Soul Sisters

by Lesley Lokko

  He stepped off the patio and onto the thick, soft grass. There was a small knot of people standing by the pool. He walked towards them, preparing himself to greet and be greeted . . . and froze. He felt the smile drain from his face.

  It took him a few minutes to recover from the shock he’d felt as soon as he realized it was Kemi standing beside the pool, her expression hidden behind a pair of oversized sunglasses. His mother came towards him with a playful smile on her face, unable to conceal her pleasure at finally having brought the two of them together. ‘Look who’s here!’ she called out gaily, waving him over. He recognized Dr Mashabane, tall and regal, and the mother, her head wound up in one of those elaborate headscarves that the wives of Nigerian diplomats liked to wear, practically a self-standing sculpture in its own right. Kemi was standing next to a tall redhead whom he recognized as the girl he’d met in London . . . what was her name? Jane? Jen? ‘Come and meet the daughter of our closest friends,’ she urged.

  He walked up to the group, aware of everyone’s eyes on his face. Kemi’s face was partly hidden by her mother’s headdress but it was obvious she hadn’t said anything about having met him already. He felt his heartbeat quicken. She was wearing one of those off-the-shoulder floaty dresses that brought film stars like Brigitte Bardot to mind . . . her hair cascaded around her head and shoulders like a dense, dark cloud.

  ‘At last,’ Florence Mashabane said, stepping forward. She embraced him warmly, kissing him on both cheeks. ‘You were about this high when I last saw you,’ she said delightedly, looking up at him. He was passed from mother to mother, father to father, embracing and being embraced in turn. The mood was ebullient and joyful, in stark contrast to the sense of foreboding that came over him as he looked down at Kemi, her eyes still hidden. She didn’t offer her cheek but her hand instead.

  ‘And this is Kemi’s “sister”, as we call her. Darling Jen. Daughter of another very close friend.’ Florence smiled beatifically, nudging Jen forward. They shook hands. Her grasp was firm and cool. There was no sign in her face either that they’d met. He swallowed uncomfortably.

  ‘So, let’s go through,’ his father said, shepherding the group towards the patio.

  ‘We brought our housekeeper,’ Iketleng was saying, as the women picked their way in heels across the lawn. ‘Did I tell you about the one who was here when we arrived? Oh, she was terrible! I kept having to put salt in everything. No taste!’ Their chatter washed over him. He followed them, still dazed. There was an enormous tangled grapevine hanging low over the patio roof, its leaves as pale and translucent as tracing paper. A couple of birds skimmed by, looking for fruit, but it was autumn and the grapes were small.

  ‘Now, we’ll put the young people at this end of the table,’ his mother said, taking charge as usual. ‘If I let Oliver and Solam sit next to each other, no one will get a word in edgewise!’

  He darted a quick look at Kemi. She’d taken off her sunglasses. Her expression was neutral. She took a seat next to Jen, put her elbows on the table and laced her hands together, making a bridge for her chin. She seemed utterly composed. He sat down opposite, wondering how on earth to break the ice.

  38

  She couldn’t believe her eyes. She looked up and there he was, walking towards them, all 6'3 of him, dressed casually in jeans and a thick sweater, a pair of sunglasses tucked in the roll-neck, looking for all the world as if he’d stepped out of the pages of some glossy men’s magazine. She had no idea what to say or where to look. It was clear he’d been intended as some sort of surprise. When she and Jen had been introduced to his parents, they’d embraced her warmly but said nothing about Solam having met her before, or about him coming to lunch. Clearly, their London encounter hadn’t been important enough to report on.

  She stole a look at Jen. Her eyes widened slightly, enough to convey her own surprise, and her anger too, Kemi noticed. There was a faint tightening of the skin around her eyes when she looked at him. It was a feature of hers since childhood. That, and a shiny nose when she was about to cry.

