House of Stone

by Novuyo Rosa Tshuma

  They became more vivid, my dreams; I beheld The People pounding on the doors of the Presidential Palace. In the sky, vultures were circling. It seemed as though the near-death of their morality had strengthened their will to live. And not just to merely exist, no; but rather to live with desperation at the helm of things, carolling an ode to life.

  The People in my dream began to run. But they were not fleeing, no; just running, carrying balloons and throwing confetti all over the place, and babbling in many languages, in Ndebele and English and Shona and Karanga and Venda and Nguni and all of the languages of the world. Before us, in the middle of the City Hall Square, a great golden monument had been erected; a towering isosceles triangle, on whose apex reared a magnificent bull, glinting in the sun. People knelt by the base and placed flowers and wreaths and letters and all sorts of trinkets. Along the gleaming sides of the triangle were names, thousands of names, of our dead, etched all the way up to the apex. I elbowed my way through the crowds to the monument, and there, shoulder height, was etched the name: Zodwa Nsele Khathini: Bhalagwe,’83.

  I fell to my knees and broke out in song.

  Forbidden Fruits

  Christmas is two weeks away. Christmas is two weeks away and decorations have sprung up all over town and in the stores where there are discounts and seasonal goodies; in the townships old knick-knacks have been dusted and tinkling little bells fastened to the gates and plastic Christmas trees put up in living room corners and everyone is happy happy joy joy.

  Everybody, that is, except for my surrogate family. Early this morning, I woke up to a terrific din and I knew immediately that my surrogate father was up to his violent shenanigans again. I ran into the house and this time I told myself that I would kill him for laying hands on Mama Agnes. But MaNdlovu, our nosy neighbour, had already beaten me to it, not the killing of my surrogate father, but the scene of the crime, where she had managed to insert herself between them and was clinging to my surrogate father, who was trying to reach Mama Agnes cowering behind her. Upon seeing me, Mama Agnes made a dash for it, rushing past me and out of the living room, sobbing, to the bathroom where we heard the click of the lock. The pipes shuddered, there was a splash, and then running water drowned her sobs.

  MaNdlovu left soon afterwards, no doubt to spread the news of what has happened, not of the beating itself, which isn’t so scandalous around these parts, but the reason for the beating, which is super scandalous, and so will soon be known all over the township and beyond.

  For, today Mama Agnes and the Reverend Pastor made the papers. Their picture is splashed on the front page of The Chronicle, beneath my artful work of Sister Gertrude and the Reverend Pastor.

  Yes, I informed on the bastard! He really thought I would be satisfied with just the return of my laptop? He, who had sought to usurp me from my Mama Agnes’s affections, to dislodge me from the bosom of my own (surrogate) family? I had flicked through my Red Album while wondering what to do, and I found the answer written in the returning stare of Black Jesus: show no mercy.

  I had gone to an internet café, set up an anonymous email account and simply sent the pictures of him and Sister Gertrude to our nation’s informer hotline. The best way to take care of your enemy is by handing him over to his enemy, and this loudmouth Reverend Pastor has earned himself some serious enemies in high places with his weekly tantrums in the independent papers. And now, they’re doing to him what they did to that other out-spoken critic of the government, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Bulawayo, earlier this year, in a video of him fucking some woman that was all over the eight o’clock news.

  It was Mama Agnes’s picture with the Reverend Pastor, second in a string of photos of the man with various other women, that robbed me of the pleasure I would have derived from my artisan-ship. Their picture, Mama Agnes and the Reverend Pastor, on its own, without the surrounding innuendo, is innocent enough; it’s a zoom-lens shot of them sitting cross-legged in a patch of wild grass by a river, the Mguza River where they go to collect holy water, I’m guessing. An indecipherable book, which looks like the Reverend Pastor’s King James bible, is lying face down on the grass between them. It is all innocent enough, until you look back at my damning photo featuring Sister Gertrude, and then read the caption:

  ANTI-MUGABE PASTOR ENSNARED IN SEX SCANDALS

  Look again at the picture. What do you see? No longer Mama Agnes and the Reverend Pastor, but a man and a woman, seated by that secluded Mguza River where they can get on with their holy business without interruption. And between them is a black, ominous book, on which the article helpfully speculates: what sort of diary-of-terrorist-fondling-and-political-frolicking is the little black book? The pastor is a buttock-kissing British puppet parading as a man of God, the article goes on to say, who was thrown out of the Catholic order a few years ago for just this kind of devilish behaviour. A hypocrite, a hyena dressed as an impala, a Judas of Judases. A cockroach, an informer, a virus. A Traitor of the Struggle. And is the fool not married, busy as he is frolicking with half his congregation? And frolicking with his congregation he is, for beneath this scathing attack, accompanying the photos, in a neat row like a grocery list, are the names of those Ladies of the Church, the Reverend Pastor’s impressive concubinage who have been each of them supplicating at different times and locations to the Reverend Pastor’s phallus. And right there, at the top of the list, for, like any serious list listing important things, it goes in alphabetical order, is Mama Agnes’s name.

