by Shani Mootoo
“We have no choice but to make a decision.” There was a pause and then Aunt Lavinia said, “Don’t worry. Please don’t worry about that. I have known that at some time in my life I would have to face it. It looks like the time has come.” Pohpoh could tell that her mother responded but was unable to hear anything distinct.
“I will leave them a note, partially explaining, and then I will write them in detail once we’re there. But they will never accept any of this, and if they learn of it beforehand, they will separate us at once…Look, Sarah, either we do it now or we will never be able to. There would be no point for me in living if I was unable to see you every single day of my life.”
Another pause. Pohpoh heard little of what Mama said.
“They are every bit a part of our lives. I too want them with us, no less than you. We will never be parted from the children. I promise you that.”
Again Mama’s words were inaudible.
“It is, dear. But I have access now to my inheritance. What better use to put it to than taking you and the children some place where we can be a family, where we will never be separated. Ah, my sweet, don’t be afraid. Sarah dearest, tell me, is this what you want or shall we stop all of this at once?”
This time Pohpoh heard her mother. “Yes! Yes, of course. As long as the children can be with us, I want to go far, far away with you, some place where we can be together.”
“Then I will get the passages. I will get them. I will arrange it all. We will be able to be together within the next few days. We can sleep at night and hold each other and…”
Mama did not go to the gate to see Aunt Lavinia off as she had in the past. Pohpoh suddenly felt very grown up. She also felt weak and dizzy, knowing that she and her sister and her mother were going to go away—where she could not imagine—without her father. While she had no desire to tell him, she knew she was holding a terrifying secret.
For the next few days Pohpoh shivered even in the sunshine, while Asha sweated in her ignorance. She withdrew from Asha and began to collect things in a little bag. She gathered seeds and shells from the garden. She carefully snapped a leaf off the cereus plant, which was thriving but had not yet blossomed. She was determined one day to see the spectacular blossoms that Aunt Lavinia had described so rapturously. When the white sap stopped flowing like blood from the snapped-off end, she wrapped the leaf in a handkerchief, also a present from Aunt Lavinia, and placed it in her bag.
During the next days, Aunt Lavinia did not visit. Mama and Papa avoided each other’s eyes but it was noticeable even to Papa how busy Mama kept herself, and how much attention she was paying to getting meals on time, to cleaning up and straightening the house.
Then the day arrived. It was a cool morning. Rain had fallen all night and only recently let up. Insects were clamouring. Pohpoh saw the signs early that Aunt Lavinia would be coming. Once Papa was out of the house, Mama dressed in clothes she might have chosen for a special church event. She insisted on dressing Pohpoh and Asha, even though both were capable of readying themselves. When Mama slid the new dresses off their hangers, Pohpoh knew they had been chosen a while ago, for the garments had been pressed and placed in the cupboard for easy access. She made them wear their fancy shoes and new socks. There was such urgency in Mama’s actions that neither child protested or asked questions. Pohpoh wondered if Asha also understood what was happening, for she noticed how unusually agreeable and attentive she was to Mama’s every wish.
Aunt Lavinia arrived before they had finished their breakfast. The children were startled but Mama didn’t seem at all surprised, even though Aunt Lavinia had entered through the back gate, one that was used so seldom it had all but grown over with brambles. Neither did Mama seem interested that she had brought the buggy and horse all the way into the backyard instead of parking in front as usual. Pohpoh noticed that even though bright sunshine had followed the night’s long rain, the buggy was fully covered. She observed too that Mama and Aunt Lavinia regarded each other with a strained formality.
Then Aunt Lavinia spoke quietly and urgently to Mama. “He has already gone off with my father. But I don’t know how long they will be gone. We’d better hurry.” Mama didn’t move but held her hands up as if uncertain. Aunt Lavinia moved closer. Mama instantly backed away.
“You manage all the passages? The ship sailing today self? Look how it rain last night. It won’t postpone, Lavinia, eh? It don’t have another sailing for months, right?”