  They were seated together at the end of the table, set slightly apart from the parents. Solam looked completely at ease. He made no attempt to speak to her alone. In fact, he seemed to pay Jen more attention. Food was brought to the table by a succession of uniformed maids, but she’d lost her appetite. She didn’t want to appear rude or churlish – too much her father’s daughter for that! – but neither did she have any intention of letting him in again, in a manner of speaking. Cool, calm, professional. That was the way to handle men like Solam. He was someone to be kept at arm’s length; the longer the arm the better. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of seeing how hurt she’d been, but neither would she play the coquettish game she’d seen so many of her girlfriends play. She despised it, just as she despised all forms of deceit.

  ‘What brings you to South Africa?’ he asked finally – a touch insolently, she thought.

  She lifted her gaze. ‘I’ve got a fellowship,’ she said evenly. ‘Just for a few months.’ She made no reference to the fact that it had been the major topic of conversation between them, before.

  ‘You should have told me you were coming,’ he said, lifting his wine glass. ‘I’d have organized a few things . . . I don’t know . . . a tour, or dinner with friends . . . show you around a little.’

  She shrugged. ‘Jen’s here,’ she said simply, brushing off his lame offer. ‘And besides, I’ll be at work most of the time.’ It was a snub, but a subtle one. Let him work it out.

  He took it in his stride. She had to give him that. He wasn’t one to sulk. ‘Where are you working?’ he asked curiously.

  ‘Baragwanath.’

  He raised an eyebrow. ‘Well, you’ll certainly be thrown in at the deep end. Good for you.’

  So, she had rattled him a little, she saw with the tiniest thrill of satisfaction. She looked at Jen, who appeared to be studying her chicken hard enough to dissect it telepathically. What was the matter with her? She’d barely said anything. She turned her attention to her parents and the conversation unfolding on the other side of the table. Politics and prison. She listened with half an ear to her father and Oliver Rhoyi discussing prison rations and felt immediately ashamed. It was the same feeling she’d had as a child, afraid to complain about anything for fear of seeming selfish, or worse. Whatever her silly childish troubles were, they paled in comparison to what her parents were facing; she’d learned very early on to bottle her frustrations and hide her pain. She coped with whatever was thrown at her. End of story. It meant that when the very worst thing that could happen did, she knew better than anyone what to do: nothing. She did and said nothing. She had always done nothing.

  She stopped, shocked by the path her thoughts had taken. She got up from the table, mumbling her excuses, and walked a little unsteadily down the hallway. The guest toilets were at the far end of the corridor. She yanked open the door, locked it, and walked over to the sink. The first wave of nausea rolled over her and she stumbled to the toilet, barely making it in time before her stomach heaved and her lunch came hurtling out.

  39

  Jen just couldn’t help herself. She couldn’t stop staring at him. He was the most beautiful man she’d ever seen. The two-minute encounter they’d had at the gallery in London that night did him no justice at all. She’d clearly been too harried to take him in properly. He was chatting half-heartedly to Kemi, who was doing her level best to ignore him, but Jen wasn’t fooled. Kemi had long been the mistress of her own silences, leaving others to look for the gaps and opportunities in conversation that she declined to own.

  She studied him covertly as they ate. His lips were clearly drawn, defined by a darkened, bevelled scroll at the edges, and his nose was beautifully curved, almost haughty-looking, the nostrils finely etched as though by some careful sculptor. His cheekbones were wide and high, and his jet-black eyes were hidden by the fold of his eyelids at the corners. It was an unusual face. It spoke of a mixture of races that she co
uldn’t identify, like many others in this part of the world, she supposed, whose ancestry could only be guessed at in the complex vortex of history and circumstance. She understood now why Kemi had been so bowled over.

  Afterwards, she couldn’t have said what the conversation was about. The usual pleasantries, spoken within earshot and for the benefit of the parents, engrossed in their own conversations, but curious enough to throw a glance towards them every now and then, as if in confirmation of what they’d long desired. The younger generation . . . Kemi and Solam . . . this was what they’d fought for. She could feel their desire as if they’d spoken it aloud. It wasn’t often that the differences between her and Kemi were drawn so starkly, but she felt it now. Kemi and Solam belonged to one side of an invisible but unshakeable barrier of history and she was on the other. She saw now what she’d been unable – or perhaps unwilling – to ever fully grasp. When Kemi first came to live with them, people often referred to ‘her life out there’, as if it were different in some fundamental way to the life she now had. In some ways, perhaps it was? But to Jen, in the ways that counted – friends, family, school, homework; all the unvarying routine of childhood – it couldn’t have been all that different. How else to explain the ease with which Kemi slotted in? After the first term, it seemed as though she’d always been there. If there were adjustments or accommodations to be made, Kemi made them, without fuss or complaint. But now, for the first time ever, she was beginning to grasp just how wide the distance between them might be. Kemi’s parents sat on the other side of the table but they were strangers to Kemi. There was none of the easy intimacy that characterized all parent-child relationships – even her own. No wonder she’d been so drawn to Solam. He came from the same world, the same place and time.