  (My Mama A! Of course, I wanted to end the Reverend Pastor, swat him like the pesky fly that he is, but I never imagined that Mama Agnes would be collateral!)

  We are doing a poll, ends the article. Which of these women do you think has been a flattering Hagar, and which a bashful Bilhah? Email your suggestions, and tell us why! The results shall be published next week in our Monday edition. Merry Christmas!

  If you look at the photo closely, having read this front page article, which is mostly pictures and grocery list and very little in the way of substance, you begin to notice new elements, such as the apparent tension between the Reverend Pastor and my Mama Agnes, so obviously sexual, leaping in rays so refined they appear in the photograph as strange, atomic sparks. This tension, understated and implied, suddenly makes my own photographic work, which I thought artful only a few moments ago, seem kitsch.

  See how she leans back in the photo, my Mama Agnes, one hand stretched out behind her to support her slanting position, so that her breasts perk up at the Reverend Pastor. See how her floral dress is riding up her thighs. And the Reverend Pastor, why is he leaning forward like that? They are in tandem, Mama Agnes and the Reverend Pastor, they are in sync, they share a point of view, stand as one at the standpoint, perceive with the same perspective, posit from the same position, look out with the same outlook.

  I felt a sudden pang of tenderness for them both, even for that Reverend Pastor; I smiled at the idea that, beneath the cover of Blessed Anointings, they could rehash the tryst of their youth, no longer Agnes and Reuben, girl and Father, but a woman and a man, freely, nje.

  The woman swayed her hips like Hagar.

  The man touched her like Abram.

  She fluttered her eyes like Bilhah.

  He kissed her like Jacob.

  They began to talk about love.

  ‘What does Corinthians say?’ began the man.

  ‘It says that … “These three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love”…’

  ‘What sayeth it of love?’

  ‘That … “If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing”…’

  ‘That’s right. And you, woman, are full of so much lo
ve.

  I compare you

  to a mare among Pharaoh’s chariots.

  Your cheeks are lovely with ornaments

  your neck with strings of jewels.

  ‘—no no no, listen to me, there’s no need to be shy, look at me, look up, look at me—

  Behold, you are beautiful;

  behold, you are beautiful;

  your eyes are doves.

  ‘So, you see, it is not faith that will carry you, but love …’

  ‘Oh, but I have no love …’

  ‘Oh, but you do …’

  ‘Oh, but I feel so unloved …’

  ‘And yet you are so loving …’

  The man’s lips, balmy like an august morn, kindled the woman in a spiritual rousing. She tasted his tongue, probing her small mouth yes? Her tongue probing yes! back. Man hands gripped her buttocks. The man squeezed her, clutched her, tasted her. The woman moaned; she could feel his body trembling. She pressed into him and quivered. Rubbed herself against his manhood. Hardened years of lust bulged the corona; swollen rivers of ardour ruptured the lips. Flooded the glans; bedewed the vulva. A lick, a shudder. A plunge, a moan.

  How she wanted to sing:

  Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth!

  For your love is better than wine;

  your anointing oils are fragrant;

  your name is oil poured out;

  therefore virgins love you.

  Draw me after you; let us run.

  The sweetness of it!

  I am very dark, but lovely,

  Tell me, you whom my soul loves

  where you pasture your flock,

  where you make it lie down at noon;

  for why should I be like one who veils herself

  beside the flocks of your companions?

  Divinely saccharine.

  My beloved is to me a sachet of myrrh

  that lies between my breasts.

  My beloved is to me a cluster of henna blossoms

  in the vineyards of Engedi.

  Behold, you are beautiful, my beloved, truly delightful.

  Like all things forbidden.

  Sugar flowed, crystalline in its pleasure. Delight ejaculated across her thighs. The smell of spittle and kisses. Sweat and perfume. And the odour of love. Tangy. Sweeter than the Apple that was plucked from the Tree.

  Black Jesus

  Mama Agnes locked herself in the bathroom and refused to come out. She kept the taps running all morning, as though this would dissolve the front news picture of her and the Reverend Pastor, wasting water the municipal didn’t have, just so we wouldn’t hear her sobs, even though her crying was so loud we couldn’t help but hear her anyway. My surrogate father disappeared into the bedroom they shared and reappeared with a knobkerrie. It had a shiny handle, the same walnut colour as Mama Agnes’s skin, and a lumpy head the size of a man’s fist. He swung it in the air, hwa hwa hwa, like a stick-fighter practising his moves. Then he rapped on the bathroom door and demanded that she come out. When she didn’t respond, he banged on the door, threatening to break it down.

  ‘Promise me you’ll be reasonable,’ she said.

  ‘I will show you reason, very much,’ he said. ‘You and that pastor of yours!’

  ‘I’m a God-fearing woman!’ she cried.

  ‘Clearly you are afraid of the wrong god. Today, I’m going to teach you what fear is.’

