WHEN COLOR HAPPENED
by
Henry Bantjez
One
“I blessed Africa with a new son…”
Lerato was about to be taken away from Soweto. The only place he had known. His heart beat fast. No longer would he be able to sneak over to Aunty Fikile’s shebeen for a free coke and to gawp at the drunken men who surrounded young women like vultures. Most of his belongings were crammed into a small brown leather suitcase. Lerato had to do the same with his feelings. Miriam agreed that she would carry his crayons in a separate bag if he promised to stop crying.
On this same day his Mama, Miriam, told him the story of when he was born.
On a small Zulu mat made from woven grass and blue, white and black beads, Lerato held onto her legs. He listened to the story as if he had never heard it before.
“Let Mama tell you.”
“Mama, I do not want to go…”
“It was a warm summer that year. Almost seven years ago. 1970. Saturday. Two a.m. Terrible police raids were taking place. Terrible, my boy. The streets were dark. That is when they strike — when we are at our weakest. They first stormed into your Aunty Fikile’s house next door.”
“Like hyenas, Mama?”
“Yes, my boy.”
“With their dogs, Mama?”
“Yes. Those animals were trained to attack us. They slammed the doors of their vans. Eish, my boy, but those dogs woke our township. Someone outside was screaming. I knew it was not your Aunty Fikile. She would never break down. In this little house of ours, right here in Soweto, your life started. Let Mama tell you.”
Lerato moved closer.
“They knew we’d be looking out of our windows. They wanted to treat us like animals. Like cattle chased into a kraal. You know, my boy?”
Lerato rested his elbows on the floor, his chin cupped inside his hands. He lay on his stomach and tried not to look at the brown leather suitcase that he secretly wished would travel away by itself. He listened to her story and hoped that she would not stop talking, because then she would not take him away. The buses would stop running. They would be safe at home.
“They thought your father was a terrorist against the apartheid government. Can you believe it? Your father, a freedom fighter! The stupid police.”
“Because they thought he was living next door, Mama.”
Lerato loved how his Mama lifted her head and clapped her hands together when she said this.
“Your father is just an ordinary worker with an ordinary wife. He was a good father in the beginning, but he became tired of life. If only he had been that freedom fighter!” She raised her fist into the air. “Amandla!” she whisper-yelled. “Amandla Awethu! Power to the people!”
“Mama, why didn’t Aunty Fikile scream?”
“Your Aunty Fikile is the powerful one who dresses in African kaftans. She wishes for her sister to be stronger.”
“Mama, are you not strong?”
“I am not the same as your Aunty Fikile. I am a housemaid. I work hard. Everything I make goes straight to my children. We live very different lives, my boy.”
“What happened next, Mama?” Lerato asked and pretended that he could not remember.
“Your sister, Sibongile, was only nine…”
Miriam looked down at the floor for a moment and sighed. “My poor baby Sibongile. I told her to open the door. They were going to kick it open. I had never been so afraid in my life. Not for my life, but for my little unborn baby inside of me.”
“Ke nna! That was me!” was what Lerato usually yelled, but he did not. He sat upright and held onto Miriam.
“Two white policemen pushed your sister so hard that she fell against the wall. Sibongile was weeping. I told her to keep quiet. “
“Mama, because the police would hit her if she didn’t stop?”
“Yes, my boy. One of them whipped your brothers like dogs.”
“Because they had the courage to spit at the men after they hurt Sibongile?”
“That is right, my boy. They broke into my house. They broke my water with their anger, but they never broke my spirit. I was on my knees in front of the window. Everything around me was dark and wet. The gods of Africa were smiling upon my home that morning because you were inside me. Those men. I will always remember their faces. They hit and kicked me while I was trying to protect the inside of my belly. They demanded to know where your father was. Everyone was screaming — but Lerato, Lerato! You decided to be born that day. You were not going to wait for the police to leave. It was time for you to make your appearance. I blessed Africa with a new son. I believe you saved our lives that morning. For a few moments, there were no sounds. The children stopped crying…”
“The world, Mama. The world.”
“Yes, my boy. The whole world stopped turning. There were no sounds and the men left us alone. Lerato! You were born that day. Your love saved us all and that is the meaning of your name, Lerato.”
“Love, Mama. It means love.”
