Let's Tell This Story Properly

by Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi

  Katula clicked at herself because in the beginning her love for Malik had been selfish. What she needed now was to convince herself that Malik’s selfishness was worse than hers had been. Then she would use that to leave him.

  As she put on the head warmer, her glance fell on his door again. All the doors in the house were shut but there was something final in the way his bedroom door was closed. Katula’s eyes lingered as she adjusted the hat. She stood up, wrapped a scarf around her neck and called out: ‘I’m going out to post the postal ballot forms.’

  ‘Yeah,’ came from behind the door.

  Yeah? Perhaps he hadn’t heard what she said. Sometimes, because of her accent, Malik didn’t catch the words and said ‘yeah’ to save her from repeating herself. She was about to rephrase the statement when the door opened a crack and Malik’s head slipped through.

  ‘Kat,’ he said, ‘I might be gone by the time you return. I’m going to spend the weekend with my mother.’ Malik’s eyes, like the marbles Katula used to roll on the ground as a child, looked at her, blinked and looked at her again.

  ‘Okay,’ she said, instead of you’re lying, ‘say hello to her for me,’ instead of you think I am dumb?

  Malik pulled his head back and the door closed. Then it opened again and his head popped out again, just up to the neck. ‘I’ll leave the money for the plumber on the table.’ He smiled. The smile spread from the lips, folding back his cheeks. It flowed into his eyes, lifting his eyebrows and creasing his forehead. Along the way, it massaged the resolve to leave out of Katula’s jaws and she smiled.

  ‘Thanks.’

  There was a moment’s hesitation, then Malik beamed. ‘You know what, I’ll leave an extra hundred pounds in case you want to go out with the girls… to the movies or for a meal.’

  Katula’s gaze dropped to the floor, her resolve returning. But when she lifted her eyes she smiled. ‘You don’t have to: I have my own money.’

  ‘I am your husband: I take care of you.’

  Malik’s head withdrew and the door closed.

  Katula picked up the house keys and walked towards the front door. She opened the door and was met by the brilliant whiteness of winter. The air was still the way only winter stills the world. The snow in her garden was fresh, crystalline and untrodden. The snow on top of Malik’s Citroen Picasso was a pillow thick. She heard footsteps crunching and looked up. A woman and child in fur-lined padded coats walked past. Across the road, a double-decker bus pulled up at the bus stop, hissing and sneezing. Steam burst from its backside like a fart. Katula stepped out of the house and closed the door. As she walked down the driveway, the bus pulled away and the air became still again.

  You’re leaving him this time.

  • • •

  They met back in summer 2003 when Katula was still being hunted by Immigrations. Being hunted by Immigrations was somewhat like duka-duka during the Bush War. While there were no bullets to dodge or jungle to set on fire to flush you out in Britain, it was war nonetheless. When UK Border Force captured you, they had the same satisfied look of soldiers, and some people said you got kicked by enthusiastic officials in the vans. As in war, it did not matter whether you were in pyjamas or a vest—when they got you they took you as you were. And as in war, for a fee Ugandans would sell each other to Immigrations the way neighbours sold whoever supported the wrong politician back in the early 1980s. There came a time when Katula envied the oblivion of British tramps lying drunk and dirty on the streets (a waste of a British passport) the way she had envied the oblivion of trees during war. What made it painful was that in war everyone was on the run from the soldiers, while in Britain you’re alone amidst the cries of Get them out of here.

  Katula was a student nurse when her visa expired. At the time, Immigrations stipulated that to renew a student visa you needed to show a minimum of £600 in your account. Katula earned £1200 a month from her job. She had thought that a steady income would suffice. As a precaution, she sent her renewal forms to Immigrations by post because a Ugandan friend had warned, ‘These days Immigrations keeps a van ready and running: any failed applicants, toop, into the van, and shoooop, to the airport.’

  After a month, UK Border Force wrote back to say that at one time in the past six months, Katula’s account had dipped to below six hundred pounds. That demonstrated that she didn’t have sufficient funds for her maintenance in Britain: she should leave the country immediately. Katula moved to a new house and changed her job. Friends advised her to hook a British husband as soon as possible. To buy time while she hunted for a husband, she sent her passport back to UK Border Force for appeal, using a friend’s address.