  She looked down at her plate, feeling suddenly dejected. What was she doing here? A sudden irrational jealousy took hold of her. Was she jealous of Kemi or Solam? But before she could question herself, Kemi suddenly stood up, her hand to her mouth as though she were feeling unwell. She got up and hurried to the bathroom, leaving everyone looking awkwardly at one another. What had just happened?

  ‘Oh, dear . . . is it something she ate?’ Mrs Rhoyi said, looking concerned. ‘I hope it wasn’t my chicken?’

  Jen hastened to reassure her. ‘It’s probably too spicy for her,’ she said quickly. ‘We’re not used to it.’ She realized her mistake as soon as the words were out. ‘In Scotland, I mean,’ she added quickly. ‘The food’s pretty, er, bland in our house.’ She looked unhappily at her own plate. Her words had come out wrong. She’d implied Kemi was now Scottish, not South African. She’d implied a bond between herself and Kemi that didn’t really exist. She’d implied she knew more about Kemi’s tastes than her parents did. Things in South Africa were more complicated than she’d anticipated. She felt completely out of her depth. As usual.

  40

  Kemi rinsed her mouth several times over, wetted her hands and ran them through her hair to tame it. She’d been gone for nearly fifteen minutes . . . any longer and someone would come looking for her. She looked at her reflection in the mirror, anxiously seeking signs of the storm that had blown up inside her without warning. She traced the fine line of her eyebrows, moulding them back into shape. If you didn’t look too closely, she seemed fine. A little tightness around the eyes, perhaps, but that was it. She blew out her cheeks, squared her shoulders and opened the door. It was time to re-join the others, assure everyone she was OK.

  The corridor was quiet. She could hear the maids chattering in their language as they washed up in the kitchen, down the hall. She walked slowly back to the patio, her arms wrapped around her waist, hugging herself tightly. Something was hovering at the edge of her consciousness, a premonition or foreshadowing of some kind . . . it fluttered back and forth, like a capricious bird looking for somewhere to land. She tried to catch hold of the feeling – excitement or dread? But before she could examine it properly, it lifted again. She was left feeling rather breathless, as though sensing the lull before a thunderstorm. She looked up at the sky as she crossed the garden to join the others. Clear, azure, high-veld skies. Not a cloud in sight. It was not the season for storms.

  41

  By the end of her second week at Baragwanath, Kemi could scarcely remember what her working life at UCH had been like. It was exhilarating, terrifying, all-consuming. Here there was no early morning coffee with colleagues before beginning a day’s shift. You walked straight into whatever emergency had found its way to the front door. Baragwanath – or Bara, as everyone called it – was the third-largest hospital in the world and she had never in her life seen anything as big or chaotic. Nothing worked as it should. There were chronic shortages of almost everything you could think of, from beds to essential equipment. On her second day, she’d found a patient eating his hospital meal with a tongue depressor. ‘No cutlery,’ one of the bad-tempered nurses informed her shortly. ‘They steal everything.’ Half the time, machines were either out of order or they hadn’t been serviced, or someone had stolen the spare parts. If she hadn’t seen the chaos with her own eyes, she wouldn’t have believed it possible. And yet, for all that, there was a closeness and camaraderie between the staff that she’d never before experienced. Everyone – from the most junior medical student to the most senior consultant – pulled together, extracting miracles on a daily basis. The nurses, for all their gruff bad humour, were saints. No one was turned away, no matter how long the wait. She’d spent the first six hours of her first day wondering how she would survive, never mind the patients who arrived at death’s door.

