The Rules Of The City 3y4f5y

THE RULES OF THE CITY

A COLLECTION OF CONTEMPORARY SHORT STORIES BY ZIMBABWEAN WRITERS

Edited by Matthew K Chikono

The rules of the city

A collection of contemporary short stories by Zimbabwean writers Edited by Matthew K Chikono

ISNB: 978-0-620-93987-4 EAN: 978-0-620-93988-1

Proofreading by Shadreck Mafirenyika

Cover by Andrew Huge

Copyright © Matthew K Chikono 2021

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

DISCLAIMER All views expressed in this publication are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the editor.

Matthew Kunashe Chikono

20004 Old Hospital Road

Jane Furse 1085

South Africa

[email protected]

Contents

A numb of the heart

The Christmas bonanza

The rules of the city

A little song for the young one

Scars that makes us Shine; Cost of Being a Man.

The Anointed water

Whispers from Mzilikazi Township

The Walking Dad

Mhinduro

Contributor’s notes

A numb of the heart

By Tafadzwa Chiwanza

She was not a beauty and would surely never be pretty, but she was so far away from being unattractive. Her huge nose which seemed out of place, her small bums, thin legs, and her huge breasts all seemed odd. So, it was clear to me that she was not the most beautiful girl I had ever been with, but there was something about her that touched my heart. This thing I can never be able to describe it without making the reader mistake my efforts for Shakespeare's hyperbole. I will just say there was something about her that moved my ice-cold heart, a heart that had never shown warmth to anyone or anything.

It all started when I saw her at the Mbare Msika Rank. On her small head was the most hideous sun hat I have ever seen. I involuntarily locked my eyes on her and watched how she angelically and made her way around.

After a few seconds of staring at the girl while she sold her bananas and apples, I discovered that her name was Samantha. I parked my BMW a few metres from where she sold her things and enjoyed staring at her. She made that day the most beautiful day of my existence.

That day I was two hours late and did miss some few appointments, but, hey, I owned the multi-million dollar firm and they were supposed to work without me if they were to make money.

Several days ed and I made it my daily routine to stop by the place where

she sold her staff just to gaze at her and in the same act viewing inspiration. She was indeed inspirational, after seeing her, it was difficult for me to stop my lips from smiling the entire day.

After two weeks of observing her without talking to her, I gathered enough courage to talk to her.

"Morning sister." I said.

"Morning Mister what can I do for you this lovely morning?" she asked clearly baffled by my presence. I was a popular rich young man who shared his splendid life with strangers on the internet. The media loved me and made sure everyone knew about who I slept or flirted with. Samantha knew me, I could tell by the way she looked at me that she wanted nothing to do with me.

As I stood a few centimetres from her, the world stood still, I kept staring at her. I was so stuck, so ecstatic that I couldn't say anything. Her very eyes made my heart sing angelic melodies. I began envisioning what a perfect couple we would make.

Several seconds, perhaps minutes, should have ed because when I regained consciousness the girl was pretty freaked out.

"Mister, are you alright?" she shook me vigorously. I looked at her and smiled

from ear to ear as my eyes said splendid myriad to hers.

"Whew, you almost scared me there Mister." she sighed while her liquid eyes smiled gaily at me.

I handed her a hundred-dollar bill and I began walking towards my car.

"Mister you did not tell me what you want, besides I don't have the change." she said earnestly. I turned back, smiled, and apologised. She must have thought I had lost my mind. Well, I do not think she was far from the truth because I truly had lost a lot of things just by being near her. Most importantly I had lost my heart.

"It’s alright madam, just give me some bananas and I will come for the change in the evening." she agreed and with joy I drove away ravaging the most delicious bananas I had ever tasted!

Several weeks ed and I became increasingly attached to this girl I knew so little about. During these weeks, nothing was able to wipe off the smile on my face. The price of my company's shares tried to sadden me by falling miserably but it failed dismally. On this day, when the weather was as perfect as Samantha's smile, I was ready to be dazzled by her eyes. I had prepared to confess to her the thing that was growing dangerously in me like a tumour. I got at the usual place hours earlier

than I usually did. After about two hours of waiting, people began flocking the streets as they went about their businesses. The streets were once again gay as people scattered around them yet there was no sign of the angel Samantha. I waited still. It was after lunch when I finally decided to abandon my post.

That day became the longest day of my existence. The day that followed was not any better, there was no sign of the lovely Samantha and my heart grew restless. After a week of missing Samantha, I decided to inquire on her whereabouts and the news I got was not in my expectations.

"What became of the girl that used to sell bananas and apples around here?"

The old man did not have a clue of whom I was talking about. It took a few minutes of explaining and describing before he could recall.

"Oh, I am sorry Mister, she is in hospital. I think it`s St Michaels hospital, bed 24." the old man who was a shoe cobbler told me. I thanked him and hastily drove for the hospital.

When I got to the hospital, I immediately rushed into room 24. I guess it's a supernatural side of the humans which tries to warn us of impending danger but I felt this fear creep up on me when I opened the door to room 24. Realising that bed was empty my heart almost missed a bit. The doctor's note on the bed was clearly written:

Samantha Keniso died at two in the morning due to heart failure.

I held the note in my arms as I shivered. The only woman I had ever loved was gone without knowing how she was cherished in my heart. I screamed in pain like I was burnt by a fierce fire. Doctors held me and tried to console me. How can a broken heart be consoled?

After a few hours of weeping bitterly, I became tired of crying. I got into my car and drove home. As I reached the intersection of Maurice Drive and Danielson Avenue, my eyes were now misty with tears. These tears blinded me from seeing the road clearly. I heard the bellowing of the huge car's horn, the shrieking of tyres and the sliding of wheels. I heard a car smashing into my small BMW and the next thing was darkness. ***

When I was able to finally open my eyes again, I was in a small white painted room. After a few seconds of wandering, I realised I was in a hospital. I tried to get up from the bed and I discovered I couldn't, for now I had only one leg. I lost my mind and screamed loud enough to wake the dead. They sedated me for some few hours, which was enough time for the doctor to explain why they had amputated and put me in a clinically induced coma.

It took several weeks for me to regain my full strength. One day as my new driver drove me in my limo, I decided to stop by Samantha's market-stall. As I pushed myself on the wheelchair, tears slowly rolled down my cheeks as I ed how Samantha had once made me smile. The cobbler was still at his place. He smiled his cigarette blackened lips and revealed his yellow teeth. He pretended to be oblivious to the wheelchair.

"Oh, what happened to you son?" he casually asked after we had shared and smoked a couple of cigars.

"It’s a long story man." I replied gloomily.

"What is the matter son?" the old man stumped his cigar and asked me. "What kind of person was she?” the words came amid my sobbing.

"Who?"

"Samantha."

"Well she was reserved, never really indulged in other people's affairs." he reflected. We were silent for a few minutes. He puffed his cigar and I breathed its smoke.

"I know this is a tragedy if you loved her, but Mister, why should you be overwhelmed with sorrow and grief like this as if she is dead?" said the shoe cobbler as he puffed at his cigarette and stared with keen interest at the cloud of smoke it made as it disappeared across the sky.

"What are you talking about?” I suddenly jerked my head towards him, and he looked at me. "You don't mean to say the girl is alive, because I went to the Old hospital and I read the doctor's note in room 24!" I asked him my heart wildly thumbing.