  Malik fell like manna from heaven. She was standing at a bus stop outside the University of Manchester Students’ Union when she saw him across the road standing near Kro Bar. She was waiting for the 53 bus. He was exceedingly tall; he held his head as though the clouds belonged to him. Katula looked again and thought, god must have been in an extravagant mood. She was less than pretty; exceedingly good-looking men made her uncomfortable. He was not a potential husband, anyway. Katula targeted white pensioners whom, she had heard, had a penchant for young African women. She was scanning the horizon for the 53 when she saw him standing at the same bus stop smiling at her.

  ‘I think I know you: are you Ghanaian?’

  ‘No, Ugandan.’

  ‘You remind me of someone from Ghana.’

  ‘A lot of people mistake me for a Ghanaian.’

  Now that she had looked at him properly he was odd. His jeans were not cropped as she had thought: he had shortened them rather shabbily above his ankles. On top was a long shapeless shirt. Was he trying to play down his good looks? It was the thick beard and clean-shaven head that made Katula realise that he could be Muslim. She asked: ‘Are you Tabliq?’

  ‘What is that?’

  ‘A sect of devout Muslims.’

  ‘I am Muslim, my name is Malik; how did you know?’

  Katula explained that in Uganda, Muslims who wore their trousers above the ankles and had a beard were Tabliq. Tabliqs were devout and no-nonsense.

  Malik’s interest was piqued: was Uganda a Muslim country?

  ‘Muslims are a minority.’

  ‘African names have a meaning; what does Katula mean?’

  The way he said Katula, as if it rhymed with spatula. She tried to laugh but it came out as a cough. How do you tell a man you dream to ensnare that your name is a warning? She decided to go with the absurdity of the truth.

  ‘The katula is a tiny green berry which on the outside looks innocuous, but bite into it and it will unleash the most savage bitterness.’

  Malik threw back his head and laughed. ‘Who would call their child that?’

  ‘To be fair,’ Katula defended her parents, ‘the katula is very good for cholesterol and heart problems. But my name is a warning against underestimating people because of their size.’ Now she too laughed. ‘You know us Africans, we don’t dress things up.’

  ‘Did you know that man Idi Amin?’

  Every time Katula mentioned that she was Ugandan, Idi Amin was thrown at her as if he was Uganda’s chief cultural export, but she smiled and said that she was born just after Amin was deposed. She started to hope. You could hook this man. On top of the British passport, he could give you two gorgeous daughters, one Sumin, one Sumaia, and a son, Sulait. But first you need to hint that you don’t eat pork or drink alcohol and that there are Muslims in your family.

  ‘When I saw you across the road,’ Malik was saying, ‘I knew you were African.’

  Bus number 53 drove past.

  ‘You are so dark-dark. I wish was as dark as you.’ He looked at her as if being dark-dark could actually be beautiful in Britain. Before Katula responded, he added, ‘Only you Africans have that real dark, almost navy-blue skin. Look at me’—he showed Katula his inner arms—‘look at this skin, see how pale I am.’

  Katula did not know what to say to that. No one had ever envi
ed the darkness of her skin. Not even at home. In Britain, people with skin as dark as hers were not allowed to be black—not together with mixed-race people, Asians or other non-whites—they were called blick. Another 53 came along but she could not tear herself away. When she stopped the third 53, Malik asked to come along. She could not believe herself as he got on the bus with her. Perhaps he really was attracted to her. By the time they got to North Manchester General Hospital, she had learned that Malik was not seven feet tall as she had thought but a mere six foot five. His mother was mixed race—her father came from Ghana but her mother was white. ‘My maternal grandfather is my only claim to Africa, I’m afraid,’ he said. Then he corrected himself: ‘But then again, we are all African.’ Malik’s mother still lived in Sheffield, while his father had returned to Tobago. ‘My big brother is dark because our dad is “dark-dark”, but I turned out pale. The only time I get dark is when I go to the Caribbean.’ Malik walked Katula to the entrance of the hospital and they exchanged telephone numbers. That night as she worked, Malik’s name, his soft voice, his perfect face and Britishness kept coming back and her heart would spread out in her chest.

