When the Ground Is Hard

by Malla Nunn

  Then a shocking thought hits me like a fist. It takes my breath away. Lottie, with her Swazi medicine and Jewish spinning top and dog-eared Oxford Dictionary, is the first real friend I’ve ever had. Lottie Diamond is, in fact, my very best friend, and, this time, I have the courage to say the words out loud.

  “You’re my best friend, Lottie. I want you to come,” I say, and that’s the truth.

  29

  Face-to-Face

  Howard’s Halt is dust and flies, and a handful of buildings huddled together under an endless sky. A stray dog limps past the one-room police station, the deserted tearoom, and the Hebron General Store, painted pale orange with green trim around the windows. Four or five houses dot the area nearby, and a farm store supplies seeds and tractor parts to outlying farms.

  “Now. Where are the sweets?” Mother says when we enter the cool darkness of the general store. Rows of hessian sacks filled with sugar, wheat, flour, and rice run along either side of us, and at the very back of the store is a small wooden counter with weights and scales, and behind the counter is a dark-skinned woman with bright-red hair. Ophelia, Lottie said.

  “Over here.” Lottie leads us deeper into the gloom, and I switch Mother’s overnight bag from one hand to the other and then place it safely between my feet when we reach a row of glass containers filled with black licorice sticks, hard toffees, peppermint strips, and gold-wrapped chocolate éclairs. My mouth waters.

  “One sweet each?” Ophelia asks with a sour twist to her lips. Everything in the store goes bit by bit to poor farmers and poor natives, and she’ll be dead long before the candy jars run empty.

  Lottie’s cheeks flush at the poke, but Mother is calm. She tilts her head to consider and then says, “Three bags each of the peppermint twists, the chocolate éclairs, and the hard toffee, and five bags of the licorice, if you please.”

  More than enough to add an extra note of sweetness to the end of dinnertime. Mother has come to Keziah armed with charm and money. She’s got what Father gives her and the “walking-around cash” that she earns working two days a week at Bella’s Beauty Salon for All Types. Her goal: to lift the bad-luck curse that clings to Lottie and me. Her weapon: four kinds of sweets. An unheard-of luxury on our boarding school menu.

  Ophelia hurries to the counter to collect the paper bags for the candy, and Mother whispers, “I remember this shop being huge and filled with treasure that I couldn’t touch, let alone buy. Now see it.”

  Hebron is nothing compared to the hypermarket in Manzini, and Mother is delighted. She left this far end of Swaziland a poor girl with holes in her shoes, and she’s returned with money in her pockets and white boots imported from London. This homecoming is a sweet victory, even though the memories of growing up here make Mother turn her face and hide.

  Ophelia scoops and weighs the right amounts and drops the packets into a cotton sack that’s roughly the same size as the one that Lottie brought her comb, her two pairs of underwear, her one sweater and one checked dress to school in.

  Mother pays, and opens the sack to release a delicious cloud of sugar. “Take one each for the walk back, girls.”

  Old Adele reaches for a licorice, not wanting to appear greedy. New Adele stops and takes a chocolate éclair from the paper bag instead. Being good for the sake of appearances is the same as telling a lie. Lottie’s straight talk and actions taught me that, and I really do prefer éclairs. Lottie scoops out a peppermint twist and throws me a half smile that says, And you wanted to stay behind for Scripture class!

  I laugh at my foolishness. Scripture class, of all things! It’s barely a subject, and I already have the most verses memorized of anyone. We walk to the shop exit, happy with our daring escape from school. Mother, who’s used to talking to white men, will make excuses to Mr. Vincent, and we’ll be forgiven.

  Hebron’s front door opens, and a man walks in with the light at his back. He’s an outline, a silhouette with sloped shoulders and slack arms hanging loose by his sides, but I know who it is straightaway: Bosman. His sons stand to either side of him and block the exit, and I grip the handle of Mother’s overnight case till the plastic bites into my fingers. Bosman said he’d remember Lottie and me. He promised.

  “Mr. Bosman.” Ophelia chirps false cheer from behind the counter. “How can I help you today?”

  Bosman ignores her. He ignores me, and he ignores Lottie. His catlike eyes narrow on Mother, who keeps her gaze pinned to a spot on the floor, a vague smile on her ruby-red mouth. She makes herself invisible. She makes herself small. She follows the rules to survive, but Bosman sees her.

  “I know you,” he says in gruff English. “I know you.”

  “I live in Manzini.” Mother’s voice is thin and scared. “Maybe you saw me there.”

  “No.” He snaps his fingers. He’s placed her. “You’re that girl Mbali, the little flower who lived in the kaffir village. You used to wander around singing, like one of those birds I shoot from the trees.”

  Birds killed for singing: Bosman’s world summed up.

  Mother holds still and holds her tongue. She endures. But I can’t, for one minute longer, endure the sight of her made mute by a cruel man. I go to her side, and, of course, Lottie follows.