“My handsome little boy. You know, a few days after you were born, your Aunty Fikile said that the gods must have treated your dark, silky skin with the witchdoctor’s magic.
“Because it was so perfect, Mama?”
Miriam stared at him as if she had lost her train of thought.
“Mama?”
“Yes, my boy?”
“Are you tired?”
“No, my boy.”
“Mama, I do not want to go. Please, Mama. Please stay here with me.” He looked at the suitcase.
“My boy, it is difficult.”
“Why, Mama?”
“My boy, your brothers are no longer able to take care of you. They have to leave the house and try to make as much money as they can. They travel to Polokwane, hundreds of kilometers away. They have jobs there now.”
“Mama, ask Aunty Fikile.”
“No, Lerato.”
“Why, Mama? She will help us.”
“If we took money from Aunty Fikile and asked for too much help, we would become lazy. We would not respect ourselves, my boy.”
“Mama…”
Lerato turned onto his back and stretched out his arms so he could still hold on to her legs.
“Mama, you can get a job here, in Soweto.”
Lerato breathed uneasily.
Miriam wondered if her white Madam could imagine that she was the wife of a Zulu man, that she was of the Basotho tribe, spoke four languages fluently and that her married surname was Sibanyoni. Thinking of her perfectly presented Madam felt out of place in her scanty township house.
“Do not worry too much, my boy,” she said and gently stroked his head. “Madam and her husband, Mr. Schultz, they are good people. They said it was fine for you to stay in my room,” she reminded him.
“Mama! I will miss everyone too much, even Ntate.”
“Even your father?”
“Mama!”
“Lerato. Thula, baba. Quiet.”
Lerato’s eyes were tearing up again.
“Thula, baba. Thula, Lerato. Quiet, my boy. Your Mama will take care of you.”
“Yes, Mama.”
“Dumêla! Dumêla! Where are you people?” Aunty Fikile had already let herself in. She looked like a visitor from another African country. Unlike Miriam, she wore a dark green kaftan, colorful beads and a matching headband. A fantastic Afro elevated her. She was older than Miriam and did not have a husband or any children. Her third abortion was done at home. The bleeding was so bad she almost died. While most of the women worked for white Madams, Aunty Fikile made her money from her illegal shebeen. She had transformed her house into a local drinking hole. She had bought a car, where fellow female comrades had to rely on dangerous trains, run-down buses, and songs of revolution to get them to work.
“Hierso, sissie. We are here!”
“I wanted to see Lerato before he left. Dumêla, Lerato.”
Lerato pulled a crying face.
“Lerato!” Miriam said sternly.
“Dumêla, Aunty Fikile.”
“Miriam, we need to talk about Lerato.”
“We have already talked. He will go with me.”
“Miriam,” Aunty Fikile said and raised her finger into the air. “When you take an injured cheetah from the bush, you spoil it with easy food and milk from mothers unknown to it. The problem is when the cheetah is set free into the wild. It is then that he will not understand who his enemies are.”
“I cannot hide him from the world, Fikile.”
“I am not saying hide him for the world. Prepare him for it. Do not let him loose into the wild.”
“They are good people, Fikile. Ka nnete.”
“Yes, maybe they are, ke a tseba, but is the cheetah afraid of the hyena?
“No.”
“No, but when the cheetah is asleep the hyena attacks in a pack.”
“O reng, Fikile?”
“I am just saying that the family you are staying with— the whatever-they-are-called—”
“Schultz.”
“Yes, ke a tseba, they are good, you keep saying that, but, o tla bôna, when the revolution comes, will they still be good? Will they be on your side? Will we be on their side? Will there still be a difference? Will the good Blacks and the good Whites still exist?”
“Mama?”
“Ga ke tsebe Fikile. I do not know, but one thing I know for sure is if a revolution hit us, the good ones like the Schultz family will be saved.”
“Miriam. Do not dream. They will not say, Go lokile, okay, over here we have the Makgowa, the good Whites, and over there the bad ones. O a bôna?”
“It’s not so simple, Fikile.”
“Empa, Miriam, do you think when the police see us walking in a crowd they see Miriam the good maid? Do you think that for a moment they stop to consider the children?”
“Please, Fikile! Don’t.”
“You have to talk about it, Miriam.”
”Not now, Fikile. Not now.”
