Fetching water was a sweaty, unglamorous chore. It was impossible to look beautiful while balancing a tin debbe vertically on your head. Sometimes, a leaking debbe dripped down your head, drenching your dress. But Kirabo started to take baths, to moisturise her skin and comb her hair before she went to the well. Grandmother watched her with half-closed eyes. But Kirabo had done nothing wrong. All Sio did was draw water for her when the boys fought. In fact, Kirabo always came home earlier than everyone else. As for Giibwa, she carried on pretending not to see. She would tense whenever she caught Sio and Kirabo exchanging looks. Kirabo was aware of a kind of disappointment or hurt in Giibwa about the whole thing, but Giibwa never raised the issue.
When Kirabo came to the well with her family, Sio ignored her. It made sense, but it made her desperate. Then she stole relentless glances at him until she caught his eye. When his lips lifted in the suggestion of a smile and a spark reached his eyes and they curved upwards, half closing, the tingling in Kirabo stood on its toes. And that would be it until the following day.
•
Four weeks after the kadodi incident, when this thing she felt for Sio could not get any more intense, Kirabo told him that she was going away to Kampala to live with her father.
“Huh,” was all Sio said as he lifted the debbe on to her head.
“Tom, I mean my father, is coming on the Wednesday after the first day of the year to collect me.” She looked at him to see his eyes. She hoped to see dismay, hurt even. But Sio adjusted the debbe on the nkata cushioning her head and looked past her.
“I see.”
“I am not coming back.”
“Hmm.”
She stormed past him. She had attempted to talk to him and all he could manage was “I see.”
“You call your father Tom?” he called after her.
Kirabo stopped and gave him a stare that said That is what you picked out of what I just told you? She walked away shaking her head.
That week, Sio started to visit Kirabo’s uncles in the evening. God knows when they had become friends. Now there was an anxiety in his glance. Kirabo wished he could say that it was terrible she was going away so she could say it too. Nonetheless, she enjoyed his anxious glance and basked in his worry.
Two days before Tom collected her, Sio did not draw water for her until very late. Then he carried her debbe all the way home, right to the walkway. All the way from the well, Kirabo walked behind him swinging her arms like Look at me, I am a princess. People shook their heads at the brazen display. Girls rolled their eyes. Women clicked, Miiro is in trouble; she has gone bad too. To make matters worse, Kirabo and Sio walked slowly on the thin trail from the well, holding everyone up. In the end, people pushed past them, sucking their teeth, some huffing, Ever seen a calf flirting with a bull? What did you expect—to pick tangerines off a lime tree?
Stung by the reference to her parents, Kirabo wanted to shout, A boy carrying water for you does not make you pregnant, idiots. But she kept quiet because people in Nattetta were incredibly dumb. By the time she and Sio joined the main road, darkness had fallen. A sensible voice in her head warned that she was being reckless, but she already felt out of reach of Nattetta gossip.
When they got to the walkway, instead of putting the debbe on her head, Sio rested it on the ground. Then he turned and looked at her with eyes so intense she looked lower, focusing on the baby hairs on his upper lip. They had started to crawl. His lower lip was so pale it was red. She could make out the whisper of a goatee on his chin. She looked away at the ramp by the roadside. But he stared at her until she looked at him again. His eyes said This is me, that is you, we are.
Kirabo looked away again.
“Aren’t you going to say goodbye?” Sio asked softly.
The night tightened. Kirabo stood first on one leg, then on the other, but no words came, just her breathing.
“Okay, if you are not going to speak to me …” He folded his arms.
Her chest rose and fell, rose and fell.
She felt his breath on her face before she realised he had leaned in. He whispered, as if Widow Diba was nearby, “Tomorrow, I will be waiting behind the Co-operative Store; come after lunch when it has closed.” He paused, then leaned further in and added, “Bring some words.” As he withdrew, his lips brushed somewhere. Might have been her ear or her lip; it was hard to tell because a bolt shot into Kirabo’s pants. It bleeped there like a car indicator, bleep-bleep, bleep-bleep. For some time, she stayed on the spot, her insides quivering. She attempted to lift the debbe on to her head but failed. She lugged it by the handle up the walkway, limping around the house via the back so as not to be seen by her grandparents. When she got to the bath cubicle, she emptied some water into a basin and bathed. At least then she trembled from the cold.
