The Boy Next Door (25 page)

“What the fuck was that?”

“You know what I’m talking about, Ian.”

“Don’t fuck with me, Lindiwe. What the fuck were you doing in the car?”

I can’t believe what I’m hearing. I put the glass of water slowly down in the sink.

“No, what are
you
doing, Ian? You just sit around moping. Look at you. Look at you. You forgot to pick up David twice last week.
Twice,
Ian!”

“Come on girl, has your Jean come back or are you into some other expert these days?”

“You’re drunk.”

“So are they good fucks?”

The ugliness of his words.

“At least have the guts to actually look at me, Ian. Who do you think you are? What the hell makes you think that you’ve been
making so many sacrifices? Who asked you…?”

I stand there breathless, feeling how empty and stupid it all is.

“I’m going to have a bath.”

He spins around, knocks into the couch as he lunges towards me.

I look up at him, splotches of red on his face.

He grabs hold of my arms.

“How much Forex are they dishing out to black chicks these days?”

There is something so tight and sharp in my chest.

“You’re hurting me, Ian.”

“Do you have any idea what it’s like to be doing fricking fuck all while you’re off with your boyfriends? Do you want to know
how many fricking fridges I fixed today? How many fricking deliveries I made? I am so sick of this shit.”

“So you’re bored Ian. Grow up.”

I snatch my hands from him.

“Fuck you, Lindiwe”

And I feel his words hitting my back, piercing through.

I go to the bathroom. Lock the door. I press my back against the door, waiting. For him to bang at it with his fists. For
the handle of the door to jerk up and down. For the fight to go on. For the words to become uglier still, more terrible, more
brutal. For us to exhaust ourselves until we find each other again, forgive. But there is nothing. Just the two of us, breathing
resentment, hurt, fury on opposite sides.

But it’s the
attack at Ilo’s, two weeks later, that’s the last straw.

A demonstration starting at the post office: parents queuing to pay school fees begin a spontaneous protest against the recent
100 percent increase of fees which spreads down to some unemployed youths loitering around. Stones, bricks are thrown. The
riot police are called in. Some demonstrators dash into shops to take cover, and the riot police flush them out with tear
gas; one canister fizzles open inside at Ilo’s where the old man is in the back room.

Ian comes home distraught.

“He’s in a bad way, Lindiwe. The gas got into his lungs deep, and with the chemicals, shit. Shit.”

When we go to the Avenues Clinic the next day, we find the nurse clearing up the sheets. She shakes her head when she sees
us.

“It was too much for him. He could not take it. This is Zimbabwe now. No respect for old people,” she says.

Ian walks out before she’s finished talking, and when I go out to the parking lot after him, the car’s not there. I catch
a taxi to town, to the studio, and that’s where I find him, carefully taking down the pictures on the wall.

The smell of tear gas lingers in the air.

“Ian…”

He doesn’t turn around, doesn’t answer me. I go to him, try to get hold of his arm, of him.

“Ian…”

He keeps working on the pictures, emptying the walls.

I stand there, watching, helpless.

“Ian, we have to talk.”

He doesn’t stop packing his stuff. His gear. He’s off, on assignment. I know he’s overjoyed to be out of here. He’s off to
South Africa; things have heated up there again; there’s talk of civil war. He’s going to take pictures. He’s leaving this
messy life behind.

“Ian, we have to talk.”

But he doesn’t stop for anything, not for one word. In goes the camera and finally there’s nothing else for him to busy himself
with. He’s ready to scoot off. I should just let him get on with it, he’s already missed so much, everything he’s had to hear
secondhand like everyone else, one gruesome slaughter after another.

“Ian…”

He’s looking at me. What does he see? His ball and chain probably.

“So talk,” he says, standing there with his hands crossed over his chest.

“I said
we
have to talk, not just me.”

I sound so juvenile. Desperate. I look at him glower red. I should leave. Let him get away.

“I’m taking David back to Bulawayo. I can’t look after him here.”

I don’t say, “on my own.”

“Lindiwe, it’s only for—”

He looks at his watch.

“I’m off,” he says, picking up his bag. Then he remembers something.

