Sugar Town Queens

by Malla Nunn

  “Morning, Grandfather.” I cup the yellow pepper in the palm of my hand and hold it out for him to see. “Isn’t it a beauty? Any idea what it’s called?”

  He glares at me, and I smile back. My fear will kick in later, but for now, I pretend that everything is fine, just fine. After Annalisa’s buildup, I’m surprised to find that he is an old man with leathery skin and wrinkles on his forehead. He is the first to look away. Not me. My heart is calm. After all, what have I got to lose?

  Hate me all you want, and see how much I do not give a crap.

  “Amandla. Come here to me,” Mayme calls in a lilting voice that I recognize from home. Come here by me, township mothers sing to their children in the falling dark. Don’t you wander off, now. Stick close by, girl.

  Mayme wants me safe from my own grandfather, and I am happy to oblige. I turn and walk away without an excuse me or a goodbye. Rude, for sure, but it’s what he deserves after what he said about me unplugging Mayme’s heart monitor.

  “Amandla, this is your uncle Julien and your cousin Harry.” Mayme makes the introductions, and if Sam stared for too long, Harry and Uncle Julien break his record by a full minute. They gawk at me in stunned silence. Brown sparrow alert! Uncle blinks and narrows his eyes, which are the same shade of Bollard blue as Mother’s. He shares Annalisa’s pale skin and slender build, but that’s all. Dressed in slim trousers, a plain T-shirt, and a tailored linen jacket, he could be a mannequin in the window of an expensive menswear store . . . the kind with polished concrete floors and armed guards at the door. His kind of bland smoothness does not exist in Sugar Town.

  “Annalisa’s daughter?” Julien asks no one. “That’s impossible . . . she’s been missing for years.”

  Wait, Annalisa was missing? That can’t be right. On the bus, Annalisa said that she and Mayme met up every few months in secret. That if Grandpa ever found out, he’d find a way to punish them both. Mayme and Annalisa somehow reconnected anyway. I don’t know how or when or why, but I am going to find out.

  “Missing isn’t dead, Julien,” Mayme says. “Your sister keeps to herself, that’s all.”

  “Well . . .” Julien breaks the awkward silence that falls on the group. “This is a surprise.”

  The same way a parcel bomb at your door is a surprise. Boom. The package explodes and breaks windows and ripples through the atmosphere. That’s what I am: an explosion in the heart of my mother’s family.

  “Mrs. Bollard . . .” A black nurse in a white uniform hurries from the lift and kneels beside Mayme’s wheelchair, huffing for breath. “No leaving the room without a nurse. That is the rule, Mrs. Bollard. Now you have everyone worried.”

  Mayme sighs. “Look at me. I’m fine. Sitting in the sun for ten minutes with my grandchildren is the best kind of medicine.”

  She seems to have deliberately left Julien and Grandpa out of the good-medicine category. I smile to myself, happy to be lumped in with two other grandchildren for the first time ever.

  “You’ve had your moment in the sun.” Grandpa walks over and grips the handles of the wheelchair. He backs up and turns the chair to face the lift with no time for hugs or goodbyes. “What you need is your doctor and to get back in bed.”

  “Neville, wait . . .” Mayme grabs the wheels to stop them turning, but Grandpa keeps pushing toward the lift. He either does not hear her or chooses not to.

  “Neville, please . . .” she says. “Stop.”

  He ignores her. He does not stop or slow down. He keeps walking, and that is enough for me to forget my manners. Enough is enough. Mayme was fine before he showed up.

  “Wait a second.” I step in front of the wheelchair, and the footrest hits my shins hard. Ow. He did that on purpose, but Tough luck for you, brah. I’m not moving.

  “Out of the way,” Grandpa says. “Now.”

  I ignore him. If he wants obedience, he can get a dog.

  “Come here.” Mayme holds out her arms, and I swoop in for a hug. This is all she wanted. A chance to say goodbye. Our faces touch, cheek to cheek, and I breathe in the sunshine and vanilla in her hair. Annalisa will be furious when she learns that I lied to her, but this moment of being loved and squeezed by Mayme is worth it.