“Okay, Okay,” Aunty Fikile said, waving her hands at Miriam.
“I have to finish packing.”
“Mama!”
“Miriam, there was something else I wanted to tell you.”
“Ke êng?”
“Your stupid neighbor.”
“Wêna, you are my neighbor.”
“Hei wêna! The other side.”
“Ke a tseba. I have already heard about it. It was Rose Tshabalala.”
“Sissie, you can’t let a drunken woman walk around telling people that you are taking Lerato to the whites. That you think you are better than them.”
“It is stupid. Just ignore her.”
“Eish, sissie. The people…”
“I am taking him there. It’s not forever.”
“Lerato, stay here with your Mama while she packs.”
“Mama!”
“Be a good boy, Lerato. I am going to have a word with this woman.” Aunty Fikile lit a cigarette. “Eish.”
Miriam held Lerato in her arms. “Wêna,” she said, flicking away the smoke Aunty Fikile left behind. “You are different.”
“Why am I different?”
“Does the owl ask the night why he needs to hunt when it is dark?”
“Does he?”
“The owl needs not to ask. The owl knows that his eyes are different. He uses his eyes to see what the other birds cannot see.”
“Am I an owl?”
“You can be anything you want. Just believe in yourself.”
“How, Mama?”
“It is when you are proud of who you are.”
“How, Mama?”
“When you see in the dark what the others do not see.”
“I am afraid of the dark.”
“The owl’s eyes hurt in the daylight. He is not afraid. He is just careful. Always be careful. Do not be afraid.”
“How should I be careful, Mama?”
“Eish. Wait. Something is happening outside, Lerato. Let’s see.”
Lerato quickly climbed on a chair.
“Rose,” Aunty Fikile barked. “Come out of your house!” Her cigarette hung from the side of her mouth, and she clutched a can of gasoline. She started pouring gasoline around Rose’s shack. A few spectators huddled together in a semi-circle. Some had their mouths open; others were shaking their heads. She emptied the can and flung it onto the garden that was short of grass and hope. “You don’t spread rumors about my sissie!”
There was silence.
“Rose,” Aunty Fikile bellowed again. “Why don't you come out!”
Rose peeked through a window. One purple and one orange curtain.
Aunty Fikile shook her matches in the air.
Rose reluctantly opened her door. A scrawny woman. She smoked a pipe.
“Come on, Rose, tell us your story!”
Rose looked down at her barren garden. “It is fine that Miriam is taking her son to the whites. I am sorry. I was drunk. We all say things that we regret later.”
Aunty Fikile closed her matchbox and walked away. An old man was sniffing tobacco. He laughed and coughed at the same time when Rose shut her door. “That one!” he said, “She is a wild one!”
Miriam gathered her and Lerato’s belongings and said goodbye to her sister. Without dropping any more tears, Lerato waved at his aunty until he could see no more than the silhouette of her kaftan and the only house he had ever known.
“Mama?”
“Yes, my boy?”
“Did you remember my crayons?”
“Yes, my boy.”
Two
“…a violent streak that triggered rage with every selfish sip he took.”
“Hamba! Come, my boy. Hurry. We cannot miss the bus. It is the last one that will take us to Johannesburg.”
“Mama, I am tired.”
“Look, Lerato! There. The bus is coming.”
“Mama!”
The bus driver killed a cigarette under his foot. He yanked a lever backward that opened the door.
“Mama, please. I don’t want to go.”
“Lerato!”
“I don’t have time!” yelled the driver. He spat out of a small window. “Get on, or get lost!”
“Please, my boy. Don’t be naughty.”
“Yes, Mama,” Lerato disappointedly answered and got on the bus. The moment he saw two open spaces, he dashed for them and placed his hands on the seats. Miriam paid the driver. The bus started its shaky journey, dodging potholes and a few burnt-out cars. Miriam held onto a seat.
“Mama! Here.”
“Thank you, my boy,” she said, out of breath. She could not fit the bags between their legs and decided to leave them in the walkway. “You should try and sleep now.”
“Is it very far, Mama?”
“No. Not too far. Sleep.”
“Mama…”
“Sleep my boy. Sleep.”