"Forgive me mate, it was room 42 not 24, oh she is alive." he laughed when he saw me smiling. With tears on my face and a smile on my lips we laughed awkwardly for a few seconds. Damn! His mistake made me lose me a leg! "What tragedy were you talking about?" I asked after a few minutes of reflecting.

"Ah she is getting married today in the Old Chapel." he said.

I knew where the Old Chapel was. I quickly bid the shoe cobbler farewell and propelled my wheelchair towards the limousine. I then instructed the driver to head for the Old Chapel. When I got there the wedding was already underway.

After a few seconds, I saw her walk down the aisle looking as beautiful as the skies and its shiny stars. I smiled and waited for my moment.

"God seeing that it was not right for Adam to live alone, he took Adam's rib and united them in holy matrimony..." I listened intently as the marriage officer spoke loudly. He rumbled for a few more minutes and my heart began beating violently when he said:

"That being so, if anyone knows why this couple should not be united in holy matrimony, let him speak now or forever hold his silence."

In such cases people usually expect total silence, I noticed this because when I announced that I had something to say, people were really surprised. I manoeuvred my wheelchair towards the podium. What added to the people's amazement was the fact that a popular socialite, like me, was in attendance of such a poor people's place. On top of that I had something to say.

"Before you get married to this lovely gentleman, Sam, I have something to tell you." I told her. Anger flashed in her eyes for interrupting her wedding and confusion disarrayed her whole face. Mr Ncube was no better, he whispered to everyone close to him and fidgeting all this while.

I wanted to tell her how I loved her and how I had lost my leg because of her. Not that I was blaming her but just that I wanted her to know how much she meant to me. Yet she loved this man, Mr Ncube whom she was about to be happily married to. It was because I love (d) her that I said, "You owe me $99."

I forced myself to smile and bit my lower lip until blood covered my whole teeth. All the audience did not know what was happening. No one knew, not even me.

"You haven't given me my change, ?" I said with a tumulus voice.

Samantha was surprised and smiled faintly when I said, “Take it. It's my present to you. May you always be happy!"

The following day after Samantha had gotten married, I visited the shoe cobbler. I made him promise me that he would never tell Samantha that I had been through a lot because of her. He promised.

The end

The Christmas bonanza

John Gambanga

From afar, the rubbish heap on the outskirts of the city looked like a small hill in the middle of the forest. It was surrounded by tall eucalyptus trees and brown and grey grass. The heap grew by the day, as large trucks emptied their heavy loads of garbage and other unwanted items from offices and houses on the dump site. Although the heap was far away from human habitation, a few hungry dogs and cats strayed to the dump site to feed. Early morning, before the arrival of the human scavengers, flocks of crows and other birds swooped on the heap to feed noisily on the junk and debris of society. The smelly rubbish on the heap also attracted smaller creatures like lizards, snakes, cockroaches, beetles, and worms, all in search of food and shelter. Scores of hungry kids, most of them from the streets, usually scantily dressed in dirty, torn clothes, daily ed destitute young and old men, who scavenged for whatever they could lay hands on from the heap of society’s waste. They dug deep into the mounds and grabbed stale left- over food like chips, sadza, chicken and beef, noodles, potatoes, rice, bread, buns, and doughnuts. They also found non- edible items like old clothes, shoes, rugs, hand bags and suitcases, plastic containers, broken kettles, pots and pans, porcelain cups and mugs and other unwanted goods that people dumped in their rubbish bins. Each week, the municipal trucks picked the rubbish bins from the city and emptied them at the dump site. The shameless human scavengers went about their task collecting whatever they found from the heap. It was like a gold mine where small scale miners working for themselves, scrambled at anything they could lay their hands on.

Some of the scavengers whistled, others sang and others still, cracked ribald jokes to each other to spice the otherwise gloomy but hyperactive environment. Ironically, a few kilometres away, some people led quite different lives from the scavengers. They drove in the comfort of the latest Jeep Cherokees, Mercedes Benz, Range Rovers, Land Rovers and Mitsubishis, oblivion of the misery that the scum of society, the scavengers led. Dressed to kill, the other of society feasted on delicious food in expensive restaurants and hotels, yet the scavengers were on fire with anger and resentment which they could not express openly but blamed fate for their predicament. For the scavengers, life had swung from high optimism when they were in gainful employment to present day depressing pessimism. Daily, they endured an uphill struggle for something to sell to get money to feed their hungry families back home. Unemployment had soared so much during the last decade that many people like ticks on a dog’s ears, the scavengers lived off the rubbish heaps around the outskirts of the city. “It’s just like yesterday, nothing of real value,” complained one of the scavengers, a sour faced, thick-lipped young man in an old grey, overall. “You never know, one of these days someone’s going to strike gold,” replied another scavenger with red eyes and a yellow cap. “Gold? From the rubbish heap? That would be the day,” another scavenger, an elderly man with a long beard said with a laugh. His remark attracted more laughter from the others working on the heap. They all carefully selected the usable from the garbage, driven by desperation and poverty. All seemed oblivious to the stench of human faeces and decaying waste on the

rubbish heap. Some of them wore gloves, others used sticks and wire to lift the unwanted stuff, but others threw caution to the wind and used their bare hands to sift through the garbage. One would lift something, examine it closely and throw it away if he saw little value in it. On the other hand, if he felt it carried some monetary value, no matter how small, he would shove it in his plastic bag, that he tagged along as he moved around the heap. Later, the scavengers would take their bags home, clean their items, and display them on the pavement in front of buildings in the city or in high density suburbs for prospective buyers. At times they found buyers, but often they went home empty handed and would be back on the streets the following day. It was a dreadful and precarious way of earning a living, but they had to survive so they soldiered on, day in day out. One morning a fierce fight broke out between two scavengers at the rubbish heap. Two big trucks from the municipal council’s waste removal department had driven to the rubbish heap and dumped more garbage. As usual, the crowds, who were already on the dumpsite, ran towards the trucks, hoping to be the first to grab the best from the worst. It could be a load of moulding bread, a half-eaten stinking fried half chicken or decaying roasted beef. This was food for the hungry scavengers who often spent days without a decent meal. The trucks drove off soon after emptying their loads, leaving the people busy on the heaps, like drones around a Queen bee. No one imagined that the lives of some of the scavengers would be changed that day by the arrival of the latest trucks at the rubbish heap.

A short, thick-set man, with a bright blue cap which could not cover his scruffy black dreads, dug out a heavy green bag from the heap. It looked like it was made of canvas and had a golden zip that had opened. Next to this man was a tall slim young man in a brown jacket who also dived for the same green bag, almost simultaneously as the first man. There was a tug of war, each man pulling the bag. “It’s mine! I saw it first!” shouted the man with the cap. The slim man didn’t say anything but continued to pull the bag from the fat man as if he knew what it contained. They exchanged blows and, in the process, the bag fell, and two other men went for it. Bundles of crisp new green American dollars bound together by rubber bands fell out of the bag and everyone around rushed to grab some of the money. The two fighters also went for the money and grabbed as much as they could in the scramble as the money fell from the bag. There were shouts and curses as people went for the bundles of money. In the end, five people managed to grab all the money that had fallen out of the bag and they all ran off from the rubbish heap stashing their loot in their pockets. How the money had ended on the rubbish heap was anyone’s guess. What was obvious was that it was a lot of money and scavengers had been visited by Lady Luck that warm Tuesday morning. God had smiled on these poor souls. The money was a welcome windfall for the Christmas that was only one week away. The oldest among the scavengers, Silas, a former clerk ended up with as much as eighteen hundred American dollars in crisp ten-dollar notes. His colleague from Epworth, Remigio, who had been a security guard, got slightly more than that, nineteen hundred and fifty dollars. For him, it was like winning the local Lotto.

