The Eternal Audience of One

by Rémy Ngamije

  Séraphin’s first year in law school had chipped at his ego. One failure following another and then followed by half-successes and then by failure once more. He was not accustomed to scraping by. His undergraduate scholarship had lapsed with his graduation, prompting a frenzied search for postgraduate funding. He had managed to secure a full scholarship by ferreting out an international scholarship for students studying law. Its requirements were easily met.

  Rwandan: check.

  Financial need: check.

  Studying at a reputable South African university: check.

  Displaying a keen interest in human rights, international law, and social justice: not really, but what student ever turned down money because of such trivial career concerns? Check.

  His parents practically began advertising his future leadership of the United Nations as soon as he was accepted into law school.

  The readings and the rigour of law school sapped the sunshine from Cape Town and the majority of his first year in the law faculty was spent indoors, cooped up in the library with Yasseen, trying their best to keep up with the rest of the class.

  The Sera-Fire had long ago faded, leaving in its stead a circumspection of secret origins which his friends welcomed. The Thing They Never Spoke About became The Thing He Thought About For A Long Time. He and his friends hiked up Table Mountain and Lion’s Head often, they went to the Kirstenbosch Summer Concerts, they took the harbour tour, and managed to get Idriss to drive to Cape Point, where they posed for pictures on Africa’s southernmost tip. Here and there, but not in the gluttonous quantities of the tumultuous first year, there were amorous connections as effervescent as sea spray. The memory of Soraya would hurt on some days like a lost limb, the ghost nerves shrieking in pain, trying to connect to what once was. His second and third years at Remms were comparatively tranquil, a time absent of hurt and filled with literature lectures and the corresponding nebulous critical academic essays. The first year of law had impounded his flirtatious nature and looking at Kim, Kelly, and Megan he felt inferior. Mediocrity stood between him and a simple hello.

  “You guys are in our class, right?” Megan asked.

  “Yes, we are,” Séraphin said. “Same tutorials too. I’m Séraphin, this is Yasseen.”

  “I’m Megan, that’s Kim, and that’s Kelly.”

  “We know who you are,” Séraphin said. “I’m lying. We don’t know who you are. We just know you’re the names next to all of the high marks. You have to scroll down many lines to find us, which is probably why you don’t know us.” The KKM trinity laughed politely.

  “It’s not that bad,” said Kelly.

  “It’s worse,” said Séraphin. “We just collected our course readers. The number of readings is fucking ridiculous. I don’t know how we’re going to get through them.”

  “You don’t have the notes already?” asked Megan.

  “Already?” asked Séraphin. “Term’s just started. How the hell d’you make notes for everything already?”

  “No, we don’t make notes. We get them,” said Kim.

  “You know, the magic notes. They have case and article summaries. Well, most of them. The readings change sometimes but not a whole lot. You don’t have to make new notes. It’s all already there.” Kim spoke with the nonchalance of knowledge.

  “Wait,” said Kelly, “you haven’t been reading and summarising everything for the past year, have you?”

  The girls looked at Séraphin and Yasseen with the look of family friends realising they’ve just exposed the truth about the Tooth Fairy or Santa Claus to a table of unknowing seven-year-olds.

  “Damn,” said Kelly.

  “You read everything?” asked Megan. “And summarised everything?”

  “We tried,” said Yasseen.

  “And failed,” said Séraphin.

  “I thought you knew. I thought everyone knew.”

  “Clearly everyone doesn’t include us,” said Yasseen.

  “What does one have to do get these notes?” asked Séraphin.

  “Have an email address,” said Megan.

  When the zip file containing the notes for that year’s subjects popped into their emails later that night Séraphin and Yasseen’s stomachs churned acid in the library. Yasseen looked over Séraphin’s shoulder as they scrolled through the case summaries for constitutional and property law and said what would probably be the most important words of Séraphin’s time in Remms: “We’re sitting next to those girls tomorrow.”

  “Those notes nearly made me cry,” said Séraphin, as he and Yasseen sat down.