The following day, as if women had not warned her that men were all after one thing, Kirabo gave Grandmother the slip and ran to behind the koparativu stowa. Sio was sitting on the huge log behind the building. When he looked up and she saw the little scar on his Adam’s apple, her heart exploded. She smiled, but he did not. She stopped, and almost came to her senses and ran back home, when he burst out, “You don’t even care what people suffer.”
“But I have come!” She had expected smiles and hugs and holding hands and looking at each other properly because Nattetta was too mean to give them the space and time. Even language in Nattetta was so limited it could not articulate their thing.
“My father is taking me, I am not coming back,” Sio mimicked. “You just don’t care all this time.”
“What can I do?”
“Let me show you.”
He walked towards her, unbuttoning his shirt. The heartbeat in Kirabo’s knickers started again. The skin beneath Sio’s shirt was even paler than his face. His chest was wider than she had imagined. Narrow waist. As if he had been gutted. He stood in front of her and raised his hands. “Feel it.”
The bleeping in Kirabo’s pants threatened to perforate her knickers.
“Go on; feel it.”
She put her hand on his heart and he caught his breath. His heart jabbed slightly away from her hand. He put his hand on hers and adjusted it to the left, on top of his heart. “Do you feel it now?”
It jabbed into her palm, double time. Kirabo pulled her hand away.
“You have nothing to say to that—do you?” Sio challenged. “You have nothing to say to the fact that even way back to when I saw your grandmother drag you as if she was going to kill you, I could not sleep.” He walked back to the log, buttoning up his shirt.
“Forgive me.”
“What good is that? You are happy to go away and proud not to come back.”
“I am not. It is my father taking me away.”
“Do you suffer?”
“I do.” But what else could she say: that she suffered more, especially when he did not come to the well, when doubt accosted her? That it was rapture when the following day he looked at her, that his stare made her feel as if the world was scorched but she was the only plant sprouting? These were things you felt, but words in Nattetta were inadequate.
“Then I will come to your house tonight, behind your kitchen.”
“Don’t,” Kirabo pleaded. “Grandmother is extra tight on me at the moment. It was hard to steal myself away just now.” Then an idea occurred to her. “Do you want to touch my heart?”
Sio looked at her.
“It beats like yours.”
Sio’s eyes fell to her breasts. Then he looked away. He thought for a moment, but then he shook his head.
“It will only hurt more.”
He got up and walked away. Kirabo stared in dismay. She had never risked so much for a boy. All he had to do was feel her heart. What was she thinking, coming to meet him like this in the first place? She bolted. Never again. I will go to Kampala and leave him in stupid Kamuli.
Yet she was restless for the remainder of the day, anticipating, dreading, hoping, waiting. When it got dark,
she wanted to check behind the kitchen, but Grandmother’s eyes were glued to her, telling her to do this chore and that, not letting her out of her sight. As if she knew what Kirabo had in mind. When supper was readied in the diiro and everyone started walking to the house, Kirabo fell behind. Grandmother noticed and came back.
“Why are you hovering in the dark?” Her voice was gravel. “This way.” She pointed to the house.
Throughout supper Kirabo imagined Sio behind the kitchen, in the cold, mosquitoes revelling. After eating, she rushed to help clear up the banana leaf wraps. As she carried the baskets to the kitchen, Grandmother said, “You stay here,” and told the boys to help. When she made to go outside to toilet, Grandmother said, “Wait.” She grabbed a lantern, walked her outside, and waited by the side of the toilet as Kirabo peed. When she could not pretend to pee any longer, Grandmother reached for her arm. “Come and wash your hands.” They stopped at the water tank. Kirabo washed her hands as if scrubbing at glue, glancing towards the kitchen, hoping that Sio had realised they had no chance that night. When Grandmother closed the door, it caught Kirabo’s heart and crushed it, but Grandmother locked it anyway.
•
Tom must have heard her sigh because he reached for her shoulders, lay her head on his lap, and said, “Sleep; I will wake you when we get there.”
