‘Eh, M’Pho, you must make finished in the lavvy before you get in the bed!’
‘But, Marta, sometimes I just have to go!’
‘Eh-eh, M’Pho!’ Marta shakes her head and looks around to see if Ma’s listening. She sighs. The threat of impending disasters hangs heavily over our heads.
Walls Within Walls
My younger sister is born two weeks before my third birthday. Sister Greeff moves in with the baby to look after her. Every morning she fastens her starched triangle to her hair, pins a small, round watch to her ample chest, and fixes her pale eyes on me.
‘You stay away from that pram, girlie,’ she hisses. ‘Don’t you touch the baby.’
Ma and I are sitting outside on the steps in the back garden.
‘Remember Uncle Sam and Aunty Anita and your cousins?’ Ma asks. ‘You haven’t seen them for a long time – we’re going to take you to visit them.’
I look up at her. She’s smiling.
‘Can Sandy come too, Ma?’
‘No, love, Sandy doesn’t like being in the car. He can stay at home with Marta and Isak.’
‘I don’t want to go without Sandy, Ma. He doesn’t want me to go without him.’
Ma stops smiling.
‘Is she also going to come?’ I point at the baby, asleep in my old pram in the shade of the syringa tree.
‘Of course she is. But you’re going to stay with Uncle Sam and Aunty Anita and she’s going to stay with Granny and Grandpa MJ …’
‘I don’t want to! I want to stay here with Sandy and you and Pa …’
‘You won’t be staying with them for long, sweetheart – Pa and I are just going to take a short holiday; before you know it, we’ll all be together, back home again.’
I cry and stamp my feet. Ma puts her hands on her hips.
‘Stop that nonsense at once!’
I cry some more when I say goodbye to Sandy. I hug him. Kiss his head. He licks my face.
‘Stop kissing that dog,’ Pa says. ‘He’ll give you worms.’
I love Sandy.
‘He hasn’t got worms, Pa!’
I lift the soft flap of Sandy’s ear, whisper into the waxy, curly snail inside.
‘Don’t forget to say goodnight to Willie-Venter in the sideboard, Sandy-my-dog.’
Pa folds himself behind the Studebaker’s steering wheel. He pokes his head forward, shifts around and pushes back against his seat. I can feel the bulge of his back against my outstretched feet.
‘Stop kicking the back of my seat,’ he growls.
I fold my arms. My legs are straight out in front of me.
‘My legs are too short to kick your seat, Pa. I’m only three, you know.’
The car’s tyres whisper over the tarred road. Sweet-grass bends and whips along the verges. Secrets hum through the telephone wires and bump against the porcelain bobbins that tie them to the orderly lines of tall poles connecting town to town and village to village, some branching off along dusty farm roads to link rusting corrugated-iron roofs to gossiping party lines. A long-legged secretary bird swoops in front of the car and lands in the middle of the road. Ma’s sitting next to Pa with the baby on her lap. Ma’s head keeps dropping on her chest, jerking back again as she struggles to stay awake. My sister is fast asleep, her face turning pink in the warmth of the car.
Pa turns around to see whether I’m awake.
‘Look! See the secretary bird?’
‘Secretary bird? That’s not a secretary bird, Pa. That’s the stork that brings the babies.’
I look at his reflection in the rearview mirror, his wavy hair blowing in the wind from his open window.
‘Don’t you remember, Pa? Ma told me it brought me, then it went back to fetch her.’
I nod in the direction of the sleeping baby. Pa starts laughing. ‘It did too, Pa!’
I’m sitting in the middle of the car on the edge of my seat, my hands folded over the back of the long bench in front of me. I stamp my foot on the floor. Around us, the land is vast and flat. The fields are swept full of mealie leaves, dry and rustling in the faint breath of wind brushing itself up against them. Pa stops laughing.
‘Yes, Pa,’ I say, nodding. ‘I saw it, the secretary bird.’
If I stretch my chin right up, I can rest it on the back of the long seat in front of me. I stare out at the narrow national road stretching to that never-reached, gleaming puddle of water where the end of the world meets the sky. I start jumping up and down on the back seat. If I jump really high, I can see the top of my head in Pa’s rearview mirror.
‘Stop that! You’re irritating me,’ he says.
Ma wakes up when she hears his voice. She looks down at my sister, still asleep in her arms, and half turns towards me.
‘You okay, love? Do you need to stop for a wee-wee?’
Pa groans.
‘Are you sure you need to go?’ His eyes in the mirror glare at me. I look at the back of Ma’s head. Her black curls are shining. I don’t like it when Pa gets cross. Ma turns around to look at me.
I nod.
‘Find somewhere to stop,’ she tells him.
The speeding telephone poles slow down. The tyres crunch on the stony verge, throwing up sprays of dust and pebbles. Ma leans across the seat and opens the back door for me. The sweet, prickly fragrance of dried mealies and dust, and the deep, hot smell of cracked earth fill the world around me. Small purple flowers spread their heads. Khaki weeds lean across towards me, slyly hooking their blackjack seeds into my socks. A line of ants weaves between small pebbles. The veld rustles and whispers around me.
‘Hurry up!’ Pa calls from the car. ‘What are you doing out there? Come on, get a move on!’
Sitting on my heels, my hands on my knees, I watch the dry ground suck up the warm froth. Tiny grains of red sand cling together in an irregular, damp patch. I shift my feet, trying to distribute the flow more evenly. The instep of my shoe gets in the way and a wet dribble marks the dusty leather. Ma opens her door.
‘Come on, love, hurry up! We’ve still got a long way to go!’
Still squatting, I squint up into the sun. Then I stand up and pull my broekies to my waist. Slowly I draw the toe of my shoe through the moist ground. Small clots of red mud stick to its sole. I climb back into the car, and before Ma slams the door shut, I look back and see my footprints in the dust.
On and on we drive across the pale plains of the Free State until we reach the small town where Uncle Sam and Aunty Anita live. I don’t want to get out of the car. Pa’s tired. His big hand reaches in, grabs my arm, and pulls me outside. I stand next to the car, crying.
‘D’you want a smack? Behave yourself – you’re not a baby! What are your cousins going to think?’
I twist away from him and run across the lawn. Ma’s standing at the bottom of the stoep, saying hello to everyone. I throw my arms around her legs and won’t let go.
She puts her arm around my shoulders.
‘Look,’ she whispers. ‘Look who’s here!’
I move my head away from her leg. She’s pointing at someone behind me. I turn around and see Granny Bobbeh. She’s smiling and stretching her arms out to me.