Tomorrow I'll Be Twenty

by Alain Mabanckou

  Little Pepper falls silent for a few moments. I’ve begun to look through the bin again, though since he told me the story of the cockerel I’ve had a little bit of a bug in my eye. Then suddenly, in great excitement, he plunged a bit further into the rubbish, shouting: ‘That’s it! I’ve found it! There’s the key!’

  I hurried towards him to look. But I was soon disappointed: ‘Little Pepper, that’s not a door key, it’s far too small.’

  ‘Well what is it then?’

  ‘It’s a key for opening tins of sardines, the kind without heads brought in from Morocco.’

  ‘Yes, but you said a key, you didn’t say what kind!’

  He kept it in his pocket, and we went on looking for at least an hour. People who saw us thought I must be his child. My clothes were dirty, like a mechanic mending an old car engine. There were maggots climbing up my arms, and Little Pepper came to pick them off and eat them like roasted peanuts.

  ‘As long as it’s not chicken, I can eat it!’

  It made me feel sick, which made him laugh like a little child. Then I realised he really liked this game and that we’d be spending hours in this bin if I wasn’t careful, so I stood up.

  ‘I have to go home, or my parents will be cross.’

  ‘Oh come on, Michel, let’s keep looking, the key’s here, we’ll find it, I promise.’

  But even when people bought fresh rubbish, and stood a little way off, watching us rummage, we didn’t find the key.

  When the sun began to set behind the houses on the edge of our quartier, Little Pepper stood up and dusted his backside down with his right hand.

  ‘You can go now, little one. I’ve just had the best afternoon of my whole life. I’ll go on looking for that key for you. If I find it I’ll keep it for you.’

  He pointed over towards the cemetery of the Voungou quartier: ‘I live down there. Yes, just by the door to the cemetery. It’s quiet down there at night, I can sleep in peace, and talk with the dead and departed. They don’t look at me like the living do. They tell me everything that goes on in this town…’

  ‘Can you really talk with the dead?’

  ‘Of course!’

  ‘So have you seen my two sisters?’

  ‘What are their names?’

  ‘My Sister Star and My Sister No-name.’

  ‘I need real names. You know how it is, I see so many people pass by.’

  ‘I don’t know their real names, I just call them that.’

  ‘Well ask your mother their names and come back and see me whenever you like.’

  I stood up too. I dusted down my backside like Little Pepper. I called goodbye as he watched me leave. I’m sure he was thinking I’d never come back.

  I’ve just told Geneviève about what happened with Little Pepper.

  ‘Have you really got a key you’ve hidden somewhere?’ she asks.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well find any old key, then! I’ll help you. I’ve got an old key that…’

  ‘No, Little Pepper’s going to find it for me, he can talk to invisible people. And it will be a real key, to open up my mother’s belly.’

  ‘You should be careful. That man’s mad.’

  We’ve been walking down the street for a few minutes. We’re going to the Lebanese shop, where she’ll buy me some boiled sweets.

  I look at her. ‘The river in your eyes isn’t as green as it was. The diamonds have gone from the edges.’

  ‘That’s because it’s dark.’

  ‘Diamonds shine in the dark, too.’

  ‘I know, but sometimes they have to rest because they’ve been shining so much in the day. Tomorrow you’ll see, the river will be green again, and the diamonds on the edge will shine once more.’

  ‘Will they shine just for me, no one else?’

  She smiles: ‘Yes, they’ll shine for you. No one else. But you should be looking at the river and the diamonds that sparkle in Caroline’s eyes. Have you spoken to her?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘We’re not divorced now, we got married again.’

  ‘That’s great!’

  ‘I told her I had castles in my heart that were bigger and better than the castles of Marcel Pagnol. And I said I wanted her to come into the castles in my heart, and then I’ll protect her.’

  ‘That’s beautiful! If your brother Yaya Gaston could talk like that, I think I’d be the happiest woman on earth…’

  ‘I’ll ask him to talk to you like I talked to Caroline!! I’ll write down my sweet-talk on a piece of paper, and then he can read it to you when I’m not around, because he’d be embarrassed if I was there.’

  ‘No, you can’t force things with love, it has to come from the heart. Yaya Gaston could never talk as you just did, he lost his innocence long ago.’

  Now we’re standing outside the Lebanese shop. But I don’t go in.

  ‘Don’t you want to go into the shop?’

  ‘I want to ask you a question first…’

  ‘You know I always listen to what you say!’

  ‘I want you to tell me the truth, I don’t want to go on and on feeling unhappy.’

  ‘Ask me then. I’ll raise my hand and swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.’

  ‘Am I your little black prince?’

  ‘I see you’ve finished reading The Little Prince! Of course you’re my little black prince. Come on, let’s go and get some boiled sweets and go home.’