4
When Kirabo and Tom arrived in Kampala, they alighted at the Yield, locally called ku Yaadi, on Jinja Road. Kirabo staggered when she stepped out of the taxi. The city’s bright streetlights, after the natural nights in Nattetta, stunned her. She shivered and Tom draped his jacket, heavy like a blanket, around her shoulders. He held out his hand. Kirabo took it and they walked along a wall towards a roundabout. The tarmac was yellowish. She looked at her feet: they were yellow. She let go of Tom’s hand and pushed her own through the coat’s sleeves: they too were yellow. The tall eucalyptus trees on the left were yellow; so was the long wall on the right, the passing cars, the pedestrians. Kirabo looked up. It was the streetlights. They made everything yellow. She wanted to skip, jump, and bask in the yellowness of the night, but Tom was hurrying ahead. She wondered who turned on the lights. It had to be a huge switch. They walked a short way past the roundabout, crossed the road, and stood on Old Port Bell Road, where they caught another taxi to Bugoloobi.
All the way through the industrial area, past the abattoir, across the railway line, into the swamp with yams, Kirabo stared through the window. After a while they came upon the most beautiful building in the world, the Coffee Marketing Board, with its multicoloured glass panels of yellow, blue, and green. It was surrounded by bright lights. She tugged at Tom’s sleeves. “Your office.” Tom looked up and smiled.
They got out of the second taxi in Bugoloobi Town. The shops on either side of the road were imposing. On a high wall was a large advert: OMO THE BIG ONE, BLUE BAND, COLGATE, KIMBO, JIK, VIM. A man held his wife’s hand and she held her daughter’s hand, who, in turn, held her little brother’s. They were happy because they used these products. Another advert in a lightning bolt screamed CHIBUKU FOR WINNERS.
Now the shops were behind them. Kirabo, walking behind Tom, noticed how his body moved, the way his head nodded with his gait, his Afro thick and round. This being close to Tom, this being his daughter, was new. Her mother too was drawing nearer: she could feel her. Nattetta had been too far from the truth.
They turned into a murram road with a Nattetta kind of darkness and Tom became a shadow. Kirabo hurried to his side and slipped her hand into his. He slowed his pace and she tried to fall into his rhythm, but her strides would not fit into his: she had to hurry and hop.
When she could not bear the silence any longer, she said, “Taata.”
“Daddy; you call me Daddy from now on.”
“Dadi?”
“Daddy.”
“Daddie?”
“Yes.”
“How come you visit Nsuuta when you come home?”
“Because she is my mother.”
“But how? Grandmother is your mother.”
“Grandmother gave birth to me, but Nsuuta brought me up.”
“Oh?” She contemplated for a while. “Grandmother does not like her.”
“That is their problem.”
“Grandmother does not like me to visit Nsuuta.”
“Then don’t visit her.”
Kirabo dropped Nsuuta, but soon the silence became too much again. She wished Tom could say something. She cast around for something to say. She was shocked to hear herself say, “Where is my mother?” It just came out.
“What?” Tom’s head turned to look at her. Kirabo could not see his expression. “Are you unhappy?”
“No.”
“Then why do you want her?”
“To see what she looks like; so she can start to be my mother.”
“I don’t know where she is.”
“Why?” Kirabo was not deterred by his clipped answer.
“No one knows where she is.”
“Because people will find out she had me while in school?”
Tom stopped walking. “Who told you that?”
“Nsuuta.”
“Did she?” He started to walk again.
“All she said was that my mother finished studying and is married.” Because Kirabo had to run to keep up with Tom, now her voice vibrated as she explained, “I was pestering her when she told me.”
Tom did not respond, but Kirabo felt his anger. She could not believe she had betrayed Nsuuta so quickly, only to hit a wall.
“Why did you not marry her?” The reckless streak in her decided that if Tom was going to be angry with her for asking, then she might as well deserve his anger. She thought back to the advert she had just seen, imagining Tom holding her mother’s hand, her mother holding Kirabo’s own. Perhaps they would have a baby boy and Kirabo would hold his hand and they would all be happy.
