The Bride Price: An African Romance (Chitundu Chronicles)

by Suzanne Popp

  When Karin started to have leg cramps and blurred vision, they traveled to London to have it checked out. She could not travel to South Africa where the hospitals were excellent, as it was illegal for the races to integrate, much less marry, and a mixed-race couple was guilty of the crime of miscegeny.

  Karin had been diagnosed with MS and she was pregnant. She never hesitated to have the baby; and actually felt better while pregnant, than she had before. After Lily Wonder was born, Karin’s health deteriorated and Karin was confined to a wheelchair. With her husband and a caring faculty at the school where they taught, she managed to raise her baby. She also raised the scores of her students on their math tests. The headmaster, Mr. Kerala, respected her and Bwalya, and would often have them over to his house, where he would drink scotch and regale them with stories of how he was discriminated against at a boys’ boarding school in Australia. Both Bwalya and Karin knew that racism was prevalent in many countries. For them, Africa would always be where their daughter Lily Wonder belonged. They worked hard to make a better life for her and a secure one where she would be able to choose her path. Bwalya was gaining recognition for his painting and was invited to several art shows in Europe. He declined, because his family came first. They were his inspiration, and he pursued his passion and taught his students to do likewise.

  Bwalya wanted to see his art students learn to think for themselves and express their point of view through their paintings and sculptures. He was aware of the devastating swath HIV, or the thins, was taking on the lives of young people in Africa. As a way of opening the channels of communication, and overcoming the fear of this disease, Bwalya decided to have himself tested. At this time, three of his brothers had died of pneumonia, and unknown to him, the other five were having recurrent bouts of illness and fatigue. Bwalya felt invincible because he had been faithful to his wife. She was the one who was in a precarious medical condition that they were handling together.

  Bwalya sat in the HIV/AIDS clinic waiting his turn to be tested. There were benches along the walls where patients sat looking studiously at their hands, the upper seams of the stucco wall, or at their feet. He wished he could talk to a few people to find out what had motivated them to be tested, but this was not going to happen. He, too, began to avoid looking directly at anyone’s face. He checked his watch. He was due at soccer practice in 20 minutes. If he wasn’t called soon, he would have to leave.

  “Bwalya L.?” a clear voice called out. He stood and walked to the small room where a sample of blood was taken. His hand was stamped then he was told to check back in one week’s time. His card would be marked with either a plus or a minus, indicating his status.

  Bwalya whistled as he headed for the practice field. He would do a brief research on the history of HIV, then present it to his class when he had his results. He’d show them the card and tell them how important it was to be tested. Maybe making a poster showing stigmatization would be a good project, with possible interest from the government in printing and distributing it. No one was ahead of this curve, and art students should learn how to be current with their ideas and illustrations if they wanted to benefit their community and be commercially successful.

  On the practice field, students were jostling each other, dressed in the red and blue of Bessbro Academy. They had such energy, he would have them go out full force and play a few quarters before working on drills and plays. The ball was soon flying from one end of the field to the other, and he loved the movement of the legs in their flashing red color with the stripes at the cuffs of the socks. They moved so fast, they reminded Bwalya of bicycle wheels. Maybe this would be a winning season for Bessbro.

  A week later, Bwalya dropped by the clinic to pick up his card with the results. He noted the plus sign, and was relieved for a second, until he realized what it meant. Then it struck him like a blow in the gut. It was not a positive result for him—it meant he had the disease. Bwalya’s head dropped to his chest, his arms were leaden, and he felt the weight of disaster. There was a flood of memories racing through his head and he thought he would be sick to his stomach. What had he done? He was overwhelmed with the message he would have to deliver to his wife and the school.

  How could he be positive? He had never cheated on his wife. They had been together almost six years. She needed him, and he had never disappointed her. His unsullied marriage was now tainted. Bwalya thought back to the girls he had known. Most of them were girls in middle school, young girls who had scarcely known what was going on as he coaxed them to part with their innocence in his dormitory room, or behind the bushes while on school break. There had been a couple of encounters with women in France when he was attending art school. The models had made him lustful, but he couldn’t imagine them being diseased. The list was not long, and he had avoided the women his Uncle Dodge had provided for his nephews. Bwalya had an aversion to the control his uncle exerted over the boys in return for these favors. In his body, there was no sign of any sickness or disorder, no nausea, or coughing, no fevers, no fungal infections.

  Bwalya had seen his brothers when they were infected, and they had no energy or beauty in their bodies. They were listless and their skin was drawn. His was radiant with health and he had never been more physically fit. He thought he was pure and would be an example to his family and his students, of how a man should live. This ended with a blue index card with his name at the top and a plus sign in black below. Bwalya looked at the paper with the test results again, staring in disbelief. He was feeling strong and at his most creative. The headmaster at school had just rewarded him with a grant to expand his teaching of the arts to the college in Blancville. His paintings from the last school break had won the prestigious Cultural Award given by the President. And now, his life was over. How could he tell his wife Karin or face his family? He wouldn’t. He would pack up and leave the area, not to be seen again.