  “They’re pretty cool, right?” said Kelly.

  Séraphin turned in his seat to look at the rest of the hall, wondering just how many students right there and then were stewing in their own bewilderment of the law, completely in the dark about how much easier their lives could be.

  He frowned.

  He had never noticed it before from the back of the class where people were raised hands, ponytails, and side partings. The faces looking back were almost all white. From the front all he could see were pale faces, freckled, bespectacled, looking up from laptop screens and writing pads. The black and brown faces were sporadic. The lecturer walked in and covered the introductory chapter of contract law, referencing cases in passing, briefly talking about an article or a thesis which backed up a particular point. Séraphin understood exactly what he was talking about because he had completed the readings the previous evening and then consulted the notes. Everything was explained.

  “So the notes helped?” asked Megan at the end of class.

  “I’m about to get me some Garnier Nutrisse,” Séraphin replied, “because I’m about to Legally Blonde this bitch.”

  At lunch they sat together again. This time Séraphin and Yasseen offered to share their plate of chips with the girls. They declined politely. They ate grains and apple slices.

  “You’re from Windhoek?” said Kim to Séraphin. “It’s a nice place.”

  “Hmm.”

  “You don’t like it?”

  “Have you guys seen The Little Mermaid?”

  “What?”

  “The Little Mermaid.”

  “Of course,” said Kelly.

  “You know the part where she’s in the cave looking at her thingamabobs and gizmos?”

  “Yeah?”

  “That was me growing up in Windhoek. I wanted to be where the people were.”

  “That’s the funniest thing I’ve heard,” Kelly said. “Next you’re going to tell me you sing and dance along to Vanessa Carlton.” Séraphin and Yasseen looked down at their plate of chips. “You’re joking.”

  “He does,” said Yasseen. “He has the whole discography too. And he’s had it before White Chicks too.”

  “Not many black guys would admit to listening to that,” said Megan.

  “Why? What d’you think we listen to?” Séraphin asked.

  “Lil’ Wayne and Kanye West. That kind of stuff.”

  “We listen to that. But we listen to other things too. Even gangsters have thump-thumps.”

  “Hearts,” said Yasseen explaining.

  “So you listen to the Spice Girls?” asked Kelly.

  “I knew you were going to ask that. It’s the go-to band for out-thereness, isn’t it? Here’s the truth,” said Séraphin. “There’re two types of people in this world. People who listen to the Spice Girls and liars.”

  “No ways,” said Kim. “They’re so cheesy.”

  “And so good,” said Séraphin. “Next time you’re in Windhoek take a couple of taxi rides. You’ll see just how much black guys love Shania Twain. Every third taxi will play “From This Moment” or “You’re Still The One”. Maybe it’s part of the requirement for getting a taxi licence.”

  Back in the lecture theatre, waiting for the lecturer to arrive, Kelly asked Yasseen and Séraphin why they were doing law.

  “Reading English books isn’t a real job apparently. So I came to get a serious degree,” said Sér
aphin.

  “Parents,” Yasseen said.

  “My dad’s a lawyer so I guess I was always going to do it,” Kelly said.

  “Mine’s a judge,” said Kim. “Megan’s is an advocate.”

  “Really?” asked Séraphin.

  “Yeah, but I don’t think I’m going to practise eventually.”

  “What’re you going to do then?”

  “I don’t know. You can do anything with a law degree apparently so let’s see what shows up.”

  He looked at her as though she had said she could perform miracles. Perhaps she could, this girl who could have the luxury not to know where everything was headed, who could live without a plan. He envied all of them and the way the law ran in their families, how easily it bestowed marks upon them, and how they could address their professors on a first-name basis. They were going to graduate, guaranteed to have their pick of law firms. Their paths were clear. All they had to do was walk them.

  It was Yasseen who called them the Benevolent White Girls and each term they came bearing gifts of notes flush with knowledge and summaries that saved time. Séraphin could never find the star which made them steer their kindness towards him and Yasseen.