Silas was a father of three school going children who lived in his rural home not far from the city. There and there his mind thought of what he would do with all that money. I will pay school fees for my two sons and one daughter and buy groceries for the Christmas holiday, he thought to himself. All his children would also get new school uniforms and his wife would have a new dress and a pair of shoes. His dirty face beamed with a huge smile. He would invest part of the remainder on livestock, a cow and two goats. His wife would be excited. She was an exceptionally good bookkeeper, he had discovered, and for that reason he would give her the rest of the booty to keep. As confidence and happiness surged through his mind and body, he quickened his step heading for the bus stop to catch a lift into town to buy some groceries to take home to his hungry family. The sour smell of misfortune that he had carried on his shoulders since losing his job nine months earlier had been replaced by this pleasant and unexpected twist of fate. “Heaven’s alive,” he said to himself, whistling happily as he neared the bus stop. The other three lucky ones, Josephat, a former gardener, Zakeyo, a former supervisor and Petros, a former petrol attendant, each got at least two thousand dollars that would tremendously enhance their poor lives. They all hid their large bags in which they had stashed the day’s collections for resale and prepared to catch the bus or hitchhike back home to break the good news to their families. Remigio, who had worked for two years as a security guard before he was retrenched, was single and for him, the prospect of getting married was very remote. He had no girlfriend. He survived on the occasional one-night stands with hookers that he picked from the local pub. These stints of sexual pleasure were extremely and far between as he seldom had money to waste on such vices.

Daily, he focussed on getting food on the table and saved money to pay rent. At times both he and Silas failed to sell anything of substance to raise enough money to pay rent for the one room they shared in Epworth, the unfashionable high density suburb that once belonged to a local church. They had pleaded with the landlord to give them more time to raise the money. He recalled one month when they went for three days without a decent meal. They had survived on popcorn and water. Someone had introduced them to potato rinds which they collected from neighbours’ bins, washed thoroughly, and fried and ate before going to bed after drinking large mugs of water. With the money safely stashed in his breast pocket, Remigio decided to buy a bed, one blanket and two sets of clothes. He would also visit his rural home to spend the Christmas holiday with his folks. He would buy groceries for his mother and fertilizer for his father, who would put down one hectare of maize. Before ing the group of scavengers after losing his job, Remigio had worked as a newspaper vendor but when sales had dropped, the company had retrenched most of the vendors including him. He now planned to get a port to enable him to cross the border into neighbouring South Africa where he would buy goods for resale back home. Josephat, the third man to get part of the money at the rubbish heap had worked as a gardener for a rich black man in Avondale. After a year, his boss and his family moved to Bulawayo and the new landlord brought his own gardener. Josephat had to move on. Jobs were difficult to get. At times he was offered part time jobs as a gardener, reporting for duty once or twice a week but later, even those jobs dried up and he was on the road again. He did not have any place to live in the big city. He slept under bridges, along dirty lanes in the city or ed groups of vagrants who lit fires to keep themselves warm at night. He managed to make friends

among these on whom fortune had also turned its back. In the morning he would collect his few belongings and carry them in his shoulder bag and walked to the rubbish heap to scavenge for survival once more. To keep himself clean, he would other vagrants along the Mukuvisi river near Matapi Police station in Mbare, a few kilometres from the city centre. He had one good friend, Tinei, who lived in a cottage in Highfield. Josephat had previously stayed with Tinei for about a month before he ed the scavengers. He decided to visit Tinei and explain to him that he would buy food and contribute to their upkeep while looking for a job. Any job, as he had no skills. He would buy decent clothes and wash his body thoroughly to look presentable. He was certain that something would come his way. At least he would have somewhere to spend this Christmas. If he couldn’t get a job, he had no choice but trek back to Rusape, his rural home and help his grandparents who raised him after the death of his father. Zakeyo, the fourth man to get part of the windfall, was a married father of three. Two of his kids were at school, the third was still too young to attend kindergarten. He had his own house in Tafara, on the outskirts of the city, adjacent to Mabvuku high density suburb. It was a small two bedroomed house with a kitchen and a living room which were enough to accommodate his family. His industrious wife woke up early each morning to other local women to the main market at Mbare. She would buy vegetables, tomatoes, oranges beans, onions and dried kapenta for resale at his makeshift small market outside the house.

She spent most of the day selling and on good days, all the vegetables would be bought, and the family would have something to eat. Zakeyo would return from the rubbish heap each day with his bag full of items that he would clean at night for sell the following day. It wasn’t a lucrative trade but at least it brought in some income for the family. The windfall gave him a brilliant and lucrative idea. He would his wife daily at the main market to buy items for sale. Only this time they would buy more than the normal, and he would set up his own makeshift market outside one of the shops in Tafara. This, he reasoned, would be better than going to the rubbish heap as a scavenger. He would buy a bed for his two sons who attended school and a refrigerator for the kitchen. Everyone would have new clothes this Christmas, he thought with a smile, the first smile in two years since he had lost his job as a supervisor with a large construction company. With the money from the rubbish heap he would apply for a driver’s licence and fulfil his long awaited ambition, to drive one of the trucks that ferried goods to and from South Africa. It was his burning ambition. He knew several truck drivers who led very decent lives. The fifth lucky scavenger, Petros, lived in the crowded Matapi Hostels in Mbare. It was a very tough life and he resolved that he would secure alternative accommodation either in Mbare or Highfield. The money from the rubbish heap was enough for him to buy a bed, a ward robe, a gas stove, and a cupboard for his cutlery. At 27, Petros felt it was time for him to settle down as a married man. He had already promised his decent girl, Maud, back home in Mrewa, that he would marry her soon.

Part of the money from the heap would go towards paying his lobola, but first, he must buy his girl a nice dress and shoes. He would use the remainder of the money to travel to South Africa to buy goods for resale in the city. Cross border trade was becoming a clever way of earning a living for many people throughout the country. In the meantime, he would visit his rural home and spend Christmas with his folks. He had a loving mother, two young brothers and one sister who was still at school. He would use some of the money to buy groceries for the family. It was going to be a very merry Christmas for everyone.

The end.