  Bwalya recalled how appalled he had been when he learned his oldest brother had the thins. Almost before he could absorb this news, a second brother was struck with the telltale pneumonia and recurring infections that accompanied the diagnosis of HIV. He had never suspected he would also fall prey to the epidemic that was winnowing the young men of southern Africa. How could his parents endure the continuing loss of their children?

  As he walked home from the clinic, Bwalya saw his daughter sitting on the swing. He could hear her singing as he got nearer, her magical curls blowing in her mouth as she swung back and forth under the gigantic mango tree. She was singing a ditty about how many kisses she would give or get, while he thought of how he might have contracted this disease. He had put away his materials, written down his wishes, and briefly considered taking his life then and there. Karin came through the door.

  She could tell from his face something terrible had happened.

  “I am HIV positive, Karin,” he sobbed.

  “Oh my God! We will get you medications. We will let the school know so they can help you make a schedule that will not be too strenuous, just as they did when I had the MS setback. Let me call the clinic and see what medications are available for you. If not here, we will get them from Holland.” Karin wrapped her husband in her arms and pulled him to her. Lily came running in to hug him and they sat on the sofa and saw how brilliant the setting sun was against the plantings in their yard.

  Bwalya arrived at the teachers’ lounge early for the weekly meeting. He knocked on the door of the headmaster, and Mr. Kerala welcomed him in. “I came early to share some information with you before anyone else got here.” Bwalya started.

  Mr. Kerala saw that Bwalya was upset by the way his hands shook. “What is wrong Bwalya? Are you ill? Is something wrong with Karin or Lily Wonder?”

  “I went to the HIV clinic and had myself tested. I am positive.”

  Mr. Kerala said nothing. His mouth opened and he sucked in his breath, flattening his nostrils. “Have you told anyone?”

  “Just Karin. She suggested I tell you immediately so we co
uld adjust my schedule and make sure I get enough rest and the medications I will need. I feel fine, but so little is known about this disease.”

  “Yes. We will have to make some adjustments. Let me think about this, and I will see you in the meeting.”

  The morning assembling of the faculty began as usual with Reverend Joseph offering a prayer and passing out the agenda. Bwalya looked it over as Karin rolled her chair to the end of the long table next to the headmaster. There was a buzz of small talk between colleagues, most of it centering around food and extra-curricular activities. The subject matter had changed in the last few years since Karin joined the staff, but it was mostly sexual innuendoes that those not interested in dating ignored and glossed over. Today, there was no conversation with Bwalya, and Karin too was left out of the teasing. Headmaster Kerala concentrated on the papers in front of him and after taking roll call, he moved to the first action item. There would be a general cleaning of the school as the Ministry of Education would make their annual visit in a week’s time.

  “I know you will all prepare your best students with something to present,” the headmaster said. Mr. Kerala was a tall, slightly paunchy man with an imposing face that suggested he could be much harsher than his quiet voice indicated. He had spent several years in boarding school in Australia, getting his education and paying for it with his spontaneity and his humor. Now, at 46, he had reached the pinnacle of what he would be. He was keenly aware that more might have been expected of him and of what it had cost him to achieve this security. Nothing was going to disrupt his path to order, security and a retirement. His wife stood behind him, never seeking to socialize with the other wives at the college compound, never venturing to attempt more than meeting her obligations to be a ready hostess to his visitors, the guardian of his appearance, and the mother of his children.

  He was thinking of her this morning, knowing he would have to dismiss this promising young tutor. His wife would question him about it because she had always liked Bwalya. How could the man have not seen that he would not brook a member of his faculty being HIV positive? What had possessed the man to get himself tested? Now, he was in the awkward position of having to remove him from the faculty.

  The students had progressed well under Bwalya’s teaching. Kerala only hoped Bwalya would have the good grace to go quietly. He would not tolerate his reputation or that of his college being put at risk of censure. Imagine parents turning away to another school because of this stigma of a tutor known to be HIV positive? And now, with the Ministry of Education coming to call, this was the worst timing. Awkward was too simple a word. This was the stigma he had spent a lifetime avoiding.

  “Bwalya, you will be relieved of preparing your students. I have an assignment that I will need you to work on immediately. And Karin, I will need to speak with you after the faculty meeting. We are going to have to relocate you from the school compound. I know that may prove difficult for you to maintain your schedule. We are going to go to a divided schedule for the remainder of the week. You will teach your first classes, then return in the late afternoon for study period and tutoring.”

  Karin looked at the headmaster in disbelief. She already had difficulty getting to the classrooms from their bungalow on the campus. The paths were not paved and without Bwalya’s assistance, she could not wheel her chair to the classrooms. With a divided shift, she would have to repeat this process four times. If Bwalya was away on an assignment, how would she manage to get to class at all, or pick up her daughter at the preschool in town?

  Mr. Kerala continued with the agenda. There was a lot of discussion about the upcoming Ministry visit, the need for improved test standards, and who would be monitoring the students as they took their exams. Karin tuned out as she tried to figure out how she could fulfill her teaching duties.

