He just says he’s with some friends.’
‘Which friends are these? And he didn’t give an address! Isn’t Berea right next to that dingy neighbourhood, what’s it called …’ Her eyes widened. ‘Hillbrow!’
This wasn’t at all the reaction I had expected. I had thought she would be ecstatic, just like the day before when she read the first message.
‘He says he’s fine,’ I tried again. ‘Look, Ma, we should be happy, the boy, he’s willing to talk to me—’
‘You should have just given the Reverend Pastor your computer. We would have his exact address, the Reverend Pastor said—’
‘The Reverend Pastor and I want the same thing,’ I said in a conciliatory tone, even managing a smile. ‘You can see just how worried he is—’
‘The man of God can’t even sleep—’
‘Amen, Ma. I just think it’s best if we use what we already have, see Bukhosi is already talking to me, he trusts me. We don’t want to do anything that will scare him into running away from us again. Do we?’
‘Oh no, no no no, Thixo, God, no.’
‘Then let us do this the boy’s way. Let him talk to me. Give me a chance to speak to him, I know how to handle him, Ma. Trust me.’
She nodded slowly. ‘Maybe if I gave you Nto’s number,’ she said, her eyes lightening. ‘Yes, let me give you Nto’s South Africa number, tell Bukhosi to call her, I would feel better hearing from her that he’s all right!’
I tried to keep smiling. ‘That’s a wonderful idea, Ma,’ I said, because really, what else could I say? ‘Yes, give me Aunt Nto’s number. I’m sure Bukhosi will be happy to have it.’
I attended the Sunday service at Blessed Anointings with Mama Agnes today. I have only accompanied her there one other time, the Sunday after Bukhosi disappeared, when we went all over the city putting up missing posters of the boy, but I need to figure out this Reverend Pastor and so I’m going to keep him in my sights until I do. I can see that he’s still not satisfied with this laptop business. Mama Agnes gave me Aunt Nto’s phone number earlier this week, and she has been pestering me since. She’s in touch with Nto who hasn’t, of course, heard from the boy. She keeps asking me what the boy has said, and I’ve so far told her that he hasn’t replied, but not to worry, he’ll respond soon. I realize she won’t let this business with Aunt Nto go, and that Reverend Pastor is fuelling her, because each time she asks after the boy she begins with, ‘The Reverend Pastor thinks …’
I have to get him off my back. I can’t just sit here and do nothing, like a hare meekly offering himself to a lion! Surely, there must be something I can do. That Reverend Nobody thinks he’s the man of this house; he’s not the man of the house h
ere, my surrogate father is. No, in fact, I, Zamani, shall be the man of the Mlambo house, the son who protects the family!
As soon as the service was over, the Reverend Pastor gave me the slip. He and Mama Agnes bolted for his car. I followed, and asked to go with them to wherever it is that they were going. Mama Agnes looked flustered, but the Reverend Pastor leaned over and peered at me through the front passenger window of his Mercedes, and said a firm ‘no’; they were going to a special place by the Mguza River to collect holy water, he said, and only anointed prophets and their subjects were allowed there. I should go home, he said, before pressing a button on his car door, winding up Mama Agnes’s window and speeding away.
I took a khombi home, but I haven’t been able to sit still, to watch TV, nothing. Instead, I consulted my Red Album, flipping the pages and asking it, ‘What would you do?’ It helped, talking to my Red Album; in it is everything I abhor, and yet everything as well I yearn for, a father, my father, my mother, to be somebody’s son. Strong family roots in which to build my legacy. Being reminded of this helped to calm me, and I was able to think clearly for the first time in days. I’ve been feeling terrible, panicking, shrinking from my surrogate parents, all because I haven’t been focusing on my redemptive chronicles. Ever since I started gleaning from my surrogate parents their hi-stories, and from this the seeds for my own new hi-story, I have felt myself progress. I have felt an inner change. I am becoming a new person, imbibing fresh stories, a new way of seeing and being, casting away the burdensome identity Uncle Fani thrust upon me on his deathbed. I am beginning, finally, to see the light.
When Mama Agnes came home this evening from her outing with her Reverend Pastor, she found me in the kitchen chopping some onions for a mince stew I was making.
‘And then?’ she said, surprised, for she had never seen me cook.
‘I have the best news, Ma,’ I said, leaning over and kissing her on the cheek – something I’d never done. ‘I finally heard back from Bukhosi.’
‘Oh? Let me see!’
I whipped out my Nokia ceremoniously, and showed her Buk-hosi’s Facebook message. He apologized for having been so quiet, he had gone down to Durban with his friends to see the beach. He would definitely get in touch with Aunt Nto. He missed me terribly, and wished I were there with him. He also missed Ma, especially her cooking – here Mama Agnes beamed – and not to worry, he would call her soon, he just needed some space, that was all, he loved her and missed her, and he was glad to hear I was there for her; that’s what brothers did! He would write soon, and he would be home for Christmas.
Mama Agnes took hold of my hand and began dancing with me in the kitchen. I tried to twirl her around, but there wasn’t enough space, and, laughing, ended up shimmying with her in a bum-jive.
‘Let me call the Reverend Pastor,’ she said, retrieving her Motorola from her handbag. I pried it from her hand and held it high above her head, looking down at her with mock sternness. ‘Ah ah ah. Tonight, I want you here with me, to celebrate this good news. See, I am even cooking for you.’ She laughed, and I could tell she was flattered that I had gone to the trouble of cooking for her. She started making plans for Christmas, what she would cook for Bukhosi, where she would look for the ingredients, despite the fact that Christmas was still a month away.
