tall tales and all

Fiction

Poetry

A Tale of Exile

Literary Monuments

Thotlines

Audience Response

"Well, shall I say congratulations!" Dr. Martin chimed, still peering into the screen.

"Congratulations??" Shaniqua shot straight up into a sitting position from the table, her belly still gooey with the gel.

"Careful now. Look for yourself. This moving mass right here on the screen is the image of your twins"

"Twins?!?" this time she almost fell off the table.

"Now, now, now, Mrs. Olesakaja. Don't break my equipment. And you're scaring your kids."

She didn't care about his equipment. She flung her arms around him, staining his gown with the gel and all.

"Yes! Yes! Yes! Oh God, this is the best news of my life! Dr. I've got to get home right away!"

"Easy now. You've got to calm down. You need your composure so you can drive home carefully."

The doctor wiped the gel off Shaniqua, wrote out her next appointment, then directed the secretary to usher in the next patient. Well, he really never considered his clients as patients. More like gardens which he felt divinely called to prune and water. He took great pleasure in every one of the gardens that came through his door. They came in all shapes, shades, and attitudes. Funny, how clinical yet attached he was to those gardens. He knew he was destined to become a gynecologist from the day he first saw a dead woman's body as part of his initiation into the medical field. At that very moment, something inside him broke into song. It was a spiritual awakening from which he had never gone into a moment of slumber. He took great care of them, taking pains to learn and perfect every new medical breakthrough in that field. He could say of himself that he had found his life's purpose. He never married, never saw a reason to.

"Next Tuesday? That soon?" Shaniqua asked as she saw the date of her next appointment.

"We've got to keep a close monitor for now. But you are fine. Run along now, dear." Shaniqua disappeared out through the door at the speed of lightning.

Dr. Martin looked up as his next garden approached. He paused, not sure what to say. He looked down at his chart and read off a name.

"Err... Donna Morgan?"

"That's me, doctor," said Donna, all six feet of his... her muscular structure wrapped in skirt and blouse, supported atop a pair of high heels that seemed to be suffering silent oppression, the ghost of a moustache still clinging stubbornly above her upper lip. Something very wrong... thought Dr. Martin. But then again, this was America, land of the free and home of the brave where you could wake up the next morning and decide the forces of nature got it all wrong and you really were meant to be a fish. Oh happy day! He welcomed the challenge, smiled, and ushered in the garden formerly known as Daniel Morgan.

Shaniqua sat in the four o'clock traffic, drumming her fingers impatiently on the steering. She took in a deep breath and tried to relax. Slowly, she brought her hand to rest on her belly and she felt excitement run through her like electricity. She still could not believe she was expecting twins. It had been three and a half long years of desperate longing and anxiety. After a battery of tests that showed there was nothing wrong with her and that she was perfectly capable of conceiving, she had started to talk to Lenana about going for tests as well.

She had been careful never to get angry with him over his refusal to be tested. She knew he was afraid. If he ever found out he was the one with the problem it would shatter his sense of self-worth completely, and she might lose her hard-earned "Mandingo". His worth and sense of identity lay deeply in the efficacy of his hoe and his two gourds of seed. Shaniqua loved his gardening skills; she said so herself. If he could dig so well, surely, he could harvest. But for three and a half years, his garden had been unable to bear any fruit. Out of shame, he had withdrawn from his friends who were now parents, had cut off his communication with his people in Kenya, and had started thinking of planting his seed somewhere else, just for experiment.

Something stopped him from doing this every time he thought about it. Shaniqua's calm and non-judgmental attitude. Somewhere in his mind, he wished she could blame him, insult him, pack her bags and leave him. Then he would find a legitimate reason to go and dig other gardens, perchance they would yield fruit and salvage his sense of self-worth. But somewhere in his heart, he also wished he could find the courage to go for the tests his wife was urging him to have. Then if he was incapable of the Abrahamic miracle of fathering a nation, even of one citizen, perhaps he could settle for a new paradigm of self-evaluation. Maybe the hoe and the two gourds of seed did not a man make after all. But how could he convince himself that it was OK for an African man not to be able to father children? How long was he going to continue bearing the shame? Why, oh, why hadn't the rains come? Why did his land remain so dry? Why hadn't the heavens shed their tears of nourishment upon him?

After tiring of self-pity, he secretly - or so he thought - went to see a doctor. Shaniqua never let him know that she had become aware of his secret visits. When he was ready, he would let her know, she thought. After some tests, the doctor told him that he had a low sperm count, but that there was hope if he and his wife followed a certain very strict time scheduling, over and above a stringent medical regimen for him. Lenana cringed; that meant telling his wife. There are other options too, the doctor said... Lenana had listened and balked. Wouldn't give them a second thought. Have his child made in a lab? Surrogate what? Invitro who? All too bizarre. He left the doctors office feeling defeated, completely ignoring all the rays of hope presented to him. After several days of laboured contemplation, he made a most difficult decision.

