Meetings with Death

Meetings with death

A Novel

Botho Lejowa

Copyright © 2021 Botho Lejowa

First edition 2021

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information storage or retrieval system without permission from the copyright holder.

The Author has made every effort to trace and acknowledge sources/resources/individuals. In the event that any images/information have been incorrectly attributed or credited, the Author will be pleased to rectify these omissions at the earliest opportunity.

Published by Botho Lejowa using Reach Publishers’ services,

P O Box 1384, Wandsbeck, South Africa, 3631

Website: www.reachpublishers.org

E-mail: [email protected]

Botho Lejowa

[email protected]

For my sisters

Bakang, Boikanyo, Kelly, Lenah, Morag and Samantha

I love you

1

I first met Death in a nondescript South African village surrounded by strangers whose faces are a brown blur in my memory. I was nine years old. I had never thought about him in any way until the moment he appeared. I had never considered the possibility of his existence until then. My family spoke about funerals they had to attend, but I never thought about what that meant.

My mother was overly protective when I was a child. She kept me close, never allowing me to experience life without her. I always thought it was because I was her only child. I spent my days with her, engulfed in the calmness that was my mother. She refused to expose me to the world, afraid of what could happen. Our only visitor was my grandmother. Her visits felt like an escape. I could do anything when she was around. My mother would fret, holding on to my hand, anchoring me to the ground when I felt like soaring to the clouds with my grandmother.

I was aware of friction between them, a fraying of the fabric that bound them to each other, but I could never name it until the week before I was sent to South Africa. My grandmother had come to visit. The determination in her eyes should have been a sign my world was about to change. But what does a nine-year-old really know about signs? Their argument was the first I had ever witnessed and I was equal parts fascinated and terrified.

You cannot keep her locked away for the rest of her life Thando. Eana needs to live!

She is not locked away; I’m trying to protect her.

By keeping her from the world? What kind of life is this for a child?

I’m keeping the world from her. She is safer here with me.

She cannot serve your prison sentence with you, Thando. This is punishment masquerading as protection. Let the child live!

That’s all I want for her. I’m not punishing her. What do you think they’ll do to her when they find out just how powerful she is?

The silence that followed was broken only by my mother’s soft sobs. I could not understand what my grandmother meant. Were we in jail?

Our house seemed different afterwards. It felt stifling. I questioned why I could not go to school like the other children; why Mama was my teacher. Why I didn’t have friends? I became more insistent on going to play outside without my mother. I climbed the mulberry tree in our front yard and watched as our neighbours went about their lives. The kids in the streets ignited a deep yearning in my heart. I wanted a friend.

Eventually, my mother sent me on holiday to South Africa to stay with her friends and their daughter. It was the first time I had been away from my mother and the first time I had flown on a plane. She cried the whole drive from our home in Gaborone to the airport. The airport, a huge wonder to my sheltered eyes, could not distract me from my mother’s tight grip on my hand before she handed me over to the flight attendant who would take care of me. She knelt in front of me, her tears spilling with abandon down her cheeks.

Eana, remember not to get upset okay? Remember what I taught you, if you feel upset, think of me. Can you promise me that?

I nodded, feeling the sting of tears in my eyes.

Don’t cry baby. Remember, no getting upset, okay? Especially on the plane. Just watch the clouds. They’re your friends.

The flight attendant took my hand and walked me through the sliding doors. I looked back to find my mother still crouched on the floor, hugging herself as if to claim the comfort usually reserved for me. My desire to explore the world now left a sour taste in my mouth.

My mother’s friends Samkelo and Siphokazi, with their eight-year-old daughter Botlhale in tow, collected me from the airport. Botlhale struck me as beautiful and free in a way I was incapable of being. During that holiday I came to learn more about her life and I surmised she was miles ahead of me even though I was a year older. She was confident in her beauty and used her feminine wiles to charm boys at her school. My reserved demeanour complemented her more boisterous personality. Where I shied away from attention, she demanded it. Where I was more comfortable observing life as it happened, she lived it.

I was in awe of her even though I thought her an incurable cry-baby. She whined all the way home from a trip to the mall. Samkelo had refused to buy her a dress she wanted because she had more than enough dresses. She sulked, alternating between giving her mother one-word answers and screaming at her. Siphokazi threatened her with a hiding and my hand itched both that day and on several other occasions during the holiday to follow through with that threat. I could not recall my mother giving me more than two hidings, yet I respected her more than Botlhale did her mothers.

On the day Death made his crude appearance, Samkelo had woken us at an ungodly hour; stuffed us into the car and driven off. I don’t remember how far we went; if we stayed over at a hotel or if that’s just another memory encroaching on my mind. It seemed like we drove for ages.

Eventually, we reached a village tucked away in the rocky plains of nowhere. The houses were far apart and scattered across a valley. Some of them were accompanied by small mud huts seemingly melting into the earth. The January heat glimmered across the valley so the village appeared unable to hold its form.

Samkelo’s small car could not navigate the large rocks littering the narrow dust road. She asked Botlhale and me to get out of the car and clear the path. What an adventure it felt like to us, to me especially. Bustling Johannesburg had become suffocating. The open space in which we hauled rock after rock out of the way was heaven-sent. I realised on that trip a constant connection to nature was a necessity for my sanity. I could not suffer the built-up city concrete for long periods and was already being drawn to home. The open spaces of the plains were balm for my soul and I met Death as a more relaxed individual.