The rules of the city

Matthew K Chikono

There was an old pay phone at the bus station, near where I was living with my uncle. It was a perfect place to call her, as I was enveloped in the privacy of the booth. After the third ring, she always picked up. She would always answer; she was unemployed and had no hobby. "Hello?" Her uncertain voice would echo from the other end of the receiver, "Milton is that you?" I would grunt or just keep quiet, neither confirming nor declining the name. She didn't care either, she would then start saying whatever was on her mind that day. "A strange man is trying to rob our house," one day she told me, her voice loud with excitement," he has ed by our house on a bicycle twice this week." My heart skipped a bit. Fortunately, she didn't hear it. She went on to tell me how this young man, black as coal, had slowly cycled as he ed on her front yard. The young youth had closely looked at her house, only her house, as if searching for something and had ed along. She was hidden in the garden; he didn't notice her. That was the first day. “Then today he ed by again," she continued with much vigour that I hadn't heard from her for a long time," He was wearing the same black hat, brown jacket and black tros. He saw me squatting and forking my garden. For a moment I thought he was going to disembark from the bicycle and ask for a job or something but then he changed his mind and sped off." She had grown accustomed to my silence that she didn't give me a time to speak. She promised me she would be safe and would use the gun her husband kept in the garage if the man ever came back again. "Milton, do you think I should tell my husband about this man?" She asked and was answered with my heavy breathing on the receiver. "I won't tell him," her voice was filled with resignation," he will think I am

making it up just to have his attention. Or I am a weakling who always need his rescue at the first sign of trouble." It was around five when she was done talking. She told me she had to go and prepare supper for her husband before he arrived from work. She dropped the receiver after she said her goodbye. She already knew there would be no answer from the other side of the phone. *** In May 1982 l left Buhera for Harare. My uncle Jokonya had heard how I had ed my 'Ordinary' levels exams and had finally accepted my request to live with him in Kambuzuma whilst I looked for a job in the city centre. I had done extremely well in mathematics and uncle Jokonya had promised it was the gateway to a perfect job with a huge salary. I was still twenty-one and could believe anything I was told by any adult. An adult was anyone older than me, I wasn't one yet. I waited the entire day at Mbare Msika bus terminal for my uncle to come and pick me up. He blamed his supervisor for coming late but the reeking stench of beer on him screamed of another story. He ordered me to carry the luggage and follow him to a taxi. It wasn't much, my luggage, an average sized box which contained everything I owned; a pair of grey shorts for change, a couple of shirts, my high school certificates enclosed in an envelope, and some family and friends' photographs The taxi, a fifteen-seater omnibus, took ages to fill up before it sped up in the evening streets of Harare. Uncle Jokonya didn't miss the opportunity to sleep off some of the alcohol. I took the opportunity to see my fellow engers who didn't seem to mind being packed in the confined vehicle with sweaty and smelly bodies. A enger sat next to me. She wasn't that much older than me. Probably with a child but still doing her studies. She restlessly flipped through a book, desperately trying to read the pages in the dimmed vehicle lights. I tried to peer on the leaves only to find names and numbers randomly written on every page. A phonebook, that's what it was. I quickly lost interest, I kept one eye on the book whilst the other looked in awe the night lights of Harare city. Garden boy job (04) 404--

On her gravestone, my grandmother's date of birth was said as the fourth of April 1904. The same as the Garden boy job, whomever it was. It seemed like an employment as a garden boy. I was certain I would have gotten the job if I had called. I instantly dropped the thought; I wasn't sure if the last digits were -34 or -43. Besides, I had ed with flying colours and was destined to get a clerical job or something better. *** I stayed with my uncle and his youngest wife for three months in Kambuzuma. He would leave around 4 am and ride his bicycle to work in the CBD where he worked in a shoe factory. I would leave the house in the same direction only to spend the day roaming around the city looking for employment at every building I came across. We would meet home at around seven, have supper and retire to our beds. On my uncle's off days, I would ride his bicycle to the CBD. For three months, my life was a series of monotonous trips to find work. I grew tired of the endless job search. I would go to the CBD, find a bench in Harare gardens, and sleep the day off. The flying colours I held close to my heart everyday grew heavy that I ended up reminding myself to forget them at home. It didn't change the situation anyhow. I was still unemployed. What I had was few coins my uncle gave me for 'emergencies'. One day I took the coins, went to a pay phone booth, and dialled the garden boy job number. Zero-four-four-zero-four-three-four. The number was no longer in use. I loudly released a breath I didn't know I was holding. I could feel the wind cooling the sweat that had started to trickle down on my forehead. Zero, four, four, zero, four, four, three. I could hear the familiar sound of a ringing telephone on the other end of the line. It was utterly madness to beg employment from a stranger. "Millstone residency, hello." A female voice came the from speaker.

*** "Good afternoon ma'am, I am looking for a job." I jabbered the thought on the microphone. "This is a private residency and we don't have any open vacancy." She slammed the receiver down before I could thank her. That day I spent my afternoon sleeping on the bench, dreaming what the woman on the other side of the telephone looked like. I could imagine her frowning at the telephone, telling whoever was beside her what a weird phone call she'd just received. I hoped she was intrigued by our conversation as I had. I went home early and was reimbursed the coins I had used to call her. All I had to do was tell my uncle it had been a necessary expense. He was half drunk and generous that night. He didn't think twice about my stupidity. It must be noted that I did not sleep soundly as one would expect after having a blissful day. I hit my head in shame as I how naive and clueless, I had sounded. The conversation I had in my head sounded much better and my voice had much confidence of a grown-up man. That night I dreamt of her, the woman on the other side of the telephone.

*** It was almost a week before I could garner enough courage to call her again. She answered after the third ring. "Millstone residence hello," the perfect voice said," hello?" I hadn't stocked up enough guts to say anything to her. I held on to receiver to my ear whilst a hundred or so thoughts ran in my mind. "Milton, is that you?" She continued," I don't have much time Milton. I have to rush to the neighbourhood meeting. I haven't attended one in ages that some of

the neighbours think I had already moved out of Mt Pleasant." She erupted into a laughter before dropping the phone. I was left listening to the dialling tone. The payphone spitted some coins. Change! The call had lasted less than a minute and I needed the coins for food. I promised myself never to call her again. Mt Pleasant, that was where she had said she lived. Millstone in Mt Pleasant. I doubted there were that many Millstones in Mt Pleasant. If I were to ask around that area I would find out where she lived exactly. It was no use though; I wasn't ever going to call her again, why bother knowing where she lived. I had few hours to spare before going home. I had not found a job yet and my aunty was no longer excited to see me get back inside her home empty handed every day. I took the local telephone directory, they kept one inside the booth, and flipped the pages. Millstone Morgan 275 Mt Pleasant 40443.

*** That night, when I told my uncle I had found a job at a car tyre dealer, he was in ecstasy. His breath smelt of booze although it was still a Monday night. I didn't ask questions; I knew he was dealing with a lot. His eyes had sunken further into his skull, I blamed my continuous dismal news of unemployment. My aunt had already stopped talking to me. The pride she had shown whilst showing me to her neighbours was nowhere to be found. I couldn't tell if she had finally given in to the rumours that I was bewitched and destined to be poor and unemployed. I was told to my uncle as he garnished a huge calabash of homemade beer. I declined and told them how tired I was. I also told them I had to start preparation for my new job. "Preparation? But you said you start in two weeks?" The mute aunty finally spoke.

It took me a minute or so to convince the couple it was normal. I listed a dozen procedures that were supposed to be done before I could be allowed to start work. I didn't know I was such a good liar. "It's okay my nephew," my uncle said," if you need money or to use the bicycle in your preparations just tell me." I nodded and went to bed. I dreamt of the woman at Millstone residence.

*** I couldn't continue going to town to call her. Fortunately, there was an old pay phone near the bus stop, a few yards from where we lived, and I used to call her from it. I decided to stick to a schedule, that way she would always answer, and her husband wouldn't. "Hello Milton, I was thinking about you," she said before I could say anything, " Morgan went to the dentist today. He needed his replacements." "I didn't have a clue how expensive it was. Well since we no longer had insurance, we had to use our own savings. Lucas said he would help with some cash, but it seems business is not getting any better since he took over. " It turned out that Morgan was her husband and Lucas her brother. Lucas had inherited the family business a year earlier when their father had abandoned it for England. He, the father, could not live in a country ruled by the blacks. He had been a high-ranking army man in the Rhodesian Patriotic Front. It made sense that he fled as soon as the war ended. His son-in law, Morgan, had only risen to a rank of sergeant. He didn't come home with any medals or fortune. He had promised his then pregnant wife that they would leave for South Africa and buy a farm or something. "We'll leave as soon as we find the money," she sobbed a little," if only he would stop spending all the money on at the casino." She was telling me Morgan Millstone was a drunk, gambler and into prostitutes.