It’s not lost on me that I was doing the very thing I had scorned my surrogate father for doing, winning back my Mama A through the softness of her stomach. Only, unlike my surrogate father, like a true Mthwakazi warrior I had hunted for the ingredients in this our foodless jungle, and now, I cooked up quite a Sahara storm for my Mama Agnes, refusing her offers of help, telling her she needed someone to spoil her for once, and who better, as Bukhosi had written in his message, than someone he considered his brother.
‘I’m sure if Bukhosi was here, he would do the exact same thing for you, Ma.’
She laughed sceptically, pleasing me no end.
We sat by the cobalt kitchen table, just us two – I had slipped my surrogate father a baggie of ubuvimbo and suggested he go and look for the boy. The food tasted better than I had expected! We dug into platefuls of spaghetti, with a rich mince stew and potato salad, washed down with Mazoe Orange Crush. Nothing but the best for Mama Agnes – and nothing but the best if I am ever to get her to talk to me about the camp.
I imagined us sitting together, me as her son, her as my mama, opening up to me about the terrible things that Black Jesus did at that camp. I vowing to avenge her, kissing her cheeks, wiping away her tears, she beaming at me, her son, her protector, assuring me I was nothing like that man, that she loved me, my particular navy blue skin, my pouting lips, my refined cheekbones. She loved all of me, my mama, I was Bukhosi and she was Mama Agnes. It made my heart giddy, imagining this. I gazed dreamily at her.
‘Ma,’ I said, giving her a sober gaze. ‘Ma. We can no longer deny what Father is capable of. I know it’s hard, but, it’s obvious his violence is what drove my little brother away.’
Mama Agnes looked embarrassed. She averted her eyes. ‘He’s not that bad—’
‘No, Ma, uh-huh,’ I said firmly, shaking my head. ‘You can’t keep making excuses for him. He’s becoming increasingly unpredictable. This business of always disappearing to God knows where at night, the secretiveness. I won’t sleep well tonight, knowing you are all alone here with him.’
She looked frightened then, Mama Agnes. ‘Do you really think—’ she began anxiously.
‘I’ll start on the dishes, Ma,’ I said, getting up abruptly, as though I, too, were getting anxious and eager to change the subject.
She protested, as I suspected she would, helping me to clear the table and insisting that she do the dishes, after all the cooking I had done for her, shuwa. I made a show of demurring, finally relenting and agreeing to let her help. We did the dishes side by side, in the semi-darkness, with flickering candles for light, for the electricity had gone again. I soaped the dishes and she rinsed, placing them in the rack. I tried to stretch those moments, savouring each time our hands brushed as we passed a dish between us, basking in the happiness of mundane domestic tasks. What son would not delight in spending such quality time with his mother? Bukhosi, that’s who!
Afterwards, when it had become clear that bed was the next order of business, I said casually, stifling a yawn, that I probably needed an extra blanket as Bukhosi’s room got cold at night. There was a pause. Then Mama Agnes said all right, she had just the right blanket, nice and warm, and disappeared into her bedroom, appearing in Bukhosi’s room a moment later with a duvet, one of her old ones, for I could smell her sweet perfume on it. By then, I had comfortably lodged myself in the boy’s bed, thinking how I could get used to this.
She made quite a fuss, Mama A, covering me with her duvet, and patting around in the dark to make sure I was properly tucked in, asking if I was OK.
‘I’m not feeling well,’ I lied. ‘I think I ate too much.’
‘Eh, I saw you eating as if for a whole soccer team, bantu!’
I chuckled. ‘Stay with me a while, Ma,’ I said, patting the space on the bed beside me. ‘I don’t want our nice evening to end so soon.’ I meant it.
I could hear from her voice that she was smiling. ‘Just for a few minutes.’
She perched beside me. I sat up on the boy’s bed, and groped about for her hand. It was warm, and her palms were soft, so motherly; she rubbed her hands religiously with Vaseline, and when she couldn’t find Vaseline in the shops, with precious drops of the oil we use for cooking.
This was it. It was now or never. ‘Ma,’ I ventured, massaging her hands. ‘I was hoping you wouldn’t bite my head off if I asked you about Bhalagwe.’ When she tensed I quickly added, ‘I would never disrespect you like that but … I need to know.’
She snatched her hand away, and though I couldn’t see her because it was dark, I could picture her walnut face discolouring. ‘You should know better than to ask.’ She took several deep breaths.
An
d now I played my trump card. If I expected Mama Agnes to share something that left her so vulnerable with me, I would have to be vulnerable with her, too. I lowered my voice. ‘I’m sorry, Ma, it’s just that … my mother, she, she died at Bhalagwe. She was there around the same time as you and I thought maybe you might know her …’
It was she, this time, who grabbed hold of my hand. ‘You poor child! I had no idea—’
‘That’s why I was hoping that maybe if you were to tell me about it, Ma…’
Finally, she pulled away. She sat pensively on the edge of the boy’s bed, her face partially caught in the pale strip of moonlight slanting through the window behind me. Her brow was furrowed. I stared at her and waited, massaging her hand. For a long time, she said nothing. She moistened her lips. She rocked herself to and fro. She looked at me. Looked away.
‘That’s something I can’t talk about,’ she said, finally. ‘I just … I can’t go back there. I can’t.’
‘Maybe if you tried, Ma!’ I said, and then, softening my words, ‘I just need to know what type of place it was for … you know… my mama.’
She seemed to consider this. ‘I can’t, Zamani,’ she said again. ‘I can’t go back there.’
I nodded in the dark, trying to swallow my disappointment.
‘But I can tell you about the Commission of Inquiry.’
I remembered the year the Commission of Inquiry came. It was in ’96. I was thirteen at the time. The news that there was a Commission of Inquiry into what had happened in the ’80s spread across Bulawayo in urgent, hushed whispers. Because one could never be sure, heh? There were ears everywhere, busy itch-itching, itch-itching …
House of Stone Page 24