Coach seemed to know exactly where Jean Patrick’s breaking point was, and he kept Jean Patrick just at its edge. Instead of snapping, his body turned harder, stronger, faster. Coach had abandoned the truck tire for a new method from his magazines, a technique called fartlek. It was a system for distance runners modified for Jean Patrick’s torture. “I will make you suffer for kilometers at a time,” Coach said with his typical smirk. “That way, the eight hundred will seem like a walk.”
Since the beginning of the new semester, they had been working out together in the mornings, then weights and breakfast at Coach’s house. Coach said he wanted to keep a closer eye on Jean Patrick’s training and nutrition, and anyway, it was time he got back in shape himself. Coach had grown lean like a leopard, the angle of his jaw sharper. Jean Patrick wondered if a woman had caused this change, and his mind pondered what she must be like.
“Go! Last and fastest!” Coach shouted at his back.
Jean Patrick accelerated. Three minutes of pain until Coach yelled “Stop.” As he surged, he tried to focus on the political situation. The transitional government had yet to be sworn in. Always the tease of success and then another excuse: a procedural difficulty, a delegate whose name had been omitted. He could no longer tell Bea to have faith, to trust that Habyarimana would keep his word.
“I can’t stand this anymore,” Bea said on one of the rare days Jean Patrick managed to capture her for a walk. “This cycle of hope and disappointment breaks my heart every day.”
Jean Patrick knew too much about the behavior of hearts. His own was breaking. Bea had jumped headfirst into politics. She started a club, organized student meetings, wrote articles and opinions for an underground newspaper. Jean Patrick saw little more of her than a skirt disappearing around a corner, a fringe of shawl beckoning from the stairwell. He tracked her news through Jonathan, greeted Niyonzima to catch a glimmer of her scent. He wondered if all this passion had at its heart the fear of losing her father for good. Jean Patrick glanced at his watch. Forty seconds to go. He let emotion fuel a final burst of speed.
“Stop!” Coach said, surprisingly close behind him.
Jean Patrick took a welcome gulp of cool air, turned back, and jogged toward his coach. His legs quivered, and sweat burned his eyes. “You’re getting fast, Coach.”
“Or you’re slowing down,” Coach said. He took off his sweatband and shook it out. “You’ll turn heads at World Championships, put Rwanda on the map.”
“Turn heads? I’m going to win.”
Jean Patrick was half joking, but Coach didn’t laugh. “It’s possible. I’ve been thinking. We should travel this spring, race in countries like Kenya that are serious about running. People outside Rwanda need to know your name, and you need to get a taste of real competition. You have to get experience fighting through a pack with guys who’ve been around a track once or twice, guys you can’t shake off so easily.”
“Those boys from Kigali—didn’t you say they went to Kenya?”
“Those boys,” Coach said, “are specks beneath your heels.”
THE PHONE RANG the instant Jean Patrick and Coach walked in the door, as if their entrance had set it off. Coach sprinted to answer. He listened in silence a moment, then covered the mouthpiece and turned to Jean Patrick. “Wait in the dining room. I’ll just be a minute.”
Taking off his shoes, Jean Patrick strained to catch some scrap of Coach’s conversation. Jolie came in from the yard, chicken feathers stuck to her arms and clothing. “Where were you five minutes ago when I needed a fast runner to chase down a hen?”
“It looks like you did fine without me.” He thought he heard Coach say icyitso, and he cocked his ear toward the living room.
Jolie slapped his arm. “Inshyanutsi! Mind your business, nosy one. What did I warn you?”
Coach strode into the hall. “Bring us tea and something to eat, Jolie.” The toothpick between his pursed lips worked up and down. “No weights today. Something’s come up.”
Sitting at the table, Jean Patrick watched Coach out of the corner of his eye. Whatever news he had received was important enough to change a schedule that was as rigid as stone. He waited for a hint, a crumb of information, but Coach remained silent except for the rhythmic tap of his knife against the tablecloth.
Jolie brought bread and fruit, a thermos of tea. She set down plates and cups.
“Jean Patrick takes milk,” Coach said.
“Milk is finished. Four days now I haven’t seen that Tutsi woman I buy from at the market. She must have joined the Inkotanyi.”
