This Thing Called the Future (10 page)

Then Mama gets out of the car. She has lost so much weight, her face is wrinkled, the skin sagging off her jowls—like she suddenly became really old, overnight. Her ankle wobbles as it hits the ground, as if her legs are still adjusting to the lost flesh.

Zi stops. She backs away.

Gogo is so surprised, she exclaims, “Pho! Who are you? Who took my daughter? Where is Elizabeth?”

“I told her she's trying to be like the white women who think it is beautiful to be a skeleton,” Auntie Phumzi says, laughing to make light of our fear.

“It is just that I have been so sick, Mama,” Mama explains. “I was even sick when I came home last visit, but I did not want to worry you.”

“There is sick but this?” Gogo sweeps her hand towards Mama.

“I didn't think I could handle the long trip back from Greytown,” she says. She holds her arms out for Zi. “Aren't you going to say hi to me, Zinhle?”

That's when Zi finally goes to her. But as Mama wraps her arms around Zi's little body, Zi starts weeping and howling. Mama looks over at us, her eyes and body saying “Help” even though she doesn't say the word. Then she sees me. “Nomkhosi,” she says, her voice gentle. “How are you?”

“Mama, come inside and take a seat.” I am confused and ashamed to see Mama like this, so thin like the men and women who die of AIDS.

Mama wobbles, her movement constricted by Zi's arms wrapped tight around her.

“Elizabeth!” We all turn at the sound of someone calling Mama's name. Inkosikazi Dudu is hobbling towards the fence that separates our houses, moaning like a woman in pain.

“What's wrong?” Mama asks before we can stop her.

As soon as she has our attention, Inkosikazi Dudu starts shouting. “You thought you could cheat an old woman, Elizabeth,” she cries.

“What—what are you talking about?” Mama asks.

Inkosikazi Dudu grips the fence, her face close to the metal wires. “The leg has no nose, Elizabeth!” she cackles. “You see, your sins
always
find you out. Already, you are suffering because of what you have done!”

“Hush now, Themba Dudu.” Gogo's voice is harsh and angry.

Zi whimpers.

“But what are you talking about?” Mama's face loses color. Her cheeks, the color of ashes. “What have I done?”

Gogo steps in front of Mama, as if she wants to hide her from the accusations, but Inkosikazi Dudu paws at her arms, trying to face Mama directly.

“You have done enough damage with your anger,” Gogo says. “There is no trouble between us but you will make trouble with all your accusations.”

“There
is
trouble between us,” Inkosikazi Dudu's words are high and pinched and strangled. “
Yebo, impela
, trouble indeed. Don't deny it!”

She claws past Gogo and suddenly the two old women are shoving each other as Mama retreats, her feet slipping on the gravel. Auntie Phumzi helps her up and the two of them hurry into the house.

Gogo is old but she has tremendous strength and will in those arms of hers. She doesn't let go of Inkosikazi Dudu even as I force my body in between them.

“Gogo, go inside,” I yell.

Inkosikazi Dudu grabs a chunk of my hair and yanks. “It's because of your mother that I'm hungry.” She spits, right in my face, shouting at the closed door, “Where is my money, Elizabeth? You can't hide it forever! God will find you out!”

We're so close, face to face, Inkosikazi Dudu fuming in my arms. We look each other in the eye and the anger in hers spills over like mealie-meal boiling over the side of a pot.

I close my eyes and will my whole body to become a secret, shutting off the tunnel that leaks emotion from my heart to my eyes.

“Please go home, Nkosikazi,” I say, opening my eyes.

“Go home to
what
?” She sighs, as if she's giving up. “To an empty cupboard?”

“If you're hungry, we have food we can give you.”

And finally she sags in my arms, a feeble weight. My arms close around her body, so natural, almost a hug.
She's so afraid
, I realize as I touch her.
She's so afraid and so hurt.

But then she stiffens, like I spoke my thoughts out loud. “I'll return, Khosi,” she threatens, “and I'll be better prepared next time. You tell your mother.”