  “They’ve never hung out with us outside of class,” Yasseen said. His chopsticks dipped a piece of sushi in soy and popped it into his mouth.

  “That’s because it would be weird,” said Séraphin. “What would we talk about? They’re from another planet.”

  “I can see it,” Godwin said. “This little planet that’s visited just three times a year.”

  “Where they observe an hour of darkness once a year for Earth Hour,” said Bianca.

  “Vote DA because they do a good job with the province,” said Richard.

  “I wonder if we know anyone like this?” said Adewale.

  “Fuck you guys,” said Andrew.

  “Anyway, the BWGs deserve to have our children named after them,” said Séraphin. “I call dibs on Kelly. No ways I’ll take Megan. Sounds like a girl from Fresnaye who likes being cheated on by her boyfriend.”

  “Idiot,” said Silmary. “But why don’t you hang out with them?”

  “It isn’t like we do it on purpose,” said Séraphin. “Class is like, what do they call it these days, a safe space. Everyone is the same there. Same needs, same goals, same worries within that space. We don’t have to talk about anything other than law. Maybe the film we saw last night or what we’re listening to. Safe shit. Outside is something else. Too many differences would come out. Imagine if we had to talk to them about Avec and the fucked up racial profiling? It wouldn’t work. Mostly because they wouldn’t believe it happens, know that it happens. They’d say we were imagining it.”

  “Bigfoot is real,” said Godwin, “but racism, not so much.”

  “If you don’t see it, or if it doesn’t happen to you, then it didn’t happen,” said Adewale. “That’s how things happen here. Experience is proof. Problem is that most people won’t experience it, so there’s no proof.”

  “But how d’you know they wouldn’t be cool?” Andrew asked.

  “We just know,” said Godwin. “Black people just know when a white guy’s cool or not. Something they say, something they do. Like Richard. When we met he was just some random white guy. Could’ve gone either way. Then he opened his mouth and I heard that thick ass Zimbo accent and I was, like, ah, this one’s cool.”

  “Or if they’re wearing a Pirates or Chiefs shirt,” said Séraphin. “It means they’ve committed to some of the worst soccer in the world. Black people respect that.”

  “Shopping at Shoprite,” said Bianca.

  “That’s a big one. Especially when they get to the till point and they whip out Zulu or Xhosa,” said Séraphin.

  “Or,” Yasseen said, “when they called black tea ‘normal tea’ or Five Roses. You call it Ceylon and we can’t be friends with you.”

  “But the best way to know whether you’re going to get along with white people is with the KZN. Never fails.”

  “If they pronounce it Kinya, Zimbabwee, or Nigeeria, we aren’t hanging out.”

  “It’s K-eh-nya,” Richard articulated. “Zimbabw-eh and Nig-eh-ria, like you’re surprised.”

  “It’s something you notice,” said Adewale. “If you really hang out with black people you stop pronouncing their things wrong because you’re around them long enough to hear the correct thing.”

  Bianca said, “I’ve sat next to these girls. They’re sweet. But you also get the sense that you can’t say something in class that might offend their sensitivities and that would compromise the supply of magic notes, man. I, for one, plan on graduating this year.”

  “That’s how it is,” said Yasseen. “You have to learn what to say around white people, otherwise you might find yourself out in the cold. In law school that’s a death sentence.”

  Séraphin and Yasseen learned to skirt controversy. Thanks to the notes and the occasional lunchtime tutoring from the Benevolent White Girls they passed their second year with ease. In their third year Bianca joined them. Her addition to the group was not easy. She never backed down from what she thought to be ignorant and her belligerence was in danger of choking the generosity that made Séraphin and Yasseen’s cushioned life in the law faculty possible. Bianca considered Kim, Kelly and Megan to be vacuous. She called them the Ponytail Brigade and for the first couple of days sitting with them she had made it her mission to call out every infraction they made in speech or action. It took an intervention from Séraphin and Yasseen one lunchtime when the Ponytail Brigade avoided them to get her to curb her enthusiasm. It was notes or nothing.