She bade me goodbye; she had to be a good wife and cook supper for her husband.

*** Riding a bicycle from Kambuzuma to Mt Pleasant wasn't as easy as I had thought. The distance turned out to be thrice as long as I had anticipated. Halfway into the CBD I took off my jacket, it was soaking wet with sweat. The June breeze didn't help much. After navigating the crowded city and the tricky streetlights systems, I easily slid to the low-density Mt Pleasant homes. It was quiet and peaceful. The address system was quite confusing, and it took me an hour before I got the hang of it. Number 275 wasn't that hard to find after that. I slowly rode past as I closely looked at number 275. It wasn't a house but a mansion. The building was a three-storey built on a large plot, large enough to be a sustainable maize field. It wasn't walled or fenced around; it was surrounded by flowers. There were flowers everywhere, all types of flowers and colours. I tried to peer through the large windows, hoping to have just a glance of the madam. I wasn't lucky, the house looked locked and deserted. I sped up before anyone could suspect me of being a thief. I decided to come back the following day. *** The following day I rode the bicycle to town. It was around 10 o'clock and I thought it was too early to go to Mt Pleasant and I decided to ride around the downtown a bit to time. That was when I saw it, Kaplan Hardware and Furnitures, the perfect place I was deemed to find everlasting employment. When I lived in the village, I was fond of reading and would go around asking neighbours for old newspapers and magazines. One neighbour had some to spare. Some of the magazines and newspapers were as old as my father.

Somehow Kaplan hardware and Furnitures had already started selling wardrobes in the early 1920. It always fascinated me how such a business could run for so many decades. I used to imagine myself walk into one of their stores and buy a chair or table. That day I got a chance to go into one of their stores. I left my bicycle chained to the lamp-post outside. The cleaner, a woman old enough to be my grandmother, welcomed me into the shop. I went straight to the white man who was sitting behind the counter. I politely asked for a job. He wasn't pleased with me disturbing his newspaper reading time. My almost perfect English didn't impress him enough. I promised him I would bring a reference letter, my identification document, and my academic certificates the following day. He nodded and went back to reading his newspaper. *** I went back the following day, with an ironed shirt and tie. The white man did not show up for work that day. The cleaning lady told me to wait and I waited the entire day. I didn't complain, I was now accustomed to the disappointments of the city. The cleaning lady was encouraging, she even shared her lunch with me and did not want me to leave with my certificate nor give them to her. "I don't know how to read and write, and I am old and will lose them anytime. Give them straight into his hands and he hire you immediately." The old lady who said I reminded her of her grandson told me. Around 4 pm I went home fed up and dejected. I didn't forget to pray for death to the white man who had stood up. *** Instead of going back to Kaplan Hardware and Furnitures the following day I decided to visit the Millstone residence again. A childish and a naive decision. My uncle and auntie believed that in about 2 weeks I would be starting a new job at a tire shop. A lie I even was starting to believe. I was still an unemployed youth with no prospects at all. It would have been an ideal decision if I'd gone to look for a job, I thought so as I rode my bicycle to Mt Pleasant. As always, the streets were empty as I slowly came upon number 275. There was

a deathly stench at the house and the yard was empty. The yard wasn't empty, a fair skinned lady was crotched in the garden. She peered through the shrubs after noticing my presence. She stood up and I saw the garden fork in her hand. I looked away pretending not to see her. I had seen enough. Her photograph had been captured in my memory. She looked to be in her late twenties. Blue eyes and perfectly small ears. She was donning a sky-blue dress which made her gracefully tall and slender. Not a single piece of jewellery was on her. I didn't have to imagine what her voice sounded like; it was the woman on the other end of the receiver. I stopped my bike intending to go and talk to her. Halfway through the manoeuvre I changed my mind and tried to escape, I ended up falling to the ground. I quickly got back on the bicycle and sped away hoping that she at least felt sorry for me.

*** "Hello?" Her uncertain voice echoed from the other end of the receiver after I called her that afternoon, "Milton is that you?" I grunted with pain from my bicycle accident, neither confirming nor declining the given name. "A strange man is trying to rob our house," she said, her voice loud with excitement," he ed by our house twice this week on a bicycle." My heart skipped a bit. Fortunately, she didn't hear it. She went on to tell me how this young man, black as coal, had slowly cycled as he ed on her front yard. The lad had closely looked at her house, only her house, as if searching for something and had ed along. She was hidden in the garden, he didn't notice her. That was the first day. "Then today he ed by again," she continued with much vigour I hadn't heard from her for a long time," He was wearing the same black hat, brown jacket and black tros. He saw me weeding my garden. For a moment I thought he was

going to disembark from the bicycle and ask for a job. Then he changed his mind and sped off." She did not say anything about the man giving the ground a hug and a kiss, I couldn't ask her. She had grown accustomed to my silence that she didn't give me a time to speak. She promised me she would be safe and would use the gun her husband kept in the garage if the man ever came back again. "Milton, do you think I should tell my husband about this man?" She asked and was answered only with my heavy breathing on the receiver. "I won't tell him," her voice was filled with resignation," he will think I am making it up just to have his attention. Or I am a weakling who also need his rescue at the first sign of trouble." It was around five when she was done talking. She told me she had to go and prepare supper for her husband before he arrived from work. She dropped the receiver after she said her goodbye. She already knew there would be no answer from the other side of the phone.

*** When the rainy season came, my uncle and aunty sent me back to Buhera to help my parents with the ploughing and planting of the fields. My aunt promised me I would come back after harvesting was done. Of course, we all knew it was a lie. I had lied about getting a job and spent lot of money on the payphone without anything in return. I agreed with their decision to send me home, I had to find my fortune elsewhere, the city of Harare was not the place. On my day of departure, I decided to call her one last time. I had it all written down. I was going to tell my name; Milton was not my name and I didn't know where she got it from. I was going to tell her how much I loved her flower garden. I was going to ask her name. I was going to tell her all that was on my heart.

"Milton," she sobbed as soon as she picked the phone up," Morgan is ill, he is in dire condition. Lucas and I are packing. We are all leaving this goddamned country. My father said he will help us settle in England. I don't want to go Milton, please help me." I listened to her as she wept. My tongue tied and refusing to whisper a single word to smother her. I did nothing, just like as before.

The end.