I watch her shamble back to her own yard before I go inside.

Gogo is fretting over Mama, who sinks into the sofa like an old weak woman—as if
she's
the grandmother. “Don't pay any attention to her, Elizabeth,” Gogo says. “She's just a crazy old woman.”

“The very idea, that I would steal money from her,” Mama says.

“Welcome home, Elizabeth,” Auntie Phumzi jokes. “I'm sure
now
you're sorry you stayed away so long. Look at all the excitement you were missing!”

Zi starts giggling and can't stop until Mama says, “That's enough, Zi,” her voice sharp, not the same old gentle Mama we've always known. She reaches up to pat her head. “Sho! Where's my headscarf? It's missing!”

“I'm sure it's just out in the yard,” I say, quick quick, trying to prevent alarm even as Gogo sucks in her breath with sudden fear. “I'll look for it.”

But the front yard is empty. So is the street. I even search Inkosikazi Dudu's yard by peering in through her gate. Nothing. No scarf.

“It doesn't matter,” Mama says, looking exhausted. She closes her eyes.

I look over at Gogo for comfort but all I see is my fear mirrored back.

I sit on a chair near the sofa and rock back and forth, pressing my hands against my lips so I don't blurt out, “It does matter, Mama! You could be in danger!”

Inkosikazi Dudu is so angry, she might be willing to do something evil. If she took Mama's headscarf…if she took some of my hair when she pulled it…she could use either of those things to harm us.

Mama closes her eyes. “Yo! I'm so tired. I've been working
too
hard.”

In just a few seconds, she's already asleep. I cover her with a blanket and tiptoe into the kitchen, where Auntie Phumzi has taken over the cooking from Gogo. “Do you think Inkosikazi Dudu took her scarf?” I whisper.

“Let's hope it just blew away in the wind,” Gogo mutters.

But the night is still, like a photograph, nothing moving, not even a single insect disturbing the air.

 

I watch my family going through the evening rituals, Auntie Phumzi clattering dishes in the kitchen, Gogo and Zi watching TV while they wait for food. Usually Auntie is in her own home, cooking for her own husband and children, and it's me in the kitchen. And usually, when Mama comes home from her job on the weekends, she's lively, full of dance and song, waltzing Zi around the house and chiding me for something I forgot to do while she was away. But here she is, already asleep.

Some homecoming!

It makes me feel…homesick. Homesick and here I am, at home, surrounded by the people I love.

I step outside to escape the feeling.

Inkosikazi Dudu has gone inside. But if she were standing in front
of me, would I say the words that are flooding my mind?
I'll be watching you. And if you dare do anything evil to my family, if you dare try to curse us, I'll come after you. I don't know how but I have friends and they'll help me.

Looking at the quiet neighborhood, the warning seems really crazy.

A nightmare interrupts my sleep again that night. In it, Mama has made a bargain with the devil.

“It's just a small thing, Khosi,” she pleads with me. “It is just so that you and Gogo and Zi will be safe when I am gone.”

“A bargain with the devil is never a small thing, Mama, you know that.” I look at her, helpless, but she looks away.

“It is necessary,” she says.

And when we are asleep, the devil comes. He is big as a whale, opening his mouth wide and swallowing us whole, house and all. Gogo, Zi, and I wake up, deep inside his belly, wondering how long we have before we will die. It's hot and humid down there and the air is thin, eaten up by fire. Already, Gogo's face is ash-gray as she struggles to breathe, and Zi is beginning to fade as her body is wrung of all its water.

I wake up sweating, sitting bolt upright in bed.
What are you trying to tell me?
I ask Babamkhulu, looking at his picture hanging over Gogo's bed.

I look at my mother, sleeping beside me. She has lost so much weight, her face is wrinkled, not smooth like it always was.

“Mama, what is going on?” I whisper. “Why are the ancestors bothering me with all these dreams about you?”

Of course, she does not hear me. She is sleeping too soundly.

In the morning, Gogo sends me off to the
sangoma's
to find out what's wrong with Mama, and to see if she has some herbs that will give Mama an appetite.