On the ninth day of the eleventh month, the man of the Manyatta, the son of lion killers, the descendant of the great Laibon, lowered his pride and confided in the woman of the Mayflower, the daughter of cotton pickers, the descendant of slaves. She was extremely supportive, having foreseen the unfolding of the entire drama, thanks to her secret follow-ups. When she was alone, she shook her head at the naiveté of men. When will they learn that women wrote out the all scripts of life, directed them, and produced them, except when fate intervened. Men were only actors at their whim, imagining all along that they controlled everything. Of course she had no problem working with him on this project that was not exactly natural. You see, farmers in this land of free thinkers have a different attitude. If the rains failed to come, one could always manipulate nature in their favour. And in the course of helping out crippled nature, the rains came in torrents. Seven months later, here was the garden, pregnant with twins, driving home with boundless joy.

Once home, she made all the surprise preparations. At eight thirty, Lenana came back from work.

"What's the occasion?" He stood at the door, staring at the candlelit dinner table, all decked in red red roses. Shaniqua was a hopeless romantic, and Lenana was rather used to what he considered meaningless and wasteful effort. He just couldn't understand it. Why waste so much money and energy on flowers and candles that you will not even eat? But he was not a loud nag. Mostly, he just displayed disinterest and nagged silently in his mind.

"Well, why don't you sit down, honey," said Shaniqua.

"This looks good. Grilled steak and Ugali," he said as he opened the dishes. Shaniqua had learnt to make a number of Kenyan dishes.

"Open the other one," she indicated to a dish at the centre. Lenana reached out and opened the lid. Inside was a card, oh no, not another romanticist prank. Can't she just be practical? He struggled against the urge to nag loudly. He disinterestedly opened it. It read. "To my baby daddy. I love you."

"What!" Lenana exclaimed in sheer excitement. "You really are pregnant??"

"Yes, I am! I am, I am, I am!" She let her excitement burst out like Cathedral bells.

Lenana did not reach out to hug her, or tell her he loved her, or shed an emotional tear. His excitement took him to all the rooms of their house as he shouted to no one in particular, "I'm a man! I'm a man! I'm a man!" He came back to the table, sat down, gobbled up his food without a word to her, grabbed his jacket, and dashed out. Perhaps to celebrate over a drink with a friend.

Shaniqua sat alone at the table and shed a silent tear that dropped inwards, making its desolate journey all the way to the womb where two nations lay. They had just received their first nourishment of a mother's sorrow.

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In the fifth month of their development, the two nations that grew inside the womb of sorrows began to find their voice. Their heartbeats were firm enough to sustain the breath of new life, their minds were formed enough to articulate thought, their souls had settled comfortably within their new physicality. They had traveled from far, having been cruelly parted at the crossroads, never knowing if they will ever regain their brotherhood. Slowly, tentatively, they reached out to each other in thought through the amniotic divide.

"Did it ever occur to you that we would meet again?" Asked the first.

"I gave up hope of ever seeing you again when season after season I failed to see your return. How many centuries has it been?" Said the second.

"Three almost," answered the first.

The second silently shifted his physical form, loving the feel of the protective fluid around. Shaniqua thought she felt a movement and excitedly placed her hand on her belly. Nothing came. She went on reading her novel.

"That was the darkest day of my life. I knew they would come for us. They had raided the neighbouring village only two days ago. They always came back." The second began his narration.

"Mhm... they always came back for more. When I saw them come, I hid in the pit we had dug at the back of the hut. I heard you run towards the pit, but you did not make it in time. I heard them whip you and shackle you. I listened to your cries and pleas as they dragged you away. I felt the harmer of guilt and helplessness shackle my spirit too as I hid in that pit. I stayed there until the sun went down and total silence enveloped our home in Nyasaland like a nightmare.

I made my way out of the pit and took in the shocking desolation. Everyone had been taken. I shivered like a leaf and felt my blood drain from my body. I could not scream, I could not speak. I wished they had caught me too. I prayed day and night that you would somehow escape and come back home. Mama and Baba's graves stared at me, beseeching me to find peace within the madness. How could I, when they had taken the entire village, and you, my only living sibling, was gone. I had nothing left to live for.

I tried to kill myself, but I could not gather enough courage. Several moons later, I embarked on a week-long trek up north and into a friendly village where I married, had children, and tried to forget the past. But it was all still too painful. I left my wife and children and continued up north searching for something... I didn't know what. I settled among the Maasai people by the plains of Olkejuado, and there started another family. An encounter with a lion while taking care of my cattle dispatched me quickly from the earth at fourty, twenty-five years after the raid. How I wish I had real Moran blood flowing in me. But in a way, it was a welcome relief, for I could not erase the memories of the past. I consoled myself that my sons would be real Morans. They would learn to fight and fend for themselves. They would be elders in their own land. They would earn the people's respect and they will ask Enkai's blessings upon my soul so I may find peace in the land of the ancestors." The little soul held an imaginary Moran's spear in his hands and flung it with his wee-wee hand through the amniotic fluid.