A cold world Tafadzwa Chiwanza

The numbness was slowly killing him. He could not the last time he had felt the touch of his fingers on his face. There was nothing left around but the cold that gathered and heaped for miles in every direction. Now he had started feeling it make camp inside him. He half suspected that his lungs were covered in an impenetrable ice block. He would have given anything to feel something, just something regardless of how fickle that something was. It was not always like this for Stone John as he was popularly known in Chikurubi maximum. Everyone knew his story. Not that he told any of them, but because the prison warden made it his business to preach about it on every occasion. Not that John cared that man did not care for anything at all in the whole world. The numbness that gathered on his tongue when he started to eat his food and that food suddenly started to taste like snow. His teeth clattered even as he drank the hot tea in the morning, his hands shivered as he had the hot soup and bread at lunch and his entire body shook when he ate hot sadza in the evening. Stone John had never said a word since entering the forbidding doors of Chikurubi prison. Some concluded that he had cut out his tongue, vowing never to speak again. Whilst others even suggested that he had never said a word in his entire life. These stories were openly discussed around him by other inmates and they never bothered him at all. His mind was frozen and stiff as the numbness spread all over his body. He was known to spend most of his time staring at the sun with an intentness that would break hearts. At first, they laughed at him and mocked his desire to sun gaze. On a certain day, Mean Joe even slapped him on his face to distract him from his obsession. He didn't flinch. Mean Joe felt humiliated and landed a couple of punches to the back of Stones John's head. Stone John woke up in the hospital

three days letter, feeling the numbness at the back of his head where Mean Joe had fractured his scull As the nurses asked questions as to how he had sustained his injuries, John grunted and panted like a tired horse before they grew tired of questioning the silent patient. The last time John had spoken was rumoured to be a few seconds before he was sentenced to prison. It is said that he refused to defend himself as the trial progressed. His lawyer was often heard shouting at him to say something that would aid his case, but John Chari, as he was known then, refused to heed. Even his mother and sister pleaded with him to no avail. They gave up. Having sadly concluded that he had done the crime, they stopped coming to his trial. John Chari didn't care. He had never shown interest in what was done in the court. It was as if he was watching someone else's trial. He did not care, until his acc Agnes Marino was called to stand as a witness. John sat upright, with his eyes glittering and alert. It was as if he had suddenly become a new person. Agnes kept her eyes on the floor as she relayed the events that led to John's arrest. Her voice was watery but steady. Her words were fine as salt and as salt on a fresh wound, her words caused John untold misery. For the first time in the six weeks the trial took place, John wept. Agnes told the court that the accused had done monstrous things to her. Raped and strangled her almost to death near Mukuvisi River. The torn and bloodstained clothes she wore that day were brought to the court's attention. The rope he had used to tie her was also dangled for all to see. All watched in sympathy and anger. All but one man whose gaze was steadily fixed on the speaker. He was shocked. John was so shocked that all he could do was stare. The following day, the judge would hand John nearly a century behind bars. And soon afterwards John would speak his last words in a long time. The prisoner bound in heavy chains slouched towards Agnes who happened to be near the exit door. He looked at her, never said a word, but she felt his gaze upon her and turned to face him. "Papa made me do it", she said and ran out of the court. Those who saw the scene thought that she could not stand the sight of such an evil man. Below his breath the evil man said,

"I know."

The end.

A little song for the young one

Matthew K Chikono

She didn't have to look at her wristwatch to know she was going to be late to work, again. The previous week, her new employer let it slide but she knew this time they wouldn't. She tried to quicken her pace, it didn't help much, she was old and slow. Fifty-three years old, that wasn't young at all.

Quarter to six. It was almost dark, and the streets were getting empty. It was good, darkness got rid of smelly unwashed bodies from the streets of Durban. She preferred to walk in the evening breeze on her way to work, in peace and silence whilst enveloped in her own dark thoughts.

"Sanibonani Mama Zodwa!" A man from a banana stall greeted her as she ed. She raised her hand and waved at him, she didn't have enough time to return a proper greeting and to chat. Besides if she were to greet everyone she knew, she wouldn't ever arrive at her destination. She knew everyone in the city, well, almost everyone in the city. She had been born there. At thirteen Mama Zodwa had started working as a house cleaner, babysitter, and a laundry lady. Heck, she even delivered fresh milk to hundreds of people who lived in the eastern side of Durban. It wasn't a wonder why everyone knew her, and a lot of people offered her jobs. She only accepted those job offers if children happened to be involved.

Despite the September evening being warm, Mama Zodwa donned a long brown and black dress, a wrapping towel was thrown over her shoulders and her grey hair was uncovered, short and well-trimmed. On her feet she wore knee-length black socks and high heels shoes which made a clacking sound on the paved driveway as she arrived at her workplace.

She found Ms. Pete impatiently tapping the door handle, waiting for her arrival. Ms. Pete was young, twenty-five maybe, and was from Greece. It might not be the reason why her kind of dressing was weird; a strapless tiny blouse, miniskirt, and high heels all in black. It was this kind of revealing clothes she left wearing those Thursday evenings when she hired Mama Zodwa to stay over for the night with her seven-year-old son, Jeremy.

"You are late," Ms. Pete said grabbing her handbag and keys. "Next time I won’t to be so forgiving." She didn't wait for Mama Zodwa to reply before dashing out to the driveway where her car was parked. Mama Zodwa's greeting was left on her lips.

"She's definitely a prostitute," Mama Zodwa said to no one as she made her way to Jeremy's bedroom, "or else how would she afford this luxurious house."

Jeremy was reading his favourite storybook, about cows, giants, and a boy, whilst he lay on his tiny bed. He looked up as Mama Zodwa bulged in the boy's room without knocking. A minute smile tried to form on his lip, but it died without reaching his grey eyes. He was already in his pyjamas. Jeremy was a chubby and an unhappy boy.

Mama Zodwa took out a lunchbox of mashed potatoes and gave it to the boy in silence. Ms. Pete had forgotten to prepare something for her son to eat before she left on those nights, more often than expected of a young single parent. Mama Zodwa wasn't sure if that day was one of them, it was confirmed seconds later when the boy garnished the contents of the lunchbox with his bare hands. Half a

minute later he was laying on the bed staring at the ceiling with a satisfied look on his face.

"Will you tell me the story of the fisherman again before I sleep Mama Zodwa?"

"No dear, tonight I will sing for you one of my favourite folklore songs my grandmother taught me but first let me go and lock up and do the dishes." She replied with her smothering motherly voice.

The boy gave a small smile as Mama Zodwa left the room for the kitchen, she found it in disarray. Pots and pans on the floor. Plates and spoons, from last week's lunch with the priest, were stashed in the sink and under the table. Mama Zodwa cursed before she started washing them.

She thought to herself how it would be nice to have such money and a beautiful home like Ms. Pete's. She didn't know what Ms. Pete did for a living but what she knew was that every Thursday evening Mama Zodwa was called upon to babysit Jeremy for the whole night. Ms. Pete would leave wearing fancy clothes only to return the next morning, still looking fresh and young. Without saying any word Ms. Pete would hand her a couple of 200 Rand notes, Mama Zodwa would accept them and take her leave without questions. It still would be nice if she could afford those fancy things and food like her employer. Surely with all this money Mama Zodwa would finally be able to afford a doctor who would treat her aliment properly.

She was old, sick, and dying.

A strange curse was coursing through her veins, causing her pain and temporary paralysis. Since birth, Mama Zodwa had suffered from such disease that no witchdoctor had been able to cure. She did found relief in children though, a little lick or suck of the young one's blood restored her healthy, just for a couple of days though, but it was enough to call a life.

After washing the dishes, Mama Zodwa cleaned the kitchen and went back to Jeremy's room. He was still awake, waiting for his favourite nanny. Mama Zodwa tucked him in and lay beside him on the tiny bed. Jeremy didn't have to beg twice before Mama Zodwa started to sing to him. It might have been a hymn, it might have been a chant, the difference between the lyrics and the incarnations were lost to the little boy who drowsed to the feminine voice which sliced the night with its Zulu enchantments. It was no ordinary folklore, Mama Zodwa knew of its magic.

