I blamed him for his own death. I maybe even made a little squeal of
joy when the neighbours arrived at the homestead to pay their
respects. It was his careless decisions that left mhamha and I in
enough debt to make us work as labourers on a farm or prostitutes
in the city streets for the rest of our lives. And even then we’d only
be able to pay off an eighth of the money he’d stolen. He ruined our
family, my childhood; my innocence was ripped away from me like
sheep skin being sheared off for wool.
Whenever I heard the door
grinding on the wooden floor, I could visualise him sneaking in like a
robber when the night was pitch black and the village was gravely
silent; his body would be heavily intoxicated by cheap alcohol from
Gavas, the local pub. He’d tip toe into their bedroom to encounter
my sleep deprived witch looking mother. Dark bags under her eyes,
her voice hoarse from weeping, lice-infected straw sticking out from
her scalp, eyes smouldering with vengeance. After that would come
the arguing, the hitting and the slamming against the walls which
would lead to both of them giving up and slouching sluggishly into
bed all day until the sun died back into its slumber.
Repeat.
In the combi minibus, the driver was seated with the posture of a
deflating airbag and did not stop talking about his boring mistress
like a broken static on a radio. People were beginning to get irritated
and simply replied with an unenthusiastic “Hoooo,” .The old man
beside me was bent into a ‘C’ with his head leaning so far down that
his knotted, weed-like beard nearly touched his skinny palms resting
on his knobby knees. On my other side, was a woman nursing her
screeching baby, who from time to time would glare at me with its
large bullfrog eyes then let out another deafening shriek. When the
combi jolted over a crater on the road (a pothole), that’s when he
lowered the newspaper that he had been buried in since we
embarked. Our eyes locked. He seemed to be much older than me,
maybe even double my age, but something about his aura made my
heart beat faster like a beastly savage demanding freedom. I couldn’t
make out what was more captivating: between his dark cocoa skin
that tightened around his perfectly symmetrical, mountain peak-
chiselled jaw line or his hypnotic brown eyes that seemed to have
been dipped into a milky pool of softness. Then he looked away.
It seemed as if we had been in there forever; the air was getting
increasingly sultry and humid as everybody inhaled and exhaled the
same reused air.
My lungs felt like they were filling up with termites
and there wasn’t any more room for oxygen. It always confused me
how mornings in the village were so cold as if the air had
transformed into a million pieces of broken glass cutting against your
bare skin yet the afternoons were hotter than the flames that leap
and glide feverishly devouring the coal when mhamha is cooking
outside.
When we arrived at the market, which we call the musika, I was last
to disembark and so was he. I stood by the door of the minibus
pretending as if I had no clue where I was even though I had been
sent to the musika like this every day for as long as I could touch my
left ear with my right hand over my head.
“If you’re looking for the grinding mill it’s by the airtime stand,” he
whispered into my ear with his trombone voice looking at my sack of
maize.
For a moment, I stood there like a lamppost ogling at his wide,
slightly stained teeth.
“I’m Godswill,” he added,
“T- Tungba,” I stumbled over my own name.
The market around us was roaring with voices of hawkers like
thunder. High in the sky, the sun set the clouds ablaze with its deep
red flames. Stray dogs brushed past our legs scavenging for scraps of
food. Maggots feasted on rotting cabbage leaves and tomatoes were
being trampled on the floor releasing a powerful stench that no
perfume could overcome. Godswill had picked up my sack
effortlessly with his Hercules physique and led me towards the
grinding mill. We squeezed our way through the army of people
marching through the market keeping an eye out for pickpockets
bargaining off loose change.
After walking for 10 minutes, I had found out quite a bit about him
as he yelled over the crowd occasionally turning back to see if I was
still listening. I didn’t care how old he was, I didn’t care that mhamha
had been expecting me to be home five hours ago, and most
importantly I didn’t care what would happen after today. All I knew
was that it was not going to end well. We spent the day roaming
through the market, sampling brightly coloured fruit, savouring the
sweet and sour sensations. People stared at us wondering what on
earth a man was doing flirting and gallivanting with a girl young
enough to be his daughter. But we did not care. It was bliss: I had
never felt so free and I relished every moment like a little girl loves
its first doll.
When the sun began to descend and the musika was retiring to bed,
Godswill’s smile did not reflect it usual sunrise warmth as it had
throughout the day. It was more of an eclipse with the brightness of
the sun dying away into the dark evening where there would be no
dawn until we met again.