  “Mother has a beautiful voice even now,” I say.

  “Beautiful voice.” Bosman snorts. “That’s what everyone used to say. ‘Oh, what a lovely voice. Beautiful.’ She certainly thought so.”

  Bosman’s sons sift through bags of rice and flour with nervous fingers. Their father’s interest in a mixed-race woman embarrasses them and horrifies me. The youngest son, in particular, is tense: his shoulders are tight and his jaw twitches, and I wonder where the daughter is hiding.

  Bosman ignores his sons and leans in to Mother, voice low. “The sound of your tweeting grated on my nerves, but you never paid me any mind. Too good for the valley, you. Too proud to stay in your place till I taught you otherwise.”

  I gulp for breath, and Lottie makes a shh, shh sound to calm me. The hair on my scalp prickles, and every fiber of my being tells me that the bad things that happened to Mother out in those hills were Bosman’s doing. That day on his farm, Bosman said I was born to sell myself to a man with money. The poisoned words rolled off his tongue, smooth as butter. He’d said them before. I think he said them to Mother, and he did worse to break her pride and teach her rightful place in the valley.

  I imagine Mother in the crosshairs of Bosman’s rifle. A girl alone, singing to blunt the sense of danger that lurks in the forests and the tall grass. A girl alone, singing to let the world know she is alive and well, and to come and look for her if her song ever stops.

  A hot, spiky rage floods through me. Lottie was right to wonder why God took Darnell and her father instead of this man. Bosman lords his power over his family, and now over Mother, who remains absolutely still, patiently waiting for the storm to pass. If I could call down lightning from the sky, I would. I want Bosman gone from the world. I take a half a step forward, ready to swing a fist. He notices me, and he smiles. Go on, his amused expression seems to say. Do it, girl. The police station is just next door.

  “Ground coffee was it, Mr. Bosman?” Ophelia tries to break up the dangerous mood. “I have salt pork and dried apricots half-price, and a loaf of sugar bread, baked fresh this morning. I have samples.”

  The fear in Ophelia’s voice brings me back to reason. I want to strike Bosman’s face for shrinking Mother’s voice and body to the size of a child, but he is taller, stronger, and whiter than I’ll ever be. And even if by some miracle I could beat him to the ground, I’d lose Mother and Lottie and my freedom. The law favors Bosman. The law is forever on his side.

  “I see you got your girl from a white man,” Bosman says to Mother, and his ugly expression makes me flinch. “A man with deep pockets from the look of those fancy boots.”

  I understand why Mother left th
is place and never came back. She left to save herself. She left so that when Rian and I were born in far-off Manzini to a white engineer, we’d have what she didn’t: enough food to eat, an education, the freedom to dream of a better future, and the power to reach out and grab it. I suddenly know it’s my turn to be brave.

  “Come.” I take Mother’s hand and squeeze warmth into her cold fingers. “We have a long walk back.”

  With my heart in my mouth, I push past Bosman, who probes Mother’s blank expression, hoping to catch a glimpse of the frightened girl he stalked across the hills all those years ago. He wants to feel her fear. He feeds on it.

  Mother gives him nothing and raises her head. She shuts him out as if he isn’t there. Lottie shoves past Bosman’s other shoulder and opens the door to the sunshine.

  30

  Joyful

  I stagger onto the pavement and give Mother a sideways glance. Beautiful Mother, who ran from this place and came back to save me from humiliation. Clever Mother, who found a gentle man to love her, even if his love is part-time and given to her in secret. Her hand trembles in mine, and I stop to catch my breath. A few seconds at most, but it’s enough to regain control of my emotions and find the high ground from which to view Bosman in the right perspective: Small, mean, left behind. And a liar. To hate my mother’s singing is to hate life and all the joyful moments in it.

  “This country,” Mother says in a shaky voice. “Oh, this country.”

  Bosman has resurrected the scared girl dressed in secondhand clothing and eaten up by the shame of being poor and unprotected. I need to swallow my rage and get her back to our thick carpet on the living room floor and our moonlit walks along the length of Live Long Street, and the sound of Father’s voice on the end of the line.

  “Adele,” Lottie says. “We should leave.”

  Bosman’s red truck is parked by the curb, with his daughter huddled in the back. She’s dressed in a thin cotton shift with bare feet and a black eye the size of a bird’s egg. I take one step and then another on the road to Keziah. We draw level with the truck and the girl throws her arms over the side, fingers flexed.

  “Dee-Dee,” she says. “Dee-Dee is gone.”

  “You mean Darnell?” Lottie asks.

  The girl nods.

  “Yes,” Lottie says in a quiet voice. “Dee-Dee is gone,”

  “For me.” The girl stands and reaches for the sky, her hands grabbing at the air. “Butterflies for me.”