Samkelo’s cousin had died. On the drive to the village, I had caught whispers of a quick illness. Siphokazi would reach over to grab Samkelo’s hand. Those moments reminded me of my mother and how when I hurt myself and on the verge of tears, she would hold my hand and the sun would reappear. It felt intrusive to observe their interactions and I had deliberately allowed the view of the disappearing cities to act as my distraction.

Faceless strangers, inexplicably sculptured from the same earth that had built the mud houses, ushered us inside on our arrival. The corpse lay in state, displayed for the villagers and guests to pay their respects. The mud hut was cooler than the blistering heat outside. I looked for the air conditioner my mother always described as a saving grace to no avail and my gaze finally settled on the casket, its shiny brown exterior at odds with the village and the villagers’ skin. Inside lay the corpse of Samkelo’s cousin. How odd it was to only meet a person in their death. I remember how strange the darkness of his skin appeared. I don’t remember Samkelo, Botlhale and Sipho in those moments. It was just him, Death and I, in that mud house.

The dead man was disconcertingly still and a thought persisted in my head despite my logic knowing the answer: How is he doing that?

I must have known he had stopped living; that the act of dying had resulted in his unnatural complexion and stillness. Yet, I couldn’t help but think he had always been like that. He was the dead man; he couldn’t have any other way of identification. I couldn’t imagine he had lived before I met him, at least not in the way I thought life was lived. I couldn’t picture the motionless man in the casket enjoying a cone of ice-cream or climbing mulberry trees to get the best fruits. Could he have liked to laugh or dance? Did he have a mother who loved him?

My conclusion on meeting a man in his death was he must not have lived well if he could simply stop. Slowly I became aware of the sombre mood among the faceless strangers. Their whispers wailed against the shock of his death and I wanted to go home. The car ride back to the city was no better. While I was aware of Samkelo’s grief, I could neither match it nor offer any comfort. There was a reason my mother had chosen not to expose me to the world. Perhaps I should have listened.

I have tried to recall Botlhale in those moments, but she has become inconsequential. It is strange she played such an important part in my holiday until our introduction to Death.

I left my meeting with Death in South Africa in the moments of a side trip to the middle of nowhere. It seemed fitting such a thing should only happen in faraway places, to strange faceless people I didn’t know. I flew back to Botswana with brand new clothes and a radio I had purchased at one of the big malls in Johannesburg. I met Death again a year later. I was 10 years old when my grandfather died.

2

I dreamt a ghost was strangling my mother while she sat in her favourite chair in our living room. I screamed but no sound came out. He looked me straight in the eyes and feasted off my terror and pain as the life slipped out of my mother’s body.

That ghost appeared familiar, as if we had met before in a village tucked away behind memories of first-time flights and flighty pre-teens. My heart broke while his hands tightened around her throat. Every squeeze was a shard in my chest. I wailed, watching my world die. He seemed disappointed by my reaction. Almost as if he expected better from me. I wanted to lunge at him, to hurt him. My rage boiled in unison with my pain. He left, jerking me into reality where my screams were real.

I stumbled out of bed, my limbs heavy and drugged-clumsy. I fell and couldn’t pick myself up. My tears turned the room blurry and my lungs gasped for air. I had to see Mama. I dragged myself across the room as the carpet burnt my skin. It was a welcome pain. It meant I could still feel.

She’s fine.

I chanted that phrase in between laboured gasps for air.

She’s fine.

I hauled myself upright and concentrated on placing one foot in front of the other.

She’s fine.

One step. Inhale. Exhale.

She’s fine.

Another step. Inhale. Exhale.

She’s fine.

When I reached her bedroom door, I froze. What if she was not fine?

My mother had forbidden me to ever enter her room without permission. The door remained locked whenever she left. She expected absolute obedience and I had never dared to disobey her. If I went in now, would she punish me? I felt warm air on the back of my neck as if someone standing too close had exhaled. I couldn’t turn. I knew he was there. Taunting me. I opened the door.

Mama was sleeping. I saw the soft way her chest rose and fell with every breath she took and I wept. The relief was debilitating. She’s fine. I crawled into her bed, afraid to leave her side in case he changed his mind. I barely slept, listening for Mama’s soft snores whenever I opened my eyes. Yet, the natural urge for sleep must have eventually won out and I woke to a bright, sunny morning and the news my grandfather had died during the night.

The drive to my father’s home village was long and pensive. I couldn’t picture my grandfather and wondered if that was another effect of death. Do we forget the person as soon as they die? I tried to conjure up an image of his face, but for the life of me, couldn’t. I kept simply visualising him standing next to a white van, but his face was blurred and the other details were sketchy. He must have been a nice man because I saw how heart-broken my mother was. She grew older on that trip; her ever-smiling face preoccupied and reserved. Grief was mirrored in her eyes. Every time she looked at me, my heart throbbed. Was I more upset over her grief than I was over my grandfather’s death?

We had rented a kombi or a minibus to cart our family north of the country. My mother’s aunts complained about the distance. The four-hour trip must have been torture and I could almost hear their