Coach pushed the bread basket toward Jean Patrick. “Eat. You worked hard.”
“I’m not very hungry, Coach.”
“You need to rebuild muscle; you’re far too skinny.” He sliced a tomato and slid it onto Jean Patrick’s plate. “What’s the matter? You’re not sick again, are you?”
Jean Patrick picked at his food. He spooned extra sugar into his tea to make up for the lack of milk. It tasted strong and bitter. “No, Coach, I’m not sick.”
Coach’s eyes flitted to the window, stared out toward the road and came back to rest on Jean Patrick’s face. Jean Patrick remembered how Roger had done the same thing, his mind never coming to a state of ease.
With half his food left on his plate, Coach pushed it away. “I’ll drive you to school.”
“Coach, I can walk. I have time before class.”
A crumb remained on Coach’s lip, and he swiped his napkin across his mouth. “Today, you’re not walking.”
A CHILLY WIND whipped at Jean Patrick’s neck as he leaned against the car door, waiting for Coach to unlock it. He wiggled the zipper on his jacket to force it closed. Clouds gathered over the mountains and left Burundi in shadow. Coach remained in the doorway, a bundle of clothes in his arm, talking to Jolie. RTLM blared from an open window and competed with their conversation. Jean Patrick couldn’t make out the words, but the announcer’s animated tone made him nervous. He recalled the same rapid-fire, accusatory delivery from the day Ndadaye was killed. By the time Coach came to let him into the car, both RTLM and the cold had seeped into his bones.
Coach tossed a newspaper onto the seat. He handed the clothes to Jean Patrick. “I never could have imagined, that day at Gihundwe when you collapsed on the track, how far you would go. They gave you a different brand this time.”
There was a new green tracksuit with PUMA across the front and RWANDA across the back of the jacket in the colors of the flag. “To replace the one you lost. I hope you’re more careful with this one.”
“How did you know?”
“You don’t need to be an engineer to use deductive reasoning. You are wearing a rag with a broken zipper when I gave you a shiny new jacket. Until last month, you never took it off.”
Jean Patrick took off his old jacket and tried on the new one. Folded inside the tracksuit were white running shorts with red-striped matching singlets that said PUMA on the sides. At the bundle’s center was a pair of running shoes, also Puma. He held up a singlet. For years he had seen them in the magazines, dreamed how it would feel to wear one. There was a small Rwandan flag above the breast and the Puma logo—a leaping cougar—by his heart. RWANDA, in bold red letters, spanned his chest. His heart drummed a high-speed rhythm.
“For World Championships,” Coach said. “They will be here before you know it.”
“Suddenly it is very real.” Jean Patrick touched the cougar. He touched each letter of RWANDA. But as he settled into his reverie, unease returned. Every time he received one of these packages, something more was required of him. He glanced at the headlines of Kangura, which had come open beside him. UNAMIR SHOULD CONSIDER ITS DANGER.
Coach stopped in the university parking lot, but instead of getting out, he let the engine idle. “I want you to stay on campus today. I have some business. Someone will substitute for afternoon practice. By now, you know what I expect.”
“When will you be back?”
“Tomorrow.
I mean what I say. On campus. Understand?” He put the car in gear.
“Yego, Coach. I wasn’t planning to leave anyway.” Again he thought that something bad had happened, something Coach was not revealing. Then Jean Patrick shook his head, unhinged his long body, and stepped from the car.
FROM A DISTANCE, Jean Patrick saw that the door to his room was open and that Bea sat on his bed, Daniel in a chair facing her. He sprinted the remaining steps.
“Félicien Gatabazi is dead. Assassinated last night in Kigali,” Bea said as Jean Patrick entered the room. He sat down heavily beside her. She did not look up. “He called us as he was dying. We had a late dinner, and we were lingering at the table, discussing this and that, when the phone rang.”
As if it were happening right now, right here, he saw Félicien Gatabazi at Bea’s table, his squinted eyes, one swollen shut, face bruised, arm in a makeshift sling. He had looked at Jean Patrick and predicted his own death. And then he had smiled.
“There’s going to be a huge demonstration,” Bea said. “Many students are going to march. I came to ask if you will join us.”