  ......

  We’d only just got home when we heard someone whistling outside. They whistled three times. It was coming from just opposite our house.

  Yaya Gaston exclaimed: ‘It’s that Dassin, Georgette’s stupid little pal. I told him not to come whistling after my sister. If Georgette leaves this house and goes to meet him, I’ll give them what for!’

  Dassin goes on whistling. Yaya Gaston’s hidden behind the door to his studio and is watching to see what will happen. We hear the front door of the house open. Georgette comes out. She was already all dressed up before Dassin started whistling. Now she crosses the yard and goes out into the street.

  Yaya Gaston wants to go after her. Geneviève holds out her hand to stop him, but he pushes her away.

  ‘Let me go! I want to teach them a lesson!’

  Too late, he’s already out in the yard. We come out of the studio too, because anything could happen outside.

  Yaya Gaston runs down the street like a robber. Georgette, who has seen him, slips off down a side street behind the bar called Joli Soir.

  Dassin isn’t running, he just stands there. He strikes a pose like a world heavyweight boxing champion. He thinks he’s Mohammed Ali and that Yaya Gaston is George Foreman. People come running from all over now, because my brother and Dassin are exchanging insults.

  ‘Fuckhead!’ Yaya Gaston shouts.

  ‘Pervert!’ Dassin replies.

  ‘Who are you calling “pervert”?’

  ‘Who are you calling “fuckhead”!’

  ‘’Your mother’s cunt!’ continues Yaya Gaston.

  ‘Your father’s balls!’ yells Dassin.

  ‘Capitalist!’

  ‘Local imperialist lackey!’

  ‘Who are you calling “capitalist”? Me?’

  ‘Who are you calling “local imperialist lackey”? Me?’

  Geneviève pulls at Yaya Gaston’s shirt, but someone in the crowd’s just shouted: ‘Ali bomba yé! Ali bomba yé! Ali bomba yé’! They’re going to have to fight now.

  Yaya Gaston says, ‘I’m Ali, because I’m the good-looking one, and you’re Foreman because you’re an ugly louse!’

  Dassin replies, ‘No, no, I’m Ali, you’re Foreman!’

  ‘How can you be Ali, a wanker like you?’

  ‘You think you can be Ali with your face like something an elephant’s sat on?’

  Yaya Gaston takes off his shirt because it’s from France and he doesn’t want Dassin to tear it out of jealousy. He throws his shirt
over to us, and Geneviève catches it before it falls to the ground, otherwise someone else will pick it up and run off with it.

  Everyone in the quartier is outside. Ali bomba yé! Ali bomba yé! Ali bomba yé! I’d better do something, there might be people in the crowd who are against Yaya Gaston because he works at the port, because he’s handsome, because he’s got a shirt that comes from France, most of all because he has a gold chain.

  I slip away from Geneviève, I get into the middle of the circle and I give Dassin a push in the back. He wasn’t expecting it, and he falls to the ground. Yaya Gaston seizes his chance and jumps on him. He hits him, then he hits him again, and again and again. Everyone’s excited now, and every time he hits him they cheer. When he hits Dassin’s face, I kick him in the stomach because he’s the baddy. He yells out, calls for his mama. I’m just about to bite Dassin’s tibia like a wild dog when someone grabs me by the shirt. I turn round to hit them, but stop short because it’s Geneviève.

  ‘Michel’, she threatens, ‘stop that now, or you won’t be my little black prince any more!’

  I do want to be her little black prince. So I stop thumping. Yaya Gaston and Dassin are rolling about in the dust. Dassin’s also trying to hit my big brother in the face. When he gets him, I feel like it’s me he’s hitting.

  From a distance comes the noise of sirens and everyone scatters. Within five minutes the fight in the street is over. The police search for them both but can’t find them.

  We’re already in Yaya Gaston’s studio. Papa Roger is there too, and he’s yelling at my big brother. He knew there was a fight going on outside but he didn’t realise it was Yaya Gaston. So he’d said to my brothers and sisters, ‘Go back inside the house and close all the doors and windows. No one’s to go outside! There are thugs out there fighting in the street, just let them get on with killing each other, it’s not our problem!’

  Geneviève’s looking after Yaya Gaston, who’s got a cut over his eye. He asks her, ‘Where’s my Yves St Laurent shirt?’

  I show him his Yves St Laurent shirt. Papa Roger’s outside, yelling.

  Yaya Gaston looks at me, ‘That was fantastic, what you did, Michel, I’m proud of you.’

  His words warm my heart. The bug goes straight into my eye and I start crying because Yaya Gaston might have to go to hospital, he might die, and for nothing. I’m really crying now, so Geneviève drags me out into the yard. Her face is set firm. She says, ‘If I ever hear again that you’ve fought someone, or you got into a scrap in this quartier, you can stop calling yourself my little black prince. And if you’re not my little black prince, you won’t be seeing the green river in my eyes, and the diamonds at the edges won’t shine for you any more.’