Few minutes later it had done its job; Jeremy, who was now half asleep, grabbed Mama Zodwa's hand and begged her not to leave his side. From the trance he murmured something about a kiss on the forehead and how it would help him sleep better. Mama hesitated for a second, a tingle of guilty ripped from her heart before she savagely kissed him until a drop of blood fell. She licked it and decided to take the opportunity to live a little longer. She put her mouth back on the tiny wound, sucked a little more blood. She couldn't resist. She sucked some more; she did not let go until the sunrise.

The end.

Scars that makes us Shine; Cost of Being a Man.

Qinisela Possenti Ndlovu ‘Jo where are you my son? Jo! ‘ Mrs Sithole called and there was no answer, she opened the gate herself. It was on a weekend so the gardener and the maid were not around. Mrs Sithole was surprised because the dog, Cheese, which was the always patrolling at home, was not in sight either. It was around seven on a Saturday evening. The Sithole family lived in the affluent side of Bulawayo. They had a beautiful house; with four bedrooms, sitting room, dining room and pantry, a toilet and bathroom for visitors. There were also two cottages; where the workers lived, the maid and the gardener separately. Within the yard there was a swimming pool illuminated with lights, a beautiful garden with artificial lawn and a tennis court. Mrs Sithole thought her son might be swimming or maybe practising tennis alone and Cheese was probably with him. Inside the bungalow, Mrs Sithole, a widower, lived with his only child and son Josephat. Mrs Sithole drove and parked the car in the garage. Since there was no one in sight, she called again; ‘Jo, I am home Jo, Jo!’ There was no answer but the television in the sitting room was on. The windows to Josephat’s room were opened and that was a sign that Josephat was somewhere in the house. Mrs Sithole was agitated because Josephat was not answering her. She quickly used the remote in her car to close and lock the garage gate. She was not keen of letting intruders in. The neighbourhood she lived with her son, consisted of big yards with durawall and neighbours too far away to call in case of intruders. The streets were usually quiet and deserted. The house was in typical suburbia bliss of the affluent, which minded their own business, lived with their families, and treated strangers with suspicion.

Mrs Sithole was tired from her work. She was a medical doctor. She took the grocery she had purchased from the mall and carried it towards the kitchen. Still there was not sight of Josephat. Mrs Sithole glanced into the sitting room. His nightgown and sandals were there. The thought of Josephat, sleeping in when chores were to be done made her more annoyed. The fact that she looked after her son and the son was not responsible with household chores, such as opening the gate and carrying the groceries in to the house made her think she had failed as a parent. Mrs Sithole wondered whether some boys of Josephat’s age had had an easy life like him. She doubted and since Josephat was the only child and son, Mrs Sithole thought that Josephat took advantage of her love and became a spoilt brat. She went to his bedroom thinking he was fast asleep or playing videos. As she searched for her son, she cursed the potency and influence of social media on her son. Josephat was a digital junkie, always glued to his cell phone or laptop. He had no friends at all. Mrs Sithole had bought the electronic gadgets so Josephat could spend his time studying and learning. Mrs Sithole used the gadgets as compensation tools for bonding with her son. Josephat was not in his room, she was getting worried and she went outside the house to check the swimming room. ‘Hhh, hmm ahh, ahh, that’s good,’ Mrs Sithole heard these strange sounds and she walked towards the swimming pool and ed it. She continued until she was about to reach the tennis court. A spectacle unfolded in front of her made to have palpitations and she managed to take a long deep breath. In a voice punctuated with stammers she said: ‘Josephat what are you doing with Cheese? My God! What are doing? My Good grieve! This is not normal, my son oh! If only your father was alive! What are you doing? What is this? Whom would I tell? What is wrong with you? Having sex with a dog! My God, My God!’ Mrs Sithole stopped and felt weak and slumped on the lawn next to the tennis court, crying uncontrollable. Josephat, a boy of 16 years enjoying himself with a family dog, Cheese. Josephat seemed to be liking it. He quickly pulled up his tros and tried to chase the dog away, but the dog did not go far. Maybe still wanting more of Josephat’s pelvic gyrations or not being used to foul and harsh

language from the owner, Cheese continued roam around the mother and son. Josephat approached his mother to mumble an apology, but Mrs Sithole could not lift her eyes to look at her son and did not hear what her son was mumbling. She was not interested in the mumbles and was not ready to talk to him. Josephat went to the house, bathed, and went to his room. Mrs Sithole sat there for a long time trying to come to what she had seen until a call came through her cell phone, she ignored it. The caller persisted and after the sixth time Mrs Sithole calmed herself and answered it. ‘Doc your patient at Mater Dei Hospital is getting worse and please come faster or advise us what to do?’ She heard herself saying: ‘Right away, give her a sedative. I have a family situation and I will be there in 20 minutes. Get Doc Mlosthwa to assist as soon as possible.’ She dropped the call. She raised herself and slowly headed to the kitchen, she took her car keys and remote control to open the gate, she closed the kitchen and went to the garage. Before she drove from the house, she thought about confronting her son, but she did not have the courage and the words. She drove to the hospital and attended to the call. She was worried whether her son would continue what he was doing to the family dog Cheese. Mrs Sithole put her ebbing faith in God, but she could not tell it to anyone because it was a family embarrassment. She returned on Sunday and found Josephat ready to go to church, she mumbled a greeting and could not look at her son. As Josephat left the gate and locked it, she immediately sneaked to Josephat room to search amongst his belongings, she wasn’t sure exactly what she was looking for. Mrs Sithole grabbed his computer and tried several s until she finally cracked it. She opened it and was shocked by the number of videos and pictures depicting human beings having intercourse with animals. Donkeys, horses, dog, and other kind of animals, having sex with human beings was not a sight to be feast upon by someone of Josephat’s age. All these events had happened ten years prior, way before Josephat’s mother had died. Whether she had died because she had bottled her son’s predicament and got depressed, no one knew for sure. What happened between Mrs Sithole and her son after that incidence was never spoken out loud.

When Josephat was arrested for rape years later, it was the maid and gardener who told Josephat’s narrative which had been hidden from the world. Josephat had started bestial activities at an early age and had continued with the behaviour. The maid and gardener saw the sexual romps Josephat had with the family dog. They never told a soul out of respect for Mrs Sithole. Josephat Sithole had thought he was free to move anywhere without anyone taking note. Josephat had thought he was free to talk to anyone without someone scrutinizing his body language or listening closely to the words that came from this mouth. He had thought he was forced to be quiet and keep to himself without anyone asking questions. Everyone was paranoid around him. His crime, he was a man in a woman’s world. Josephat was labelled guilty the day he walked on earth. He was the accused; a predator to women and the children. Josephat mere existence and his being in their midst made them victims. He was a potential sexual offender, a prowling rapist. Josephat Sithole was a hideous, smiling, paedophile-to-be. When Josephat walked on the streets he saw strangers gossiping about his looks, dress, muscles, tattoos on his arms and body and saw cringes of fear when he arrived. In public places, the metropolis of the City Centre; the looks were the same; caution and suspicion. People coiled in fear of who he was. Even when Josephat retired from the city to Arcadian life in rural areas; pathways, forests, dense bushes, tall grasses were avoided if Josephat was in the vicinity. He was simply not welcome in people’s lives because Josephat was a beast, a monster with a violent appetite for sex. This was the cost of being him, and he was accustomed to it. When Josephat ed any individual, social distance was voluntarily practised as if he had an infectious disease. No one looked him in the eye. If they ever did, they would tremble in fear. When Josephat looked for employment, he knew women interviewers avoided to look at him in the eye. Looking at Josephat in the eye was an accusation of what he had done and did not do, even if he ed or not. When Josephat sat on job interviews, he had to be cautions and extra careful of his language not to be called upon for seducing a staff member. Josephat body language was misunderstood to mean pervasion and danger in a civilised world. Josephat, who suffered from primitive instincts was not be trusted. Most public and private places were no go areas for him in company of another human being. Josephat lived with the curse of being a man in a world where women and