Daniel jumped up. “Let’s go! Let another voice besides Interahamwe be heard in this town.”
Jean Patrick retrieved Isaka’s bandanna from his drawer and fastened it around his neck. Coach’s stone expression came back to him. Never before had he so brazenly defied him. “I’m ready,” he said. “Let’s go.”
ON THE ROAD to town, there was barely room to walk. A wall of demonstrators spanned the asphalt and spread out onto the grass. On the hillsides, small groups of spectators sporting caps of Habyarimana’s MRND and other antimoderate parties shouted insults and threats and waved anti-PSD signs.
The protest was a river of color crested by raised fists. Jean Patrick was buoyed along by the powerful tide. “Félicien can be proud,” he said. “So many Hutu and Tutsi marching together to remember him.” A small political fire sparked in his belly.
Two women Jean Patrick recognized from school carried a hand-painted banner: WE ARE ALL ONE PEOPLE. Bea raised a fist into the air, her eyes candescent. A lightning bolt struck Jean Patrick’s heart. For the first time since the riot in Kigali, hope returned, blunting memory the way a stream blunts a rock’s sharp edges with its steady flow. Maybe in death, Félicien Gatabazi had achieved what he had struggled so hard for in life. Maybe now they could learn to walk in peace and unity, AMAHORO N’UBUMWE, as one banner demanded.
“Look,” Daniel said. A group of boys in RPF T-shirts marched toward them from l’avenue de la Cathédrale. “In Kigali, they’d be torn apart for that.”
“Probably in Cyangugu, too.” Jean Patrick touched a finger to Isaka’s scarf and scanned the marchers, the buildings, the trees, his eyes turning every shadow into Roger.
Bea brushed against him. “Who are you looking for?”
“No one. Just watching.”
“Well, I hope you find this No One. You are searching hard.”
JEAN PATRICK WALKED hand in hand with Daniel and Bea on the path. She had invited them for dinner so they could watch the coverage of the demonstrations on TV. They were keyed up from the march, charged with its giddy energy.
Ineza opened the gate. “The news is not good,” she said. Like wet fingers touched to a candle’s wick, her tone extinguished the flame of Jean Patrick’s wishes. She kissed them in turn. “Come in.”
The TV flickered, the nightly news barely discernible from the static. The audio hissed and crackled. “Kigali has erupted,” she said, “violence spilling onto every street.”
“What happened?” Life appeared to drain from Bea’s body, bone by bone. She sat on the couch and stared dully at the screen.
Ineza took her hand. “In retaliation for Gatabazi’s murder, someone here in Butare lynched Martin Bucyana, leader of one of the extremist anti-PSD parties. Revenge for his death came swiftly. Interahamwe blocked the roads and set half of Kigali on fire. They’ve taken over.”
Jean Patrick slumped down in a chair. The horizontal on the TV was out of control. What appeared to be scenes of burning tires and buildings in flames scrolled between black lines.
Ineza said, “I’m so angry. On RTLM they are screaming that Gatabazi was icyitso and deserved to die.”
Bea snorted. “What did you expect? At any rate, if you’re not angry now, you are either stupid or crazy.” She got up and turned on the lights, and Jean Patrick realized they had been sitting in darkness.
Daniel squeezed beside Jean Patrick on the chair. “The peace process is dead,” he said. “Murdered along with Gatabazi.”
Bea shot back, “It was never alive.” She looked up suddenly. “Where’s Dadi? He isn’t back yet?”
Worry on her face, Ineza glanced at the door. “He should be here soon.”
Bea brought beer and Fanta from the cookhouse. “He shouldn’t have gone; he was half-dead from exhaustion. After Félicien called, Dadi was on the phone half the night, and he left for Kigali with the dawn, to help with arrangements for the funeral.” Defiance lit her face. “We will fill an entire football stadium. We will not let the extremists have the last word.”
A program of Rwandan dance came on the television. With every sound of a car, Ineza went to the window. “Don’t worry, Mama,” Bea said. “He’s lost track of time, as usual.”
“WE’LL HAVE TO eat without him, or Jean Patrick and Daniel will never get back before curfew,” Ineza said. It was nearly eight, and Niyonzima had not returned.