  Maman Martine asks Maximilien to go and buy some milk from Bassène the Senegali. Just as he’s about to dash off she grabs him by the shirt.

  ‘Wait a second. What’s your problem? Whenever anyone asks you for something you don’t even stop and think, you just go running off like a sheep. And then you’ll come back and say: “What was it again I was meant to buy? Where do I go to buy it?” You’re to go to Bassène’s, and you’re to go with your big brother, Michel, or you’ll probably lose all the money or not come home till tomorrow evening!’

  So we set off together. Maximilien wants to run, I ask him to walk, not run.

  He’s not pleased. ‘I want to run! Let me run!’

  ‘But why do you always run?’

  ‘Because if I don’t run all the greedy people round here will drink up all the milk in the shop and we won’t have any milk this morning, we’ll die of hunger.’

  I grab him by his shirt like Maman Martine, and I hold on tight. The Joli Soir bar is quite close to the house. You can often hear music, from midday till six in the morning, when it closes. Often you hear music coming from there from midday until six in the morning, when it closes. I stop and read a big notice outside, written in large letters, as if it’s meant for people who are short sighted:

  FROM 18H TILL DAWN, PAPA WEMBA IN CONCERT

  WITH HIS BAND VIVA LA MUSICA

  FROM MOLOKAI

  LADIES: 600 CFA, MEN: 1000 CFA

  I say to myself: ‘Children can’t be allowed at this concert, because there’s no ticket price given for them.’ I have actually heard of Papa Wemba. He formed his band two years ago. When you go past our local bars you hear him singing and we sing along, though we have no idea what he’s singing about. And when he sings with his musician, Koffi Olomidé, you get girls weeping over it, because when the two singers blend their beautiful voices together you can’t go past a bar without stopping to listen.

  We get to Bassène’s shop. We get two litres of milk and Bassène gives us the change, which Maximilien hides in his pocket. Now he’s running already, I try to catch his shirt but I miss. I shout after him. Too late, he’s gone already, and as he runs, his shirt billows in the wind.

  I go back past Joli Soir and a read the poster. Why is the price for men’s tickets more than for ladies? It’s not a good idea because now there will be too many women and not enough men. The boss of the bar can’t be very clever if he does that.

  Oh well, at least I know I wasn’t dreaming: Papa Wemba will be at the concert at the Joli Soir from six in the evening onwards. I really want to go, but I’m not twenty yet.

  We have our breakfast in the yard. We sit in a big circle with a cup in front of each of us. Maman Martine pours out the milk, she won’t let us do it ourselves, she thinks we’ll finish it all up, and we need to keep a bit for tomorrow. Only Papa Roger and Yaya Gaston are missing from the circle. It’s Sunday morning and they’ve gone to the port to buy sardines for lunch. Georgette doesn’t talk much now that Dassin’s had a fight with our big brother. I remember how Papa Roger calmed Yaya Gaston and Georgette down. The day after the fight he said to our big brother, ‘There’s nothing wrong with Georgette going out with boys at her age.’

  Then he said to our sister, ‘Now, my girl, you don’t have to carry on with your young men under your family’s nose. This is a big town, go and coo at each other in some other part of town, even in the field down by the airport!’

  And so the affair was sorted out, and Yaya Gaston and Dassin never fought again in our quartier.

  Geneviève’s stayed for breakfast with us. Maman Martine asked her to, just as she was about to go home to her parents’.

  ‘Stay and eat with us, my dear girl.’

  At first she says no, once, twice then three times, then after that she agreed to stay. She wanted to sweep the yard, wash the plates and put the rubbish out in the street, but Maman Martine snatched the broom out of her hand.

  ‘No, Georgette will do that, it will teach her not to let men come whistling after her round this house. She can wash the plates and put the rubbish out too.’

  Since Maximilien’s sitting next to me, he gives me little nudges with his elbow. I know he wants to eat my bread. Maman Martine said everyone could have half a roll. But a half isn’t enough for him.

  While Maman Martine’s looking the other way, Maximi-lien whispers to me, ‘Michel, if you give me your bread I’ll help you, and you’ll be happy for the whole of your life.’

  ‘No, no, no! You can’t have my bread!’

  ‘Well, that’s your hard luck, then. I won’t take you with me to Papa Wemba’s concert tonight.’

  ‘What? But you’re younger than I am, how come you’re going to Papa Wemba’s concert?’

  ‘I’m telling you, I’m going to that concert.’

  I can tell he’s just making it up to annoy me. I give him a shove and raise my voice: ‘Liar! If you can go to the concert then I can too, I’m bigger than you!’