Miriam bit her nails. Ntate. Everyone called him Ntate. Father. She wished that she could let go of what he had done to them. Ntate brought tension, empty promises and alcohol breath with him when he returned from the mines. He screwed five children out of Miriam and left her to raise their youngest. Nobody planned for that. It just happened. Like everything else in Soweto.
Ntate sang songs in Zulu when he was sober, and Sotho, English and Afrikaans when he was drunk. The screaming matches became more regular, and Lerato’s retreats to the scrap yard where he played more frequent. Ntate had a violent streak that triggered rage with every selfish sip he took. He yelled at his family and accused them of not wanting him.
Miriam shook her head when she thought of the day he came home to tell her he had a new wife and he needed money. Miriam stabbed him three times that day. None of the wounds was very deep or serious, but he yelled like hell. Two in the left arm and one in the shoulder. He cried for help and cursed her at the same time, while his two older sons pulled them apart.
“Next one is through your heart!” she yelled while he staggered backward toward the door. He tried to stop some of the bleeding with his right hand. “Now Leave! Tsamya wêna! Do not come back here again and ask for money!”
He cowered toward his car.
“You see? You made these children when you wanted me! Yes, Ntate! In the backseat of your car. In the bushes and in our bedroom!” She lifted her fist into the air. “You see this? It is waiting for you. You will be sorry for letting us down. Sorry for sneaking off in the nights to sow your seed inside the whore you have fooled into your life! We do not need you! You need us!”
Miriam rested her face in her hands.
We do not need you.
Lerato’s head jerked backward when bus abruptly stopped. A few people got on. They hovered around Miriam’s bags. She quickly put them on her lap.
“Are you okay, my boy?”
“Yes, Mama.”
“You were sleeping. Sleep some more.” Miriam moved closer.
Lerato rested his head on her shoulder. He thought of his two teenage brothers, Sipho and Lucas. They would surely not be there the next morning. He had learnt that he was different from them. A cloth partition separated their parents’ bed from the one that Sibongile and his other sister Thandi had shared. Lerato thought of how he and his brothers slept together on a three-quarter bed. They slept in the dining room. The beds in the house were elevated on bricks. The family washed in a small tin bath. They boiled water on a paraffin stove. Lerato took baths with his brothers to save water. Undressed, they looked like men. They had hair under their arms and around their ntoto. Lucas laughed and did not reply when Lerato told the boys that it was unfair that he did not have any hair around his ntoto. “Look! Nothing!”
In the evenings, when Aunty Fikile’s shebeen customers next door had left, the dark, a cough, or the squeaking sounds of the bed would wake him. If it was the squeaking sounds, Lucas and Sipho were masturbating. Lerato would pretend to be asleep. He could not believe the hugeness of his brothers’ erect ntoto. They jerked them up and down. When they moved their hands faster their ntoto spat out white cream, all over their dark stomachs and sometimes onto their chests.
Lerato noticed that even though Miriam’s eyes were closed, she still protectively held onto their bags. His eyes started to feel heavy and soon he was dreaming of his sister, Sibongile. It was usually the same. Sibongile returned home. She wore her black and white school uniform.
“Sibongile! I love you!”
“I love you too, Lerato. Every thing is going to be just fine.”
“I am scared of the noises in the dark.”
“Do not listen to the noises, little brother. Do not listen.”
Miriam felt someone trying to take one of her bags, but when she opened her eyes, everything was still on her lap. She stared out the window. Through the reflection of Lerato sleeping, Soweto was no longer visible. The road was not bumpy anymore. The white neighborhoods were not far away.
Three
“…when color happened.”
The next morning Lerato’s brothers were not sharing his bed.
“Mama I want to go home. Where is this place?”
“Lerato, I have to go into Madam’s house to prepare breakfast. After I have made the beds, I will bring you some tea and something to eat,” Miriam said out of breath. She had already turned her back, and the sunlight blinded his eyes when she pushed a heavy red steel door open. “Please stay quietly in the room, my boy. Try to sleep some more.”
“Mama, I am scared.”
The room had no windows. Just like he was inside a closet.
Lerato sat upright on the unmade bed. A bare bulb hanging from a wire in the ceiling was the only source of light. He imagined that if the light were switched off, he could be there for weeks not knowing if day or night had come or gone. He swung it from left to right until it hit the side of the wall and scattered glass over the cement floor.