  “Nine thirty tomorrow morning,” she whispers into my ear. “Bring Annalisa. It’s important.”

  “We’ll be here,” I whisper back. I straighten up and find Sam and Grandpa standing side by side and staring at me, hard. Grandpa is stunned I defied him, but Sam’s eyes are smiling.

  “Stay and enjoy the garden, Grandpa,” Sam says. “Amandla and I will take Mayme back to her room.”

  Excellent thinking, cuz.

  Grandpa stands to the side, gracious, and I step back to give Sam room to maneuver. The nurse holds the doors open as Sam turns the wheelchair around and reverses it into the elevator. A hand clamps my shoulder when I go to follow.

  “Amanda has a weak heart. If we fight in public, the strain will push her closer to a heart attack.” Grandpa’s voice is low and tense. “Is that what you’d like?”

  Mayme alive and happy for the weeks we have left together is all I want. Grandpa knows that. Of course he does. His hand drops from my shoulder and grabs the tail of my jacket. He tugs. A threat. If I move forward, he’ll yank me back and send me flying to the ground, and then there really will be a fight. Happy to oblige, but not in front of the family.

  “You go ahead,” I tell Sam and Mayme. “I’ll collect a few more plants for Mrs. M and head back home. Annalisa will be worried when she finds me gone.”

  The nurse hits the down button, and I hold eye contact with Mayme, sending out love and calm. The doors close, and my heart sinks. I want to spend more time with her, but not with Grandpa here, holding me in place. The prickly-skin feeling on the back of my neck spreads down into my chest and limbs. I turn to him. You want to fight? Then let’s fight.

  “What’s eating you?” I say straight out.

  “Tell your mother that when Amanda goes, the handouts stop. I won’t pay for her mistakes or for you—the dark-skinned kaffir girl she drags around with her. Annalisa made her bed and she can lie in it.”

  “Man, you must be thick to believe the crap that comes out of your mouth. You know nothing about Annalisa and me.”

  He rears back, offended. “Is that how they talk in the slums?”

  I see him clearly now. This man is mean. He is a bully. Annalisa would rather live in a one-room shack with a bare light bulb dangling from the ceiling than ask him for help. If she has a screw loose it’s because he loosened it. I hate him so bad that the feeling eats a hole inside my stomach. I want to raise a fist and punch hard. Instead, I follow Mother’s example and stare at him with ice-cold calm. How weak you are. Then I hear Lil Bit’s voice asking the right questions: Why would a grown man attack a teenage girl? His own granddaughter?

  “Now I understand why my mother stays away,” I say, and the sadness in my voice surprises me. I will never have the close, loving family that lives in my dreams. Not while this man is alive. No way will I call him Grandfather or Gramps or any other pet name with a hint of affection. Not till he’s earned it. “Something is missing inside you, Neville. Your hate is just pointless.”

  “Your mother defied me, and see where she ended up?” Neville’s voice is cold and clear. “No money and nothing to show for her life but you.”

  A part of me has always known that we live in a tin shack because of my skin, my face, my hair, but it hurts to hear it said out loud. Nothing but me: Amandla Zenzile Harden, a freckle-nosed brown girl, sketchpad scribbler, above-average student, and the architect of her mother’s downfall. Or not . . .

  “Whatever you’re looking for, you won’t find it here,” Neville says. “I suggest you leave and never come back.”

  That is a straight-up threat. He wants me to run away with my tail tucked between my legs like the Sugar Tow
n bitch he thinks I am. That shows how little he knows about Sugar Town bitches. We fight for what we want. And I want Mayme.

  Julien stands to the side and says nothing. If I’m a Sugar Town bitch, he is a weak-assed bitch and shame on him for not standing up for Mayme and for me. I know how to play this.

  “Fine,” I say. “I’m going.”

  Annalisa taught me well. We’ve run through the maze of Sugar Town searching for the safe way home many times, and sometimes we take a wrong turn. Pretending to surrender while we plot our next move is standard operating procedure.

  “It’s for the best.” Uncle Julien finds his tongue. “Annalisa has a way of upsetting things, and Mother is too sick to cope with big changes. You understand?”

