‘Let me ask you something,’ he finally said. He continued to play with his beard and stare over my shoulders at an invisible point in the distance. ‘Where do you see yourself in five years?’
‘I’m not sure.’
‘Not sure. Do you still see yourself here? At Bhakhuba?’
‘Maybe.’
‘Wearing the skins? Translating praise poetry?’
‘I don’t really know right now.’
‘You only have to remember five routines.’
‘Charlie said we wouldn’t use routine four tonight.’
‘It’s only a few lines. Why do you keep forgetting it?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘He doesn’t know.’ He started scratching his head. ‘Tell me, Byron, how I can help you.’
‘I’m not sure. I’m sorry, it won’t happen again.’
‘If you can give me the solution, I’m willing to listen.’
‘The solution to what?’
‘To you, Byron.’
‘I’m not sure what to say.’
‘He’s not sure.’
‘Ja.’
‘I’m going to ask you to stop coming here.’
‘No, please. I need the money. I will work hard.’ I leant forward trying to convince him of my desperation. But even I could hear that my voice lacked authenticity. Right then I didn’t give a shit if he fired me. I just wanted to go home and drink the bottle of brandy I’d saved for myself and smoke the rest of my weed.
‘Show a white man some mercy!’ I cried out.
‘Are you amusing yourself, Byron?’
I was.
‘Not at all,’ I said.
He shook his head.
‘You can come in once in a while. If you’re desperate, you can do a shift here. A shift there. If people ask for you. I realise some of the guests find you amusing.’
‘Please! You can’t do this to me! It just isn’t fair!’ I don’t even talk like that. Who was I fooling? ‘There’s nothing here without me,’ I said, and leant across his table.
‘Yes, Byron. We’d be finished without you. Go home.’
I picked up my shield and spear and gave him a half bow, half curtsy as I made my way toward the door.
‘And stop smoking dope. You’ll be brain dead before thirty.’
Vusi’s silver BMW X4 was parked in the lot. He reserves his place with an orange cone each evening. I was still dressed in my skins and so it was easy for me to take a piss on his back tire.
Brain dead before thirty, I thought as I sat in my lounge rolling myself a joint. You’ll be dead before tomorrow if you’re not careful, Vusi.
I still had a few good heads left in my stash. The last few weeks had been bad. I’d been smoking heavily with Roddy. Sometimes he brought his own, but normally we smoked mine. Like him, his stash is full of shit. I sometimes think it’s actually mowed lawn. It seldom gets us high, and he always has some excuse. He’s an old man, Roddy. Somewhere in his sixties, I guess. He has a long grey ponytail, wears dirty clothes. He lives somewhere in Salt River and stays alive by doing odd jobs. He’s a shit talker. I don’t mind him, but he smokes too much of my weed.
Maybe I’m too generous, I thought, as I slid down the back of my couch and blew smoke rings toward the dim yellow light on my ceiling. I felt like a diver sitting at the bottom of a children’s swimming pool. I took some long swigs from my bottle of brandy, then made my way into the passage. Two of the lights had gone and I hadn’t had a chance to change them. The passage is wide, high, always cold. The large wooden floorboards are chipped and offer an ideal refuge for dust. I flicked on my lighter, holding it up to the electricity meter next to the front door. At current usage, I had twenty hours left. I kicked open my bedroom door, pulled some dirty clothes off my bed. The sheet smelt of beer. I ripped it off and sent it hurtling across the room, climbed onto the bare mattress, pulled the duvet up to my chin, jerked off and fell asleep.
I woke early in the morning to the sound of gentle rain on my roof. I was glad it was there to keep the water off my face. My father had paid the house off in full when he left the country and transferred it into my name. I had never laid eyes on it before the day it became mine. It was more than five years ago now, when the property market in Obs was just starting to grow. He’d paid next to nothing for it a decade earlier. But despite this one piece of luck he was adamant that his time in Africa was up. He sold his other properties and packed all his possessions into a crate, which he loaded onto the same ship that took him to England. He didn’t want to leave by plane. He said it was important that he went by ship, the same way his grandfather had come to the country. He said he wanted to complete the cycle, and that one day I’d understand. As far as I was concerned he was just a sentimental old fart. But I was glad for the house. No matter what happened, I’d always have that.
Now that I’d been released from Bhakhuba, I had nothing to worry about except the six marijuana plants growing in my back garden. They were certain to bring me enough income to buy myself food and booze for a month. After that? Well, we’d have to see. I’d bought some indoor growing equipment from the Grow-it-Yourself shop up the road from my house. I’d been meaning to transplant the crop into my cupboard but hadn’t found the moment. Anyway, I’d worry about them later. I rolled over and went back to sleep.
When I woke again the rain had stopped. I summoned all my energy and climbed out of bed. I stumbled down the passage to the bathroom and took a piss in the toilet, dribbling all over the floor. I wanted to wipe it up, but I was out of toilet paper. I splashed my face. My eyes were red, with dark rings beneath them. My normally black hair had traces of brown caused by the dirt at Bhakhuba. I ran my fingers through it and held them to my nose. Whew! I needed to wash myself. But first, I had to take a look at my plants. I walked down the passage and when I reached the end, the part where it drops into the sunken landing that leads to the back garden, I stopped dead.
The entire concrete landing was flooded by a few inches of dirty water. Without hesitation I jumped into it, wetting the bottoms of my jeans. I pulled open the rickety wooden door with the stained glass panes and was greeted by a miniature mud slide. Thank God the landing was a few feet below the rest of the corridor, or my entire house would have been washed away. I ran into the garden.
‘What the fuck!’ I cried out to no one in particular.
I ran through the swamp. I could feel the mud between my toes, the cold water against my ankles and shins. The tree in the corner of the garden had been stripped of all its little yellow leaves; they were floating on the surface of the swamp, serving as rest points for drowning insects. And then I saw them.
‘Fuck!’ I screamed. I fell to my knees, then shifted onto my bum.
All six of them had been uprooted. I was sure that I’d planted them properly. They were meant to be resistant. I started running through excuses in my head before realising that there was no one to excuse the disaster to except myself. I was sitting amidst my own failed cash crop. I felt like a Zimbabwean farmer, the rain my Mugabe and his war veterans.
I sat completely still. It was a quiet morning and the rain had stopped. From my garden I can see the top of Devil’s Peak, the chisel-shaped rock, which at that moment was covered in grey cloud and truly looked like the forehead of Satan. I put my hands on the ground to try and push myself up. They sank into the mud. At that moment I almost felt like giving up. But then, suddenly, I felt a very sharp point stick into the palm of my hand. It sent a shock of pain up my arm. I felt around to see what it was, but now it was gone.