“You do not ask me such questions, Kirabo. I am your father. Clearly Miiro has spoilt you so much I don’t even know where to start correcting you.”
It was no use. Tom did not understand that she did not have to be unhappy to want her mother. Yet she felt her. With every step she took, Kirabo felt her mother coming closer. If there is a bond between a mother and her child, as people say, this was it. A sense. It was all around.
A huge block of flats came into view, then another and another. It would be awesome to live in the famous Bugoloobi flats. She asked, “Dadi, is it true these flats were being built by Israelis when Amin stop—”
Tom elbowed her and she swallowed the rest of the question.
They walked in silence until they turned into a tarmacked road. The air here turned from Ugandan to European. Like the air of those residential neighbourhoods, Kololo or Nakasero. All the bungalows on this road were similar. Dark, tall hedges, security lights, large compounds, paved walkways, tall gates. Tom stopped at the fourth house, picked up a stone, and knocked on the gate. A plaque on the wall with a light above said PROPERTY OF COFFEE MARKETING BOARD. Footsteps came hurrying over. The inset gate opened. Tom bent low and stepped in. Kirabo followed.
A dark figure greeted them. “Welcome back, sir.”
“Thank you.”
The figure replaced the heavy chain.
Why did Tom need such a huge house? Security lights, on the front porch and on the side, failed to dispel the immense shadow thrown in front of the building.
They climbed three steps and stood on the porch. A girl, about fifteen, opened the door. Kirabo wondered if she was a maid or relative. The girl’s eyes lingered on Kirabo. The diiro was European, the furnishing and the layout very spacious, like in magazines. Nattetta was a pigsty compared to this. Kirabo started to feel the dust on her feet. Even her dress, which she had thought so pretty, now felt drab. For the first time in her life, she felt impoverished.
“Sit down, Kirabo,” Tom said.
She went to the couch and sat on the edge. The partition between the dining area and the
sitting room was a huge piece of furniture. At the bottom it was a chest of drawers; at the top, a wall unit. The top two shelves were filled with books. Below, on a wider shelf, a Philips TV, a JVC radio cassette player, and two large jars, one filled with roast groundnuts, the other with biscuits. Two doors led out of the dining area—one to the right, the other straight on. A heavy, metallic hum led her eyes to a wide fridge with the word FRIGIDAIRE on the door. The TV flickered a static-filled screen. As Tom removed his shoes to step on the carpet he said, “Can you switch that TV off?” Then, “Why are you having supper so late, Nnaki?”
“Madam said it is okay since tomorrow is weekend.” The girl, Nnaki, was a maid, then.
Madam? Kirabo was perplexed. Which madam? She was getting up to switch the TV off when a little girl of about six peeled off a sofa and padded across the room. Her patterned pyjamas had so blended into the settee that Kirabo had not seen her. She turned a knob and it clicked like Grandmother’s tongue. She returned and threw herself back on the sofa, feet and all. Something rigid about the girl said to Kirabo I don’t want to know you.
“Are you not going to greet me, Mwagale?”
The girl ran across the room and threw herself at Tom. “Welcome back, Daddy.”
The insides of Kirabo’s stomach dissolved. My sister? She looked down because she felt emotions she never knew she had. Her feet, coated with dust, were dirtying the carpet. She tucked them out of sight. First a madam, now a sister? She withdrew her feet, wiped the dust with her hankie, and then regretted it. The hankie was now filthy. Why did I not know? She crossed her ankles, raised her eyes, and looked at the little girl. Resentment, blindingly intense, came in waves. The fact that Mwagale’s name meant “beloved,” while Kirabo’s only meant “gift,” did not help.
Nnaki now fed a child of eight or nine months sitting in a high chair. He dribbled his food. The girl crooned, “Please eat, Junior, have some.” She scooped up the dribble around the child’s lips and sunk it back into his mouth, only for it to be dribbled out again. Only a maid would put up with that nonsense, Kirabo thought. If she fed the little monkey, she would have stopped a long time ago. You don’t drag a person with chills to the fire. God, she wanted to pinch the little thing and slap the little girl and throw them out of her father’s house.
A Girl is a Body of Water Page 11