Pitch dark. Quiet. He wished that Aunty Fikile would switch on the shebeen light that lit up the living room when he was scared. Lerato thought that if he stopped breathing his fear would vanish, but soon he had to exhale, and it was still dark and he was still afraid.
“Mama!”
He struggled fiercely not to cry. He tried his best to be brave like his brothers. He crept back under the blanket and wept quietly for a very long time until his Mama returned. She brought sunlight and breakfast.
“Mama, ke nyamile. I am sorry. I broke the light,” he said from underneath the blanket.
“Don’t worry, my boy. It is not so bad. Madam will give me another one.”
Lerato lifted the blanket but attempted to hide his tears deep in his Mama’s pillow.
“Thula, baba. Do not cry. Mama is here now.”
Miriam carefully balanced the tray on a small pink plastic table. Thick slices of bread, apricot jam, and two cups of Rooibos tea, sugar and milk lay before them like a feast.
“Mama?”
“Yes, my boy?”
“I am thinking of the photos.”
“The photos at home?”
“Yes, Mama. Of that township where everyone lived, long before me and long before Sibongile. That place.”
“Sophiatown, my boy.”
“Yes Sophiatown. Why can’t we go there, Mama?”
“My boy, we all had to leave.”
“Why, Mama?”
“The white government didn’t want us to live there any more. They built houses for the white people. We all had to leave.”
“Were you happy there, Mama?”“Of course, my boy. Very happy, but we all had to leave so suddenly. They forced us.”
“Did anyone stay?”
“Oh, yes. But we never heard of them again.”
Miriam wiped the remainder of his tears with her thumbs.
“Come on! Jump off! Be careful of the glass. You cannot eat on the bed. If you lie down and eat you will grow horns like the devil.”
“No, Mama, I won’t.”
“Yes, you will!”
“Mama!”
“You should listen to your Mama, my boy.”
“Mama?”
“Yes?”
“The bed here, it is standing on bricks, just like at home.”
“Yes, my boy.”
“To protect us from the Tokoloshe who climbs onto beds?”
“Yes, my boy.”
“What does he look like, Mama?”
“He is an ugly hairy little thing, my boy. He carries a spear with him. He can easily become invisible by swallowing a pebble.”
“Can I try that?”
“No!” Miriam laughed. “You cannot try that.”
“Is our bed here high enough, Mama?”
“The Tokoloshe cannot climb up here. Come, let us sit on the floor,” she said, sweeping the last piece of shattered glass. “Go lokile. No more glass on the floor. Nothing will hurt you now.”
“Ke a leboga, Mama.”
Mama and son sat together on the floor. Their backs leaned against the cold empty wall. They did not talk much while eating. Lerato was thinking of his sister Sibongile. He imagined her visiting him in the alien place he found himself in without choice. He remembered how she used to make him feel better when the gunshots were close. Sibongile would put her hands on his ears. “Do not worry, Lerato. It is the same sound as thunder when the storms come to wash away the dirt.”
“Sibongile, I am afraid of the thunder.”
She would press harder on his ears and speak louder. “When you hear the thunder, remember that it will not hurt you when you are inside. Forget about everything. You are inside, Lerato. You are safe inside.”
Lerato slurped his tea loudly and dunked a piece of bread.
“Mama, when can I go and play outside?”
Four
“Her words were as clear as tears.”
Lerato knelt over his sketchbook. He moved the purple rug away, allowing him a smooth surface. His crayons used to be long. They were getting shorter, almost to the ends. They were going to disappear soon. Lerato held a brown one up and thought of his Aunty Fikile. He remembered how she told the story. He remembered that she said something about the children marching because they did not want to study Afrikaans, the language of the white people. He remembered her saying something about forcing the children, but he mostly thought of how she shut her eyes tightly when she talked about it.
“June sixteenth, 1976. Almost a year ago,” Lerato said loudly, just like Aunty Fikile. Her words were as clear as tears. “Their march and their songs were not just about Afrikaans, baby. The children wanted to be free.”
Lerato kept staring at the crayon and saw the children grouped together in their thousands singing illegal slogans. It was impossible to silence them. “Amandla Awethu! Power to the people! Mayibuye i Afrika! Bring Africa back to the black people.” Aunty Fikile’s words conquered his thoughts.