  • • •

  Now holding the postal ballot forms, Katula walked until she came to the end of the last block of the Victorian semi-detached houses similar to hers and crossed the road. She came to the local pub, the Vulcan, with its Tudor facade. A monkey, the pub’s insignia, swung on the sign. Men and women stood outside the door smoking despite the cold. The recent ban on smoking in public places was biting. Katula could see the red postbox where it stood next to a corner shop. Across the road from the postbox was the local primary school. Just as Katula prepared to cross Manchester Road, a gritting truck flew past. It dropped a few grains of sand, perhaps salt, on the road. The grains disappeared in the slush without effect. She made a mental note to pick up salt from the corner shop on her way back. There had been no salt in Tesco the previous weekend because of panic buying—they had used it on the snow on their driveways.

  • • •

  Dating was difficult. Malik could not be alone with a woman without a third person in the room. They met in halal restaurants in Rusholme. Even then, Malik sat away from her. As their relationship progressed, he told her that he had not been born Muslim. His name was Malachi until sometime in his twenties when he had gone astray.

  ‘I got into some bad-bad, real crazy stuff,’ Malik said, without going into details. To keep away from the bad stuff, he turned to god. However, he had found the Christian god rather lazy and laid-back. ‘I went to all sorts of churches but nothing worked for me. I needed a god with a strong grip to put me straight.’ Then he found Islam and changed his name from Malachi to Malik. Apparently, Islam’s god had a tight grip: the five prayers a day kept a tight rein on him.

  They had talked about the future: could Katula commit to wearing the hijab—sure. Could she take a Muslim name—of course; Hadija. Could she embrace Islam—she took a deep breath, but then she saw the redness of the British passport—yes, of course! And to demonstrate her commitment, Katula’s dresses started to grow longer and wider even though Malik had not pressed her to dress differently. Eventually, he found a third person to be with them and invited her to his house.

  That day Katula even wore bitenge wrappers on her head because Malik liked it when she dressed African. Malik’s house was a two-bedroom semi-detached in Oldham. It had a very high ceiling and the rooms were spacious, but Malik had covered the floorboards with cardboard. In the windows, he had hung bed sheets. The kitchen was rotting. The house was dark and cold.

  ‘Here is a job for a proper wife.’ Katula surveyed the squalor with satisfaction. ‘Three months in this place and all of this will be transformed.’ She planned to make such an impact that Malik would not miss his bachelor days.

  The living room doubled as Malik’s bedroom even though the house had two empty bedrooms. As she walked in, she saw an African boy, no older than twenty-one, sitting on a settee close to the door. He was so astoundingly good-looking Katula hesitated—when African men choose to be beautiful they overdo it. The lad wore a white Arab gown with a white patterned taqiyah on his head. The whiteness of his gown stood out in the grubby surroundings of Malik’s house. He looked up at her as she entered the room and quickly looked away. Then he remembered to say hello and flung it over his shoulder. Katula dismissed him. From his accent, he was one of those my parents are originally from Africa but I was born in Britain types who tended to keep away from home-grown Africans as if the native African in them, which they had worked so hard to get rid of, might resurface. It’s that shunning and bullying they suffer in schools that makes them run away from themselves. Katula wrinkled her nose.

  She walked past him and sat on another settee; Malik sat on his bed facing the boy, whom he introduced as Chedi. Apart from the few times Malik asked Katula whether she wanted a drink, the two men were engrossed in their conversation. They talked about a certain sheikh’s views on food, especially meats from supermarkets. Apparently not even tomatoes were safe to eat for a proper Muslim because they were genetically tampered with. He promised to lend Malik the sheikh’s CD. Katula was uneasy about the way the two men did not invite her into their conversation. But she had grown up at a time when men, in the company of fellow men, ignored their wives because women could not be invited into masculine conversation. Probably they ignored her because she was non-Muslim, probably Islam did not allow women to join in men’s conversation. Katula decided to play dumb.