  What I understand is that you heard every word that came from Neville’s mouth and you did nothing. Mother is the tiger that chewed off her own paw to escape. You are a worm hiding in a hole.

  “I understand perfectly, Uncle Julien.” I stop myself from smiling. This coward thinks he can speak for his mother, a woman who’d rather risk death in the sun than remain in a sterile room attached to a machine that counts her heartbeats. “I’ll pass your regards on to Annalisa. She’ll be pleased to know how kindly you think of her.”

  Cousin Harry blushes and stares at the ground. His father is a weakling and he knows it. Poor kid. In the next few years, he’ll have to choose his own path. I hope it’s one that takes him far from his grandfather and his father.

  I walk to the lift and step inside. Neville’s hate has left an invisible bruise inside me. I burn with anger to think about the poison Annalisa must have been forced to swallow while she lived under his roof. The doors close and I go, down, down, down . . .

  10

  Goodness and Lil Bit wait outside the front gate of the Build ’Em Up: an open lot surrounded by a tall brick fence topped with coils of razor wire and security lights. The thing is, I already know all I need to about Annalisa’s—and my—family. Mayme and Sam welcomed me. Neville threw me out, and Uncle Julien did nothing to stop him. Harry stood to the side, unable or unwilling to take sides. I don’t know how all this will end, but the way that Mayme crushed me in her arms before I left gave me a feeling of closeness and comfort. I want it again.

  “Come on.” Lil Bit waves me closer at the very moment I decide to turn and walk away. I don’t want any more bad news, and my gut tells me there’s plenty of it about the Bollards on the World Wide Web. “You’re ten minutes late already!”

  I want to go home and rebuild the parts inside of me that Neville broke with his contempt. His voice invades my mind, and I realize that shutting him out will be hard work. I need my friends to help me turn down the volume of his voice, and they are right beside me.

  “Calm down, Sugar Town bitches. I’m here now.”

  They laugh.

  “This way,” Goodness says, and leads Lil Bit and me into a busy loading bay. Men haul timber to waiting trucks, and forklifts buzz across the concrete floor to collect bricks and bags of cement like ants taking apart a picnic. Most businesses in Sugar Town are barely hanging on. Customers drift in and leave with a can of condensed milk and a bag of dried lentils. The Build ’Em Up is rocking.

  Goodness climbs a set of narrow metal stairs that lead to an office area above the loading dock. A loft. Or if the building was taller, an aerie.

  “You first,” I tell Lil Bit, and follow her up to a small waiting room with a row of plastic chairs pushed against the wall. The Build ’Em Up makes money, but none of it is spent on interior decoration.

  Goodness knocks on a door with Office spray-painted on the wood in navy blue. “Come on, you two,” she says. “My brothers are always busy, so let’s do this quick.”

  The office door opens and a lean black teenager in dirty khaki pants and a faded T-shirt comes out. One of Goodness’s three brothers, all of whom I know by sight but have never been introduced to by name. This brother is tall and only a few years older than me. Seventeen or eighteen at the most.

  “What’s going on, G?” he asks, and his gaze flicks from Lil Bit to me and back to his sister as he waits for an answer.

  “We need the internet,” Goodness says. “And I’m starving. Do you have any food in here?”

  “There’s chicken and roti in the kitchen.” The boy waves us into a messy work area with three desks covered in receipts and dirty coffee cups. “Use Themba’s desk.”

  The office is a boys’ clubhouse. In one corner is a mini gym with a skipping rope and a punching bag and, in the other, a sofa and a coffee table littered with papers and empty soda cans. An overweight cat sleeps on a pillow covered with its own hair.

  Annalisa would shudder if she saw this place. She might be messy in her head, but not in her habitat. The regular soap goes on the right side of the sink and the special “going out” lavender soap on the left. Shoes go under our beds. Dishes get washed, dried, and put away immediately.

  “Where are Themba and Stevious?” Goodness sits on the edge of the nearest desk and swings her leg back and forth, completely comfortable in this alien man cave. The mess doesn’t bother her, either.

  “Delivering building materials to the housing development that’s going up at the turn off to the city. It’s a huge job,” her brother says, and takes the opposite corner of the desk. He waits to be introduced.