Aunt Lavinia stood still. She bit her lower lip. Then she very calmly but firmly said, “This is the last sailing before the rains. We must hurry, my sweetest.”
Mama became unfrozen and began clearing off the table.
“Are the things in the sewing room?” Aunt Lavinia asked. Mama nodded and Aunt Lavinia bolted downstairs and started hauling boxes and trunks up into the drawing room, then down the back stairs and out to the buggy. Her shoes squeaked sharply with each step in the wet earth. Insects carried on their ruckus.
Pohpoh watched from a distance. There were already two trunks atop the buggy, strapped down with thick leather belts. She wondered where Aunt Lavinia got such strength. Asha followed Aunt Lavinia down the narrow stairs to the sewing room. Pohpoh could hear her asking Aunt Lavinia questions—what this was for and what that was for—and for the first time Aunt Lavinia was too preoccupied to answer carefully. Her tone was unindulgent and oddly sharp, and so the questions, obtuse and pointless, kept coming, as though answers were not what Asha really needed. Pohpoh stood in the doorway between the verandah and the kitchen and watched Mama busily closing windows and gathering photographs off the walls. Then Aunt Lavinia came up the back stairs and said it was time, and they must leave at once if they intended to make the sailing.
It was only then that Mama, holding the children’s velvet hats in her hand, pulled Asha and Pohpoh close, stooped down to face them and whispered, as though there were someone else in the room who should not hear.
“We going on a long trip, far away. We going with Aunt Lavinia on a boat. For a long time. Papa doesn’t know. Is a surprise. I pack up all your things. Everything pack up.” She placed a hat on each child’s head. She bit her lip and blinked her eyes rapidly as she pulled firmly on the ribbons and tied a bow, first under Asha’s chin and then Pohpoh’s.
“Now I want you to go like nice girls quiet-quiet inside the buggy. You have to sit down and stay quiet-quiet until we get far away, you hear me? Okay now go, quickly. Aunt Lavinia will take you downstairs.”
Aunt Lavinia placed her hands protectively on their shoulders and ushered them down the back stairs. At the bottom they waited for Mama. The sun had suddenly come out and the wet leaves on the trees and shrubs were glistening. Mama stood on the top stair, looked around at the yard and then, with a deep breath, ran down.
Just as they entered the buggy Pohpoh remembered her bag with all the seeds and the shells and the cereus cutting.
“My bag, my bag. I have to get my bag.” She ran toward the steps shouting.
Mama and Aunt Lavinia tried to grab her but she was already ascending the back stairs. Aunt Lavinia headed after her and suddenly stopped. Pohpoh came to a halt, for she too heard footsteps.
“Come on. Pohpoh, come now! Come here!” Aunt Lavinia snapped an urgent whisper.
Pohpoh froze in terror. Her father had returned. Unsuspecting, he had strolled up the front stairs and across the verandah, had already unlocked the front door and was walking through the drawing room toward her.
Pohpoh stood still, unable to breathe, the whole world turning black around her. She saw her father hesitate, the cock of his head and the sudden twist of his body revealing he had noticed that pictures were missing from the walls, that the curtains were drawn, that the house was uncommonly tidy. She imagined what he was seeing—things cleared away or cleared out. She heard his unsure footsteps walk to the bedroom he shared with Mama.
Aunt Lavinia no longer whispered. “Pohpoh, Pohpoh,” she called out sharply. She tried to grab Pohpoh’s hand when she heard Chandin cry, “Sarah!” The nervousness in his voice made her pull back. When he called the second time his voice was unrecognizable.
Chandin swept through the kitchen and onto the back verandah. Aunt Lavinia backed down the stairs in haste. He saw Pohpoh and ran past her. She turned to watch him but the sun had caught on the jagged edge of the porch’s iron roof and the spot dazzled like a blinding star. She heard her father descending the stairs, two, three at a time. She heard everyone shouting at once. She heard her father screaming, her mother screaming and Aunt Lavinia’s voice, suddenly deep and raspy, shouting her name and Asha’s. She heard Asha screaming.