  The next time Malik invited her over to his house he was on his own, but she did not ask why. She sat on the sofa. He sat next to her and even held her hand as they talked. He sat so close she was tempted to kiss him. When she stood up to leave, he hugged her; Katula held him. This was her chance to feel how he felt her. Malik’s body was rigid. She relaxed her body to encourage him a little, but his body did not notice: he could have been hugging his mother. When Katula reached up to kiss him on the neck he tore away, ‘In Islam,’ he said breathlessly, ‘a man must guard his neck at all times.’

  Katula crept out of Malik’s house shrinking. On the way home, she chastised herself for pushing too hard—Malik falling in love and having children with you are toppings; focus on the main thing. She had never dated a British man; maybe that was the way they were. And you know what they say about Africans—hypersexual. The British are no doubt restrained. She cupped her hands around her mouth and blew into them. She smelt for bad breath: nothing. Her stomach chewed itself all the way home.

  The following day Malik was waiting outside the hospital gate when she finished her shift. When she saw him, a feeling of pleasant surprise broke through her mortification. He invited her to come to his house the following weekend. For a moment, Katula looked away, but she overcame her embarrassment and smiled.

  This time when she arrived Malik was wearing a towel. She stared. If she thought he was good-looking before, undressed he was magnificent. This time he had even tried to clean the house. He had the air of an expectant lover about him. He told her to make herself a cup of tea while he took a bath. As she had tea, he came out of the bathroom grinning.

  ‘You know, the other day a man followed me all the way from Asda,’ he said as he dried his hair with a towel. ‘The man said I have the cutest legs, no?’ He turned his legs to her.

  Apart from the hairs, Katula wished Malik’s legs were on herself. ‘As far as I’m concerned, you’re close to perfect.’

  Malik’s eyes shone as if no one had ever told him that he was gorgeous. He walked towards her and held her. Then he kissed her on the lips. She felt like a new flavour of ice cream. She was not sure he liked it.

  ‘Do you like my body?’ He smiled into her eyes.

  ‘You’re stunning.’

  ‘Then I’m all yours, if you’ll marry me.’

  The earnestness in his eyes prompted Katula to tell him that she could not marry him because of her visa troubles. Instead of getting suspicious, Malik
got angry. ‘They make my blood boil.’ To help her save on rent, Malik asked her to move in with him. She moved in the following day. However, he said that they could not share a bedroom until they were married. To make herself useful, Katula started to clean the house. The nagging fear that things were moving too quickly, that Malik would change his mind, that it was all too good to be true, was dispelled when he said that he wanted to fix the wedding date as soon as possible.

  First, he gave her money to return home, where she sorted out her student visa. She returned to Britain a month later and, because she was a non-EU citizen, applied and paid for permission to marry a Briton. Ugandans called it a dowry. When it was granted, Malik asked for her shift roster.

  Katula was due to work the night shift the day they got married. Malik informed her that they were getting married that morning because, as he explained, a couple had cancelled at the last minute and the imam had slotted them in.

  ‘But I’m working tonight: should I call in sick?’

  ‘No, you don’t have to: we’re getting married at midday.’

  There was no time to dwell on the fact that Malik wanted her to work on their wedding night. Unknown to Katula, Malik had already bought the clothes she would wear for the nikah. ‘I got them yesterday,’ he said as he handed her an Indian gown similar to the one she had seen in Asian boutiques in Rusholme. Turquoise, it had glittering sequins and beads. It had a scarf which she wore on her head.

  At the wedding, Katula did not know any of the guests, not even her witness. Chedi, Malik’s friend, did not turn up. His mother was not at the wedding either—she could not make it at such short notice. Afterwards, they went to a Lebanese restaurant for lunch. When they returned home, Malik offered to drop her at work. As she stepped out of the car at the hospital, he leaned over and kissed her on the lips. ‘See you tomorrow, wifie.’

  Katula sensed that something was wrong when he did not pick her up in the morning. When she arrived at home he was in his bedroom, but the door was locked. His greeting, from behind the door, was curt. When he stepped out of his room, his face said Don’t come near me. He rushed down the corridor and into the kitchen as if Katula would pounce on him. He didn’t look at her. He ate in his bedroom. He left money for the house on the kitchen table.