  Now, two weeks in, she felt as though she’d been there all her life. It was nearly nine o’clock in the evening. She’d been on call for almost forty-eight hours and it was finally time to go home. She walked dazedly to the staffroom and was just changing her rubber-soled shoes when the door burst open.

  ‘Stabbing’s just come in! Third door down . . . can you assist? I’ve got another emergency.’ A harried-looking junior doctor looked wildly around for someone – anyone.

  ‘Sure,’ Kemi gasped, the usual surge of adrenaline kicking in at the mention of an emergency. She ran down the corridor after him, looking for the third door. It was open. She walked in and clapped a hand to her mouth. A man was sitting on the wooden bench with a knife sticking out of his head, the blade buried deep in his skull. His hair and face were matted with congealing blood and the stench of alcohol was overpowering. He was completely still. There was no one else in the room. She gulped, and approached him. ‘Sir?’ She touched him as gently as she could on the arm. ‘Sir?’

  ‘Don’t waste your time. He’s gone,’ someone said.

  She turned round. It was a woman. She was wearing a smart black suit. Kemi couldn’t tell if she was a doctor or a visitor, perhaps neither. ‘Gone?’ she repeated blankly.

  ‘Dead.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Who’re you?’

  ‘Kemi Mashabane. Mr Dissanayake’s my supervisor.’

  ‘Ah. I’d heard you’d arrived. Welcome.’ The woman looked closely at her. ‘Come with me,’ she said abruptly. ‘You look as though you could do with a coffee. Maybe something stronger.’

  Kemi hurried after her as she marched down the corridor. She pushed through the exit doors at the end and walked down a flight of stairs, passing nurses and medical students running off in all directions. The canteen on the ground floor was almost empty. There were two other junior doctors slumped over their coffees. Judging from their blood-stained coats, they were coming off a long shift. The woman motioned for her to sit down. She fetched two cups of coffee from the vending machine and brought them over. ‘I’m Dr Mkize, by the way. Ayanda Mkize. I’m one of the directors. How long have you been up?’

  Kemi shook her head. She’d lost track. ‘What time is it?’

  ‘Dr Mashabane, I’m going to send you home. It takes time to get used to the pace here. Go home, get a good night’s sleep. I’ll see you back here on Monday mo
rning.’

  Kemi was too tired to argue. Dr Mkize was right. It wasn’t just the hours she was putting in; it was the frenetic pace. Everything moved at twice the speed of anywhere else, including death. Since she’d arrived, three patients had died on the operating table, right there in front of her, often from such minor complications that it seemed absurd. An elderly woman waiting for hip surgery had developed a bed sore. It wasn’t seen to and within a week, it had turned septic. She died of blood poisoning. Pointless. A young girl in the advanced stages of labour had come to ER. She’d been told to wait her turn in the long queue outside. She wound up giving birth in the toilets, haemorrhaged and bled to death. The other doctors shrugged. She would get used to it. There was a young Nigerian registrar named Ogundare. He smiled at her. ‘Johnny-Just-Come. That’s what we call people like you. You’ve been overseas for too long. Welcome home.’ She’d smiled weakly.

  ‘Thanks, Dr Mkize,’ she heard herself saying. ‘I’ll be fine. It’s just—’

  ‘It takes some getting used to, as I said. Where did you train?’

  ‘UCH.’

  ‘Ah. I was at Bath. Yes, it takes a while. Do you have a car?’

  She shook her head. ‘No, the guesthouse where I’m staying has a driver. I’ll just ring them.’

  ‘I’ll run you back, if you can wait for half an hour. Where are you staying?’

  ‘Melville. But please don’t go out of your way. It’ll take him half an hour to get here and—’

  ‘I’m not. It’s on my way home. Just wait here. I’ll be back shortly.’

  She was too tired to argue. She could only nod in assent.

  They drove out of Bara, turning right onto Chris Hani Highway. It was pitch dark; the street lights weren’t working. The car was brand new and smelled of leather and perfume. Ayanda was in her forties, Kemi guessed, with a no-nonsense, brisk air that presumably kept her team in check, and in awe.