It was Asha she heard most clearly, “No! No! No! Pohpoh! Pohpoh, Pohpoh. I want Pohpoh. No! I want Pohpoh.” Then she heard the buggy rolling swiftly through the yard. She lay in a puddle on the floor of the verandah, her nose against the damp wood floor, shutting out the sounds. She covered her eyes with both hands.
It seemed as though hours passed before her father dragged Asha, heaving with incessant dry sobs, up the stairs. He stood on the verandah in his Wetlandish whites, and not until the sound of the horse and buggy had completely died out did he move. He kicked the banister again and again, first with his right foot, then with his left. He hobbled into the house. The two children huddled on the verandah floor, unsure and terrified. He seemed oblivious to their presence. They watched as he swiped at the kitchen counter, sending pots and pans and cutlery crashing to the floor, clanging and spinning. Asha began a soundless, fitful crying. Pohpoh held her breath and covered her mouth. Her eyes missed nothing. Plates and cups and glasses shattered all over the kitchen floor. Her father tore through the house smashing ornaments. Asha and Pohpoh turned to face whichever direction he took, keeping him locked in their sight. He thundered into his bedroom, kicking and banging the walls. They heard the drawers of the armoire being yanked out. Pohpoh knew he was seeing emptiness. He came out with a tin, thundered into the kitchen, banged the container on the table. He rifled through photographs, pitching some on the floor. Those of his wife or Lavinia Thoroughly he crumpled into a ball, then spat on, all the while crying and making growling sounds. His children cried even more seeing him cry.
His task so blinded him that he did not notice Pohpoh tiptoe to her room. She walked straight to her Bible, which sat on the table where she and Asha did their homework. She shook the Bible and out fell a photograph. Her heart beat rapidly. It was the one of Aunt Lavinia and Mama that her father had taken at the beach not long before. She shoved it in her pocket and, holding her breath, made her way toward the verandah.
Her father’s skin and hair were drenched in sweat. He staggered as though drunk and threw the crumpled photographs into the kitchen sink. He struck a match on the window sill and dropped it. It did not take long for the little flames to become one large one. The flame leapt up from the sink, burning blue and orange. Black smoke tumbled upwards and flecks of blackened ash sputtered throughout the kitchen.
* * *
—
The story of Chandin Ramchandin’s wife and Reverend and Mrs. Ernest Thoroughly’s daughter spread across the island with the swiftness of a brush fire and the quietness of ripples in a sugar-factory pond. The affair was not discussed during the evenings when villagers congregated in the shade of their favourite trees to take in the breeze, talk out their problems and hear a little gossip. More than half the labourers on the island had converted to Reverend Thoroughly’s church and no one wanted to be seen or heard partaking in idle chatter involving his name. But when one person met another, under their breath and with hands perched at their lips, people did indeed speak.
“You hear about—?” The sentence would remain unfinished, a flick of the head in the direction of the church being enough.
“What about the children?”
“By him, na!”
“Hmmm, he take up the bottle, I hear.”
And that was more than enough for the talkers to feel pangs of guilt, for they felt as though they were discussing, not the Ramchandins or Lavinia, but rather their Reverend, their church and their God.
* * *
—
Chandin Ramchandin never set foot in the school house or the church again. The Thoroughlys, mortified by the actions of their once-treasured daughter and by Sarah, let go of their ties to him. He fenced off his house crudely with chicken wire and stayed indoors, waiting in a spot equidistant from the back door and the front door, expecting one or both of the women to return to try and nab the children.
He did not let them out of his sight. He stood guard as they showered in the outdoor bathroom. He waited for them not far from the latrine. For the first few weeks after the shattering of his world, he slept in his bed with a child on either side.