Shaniqua felt the jolt, quickly put her book down and waited for more movement. Those vibrations in her womb excited her so. There it is! She put her hand on her belly. There! What were these two up to now, she chuckled. She got back to her book when the movement seemed to stop. The other began his narration.

"After they shackled so many of us together, I looked back, hoping to see you for the last time. But you were still hiding in the pit. We were led up north on a trek that lasted many days until we came to the town of Bagamoyo by Tanganyika's seaside. By then, quite a number had fainted from fatigue and beatings and were left by the wayside for the vultures. We were packed in a dhow and shipped to Zanzibar where the auctioning of the animals we were took place. I could not allow myself to think, to feel, or to dream. My mind mercifully erased from my conscious memory every bit of the journey through the dark seas and into the Americas.

I became the property of Masser Jim Thimble, and acquired the name Frederick Thimble. We slaved, and slaved, and slaved some more. A slave woman in the stock and I were put together to breed more slaves for the Masser. I grew to love her, but lost her to pneumonia soon after our fifth child. I managed to hold on to life through my reflex mode of think not, feel not, dream not. The animal instinct that was bred in me was my driving force. I drove myself to hard work. I replaced the word happiness with duty. By the age of sixty-seven, I had bought my own freedom, changed my last name to Williams, and moved up to Baltimore with my children. My heart stopped at seventy four on its own accord."

They were both silent for a while.

"Do you think we will be able to understand each other after more than three centuries of separation?"

"I hope so... I sure hope so. We still look alike, and we still share the same Motherland, don't we"

"I guess..."

They both shifted unsurely. There was so much to come to terms with. Vast cultural differences, in spite of a common ancestry. Finger-pointing; one blaming the other for allowing the brother to be sold into slavery. Superiority complexes acquired from being a product of the great America, even silent gratitude for slavery which saved one the shame of being brought up in barbaric Africa. One passing judgment on the other for losing that authentic African morality - too much drugs and vulgarity. So much to contend with. So much to understand. Such a divide. They shifted uneasily, their worry sending waves hitting against the uterine wall.

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Shaniqua was now quite worried. She felt wave after wave of movement hitting against the walls of her womb. It was not painful, but she did not think it was ordinary. Her next appointment was tomorrow. She decided to call the doctor and push it forward. She was new at being pregnant and did not want to take chances. In less than an hour, she was driving to Dr. Martin's office.

"What's the trouble, Mrs. Olesakaja?" Dr. Martin chimed in his sing-song voice.

"Too much activity going on inside. Maybe they are lying in the wrong position," said Shaniqua.

"Why don't you get up there and let me have a look," Dr. Martin prepared to run a scan.

Peeking through his screen, he smiled and assured her everything was ok. "I think they are just having a little heated conversation. Could be they are singing hip-hop too, or playing basketball!"

"I doubt very much they will have any of that in their blood. I fear they'll carry their father's strange genes." Shaniqua said as she dressed up.

"Why do you underestimate yourself, Shaniqua?" When he wanted to get personal, he used her first name. "These children are half of you too, you know. They could do hip-hop and play basketball just as much as they could kill lions. Did you not tell me that is what your husband had to do to become a man?"

Shaniqua sighed. "Is it possible for one twin to take completely after the father, and the other after the mother?"

"It happens. Is that what you wish for, separation?" Dr. Martins was now sitting down to do some listening.

"I don't know what I wish for, doctor. Lenana and I are just so different, I don't even know how two people who share the same ancestry can be like day and night. I don't understand these people anymore!"

"'These people'! Hah! Now you too call them 'these people'. If you called us Hispanics 'these people,' I would understand, although I'll still be insulted. But you and Lenana are the same people! What is the problem, my dear?"

"Sorry I sound racist, but I have failed to grasp the essence of this man. Maybe the other African people are different, I don't know. We may be better off sticking with our own kind."

"As if you would have been happier with a brother!"

Shaniqua laughed at the doctor's parodied ghetto intonation of brother. Considering the rate at which African-American relationships fell apart, she knew he had a point.

He went on, "You were torn apart centuries ago and have undergone very different experiences. But you have more similarities than you care to imagine. If you really love him, you must start somewhere. You must start looking for him where you parted ways. At the crossroads, Shaniqua. Go back to the crossroads and understand why things fell apart." Dr. Martin looked at Shaniqua and saw something shift deep in her eyes. He had no idea his words had just began to water a very dry patch within her.

As she drove back home, a soft drizzle began to fall, clearing the dust off her windshield, filling her nostril with the smell of fresh rain. As she turned on her wipers, the waters gently broke their banks inside her heart, filling up the little wells in her eyes, and pouring over in joyous streams that ran down her dry cheeks. She felt a whoosh in her womb that seemed to tickle her bones so. She laughed out loud as she passed the sign indicating crossroads ahead. At the crossroads, she thought. I will find you at the crossroads.

The tale continues...  A Rumour of God

Note: All characters and situations are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Mkawasi Mcharo Hall
© mkmc