  Again, he banged on the door, demanding that she come out; again, she refused, her entreaties drowned partially by the running water. I stood in the passage, trying to plead on Mama Agnes’s behalf, each time my surrogate father throwing eyes at me like I was a fly bugging his ear.

  Finally, the door unlatched and Mama Agnes came out, quickly ducking behind me. She gripped my arms. Her grasp was firm, her grasp was motherly; it made my muscles spasm.

  My surrogate father swung his knobkerrie, its lumpy head fisting me full in the chest, for Mama Agnes was busy swivelling my upper body this way and that, using me as a shield. My chest heaved, but I stood my ground.

  ‘This mess started when our nanaza went missing!’ Mama Agnes cried. ‘Where is our boy, Abednego, heh? You drove him away! And what have you been doing to bring him back? What, exactly? Because the Reverend Pastor has done plenty, every day he has been praying, he has shown up for me every time—’

  My surrogate father lunged at us, tried to swing the knobkerrie past my head, missed and struck my temple. I staggered and tried to blink back the tears. I could feel my legs folding, but I did not fall, I held firm, held firm for Mama Agnes. I could no longer see properly; shapes were dancing before my eyes and everything refused to remain still.

  ‘It only happened once!’ cried Mama Agnes.

  ‘Liar!’ roared my surrogate father.

  ‘Twice!’

  ‘Hey, wena—!’

  There was a woosh before my eyes, and I imagine he must have been raising his knobkerrie.

  ‘Mrs Thornton!’ I cried, staggering about, my hands swinging from side to side.

  This must have stopped him in his tracks, for I could no longer hear the hwa-hwa sound of a swinging knobkerrie.

  ‘We don’t want another Mrs Thornton!’

  I could hear my surrogate father breathing heavily. Then the tread of his feet on the cement floor reached my ears, getting lighter and lighter, in the direction of the sitting room.

  Mama Agnes helped me back to my pygmy room, all the while murmuring how she was sorry. There she made me lie down on my mattress, on my back, and pressed a warm cloth to my temple. I was suddenly ashamed that she should be in my humble lodgings. I had never felt such shame in her presence before, and it confused me, making my head throb even more violently. I wished I had something nice to offer her, like a cup of Tanganda tea with a slice of lemon. She cupped my face, murmuring how so very sorry she was, she was sorry for everything. Her hands were soft and warm on my cheeks. I tried to lie absolutely still. I could smell her perfume, a soothing, fruity fragrance. Sorry, she kept saying over and over, rubbing a thumb over my pronounced cheekbone, tracing its elegant arc. Something warm spread across my chest. Sorry, she said, so sorry. But it was I who was sorry! Had I not inadvertently informed on her by informing on that wanton Reverend Pastor?

  ‘It is I who is sorry!’ I said.

  ‘Oh, mfanami, you have nothing to be sorry for! It’s just Baba sometimes, he gets a little angry, and then you see …’

  She lifted her warm hands from my cheeks then, and I imagined she was making a gesture of despair, throwing her hands in the air. I wished she’d cup my cheeks again! No one had ever caressed my face like that before. Was that maybe what my mama Zodwa Nsele Khathini’s hands felt like?

  *

  Desperate to save my Mama Agnes from the wrath of my surrogate father and to save my surrogate father from himself, I intercepted him that evening just as he was coming out of the house, to slink off on one of his nocturnal escapades to Mrs Thornton’s grave, I thought.

  ‘I was coming to see you,’ he said.

  ‘Oh!’ I said. It would be easy, then, to neuter him with a dose of ubuvimbo; to talk him down from his anger; to cajole him down from his high horse.

  But for the first time, he wasn’t interested in ubuvimbo. I could see his lips trembling as I dangled my ubuvimbo-laced finger in front of him. And yet, instead of lunging for it as he usually did, he stared at it for a long time, and then slowly shifted his eyes to mine.

  ‘I got this, today,’ he said, slapping a piece of paper onto my lap. ‘From the IT people.’

  I picked it up and pretended to study it. So, that Reverend Pastor had got the findings from his IT guys after all! And this was his pathetic revenge. Well, rot in hell, you quack.

  ‘Oh?’ I said, as though I couldn’t decipher the report. ‘Have they found the boy?’

  ‘You know they haven’t! You know they haven’t because that Face-what account is yours and not Bukhosi’s! It was in your computer!’

  ‘What?’
I said. I held my surrogate father’s stare. I wished it was Mama Agnes, and not he, whom the IT guys had contacted. I could have easily dealt with Mama Agnes; it would have been easy to use her recent shame against her.

  I held out my ubuvimbo-laced finger to Abednego. ‘Here,’ I said, ‘this will make you feel better.’

  But he whacked my finger aside. ‘Where is my son?’ he said.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘Why are you looking at me like that?’

  ‘I’m going to the police. You are going to tell them where my son is. And if you don’t, I’m going to kill you. I’m going to kill you with my bare hands!’

  I grabbed his arm. He tried to yank it away, but I held on to him, pulling him down. ‘Wait,’ I said. ‘You have it all wrong, the IT guys are lying, why would I—’