“Mama won't like it,” I say.

“I cannot just sit by while my daughter starves to death,” Gogo says.

We both look at Mama, already asleep on the sofa even though she only woke some few minutes ago. She just stumbled out of bed and then lay down on the sofa, shaking her head when I asked her if she wanted breakfast.

We walk outside and Gogo calls the woman across the street to ask her if she will accompany me up the hill. “My granddaughter has become a magnet for troublesome men,” she says. “I'd prefer if she doesn't go alone.”

“One minute, Mama,” the woman says, and goes inside. She comes back with a scarf and her four-year-old.

“So the
tsotsis
like you, eh,
Ntombi
?” the woman asks, shaking her head. “Ah, there are so many of these men hanging around Imbali, with nothing better to do than to bother young girls like you. No wonder your grandmother is afraid.”

“Oh, those
tsotsis
just yell at me, Sisi,” I say. “It's this one older man I'm having a hard time avoiding.”

“
Ncese,
shame.” The woman drags the word out. “I don't know what these men are thinking. You're just a child.”

The two of us trudge up the hill, talking about everyday things and what what what, nothing important. She is a good neighbor; she doesn't even ask why I'm going to visit a
sangoma
. You don't talk about these things because it could be something shameful.

That is true in our case. It is embarrassing that Mama has lost so much weight. People will be talking next, saying she has the disease of these days. So if our neighbor asked, I would say, “Zi has a cold,” or “Gogo's bones ache,” or something like that. I would never say why I am really going.

When we reach the
sangoma's
, the neighbor points to a nearby house, “My sister lives just there. When you are done, come find me and we will walk home together.”

I pass through Thandi's metal gate, noticing the new white sign, with the misspelled word announcing: “Brothers and Sisters, we are abel
to cure any sick.” I know I should run inside and say hello to Thandi, but I am not up for any questions, especially if she asks how Mama is doing. I cannot tell her the truth, and I do not want to lie.

Thankfully, there is no queue and I crawl into the hut to see Inkosikazi Nene quick quick.

I tell her about Mama. “She's tired, Gogo,” I say. “Tired and stressed.”

Inkosikazi Nene regards me for some few seconds. “Is she eating?”

I start to cry. “Oh, Gogo, she's lost so much weight.” My voice drops to a whisper. “She looks like the men and women who die.”

“Has she gone to see a doctor?”

I shake my head. How funny, my mother who believes in science and doctors has failed to see one for her sickness.

“
Hayibo!
She must go to a doctor.” Inkosikazi Nene moves fast. She mixes herbs together and wraps them in a newspaper packet. “Twice a day, steep a big spoonful of these herbs in a cup of boiling water. Your mama must drink it every morning and every night. These herbs will calm her down and give her an appetite, which will give her energy.”

“Thank you,” I say.

“Tell her it's very important that she eats, even if she doesn't feel like it, to gain back her strength. Tell her it's very important she goes to see a doctor.”

“I'll tell her,” I promise, wondering how mad Mama will be when I present her with herbs from a
sangoma
—herbs and advice to go see a medical doctor.

I hand Inkosikazi Nene fifty
rand
for the medicine, wondering if I should tell her about the latest developments in my life. But I am ashamed to reveal our neighbor's accusations. It is one thing to tell her that a witch has been stalking me. It is another to tell her that somebody thinks Mama stole money.

“Are you worried about something else?” Inkosikazi Nene asks.

“No, everything's fine,” I say, feeling just as terrible denying it as I would admitting it.

“And the dreams? Are the ancestors still bothering you when you sleep, Khosi?”

I look down at the mud floor. “Sometimes, Gogo. But it is getting better.”

She's still sitting there when I squat down and crawl through the entrance to leave.

I don't know why I lied to her, when her spirits will surely reveal the truth. But I don't want to admit how many of the dreams involve Mama. Then she might think Mama is sick because God is punishing her for her sins. Then she'll wonder what Mama has done that is so bad, when I'm sure she's done nothing wrong.