  Nothing, as always, was a steep price to pay. Bianca backed down.

  “That’s how it is,” added Séraphin with a sigh.

  When they left the restaurant and walked down the chilly April to Stadium-on-Main, with the sky in two minds about raining or not, no one said anything when a passing car of students slowed down as it passed and someone shouted, “Can you handle all of those black guys, ladies?” to Silmary and Bianca. They ignored them and carried on walking.

  Nobody said anything about the crowded bowling lanes full of Coloured families who threw Bianca questioning looks, trying to figure out which of the party she was dating Hopefully, if she had sense, it would be one of the white ones.

  When the spirit of competition took over and everyone became engrossed by Richard’s strikes, obliterating Adewale and James in their final game, Séraphin attempted to protest when the manager walked over to them and requested they keep the volume down. Bianca said, “Just leave it, Séra.”

  He left it because that is how it is.

  The arcade was filled with little children inserting large game tokens into machines and jogging joysticks back and forth without any co-ordination. Séraphin waited for the Street Fighter console to be vacated and then proceeded to ensure the joystick next to him had a new handler every three rounds. The next challenger placed the ferryman’s coins into the machine before Séraphin delivered them to the land of loss and shit talking, a land populated by the dead egos of Nesquik blacks.

  At the end of the night when the High Lords and Silmary left Claremont, Main Road was full of high-heeled girls walking into or out of clubs with the grace of a just-dropped Springbok walking over a minefield. Fair-haired rugby jocks with arms as thick as thighs and thieves bumped into people without apologising because, well, that is how it is. Andrew drove Silmary home. Everyone else piled into Idriss’s taxi. With nothing for company but a stack of administrative law notes waiting for a ruler and a highlighter, because if it is not highlighted then it is not the law, Séraphin put on Aftermath Before The Event, a moody compilation which seemed to suit the times because it was April already and the fiction was that this was the best time of his life but the truth was that this was also the worst and so he started reading and highlighting and working towards graduation and then—

  And then?

  XXIV

  “Chi
ldren! There are not enough chairs or desks in this class.” Miss Mutumanu paused and looked at her standard one students. Popping up here and there was a round face framed by a black hijab. Underneath the hijab Miss Mutumanu knew the hair would be long, thick, and black like a horse’s tail. She envied Somalian girls and their ability to have red and brown skin and hair that fell as straight and as true as the curtain of night. Hers was coarse beyond chemical correction. When she grew older she cut it short to keep what she deemed its embarrassment, manageable. She was thankful the hijabs were hiding the tresses of her jealousy. Eight heads were topped with cauliflower buds of black hair. Those would be the Indian boys who sat together as they always did on the first day of school. Eventually, their brownness would mingle with blackness for a time, equal, friendly, and then at a distant point in time it would stop and become better, superior, and all of the times spent on the playground would be forgotten. She looked around and spotted the four Indian girls, who also sat together. A moat formed around their otherworldly prettiness. From experience she knew they would not mix with the other children. “As you can see,” she carried on, “we only have twenty-five chairs and twenty-five desks in the classroom. Can you count to twenty-five for me? One, two, three, four, five—”

  The class picked up the count and boldly steered to ten by themselves. At fifteen the chorus of counters dwindled and at twenty only one remained to make it to twenty-five. Miss Mutumanu looked at the wafer-thin Indian girl with sable hair and big eyes with a mixture of praise and gratitude. All was not lost. In the time-honoured tradition of teaching which involved the discovery of that one student who would run at the head of the pack while the teacher encouraged the rest of the class to chase and catch up, Miss Mutumanu singled out the Indian girl as her Peter. Upon this rock she would build. She asked for her name.

  “My name is Gina Patel.”

  “Thank you, Gina.” Miss Mutumanu turned to the rest of her class. “I can see we need to work on our counting. Now, as I said, there are only twenty-five seats in this class. We have to decide who will get a chair and a desk.”