  “Oh,” Goodness says to us. “This is my brother Lewis. Lewis, these are my friends Lil Bit Bhengu and Amandla Harden.”

  “Lil Bit and Amandla.” Our names come out slow and deliberate. Is he thinking about Lil Bit’s father, the disgraced priest, and my mum, the strange white lady who goes into the sugarcane fields to sing to the stars at night?

  Until this morning, I would have felt embarrassed about Annalisa’s strange behavior. Now things are different. It’s my grandfather Neville who should be ashamed of himself. Not Annalisa. Not me.

  I cross the worn carpet and hold out my hand. “Hi, Lewis. I’m Amandla.” Fake confidence gives way to the real thing. “Nice to meet you.”

  His handshake is tight and awkward, and standing this close, I can see that he has brown eyes and dimples in his cheeks. I don’t think he knows it yet, but his square jaw, full lips, and dark brows come together exactly right. He is . . . delicious.

  “Me too,” Lewis answers in a rush. “I mean, it’s nice to meet you as well.”

  Goodness rolls her eyes at his awkwardness and flings herself into an old leather chair that creaks and groans when she moves. She hits the power button and the computer monitor on the desk pings to life. Lil Bit stands close to Goodness’s right shoulder, but I keep my distance; I’m too scared to confront whatever information might come up. I let Goodness be my filter.

  “Where should we start?” she asks.

  “With what we know for sure,” Lil Bit says. “A name. A place. A date. What have you got, Amandla?”

  Three facts jump to mind.

  “Mother’s birth name is Annalisa Bollard. Her mother’s name is Amanda. Her father’s name is Neville Bollard, and he is a bastard.”

  Goodness taps in the information, hits search, and frowns at the screen. “Neville Samuel Harry Bollard. From Durban?”

  “I think that’s him.” Uncle Julien named his sons after Grandfather and still no love from the old man, Sam says. Poor Uncle. “What have you got?”

  Goodness stares at the computer and then up at me. “Says here that the first generation of Bollards made their fortune in sugar. The next generation bought half shares in a diamond mine in Kimberley and the next generation expanded into real estate and transportation. Your grandma Amanda brought in fresh money from an investment firm and a technology company. Brah, your gramps is rich as fuck. The hell are you doing in Sugar Town?”

  Like I have a choice between a shack and a glam house by the ocean!

  “Wait.” I step closer, eager for more
news, but still afraid of what I might find. “Is my mum listed under children?”

  “Annalisa Honey-Blossom Bollard. You can’t make this shit up, so yeah, she’s listed. Second child. Only daughter. Come. See for yourself.” Goodness leans back so Lil Bit and me get a clear view of the screen. I lean in and do a quick read before breaking the information down: Old money (Bollard sugar and diamonds) meets new money (Harden technology and investments), and together they make more money.

  Goodness flicks to images of the Bollards: a recent pic of Mayme and Neville at the opening of the Amanda Bollard Institute, Uncle Julien breaking ground for a new factory, and a photograph of my mother, young and suntanned and standing on a snowcapped mountain with tall spruce trees and views of a winter-white valley.

  “Oh,” I say. “Oh.”

  It physically hurts to see Annalisa so happy. She has no idea, in that photo, that her rich-girl life is about to end. That she’ll end up living in a tin shack with a baby and no money. Was that a choice she was forced to make? Me or the money?

  “Seriously,” Goodness says. “You never thought to look this stuff up before?”

  “Annalisa used her mother’s maiden name, Harden. Same as my surname. She never mentioned her family, not even once. I asked. She said we were alone.”

  “Now that you know the truth,” Goodness says, “why are you here, mixing with us poor folk?”

  “Goodness . . .” Lil Bit says.

  “Okay, okay. I’m just saying . . .”

  I sigh.

  “My grandfather Neville kicked my mum out of the house when she got pregnant with me or maybe after she had me. I don’t know for sure. What I do know is that my brown skin is too dark for Grandpa. He’s old-fashioned that way.”

  Lil Bit says, “Hold on. You’ve met him?”