One night he turned, his back to Asha, and in a fitful, nightmarish sleep, mistook Pohpoh for Sarah. He put his arm around her and slowly began to touch her. Pohpoh opened her eyes. Frightened and confused by this strange, insistent probing, she barely breathed, pretending to be fast asleep. She tried to shrink away from under his hand. Suddenly, awakening fully, he sat up. Then he brought his body heavily on top of hers and slammed his hand over her mouth. She opened her eyes and stared back at him in terror. A sweat covered his face and neck, and dripped on her. Glaring and breathing heavily like a mad dog, he pinned her hands to the bed and forced her legs apart.
That is how it started. The following night he sent the two children to sleep in their own room, but they both came to know that he would call for one or the other to pass at least part of the night in his bed.
* * *
—
Soft-edged shadows danced on the wall: a dog with drooping ears but no sound to accompany its opening and closing mouth, a rabbit with long ears, a butterfly gracefully beating the wall with its wings as it ascended and then transformed into a giraffe’s head on a long neck.
Late into the night, long after their housework and school studies were done, sleep was impossible. The flame in a kerosene lamp sitting on the floor jumped in the breeze passing through the window. Too exhausted to sit at the study table, yet too frightened and tense to sleep, Pohpoh and Asha lay together in the narrow bed against the wall. In the yard crickets chirped. From the other side of their bedroom door came the low voice of their father in the drawing room, mumbling tuneless phrases from church songs. Occasionally he muttered long and animated conversations with himself, sometimes crying or pleading or angrily cursing.
Asha lay huddled in Pohpoh’s chest between arms that were magical and elegant, making creatures dance and transform gracefully. She hugged herself, her hands clenched into little fists. In the protective comfort of Pohpoh’s warmth, Asha’s eyes brightened, her eyebrows arched and a smile twitched and widened at each new animal. Pohpoh’s mouth wore the strained shape of a smile for her little sister’s eyes, but her forehead and her own eyes were dark and solemn, waiting for the inevitable ripping apart of the night. She heard every creak of the chair outside in the living room as her hands worked to calm and distract Asha. She hoped he would drop off to sleep right there in the drawing room, unable to budge with so much alcohol in his brain.
The chair in the drawing room groaned. The singing and chatter stopped. The smile on Asha’s face disappeared. She squeezed her eyes shut and turned her face into Pohpoh’s chest. Her little hands grabbed Pohpoh’s upper arms and she clenched her fists. The sting of pinched skin felt good to Pohpoh. She pulled Asha closer to her and squeezed her, trying to save her by obliterating her.
“Asha,” he called out from the drawing room. “Asha.” Asha’s body trembled as if she were naked in an icy wind. Pohpoh clamped her hand over Asha’s mouth.
“Stay!” Pohpoh snapped. “Don’t move. I’ll go. Shhh, he too drunk. He’ll never know the difference. Go to sleep. You close you
r eyes and go to sleep, Asha baby. Nothing will happen to you, I promise.”
Pohpoh unwrapped herself from Asha and went. As if it were nothing at all.
THE GARDENER’S NAME was John Hector. Sister called him John. The staff referred to him as Hector, some of the residents and I called him Mr. Hector, and to the others he was “son.” Mr. Hector was still curious about me. When I passed him, stooped shirtless on his haunches weeding a bed (almost too lean for a man of his fatherly age), he would put down his tools. His eyes would tickle my flesh as they followed me, the sort of tickle that jabs rather than titillates. His curiosity, though, did not have the same sneering intent that I felt from the nurses and Toby, the yardboy. Before the incident I am about to relate, which has, contrary to first impressions, more to do with Miss Ramchandin than with him or me, he had not spoken more than a polite sentence or two to me.
“Tyler!” Before I turned to see who had called, he was getting right to the point. “The old lady interested in gardening? I know she had big yard before it burn down. I hear it was full of all kinds of bush, plenty for teas for bad feeling and pain and thing. She had pretty-pretty plants, I hear. They say the yard also had some plants that was ugly like snake-face and dangerous like snake-bite, but plenty-plenty bush. It look like she used to take care of it—useful, pretty, bad, whatever. How she doing?” He held a stem of a yellow gerbera picked from the bed he was tending.