  After the meeting was over, Mr. Kerala waited for Karin in his office. He closed the door behind her, then pressed his hands together in front of his chest, the long fingers bending from the pressure. “Karin. I am sorry you will have to leave the faculty. Unfortunately, my hands are tied. We need to be professional about this. We cannot have one bad apple spoiling the barrel.” Karin mentally rang up the clichés, one after the other. Mr. Kerala was on automatic pilot, or should she say, bureaucratic overdrive. Next, he would be recounting again how he had suffered as the only black student in his boarding school who survived the racism of the sixties in Australia. But she was not going to let her dismissal go unchallenged.

  “On what grounds do you believe you should dismiss me?” she asked. Mr. Kerala was taken aback.

  “You know I am having to let Bwalya go,” he said.

  “No. I did not hear that in the faculty meeting. What I heard you say was that he would not be assisting with the Ministry of Education program this year and that you had a special assignment for him.”

  “Do I need to be blunt? The man has stabbed himself in the foot. He has burned his bridges.”

  “You are not being blunt. You are not being candid. You are not being honest. But what offense have I committed?” she asked.

  “Surely you don’t expect to be working when your husband is no longer welcome here?”

  “Why not? Am I not performing well in the math department? Don’t my students need my tutoring to do well on their “O” level exams? What is the cause for dismissing a teacher who has done excellent teaching for this college?” Karin could feel the heat in her cheeks at the indignation she felt.

  “Our discussion is over. Please plan on leaving the campus by the end of the week as I am having your bungalow renovated and need it vacated.” Mr. Kerala rose to open the door but Karin had already opened it and was on her way out.

  She headed for their home to console Bwalya and help plan what they could do to survive in this emergency. She would need to take Lily Wonder out of her preschool if there was no immediate work for her to do. She could always tutor students. They would think of something. She would write a formal letter to Mr. Kerala asking for an explanation of her untimely dismissal. With a push of the wheels, she launched her chair through the pea gravel, sweating in the midmorning heat of December. It was a day she would not forget.

  Karin wasn’t the kind of woman who saw the dark side of life. She had been with her husband when he told the faculty he had been tested and found positive. She noticed that no one looked at him after that. Karin and Bwalya were asked to move off the school compound to a flat in town. Within the month, Bwalya was laid off. Karin had to wheel herself along the sandy road to the school compound each day, while Bwalya remained at home with their child.

  The students who had been so eager to take lessons in drawing and painting now made excuses why they could not come to the house. The housekeeper no longer showed up, and when Karin went to the grocer, he laid her change on the counter, not in her hand.

  Karin applied for anti-retrovirals for Bwalya, but she was refused. She was told her husband would have to come to the clinic himself and explain why he needed them. There was never a convenient time for this appointment, and the pharmacy told Karin that it was not their policy to stock what were not proven medications. Next Karin tried to get the pills from Holland, but the government would not allow them to be issued without seeing the person directly to determine the need for them. Bwalya found himself ostracized from even the beer hall in town. People stopped their conversation when he entered, and if he put his hand out to shake hands, they withdrew theirs. He concentrated on his art and on his child, but depression set in as the illness took its toll.

  For a brief period, Bwalya attended the Full Gospel Evangelical meeting, but when he confessed that he was positive for HIV, the pastors said they could not accept a person with HIV, nor want them in their midst contaminating others. Karin too was singled out and asked if it wasn’t HIV that made it necessary for her to be in the wheelchair. Her daughter was denied admittance into the preschool that Karin herself had founded in the village. Now, the family fiber was stretched as the
two parents struggled to provide for their child and shield her from stigmatization.

  The newspapers began to carry a few articles on this mystery disease, but it was seen as a visitation of punishment on those who fornicated or committed sodomy, and the best advice was to avoid anyone who tested positive. As a result, few people went to be tested. There was a growing consensus that those with the disease should be shunned, and this led to fewer people willing to admit that they had the disease, or had lost family members to HIV. Some suggested those infected should even be denied a funeral, if they were known to carry the virus.

  Bwalya’s first encounter with a positive HIV message of hope came from a group of gay men who were traveling in Africa. They shared their medications and reported that HIV was also in other parts of the world. For a brief time, Bwalya felt hope and opportunity, and felt better after taking the medications. He could not overcome the fact that he was now the last of his brothers alive, and that his parents might learn of his illness. He had already shirked having them meet his wife, who was not only white, but handicapped. He didn’t want to face the criticism or questioning. He was losing everything he had worked to attain, and finally, even his creative spark no longer kindled as he retreated into the world of the outcast.

  Joseph called his wife, Violet, out of the house and took her by the arm. “Violet, I have heard from Bwalya. He is not well and he does not want us to come and see him. He says the school where he works is letting him go at the end of the month and that he will need someone to care for their daughter. Do you know anything about this?”

  Violet could see the anger and the pain in her husband’s face. He had never confronted her like this, and she felt all her frustrations and fears run together like the whitewash on a freshly painted hut in an unexpected rain.

  She answered him in a voice she did not recognize. “Why are you telling me this now? It has been five, no, almost six years since the boy has visited us. He went to University, we heard he had married and had a child, and suddenly, you are concerned. Have you heard anything else?”