“The rent’s paid up for the year.”

Don’t expect me back. Soon. Ever.

And then he’s gone.

When Bridgette hears it’s me, she says, “Howzit?”

“That’s not funny.”

“Sorry,” she giggles.

“And anyway, you missed out ‘hanging?’”

“Hanging?”

“Yes, as in ‘howzit hanging?’”

“Oh, my God, Lindiwe, you’re not serious. That’s how they talk? Howzit hanging? I’ll remember that for next time.”

“He’s gone.”

“So, you’re a free woman. We can have some real fun now. How’s David taking it?”

“I’m going to take him to Bulawayo, but Bridgette, I feel so guilty. He’s just got used to life here; he’s actually made a
friend at school and sometimes he forgets about the giraffe and I’m about to—I can’t look after him—I have to go out to Makoni
communal lands for my dissertation.”

“That cooperative thing? Group management styles, group dynamics, etcetera, etcetera?”

“Yes. I can’t drag him around with me. I—”

“Listen, Lindiwe, I can do that. When you’re not around, I can help. I’m a freelancer; I set my own hours.”

“No, I can’t.”

“Don’t be silly. I think he’s so cute.”

“Bridgette, it’s a lot to—”

“Think about it, okay?”

“Yes, thanks, Bridgette.”

*    *    *

It’s the Liberation War Heroes holiday, and we’re on the train, David and me, off to Bulawayo.

We’re in cattle class, and I’m sitting at the edge of a bench, David squashed up tight against me. The wagon keeps filling
up until it’s thick with bodies, and I can’t see clearly on either side of me. I’m breathing in: stale Chibuku coming out
in heavy, hot tufts from the gaping mouths of last night’s revelers; freshly brewed Chibuku in its brown plastic tubs ready
for consuming as soon as the train chugs away into the night; and sweaty squashed bodies which sway as fingers lose their
grip on the overhead metal bars. The train is already an hour and a half late. I have an urge to bolt out of here, but it’s
not even possible. We’d be trampled underfoot. It’s going to be a long, long ride.

This is our last minute escape from the celebrations. Rumor has been circulating in Harare that the Youth Brigade has been
told to go door to door, even in the suburbs, to drag people out to Rufaro to show the president just how much he and the
other heroes are loved, and after what happened yesterday in town, it’s best to be away. Celebrations in Bulawayo will be
a lower key affair.

The train shudders then is still again.

“Hey, man!” someone shouts.

The train shudders again, and this time manages to drag its bulk across the lines.

The ride is fitful, lots of stops and then starts, some short, some long. Chibuku splashes about, and soon the wagon is also
filled with the sound of someone retching, someone swearing and shouting, threatening to do damage to someone’s organs, but
then tiredness seems to settle in all round and the carriage becomes filled with snoring and intermittent murmuring.

David sleeps. I stroke his head and bend over, give him a light kiss on his forehead.

He’s been upset that we couldn’t take Jade with us; no animals allowed on the train. We left her with the neighbors, distracted
by the huge bone we got from the butcher’s.

I think of Ian running around, taking his pictures, of the image I’ve been having: Ian meeting Mandela and giving him that
legendary greeting “howzit,” and Mandela cocking his head to one side, his face crinkling up into that smile. “Howzit,” he
says back.

I don’t want to think about Bulawayo, what I’ll find there.

Mummy, Daddy, Rosanna. And my sister. Half.

I try not to think of the house next door.

I think of the planes that will do the flypast for the president, their acrobatic displays in the sky. Duncan and his merry
men landing at Mugabe’s feet.

I think about David and me yesterday in town, having hamburgers at Wimpy, First Street. We were sitting watching the fire-eater
through the window. He was very tall and very black and dressed in nothing but a loincloth. His body shone and glistened as
though he had smeared tar all over it. His teeth were startling white, his lower lip a vivid pink. His hair fell all the way
down his back in thick flat pads like the stretched, kneaded dough you could spy from the window at Downings Bakery. We watched
him pick up the club, set it alight, and bring the flame to his open mouth. In it went and then out again.

David watched as he sucked the last of the cream float.

Then we watched as the crowd began scampering, somebody falling.

