Pumpkin fritters, carrots with butter and sugar, roly-poly pudding, meatballs wrapped in bacon, waterblommetjiebredie, beef stew with carrots and potatoes – she knows everything. I tell her I love her cooking, and she smiles so that her cheeks move right up under her eyes. They sit there and shine.
“Food tastes that way when you put your heart into it, Miss Lily.”
Gesiena smiles, showing gums the colour of morning glory flowers.
Chapter 12
“Have you ever gotten a really good look at him, huh?” Beth is asking about Uncle André. “As in, in real life?”
The two of us are standing in front of his portrait in the dark, creaky passage. This is the only photo of him in the whole house. The colours are faded as if it used to hang on a sunny wall. The boy in the picture is dressed in army clothes. He isn’t smiling, and his light blue eyes seem to be cutting right through whoever took the photo. I would say that he’s handsome, but this is not the kind of person I’d try to talk to in the street. His smooth forehead is creased in the middle where his eyebrows are pulling towards the ground. He’s standing up straight, as if he has a rod up his spine, but his shoulders seem to be dragging him down. His nose is small, like Mom’s, and his mouth looks like hers too, although the lips are thinner. Also, Mom’s lips curl up a little at the corner, but his are dead straight, as if he’s pulling them towards his clenched molars.
I look at Beth and say, “I don’t think I’ve ever gotten a really, really good look at him, hey.” The thing is, his door is always open a crack, but you can’t exactly see anything.
“Well, then we should go take a look.”
This idea sounds far too scary for me, but if Beth is brave enough to do this, then I sure don’t want to be chicken.
“How do you want to do that?”
“You know, we could go hide under his windowsill and take a peek.”
My heart beats faster. I think of the moaning in the night, the wandering about. But I must remember I’m the eldest, and therefore supposed to be the bravest.
“Well, sure,” I answer. “When do you want to do it?”
She thinks about it, then nods her head as she says, “Tomorrow.”
I’m relieved, and I want to get away from his stare, and into the sunlight.
“OK. So, let’s go see what’s up in the garden,” I say, maybe a little too merrily.
* * *
I know you’re supposed to confess your sins, but I’m not stupid. I’m feeling bad about something that happened today, so I have to write it down on paper, which is safer than saying it out loud. Sins will get you into trouble if other people find out. But you can write them down. That’s confessing. And then you bury the paper in the garden, so you’re all clear.
Today Beth and I found cattapillas. Beth was busy killing one when Gran saw us. Then Gran said NEVER to kill God’s creechers, and didn’t we know that cattapillas become butterflies. I shouted, It wasn’t me! and then I started crying because I’ve killed lots of ones other times, and I didn’t know about the butterflies.
I go straight to the petunia bed in the front garden, and dig up the earth with my fingers. And I bury my note.
* * *
Since the milk van, Mom doesn’t have a husband, but Gesiena still does. It’s important to have one, because they take care of you, and if you have one you’ll never be lonely. Gesiena has three children, all older than me. Her husband, Harry, used to work here, but one day he had to move. Now he’s on the other side of town, and it’s too far to come home much. Gesiena’s arthritis is much better since he left.
You can tell when Harry’s been for a visit, because Gesiena wears her doek lower down on her forehead, or she stays at home for a day or two, and then she comes to work wearing sunglasses, which look funny with the doek.
When I ask her why she’s trying to look weird, she says it’s the new style.
“Miss Lily, it’s rock ’n roll,” she says, swinging her hips and clapping her hands, which is funny for her, because she never dances, and doesn’t move or speak much, either. Gran said something about she could keep “daai va’k” off the farm for good, but Gesiena says, “Dis complicated” and what about her children.
Later, Gran is dusting her face at the dressing table.
“Gran, what does ‘dye fuck’ mean?” I ask.
She looks at me in the mirror from under dead-straight eyebrows. Without turning around, she meets my eye and says, “Child, I have no idea, but I never want to hear those words again.” And then she slides a lipstick over her mouth, which leaves it looking like blood on ice.
* * *
“So, are you ready?”
Beth looks at me with a frown. I could pretend not to know what she’s talking about, but that’s not going to help much.
We said we’d go just before dark, because everyone will be getting ready for supper, and there’s less chance of them seeing our leopard-crawling along the stone foundation.
The hair on the back of my neck is doing its best to stick out from the skin, and with slithering along the cold wall, even the hair on my arms is standing on end. Beth, who was very brave until now, has allowed me to go first, because I’m the eldest. I think I hear something, so I stop, and Beth bumps into me. But all I really heard was my heart thumping and Beth’s tummy rumbling.
We find the window open. Faded muddy bootprints line the wall. We spend some time just listening to our own breathing. It’s half dark already, but no light has been turned on in this room yet. With its net curtains blowing out into the breeze, it has the feeling of a completely empty space.
“Definitely out on the prowl,” is Beth’s finding. “Maybe you should take a look.”
I’m not keen. “What if he comes back?”
“I’ll wait outside. I’ll make a racket if he comes, and then you just shoot out the door and into the passage.”
That makes me safer than you, I think, as I lift myself through the window.
The room smells sweaty and stale, even with the window open. In the dim light I can make out that the floor is covered in books and socks. We came to spy on our uncle – to see him, not his empty room, so I suddenly wonder, What am I doing here?
I notice some of the books have been torn apart. I step on a scrap of paperback cover that says Man’s Search F-.
My heart jumps when I notice a big knife. Usually, knives are shiny, but this one lies on the table all dull and grimy. I’m frightened and want to get out, but my curiosity has taken over, and I start opening drawers. I see old music tapes, pens, stamps, badges; the usual boy rubbish. I only have the most boring stuff to report to my sister.
I am about to leave when I notice the cupboard door is slightly open. As I step towards it, the musty smell, a mixture of sheep shed and something I don’t know gets stronger. It sits in my throat.
The door opens without a sound. I see something furry and pick it up, then drop it because it’s wet on the inside. I almost scream, and in my fright I knock a whole lot of things to the ground. I’m so scared, but still, I scoop the hides and bones off the floor and stuff them back onto the shelf. I almost bump my hand against