After Tears. Niq Mhlongo
only came out of his room when Priest Mthembu had left for his own house. By then Mama had also left for work.
“Hhola, Uncle, it seems you don’t believe in Jesus,” I said.
“It’s not a question of believing in God or Jesus, my laaitie. It’s whether They believe what is important to me. I might not be educated like you, but I’m not an idiot. How can I believe in a man who was convinced that His own mother, Mary, was a virgin? Just look at it, Advo! She carried Him for nine full pregnant and painful months, but Jesus still denied that Mary was His own mother.”
“But I already promised Priest Mthembu that we’re coming to his church together this Sunday,” I teased. “Is that the only reason you won’t come with me?”
“I grew up respecting my parents, Advo,” he said. “Even though my father was a drunk, I still respected him. Jesus never did that to His parents. He disowned them.”
I laughed out loud while my uncle limped to his room and came out with a glass full of whisky. He stopped and took a sip before belching loudly.
“Ahhhhh! This is my Garden of Eden. I tell you, Advo, if Jesus and God were not dead, They would come down from heaven to have a sip with me. This would make Them forget Their Christian confusion.” He kissed his glass and laughed at his own joke.
“But, Uncle, we must be thankful for the life that God gave us,” I said.
“Life! Come on, Advo,” shouted my uncle. “I’m not going to waste my time bribing God with prayers. Whatever I say to Him, He won’t bring back the leg that I lost twelve years ago.”
“Let’s leave God out of this, Uncle,” I said, trying to change the topic.
“To tell you the truth, Advo, it was not a mistake or oversight that I lost my leg. God did it deliberately to punish me because I was a tsotsi.” He pointed at his stump. “It was part of His plan that I should be a cripple from the age of twenty-nine.”
Memories of the day of his accident started to flood into my mind. I recalled coming home from school with my sister, Nina, and hearing that my uncle was in hospital, but I wanted him to tell me more about it.
“What happened on the day you lost your leg, Uncle?” I asked.
“It’s a long story, Advo. Let’s not even go there.”
“But I want to know, Uncle,” I insisted.
“Okay, okay, I’m only telling you this on condition that the first thing you do as an advocate next year is to sue Transnet for millions.”
Silence fell for a while as my uncle took another sip from his glass.
“Well, it happened a very long time ago, in 1987. Let me see, how old were you then?” He scratched his head. “I think you were about four or five years old, a real pikinini. You were still sucking Rea’s breasts.”
“No, Uncle, I was nine in 1987,” I corrected him.
“Yeah, but I remember the popular beer was Lion Lager then.”
“Okay, fine with Lion Lager and my age now, Uncle. I want to know what happened to your leg,” I said, interrupting his thoughts. “Tell me everything.”
“All right then. It happened on my way home from Jozi. I was with PP and we were empty-handed. Then inside the garo I saw this woman sitting alone at the far end of the coach. Some smokser came in selling ice cream and the woman opened her purse for some money. Inside it . . . Advo, phew!” He whistled. “There were banknotes this thick.” He demonstrated, using his forefinger and thumb. “PP saw her as well.”
“So you and PP have always been bra’s and tsotsis?”
“We’ve been friends for a very long time, since we were pikininis, my laaitie. We dropped out of school at the same time because isigele was just not meant for us. It was meant for people like Dilika.”
“So what happened?”
“Oh, I think the woman was going to Vreega with the train, so I looked around and aimed at her purse. As the garo picked up speed away from the station, PP was already at the sliding door blocking it with his body so that it didn’t close. We were good at sparapara and that’s why we were planning to come out with the purse while the train was still moving, but as I stepped out, holding the purse, I tripped and fell.”
My uncle suddenly stopped his narration. His sausage-like fingers were nursing the whisky glass on his palm. There was an expression of bitterness on his face.
“I’m telling you this because I’m glad ugelezile. You’re educated. You’re going to be an advocate next year and not a tsotsi like most boys here in Chi.”
“Thank you, Uncle.”
“I want us to sue Transnet for my lost leg. Yeah, we must sue them,” he repeated.
“On what grounds are we going to sue them, Uncle?” I asked.
“You know what, Advo? Some people say that I was pushed off the train by a security guard who worked for Transnet. They say that he was inside the train and heard the woman’s cry for help.”
“Do you have enough evidence for that, Uncle? I mean, did you see him push you?”
“My witness is PP. He says that he saw the guy push me, but I don’t remember anything. All I know is that my leg was amputated below the knee three days later.”
FIVE
Tuesday, November 30
Five days after I had placed the advertisement for the sale of our Chi house with the Sowetan newspaper, an old man walked up our dusty driveway. He stopped and looked up at our house number that was scrawled on the unplastered brick wall outside the front door. He looked at least seventy, or maybe a bit more; both his hair and beard were grey and he was wearing an old brown suit with black shoes. Suddenly he seemed to come to some kind of a decision and knocked at the kitchen door.
I saw Mama open the door, which was still the original steel one that made a loud bang when you opened or closed it, but I kept staring at the old man. I had never known my father, or my paternal grandfather, and I had long ago accepted the fact that I was the product of a man who didn’t care that I existed and a woman who hid the truth from me all the time. I didn’t miss the man who ran away without seeing the fruits of his handsome labour, but for some reason I was hoping that Mama was going to announce the old man as my grandfather.
By the time I got to the kitchen the old man was already sitting on one of the plastic chairs while Mama rested on one of the others with a puzzled look on her face. The two of them were examining each other with great curiosity.
“My name is John Sekoto,” the old man introduced himself to Mama. “I used to live in this house in the early seventies, before I leased it out to Mr Kuzwayo in 1974.”
“Sawubona, mkhulu,” Mama greeted the old man, “I’m the late Kuzwayo’s daughter and my name is Rea.”
“I see. Are you Nandi’s daughter?”
“Yebo, mkhulu.”
“You look more like your mother. You were still young when I was transferred to the Welkom mines.”
Mama smiled.
“You see, I was just discharged from the Weskoppies Mental Hospital in Pretoria. I had been there for almost two decades and right now I don’t have a place to stay. I read in the Sowetan newspaper that this house was up for sale and I thought that I should come here and discuss some issues with you.”
“Oh, you’re right. It’s been a month now and we’re waiting for a potential buyer,” Mama lied.
The old man nodded.
“My two brothers have got their new RDP houses from the ANC government in Snake Park and Slovoville and now there’s nobody to live here. We’ve got another house