We watched as the youths toi toyed in the wake of the crowd, their berets askew, their vote zanu-pf T-shirts looking grubby
and tired.

We watched them kick the fire-eater’s drum; grab hold of an old man, give him some slaps; pee on the streetlamps; and rip
the poster that some brave soul from the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions had stuck on a wall, calling for a general strike
against the World Bank–sanctioned economic structural adjustment program.

We watched as three of the youths broke off from the group and sauntered into the restaurant.

“Pamberi ne ZANU!” one of them shouted.

They were greeted with silence.

“Pamberi ne ZANU!” the youths shouted, one of them slamming his fist on a table, rattling the cutlery. There was silence again.

“Eh, eh, Pamberi ne—”

“Heh, shut up with your
pamberis,
can’t you see we are trying to eat in peace?”

The voice was loud and strong and came from the table behind us. I didn’t look back. The youths started moving forwards, and
I heard chairs scraping from the table behind. There were four of them, big men. One of the youths backed out and started
running out into the street. The patrons of the restaurant hooted and cheered. There was a scuffle and the fight was carried
outside, the two youths looking suddenly small and scared out of their wits, their shirts already torn from the bodies, their
pants pulled down, their buttocks exposed; someone squirted tomato sauce on them.

I told David we were leaving. I didn’t want to be there when the runaway youth came back with reinforcements. Anyway, the
manager came in and started shooing everyone away; the restaurant was now closed for business.

I dragged David home, constantly looking back in case the youths came leaping out.

Home, I locked myself in the bathroom and started crying.

The train stops yet again.

We must be almost there. Dawn is beginning to break. Rays of light are filtering through the windows. I haven’t slept and
my head is stiff and aching. I feel David’s weight on me. I shift a bit and he wakes up.

“Hey, sleepyhead, we’re almost there.”

The train starts again, and around us we begin to hear the stirring of those who’ve fallen asleep on their feet, shaking the
weight back into their legs.

Bulawayo.

I’m too tired and sore to even think of the walk across town to get the bus home. We get a taxi, a run-down Peugeot that smells
of engine oil and smoke and whose ancient sound system is crackling “Corruption, corruption” by Thomas Mapfumo.

I look over at David who leans his head against the greasy window, his lips flat against it. I don’t say to him, “Don’t do
that, you’ll get sick with all the germs.” I let him be.

My heart starts knocking against my chest when we pass the cemetery, then the garage, the bus stop, the turn right, one, two,
and there we are in front of the iron gate.

I step out of the car and everything seems eerily quiet. David stands next to me and together we look out to the old Spanish
Colonial house. I feel his breathing change, his body tense. I take his hand. We’ll be all right.

But there are shocks waiting for me, for us.

Mummy is not here. She’s been gone for weeks. She just packed her bags and left. The only place I can think of is that she
is in Botswana with Aunty Gertrude.

Rosanna has moved into the main house. Her bedroom is the spare room. She is looking after Daddy.

Rosanna’s child, Daddy’s daughter, my sister, half, looks so much like me.

Maphosa is back in his room. And he has a wife.

I phone Aunty Gertrude who says, yes, Mummy is there with her. I ask to speak to her, and Aunty Gertrude comes back to the
phone to say that Mummy has just gone in the bath.

“How is she?” I ask Aunty Gertrude.

“Don’t worry,” she says. “She is doing well.”

Rosanna says that she hopes I am not upset with her for being in the house.

“Your father was in need of care, Sisi, and at night I could not hear him if he had need.”

She says this while almost kneeling down in front of me, clapping her hands together.

Sisi Lindiwe,
she still calls me.

“It was your mother who sent for me again. She went away as soon as I came, the day after; she was waiting for me to arrive.
She said that she did not think that she would be coming back.”

I look at her child, my sister, half, and ask her, “What’s your name?”

“Danielle,” she says quietly, a name she finds hard to pronounce.

My father’s name. Daniel. I wanted to hear it in her voice.

“Thank you, Rosanna, for looking after Daddy so well. I am grateful. I’m only here for a short time, so we’ll keep things
as they are. It’s quite fine by me.”