A car honked outside. Claire set down the food she had just brought and scurried to the gate to let the visitor in. Ineza and Bea exchanged glances. “I’ll go to the door,” Bea said.
“There’s been an accident.” The voice came, disembodied, from the hall. Jean Patrick had heard the voice before. Where? The man stepped from the shadow. It was the policeman who had spoken with Bea at the Ibis.
“I’m sorry to bring you this news.” Butter could have dripped from his mouth. “Your husband was found near Murambi. He had gone off the road. He had been drinking.” A flash of surprise metamorphosed into a smile when he noticed Jean Patrick. He gave a mock bow and said, “Good evening, Mr….” He raised his eyebrows.
“Nkuba. Jean Patrick Nkuba.”
Shakily, Ineza rose from her seat. “Is my husband alive?”
“Madam, I wish I could tell you. I was only instructed to take you to the hospital.”
Bea put an arm around her mother. “Be strong,” she said, her face stony. Turning to the policeman, she added, “My father drinks only at home. He had no plans to go to Murambi.”
The officer slid his glance over her. “Ah, but that is where we found him.”
Ineza collected her shawl and purse and slipped on her sandals. “You must stay and eat,” she said to Jean Patrick and Daniel. Her back straight and regal, she took the arm Bea offered and followed the policeman out the front door.
The car rattled down the road. After a time, the sound melted into the night’s hum and click. “It wasn’t an accident,” Daniel said.
“I know.” Jean Patrick had had enough of secrets. Gatabazi had been murdered. They didn’t know if Niyonzima was dead or alive. Now, it was up to him and Daniel to carry the truth forward. No matter what Bea thought, Jean Patrick knew he could trust Jonathan. Down to the smallest cell in his heart, he knew it. “I think we should tell Jonathan,” he said.
“Right now?”
“Right now.” Jean Patrick put on his jacket and his shoes. He pounced on this small promise. Jonathan would find a voice to shout into America’s listening ear.
The trademark spot of tongue showed between Daniel’s teeth. “I’m with you.”
TWENTY-TWO
AT LEAST NIYONZIMA WAS ALIVE; they had that to be thankful for. Leg shattered, unable to move, he had lain against the car door where he was thrown and made his peace. But just as he had abandoned all hope, out of nowhere the police arrived to rescue him. At the hospital, he asked about his car, and they told him not to worry
, they would see to having it towed. When no car appeared, Jonathan drove Bea and Jean Patrick to find it, but they could not. Several times they drove far past Gikongoro, searching the ravines and bushes. Jean Patrick asked the workers in the fields. No one had seen it. The earth, it seemed, had swallowed Niyonzima’s vehicle. When they inquired at the station, the officer at the desk shrugged his shoulders and launched into a complaint about the lawlessness of the countryside.
Of course it had not been an accident. Opening his office door on the day of Gatabazi’s death, Niyonzima found a letter slipped beneath it. The sender promised details on the secret arming of Interahamwe and asked Niyonzima to meet him at a restaurant near Murambi. He claimed to be a friend of a close colleague. “It was a novice’s mistake not to verify the details,” Niyonzima said. “But the colleague was away, and the bait, too delicious.” A truck forced him off the road. It had happened so quickly; he had recognized neither vehicle nor occupants.
As the days passed, Jonathan called and wrote letters to the police chief suggesting an investigation. When his attempts went unanswered, he requested an interview with the burgomaster. He was received politely, given tea, promised results with a smile as sweet as the icing that glazed the cakes he was offered. “The man was drunk,” the burgomaster said, wiping crumbs from his hands. “He could not tell us what happened or where he lost control of his car.”
“You are asking a lion to investigate a calf killing,” Niyonzima said when Jonathan told him of his failures.
“I always get the same smile,” Jonathan said. “I call it the make-the-muzungu-go-away smile.” Seeing Jonathan’s exasperated expression, Jean Patrick felt his own hope fade.
Hope rose again when Jonathan wrote a formal complaint to the U.S. Embassy, but weeks later, he was still waiting for a response. Jonathan’s voice simply rose into the mist with the rest of their voices. The ear of America remained deaf.
Running the Rift Page 26