  Lottie and I exchange blank stares. The girl has lost us. She reads our clueless expressions and sighs as if we are the ones who are simpleminded and need help understanding.

  “Purple. Butterflies. For me.” She dances from one end of the tray to the other with a strange grace as she chases and grabs at phantoms. Then with a final lunge, she jerks and falls down onto the tray of the dirty truck. She lies with her arms and legs sprawled, a wisp of brown hair caught in the corner of her mouth.

  “I ran,” she says with a knot in her voice. “I ran away.”

  Lottie understands, and then I do too:

  A cloud of purple butterflies hangs suspended in the air, their shimmering wings reflecting the sunlight. Darnell grabs for one butterfly and then another, always a second too late. The perfect present just out of reach. The purple wings are so close. The lip of the ledge is closer. Then the air takes him and the ground catches him, and the world goes dark.

  Lottie has her answer to the why and the how of Darnell’s death, and I wonder if the truth hurts more than the fantasy she spun with Bosman at the center.

  Mother comes out of her fog and pulls a strand of hair from the corner of the girl’s mouth. Her fingers trace an eyebrow, cheekbone, smooth jawline, and dimpled chin—every touch a sorry.

  The door to the general store opens, and Bosman’s voice growls at his daughter. “Get up, you useless girl. Get up before I make you.”

  Mother’s hand jerks back as if stung, and the familiar pressure that built in my throat at Darnell’s funeral builds again; a burning. Men like Bosman will always win if we let them. Are we forever helpless? Weak girls and women born to suffer in silence and do nothing to fight back? It breaks my heart to think so. Then, like rain falling, Mother’s favorite proverb comes into my mind: “When the ground is hard, the women dance.” I understand what it means now. Darnell’s death, Bosman’s cruelty, and Mother’s pain are the hard ground that we stand on. The ground itself can’t be replaced, but it can be changed. It can be made new. That’s why the women dance. They dance to bring joy. They dance to soften the ground beneath their feet. They dance for change.

  Lottie takes Mother’s other arm, and the pressure fills my mouth and finds a voice. I lick my lips and start out slowly and self-consciously. Mother normally leads the singing and leaves me breathless in her wake. Now it's my turn to lead the dance . . .

  “This little light of mine”—the simple words are a whisper on the wind—“I’m going to let it shine. This little light of mine . . .”

  “I’m going to let it shine.” Lottie Diamond, who mouths the words to hymns in chapel and refuses to answer the preacher’s call-and-response, joins the song in a high, sweet voice. “This little light of mine. I’m going to let it shine.”

  Bosman’s daughter smiles to hear the music, and her happiness brings Mother back to me. She squeezes my hand and lends her voice to the chorus, “Let it shine. Let it shine. Let it shine. Everywhere I go, I’m going to let it shine. Everywhere I go, I’m going to let it shine . . .”

  We link arms, the three of us, and walk the length of the main street with easygoing steps. I sense Bosman watching us from the front porch of the Hebron General Store, and I glance over my shoulder. He stands with his hands on his hips, a powerful man powerless to drown out our song or stop the music from rising over the mountain and into the valleys and the hidden, lonely places of the heart. A man left behind.

  The road leads us away, and our voices rise, clear and certain. We sing to heal Lottie’s mother’s fractured heart. We sing for Darnell, gone so soon, and his father left behind. Our song flies over the fields and into the sky.

  We sing the light into being.

  Acknowledgments

  When the Ground Is Hard has deep roots in my family history. Adele and Lottie’s story is my mother’s story and my aunties’ story. It is also my story. I gave the book its title to honor and show respect to all the women worldwide who give life to my mother’s favorite African proverb, “When the ground is hard, the women dance.”

  Thank you and lots of love to my children, Elijah and Sisana, for understanding that Mummy sometimes has to talk to the people in her head at dinner instead of them. Thank you also to my husband, Mark, my first reader extraordinaire, and the only man brave enough to tell me when I’m wrong. I love you. (Yes, I know, babe . . . I still owe you a trip to Fiji.)

  Thank you also to my agent, Catherine Drayton from Inkwell Management, who stuck with me through difficult times and provided me with great insight. I’m so grateful you have my back.

  Lastly, thank you to my editor, Stacey Barney of Putnam Books, who believed in the book at every stage and asked me all the right questions to help me make it better.

  Photo credit: Darryl Robinson

  After her family migrated to Australia to escape apartheid, MALLA NUNN graduated with a double degree in English and history and then earned a master of arts in theater studies from Villanova University. Faced with a life of chronic under-employment, she dabbled in acting and screenwriting. She wrote and directed three award-winning films, including Servant of the Ancestors, which won best documentary awards at film festivals in Chicago, Los Angeles, and Zanzibar and was shown on national television in Australia. She married in a traditional Swazi ceremony. Her bride price was eighteen cows. She now lives and works in Sydney, Australia.

  You can visit Malla Nunn at www.mallanunn.com
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