“They danced and sang those slogans around hippo trucks filled with hundreds of soldiers. The police were there as well and surrounded the children in no time.”
Lerato’s two brothers and sisters were there that day. The boys who helped Aunty Fikile to sell her liquor also marched.
“Be careful,” she said to the children. “I know it is just a march, but they will not take any shit from you. Trust me. I have seen it happen before.”
There was no way that the children would stay at home. Soweto stood up as a giant child. Lerato was crying when his brothers and sisters left the house. Aunty Fikile made sure that Lerato had no chance to sneak out and follow them the way he did when his father visited.
“I want to go as well. Please,” he begged.
Sibongile knelt next to him. She flung her arms around her little brother. “Who will look after Aunty Fikile? You need to stay here, Lerato. You are the man of the house now.” She lifted Lerato into the air and he knew what would happen next. “Lerato, show me the sky!”
Lerato put down the crayon and stretched both his arms into the air. He remembered how he giggled, hesitated, and then pointed at the ceiling while he kept his eyes firmly focused on Sibongile, giving her an unfair advantage to tickle him.
“Do not cry again, my little brother. We will be back soon. I promise,” she said.
Lerato closed his eyes and cupped his ears but Aunty Fikile’s words refused to settle down.
“Aunty Fikile, tell me what happened.”
“Lerato, you are too young to understand.”
“Aunty Fikile! I don’t know what happened!”
“Okay, baby. Will you promise me to be strong?”
“I promise.”
“Lerato, you know the children were marching?”
“Yes.”
“Baby, they just could not be silenced.”
“Why, Aunty Fikile?”
“They had enough, Lerato.”
“Why?”
“There were soldiers…”
“The ones in the trucks?”
“Yes, huge hippo trucks. Young white soldiers and police waved their guns in the air shouting, Come! Come! The soldiers did not see fear in the children’s faces. All they could see was the freedom they wanted. But the Beast was just too strong.”
“The Beast?”
“Yes, the white people who are in charge of this country.”
“What did they do?”
“Teargas and rubber bullets followed, my baby. The children threw stones at them. My God, Soweto started to burn.”
“What did the children do, Aunty Fikile?”
“Baby, the children only began running in their thousands when real bullets darted past them.”
“The police didn’t shoot the children, Aunty Fikile, did they?”
“Baby. Yes. Yes, they did.”
“Aunty Fikile, my throat is hurting.”
“It is because you want to cry. Cry, my baby. It is all you can do right now.”
“Where did they run to?”
“Thousands of children scattered from corner to corner, crying and bumping into each other. Baby, they fell over the children who were already lying on the gravel roads.
“Why were they already lying on the gravel roads, Aunty Fikile?”
“Most of the children were shot above the waist.”
“The children?”
“The police had shot to kill.”
“Sipho and Thandi?”
“Sipho and Thandi were swept away along with a huge crowd. It was crazy, Lerato. The freedom songs changed to cries for help.”
“Did they want their mamas?”
“Oh, yes, Baby. They wanted their mamas to protect them.”
“Mama was working…”
“Baby, for a few seconds it seemed as if there was no movement. No air to their lungs and no will to survive.”
“Did they stop shooting?”
“The terrifying bullets didn’t stop. My God, even for those who were fleeing with their backs turned to them. That is what happened, Lerato.”
“Aunty Fikile. Lucas?”
“Lucas tried to help her. God. Lucas. He tried. He pulled her closer to him, as far away from them as he could. He tried to save her. Baby, they told me that her hand slipped out of his and fell lifelessly to the ground.
“Sibongile!” Lerato shouted.
“Lucas wept while he repeated Sibongile’s name.”
“Sibongile my sister!”
“The blood flowing from her head didn't stop when he placed his hands on her and wrapped Sibongile with his body. He wanted to protect your sister. He wanted to save her from them. They would just return to their white suburbs and boast about what they had done.”
“I want my Sibongile, Aunty Fikile!”
“She is gone, Baby.”
“No!”
“Lerato. It happened.”
“Didn’t Lucas save her?”
“It was over in a few moments. Lucas was still lying on top of Sibongile. He could not move. He thought that if he lay still she would be fine and he could take her home.”
“Why didn’t he take her home? Why didn’t he take her home?”
Sibongile’s eyes stayed defiantly open.
Henry Bantjez - Author When Color Happened
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