“Yes, I’ve been out,” she says.
“Where have you been?”
Zaak’s tone of voice belongs to a couple of unpleasant memories that she has often associated with the years following their separation as a couple when he showed his ugly colors.
“Here and there,” she says.
His face, swollen from sleep deprivation, wears a porcine expression, and his throat issues something of a growl. He says, “Here and where?”
“Nowhere specific.”
“And what did you do?”
“Nothing in particular.”
Then he sounds unexpectedly friendlier than he feels, she thinks, as he asks, “You’ve been having the feel of the city, from which you’ve been away for a very long time, have you?”
“That’s one way of putting it.”
“Precisely where is here and where is there?”
Cambara looks into space, dejectedly pondering. After a few seconds, her thoughts take shape in bits and pieces, this resulting in enough angry words to crowd her windpipe, badgering her to speak them. She makes a considered attempt to put flesh on her ideas without giving in to her rage. To her surprise, because the jumbles of uncoordinated phrases catch at her throat, annoying her, she curses quietly in frustration. Several attempts later, she issues a sound that is neither a cringe nor a snicker but more like a naughty girl’s attempt at fighting back a fit of giggles and failing. She continues swearing under her breath and still manages to control her anger, convinced that whatever she says now will seem inappropriate, even if she puts all she has into her rebuff in response to his mildly hostile rebuke, a reprimand cast in the guise of a question.
Perhaps it is time to change the subject, especially since she does not want to be bullied into lying, like a guilty spouse speaking small untruths to cover up the glaring huge gaps in his or her story. Nor does she feel rueful about doing what she has done; rather, she is terribly pleased with her achievements today, chuffed. Moreover, she wants to keep her affairs close to her chest. What’s the point of sharing her joys with Zaak? She sees no benefit in his camaraderie and of course does not wish to be easily duped into believing that he will be of assistance to her, which he hasn’t been to date. Now she remembers how her mother once compared her daughter’s reticence, when the mood demands, to a house capable of holding on to its secrets admirably. Cambara will move their conversation on in as natural a pace as a horse needing no encouragement from its rider to trot faster.
She picks up her purchases. She is in the mood to cook, to feed everyone who happens to be around. She thinks that it will do her spirits wonders. She asks, “What about supper?”
“Myself, I’ve eaten enough for the day.”
That he is a spoiler is not lost on her. However, she tries to work out how best to reap a benefit from having gone out of her way to buy the utensils and food items for Zaak’s house. Until now, she has been of the view that her purchases will prove useful in the long run, will probably give her an advantage in influencing the thinking of the youths in an unequivocal way, the better to cultivate their amity. She senses that she can farm the untilled terrain of their brains only if she irrigates them with kindnesses. What is she to do, chastise him in round terms, or go directly to the youths through their stomachs, feeding them in hope of winning them over to her side?
“What about the youths and the driver?” she says. “If I cook, maybe they will want to eat? What do you think?”
He takes several short steps, removes himself ponderously from her, as if she has requested that he give her a wide berth. He goes over to his favorite chewing corner and rearranges his stuff, smoothing the rug here and there, lifting the cushion and pushing the rug along with the pillow against the wall, all the while humming a tune that she cannot make out.
He says, “What’s with you and the armed youths?”
“How do you mean?”
“What are they to you, why are you bothering about them?”
Her face registers a passing fidget, and she thinks that it will be a shame if she capitulates to Zaak’s insinuations just because he has proven resistant to making the necessary attitudinal changes toward the youths. It will not surprise her in the least if he tries to thwart her moves or opposes whatever it is she proposes, envious of the fact that she is creating a new history in which she and the youths relate to each other in an altered way, and he is being pushed out into the untamed wilderness, isolated in his own home. She is no doubt aware that her empathy with the youths will, at best, be fraught with all kinds of complications, especially if, exercising her powers of peaceful persuasion, she attempts to mold a working relationship with one or two of them. For what it is worth, she has made up her mind that nothing he does and no temper tantrums from any of the youths will make her refrain from pursuing her central idea: a truce of a sort with them as she strives to do all she can to recover the family property. It is well known that great opportunities are missed for lack of mastering the small mechanisms of a device, compelling one to abandon the use of it.
“I’ll be more than pleased to cook for everybody,” she volunteers.
“I don’t give a toss about the youths and their food,” he says tetchily. Readying to sit, he bends double, raising his bum, with his paunch tumescent, his hands supporting him, and he gropes for a comfortable way of first taking a crouch and then seating himself down. All the while perspiring, he is breathing heavily and with difficulty.
No point in telling him that she is self-serving when she feeds the youths. Not when it comes to attending to SilkHair, though; he is special. In any case, she doubts Zaak will understand.
Seated, his breathing even, he gloats, “I’ve already supplied them with their daily ration of fresh qaat, which they are now busy chewing; I doubt that cooked food will interest them. As for me, I am ready for a long, relaxed chew, and you are most welcome to join me.”
The tone of her voice, being blatantly friendly, disaffirms the intent of what she says, half smiling. “Thank you, but no.”
“Incidentally, what will you cook, since there is no food to speak of in the house and I did not bring in any?” he asks.
“I’ve bought some.”
“You have?”
“In addition to the food,” she says, surprising him, “I’ve also bought a couple of utensils for cooking and other items that will come in handy whenever I am in the kitchen.”
Dusk, prematurely descending, enters Zaak’s eyes, wherein it takes residence, the darkness of the moment making it difficult for Cambara to read his uncertain expression. She cannot tell if he is happy that she has gone on an errand and bought these items or if he is annoyed. Of one thing she is sure: that knowing no better and having not been truly informed of her movements and the contacts that she has made, he is not so much worried as offended. He confirms her suspicions when he speaks.
He says, “Tell me, have you, in your madness, launched yourself into one or the other of the city’s dangerous territories in your insane attempt to visit the family property?”
“Dangerous or not, insane or not, as you can see I am still here and unhurt,” she says. “Thanks for your help. I’ll remember that.”
He lifts his chin in anger. “What’re you saying?
“Nothing new for now.”
“Are you threatening me in some way?”
Indignant, he rises, loses his bearing, at first not knowing where he is going or what he means to do; he moves around as if in search of an unrecoverable item. He is in a feral pique, angrier at himself than he is at Cambara. He stares at her fiercely, then looks away and has no idea what to do. Eventually, he calms his nerves, preparatory to making himself as comfortable as he can to have a good, sumptuous chew, his bundles of qaat spread about him. Because he drags his right leg behind him as he readies to sit, she is unsure if his foot has gone to sleep or if it has become incapacitated, in view of the fact that he never walks or exercises. He is so out of shape and so unhealthy, every physical activity or gesture pointing to his decrepitude, the infirmity, if you will, of his lowly ambition.