children had privileges and rights over him. He regretted the day his late mother had screamed and shouted in birth labour pains it was a ‘boy’ and he wished his mother were alive. Maybe, Josephat’s mother would be his alibi to a world that accused him because of his cursed genitals. Josephat’s mother would have told a different story to the world that the accused, and his biological tools, where God’s blessing of another generation to the mother. Maybe, if she were alive, she would have told the world that Josephat was her son. The mob’s behaviour, judgements, insulations towards him would be sanitized by her words ‘she was her son.’ Josephat wished for a moment of reprieve to break from the biological curse which he was born into. In Josephat’s mind, he asked those who had persecuted him with hyena like appetite relentless, what if they have given birth to a person like him, would they have treated that person the same. Josephat knew without listening to their moors, they would be zebra shocked, mortified by the indifference to his plight. However, since miracles were hard to come by and his mother could not be resurrected from the dead, Josephat would continue to live the way he thought was right. Josephat wanted to be virile, satisfy women in bed and be the pride of men. He started taking aphrodisiac of every kind, animal aphrodisiac, and mixture of animal, herbal aphrodisiac that enhanced his sexual chances to perform better and longer in bed. Little, did he know that one had started an event that grew into a past-time, a habit and eventually a culture that made him a sexual predator! The sexual enhancers began to affect Josephat’s sexual libido. He was easily aroused at the sight of any man and woman and wanted more sex. Josephat would demand sex from man and women and in the process started to force himself on people. It was a gradual progression to a rapist. As years went by, Josephat’s sexual appetite was more of a rapist when he lured women and men to relieve his insatiable sexual desires on them. Eventually, Josephat turned into a sexual crazed demon and his took residence was in a high security prison. He spent years in a tiny room, waiting for the day he would have his chance with the electric chair. In there he found a piece of paper, one that had been left by the former occupant of the room years before he was born. On it was a letter he read a million times before his day of demise. Every day he would take it out, read it and neatly fold it when he was done. He did it until his last day.

‘Dear Your We were not included in the population of those capable of attaining human status, as the language was deemed not transparent where stayed. We were excluded, ambivalent beings to deconstruct as we ed faces which we interacted with. Although, we were real human beings, we were not true human beings; they could not exchange greetings, pleasantries. We were not part of their conversation. Josephat was in the same room with Josephine her terrible twins and it was part of Josephine personality. We were simply inseparable. When I was Josephat, I was callous, yet charming. Josephat would come and manipulate others with charisma and intimidation and could mimic feelings to sanitize feelings of a normal society. The everyday guy, the son you want to have, the protective brother and loving father and doting husband. I was merely organised in my criminal mind and behaviour and would be a balanced emotional with physical restraint, showing no emotions and aroused under stressful conditions that shook and threatened any human being. Josephat was an expert in what he did, and he knew what he did, was wrong or evil but did not care or give any hoot what others thought. The other, terrible twin in me was a less organised bitch in her demeanour, always frantic and panicked as Josephine was easily angered and tense. She would throw tantrums and explode anytime. Her actions were rash and inappropriate with deep imagination and did not weigh the outcome or results of the intentions. If Josephine was to be juxtaposed with the pimp (Josephat) and Josephine the bitch in me she was not capable of committing heinous crimes with ease as she showed relationships with traces of ‘normal’ being. However, as terrible twin we had the potential to cause extreme pain and inflict lifelong tattoos in any human being. But Josephine was better, she had formed a bond with a human being. However, the pimp in me was en-fant terribus; a human monster that was death itself and a primitive beast.’

From you not so dearest but nearest’

The prison guards found the letter when they were preparing the room for the its next occupant. They burnt it to ashes. They did not want any remains of the letter. However, as the fire was about to die, there was a yellow glow which could not be put off. Maybe, the yellow glow was the reincarnation of Josephine and Josephat. Eventually, the prisons guards poured water to put off the fire. Water was a product of maritime rituals that swept the dirt, but the dirt only swam under the water and became part of a solid waste. Maybe, waiting for terrible twins, to reincarnate.

The end.

The Anointed water

John Gambanga

When the government imposed a national lockdown early in 2020 to fight the spread of the killer virus Covid-19, there was a nationwide outcry and panic. The lockdown brought most activities to a grinding stand still not only in the capital, but in all the cities countrywide. Formally employed people were forced to spend time at home with their families. Hundreds of informal workers, including street vendors and scores of women who sold vegetable at makeshift markets in the high-density suburbs were stranded as their only lifelines had been abruptly terminated. But this did not stop the innovative, like one church leader, Prophet Jacob to take advantage of the chaos to make easy money. The unprecedented tough measures were introduced in line with World Health Organisation proposals to fight the virus that was killing young and old alike across the oceans and seas. No country was spared. The deaths spread from China to Europe, Africa, the Americas, the Middle East and Australasia in a wave that reminded the elderly of the Spanish flu that gripped the world, decimating populations after the First World War that ended in 1918. Most shops were closed from dawn to dusk and there was a curfew that barred people from moving on the streets or elsewhere from p.m. to am. Only essential services and departments could operate. These included hospitals and clinics, pharmacies, supermarkets, the military and police and a small team of civil servants to keep government operations afloat. But the Money Changers remained stubbornly on the streets where they engaged in cat and mouse games with the police, some of whom they bribed to remain in

business. Commercial banks remained open, but for a few hours a day, and even they, were subject to limited number of clients at any given moment. The government introduced what it called Social Distancing. This meant that one could stand or sit at least a metre from another person. The virus was spread via the air that people breathed. The closer one stood to another, the higher the chances of spreading or contracting the virus, through the breadth. Although no one spoke about it, the pandemic forced many couples to suspend sexual relations for fear of spreading or contracting the virus. The situation was pathetic and stressful. A few food outlets could operate within the restricted times. Public transport was banned and only ambulances and essential service vehicles could be seen plying the roads to and from residential suburbs. Churches were allowed limited congregants provided they wore masks, sanitised their hands as they went into the church and sat at least a metre apart from each other. This led to a big drop in the number of people who attended churches, rendering some pastors inactive. Amid all this mayhem, some people cashed in, sewing, and selling small masks that had become compulsory pieces of clothing for all adults whenever they gathered for whatever purpose. They produced hundreds of the masks which they sold to the people at incredibly low prices. One journalist wrote in his weekly column that the masks had “become more popular than lip stick.” In a way he was right. More people bought masks to fight Covid -19 than those who bought the decorative lip stick. Everywhere people wore masks in assorted colours and shapes to cover their noses and mouths.

Others with exceptional skills, overnight produced the sanitiser that was suddenly in great demand as everyone was required to use it daily on their hands to prevent the spread of the virus. Prophet Jacob, of The Apostles of Jesus Church in Harare was a very enterprising cleric. His was one of those churches that had mushroomed across the country in recent years. Prophet Jacob and most of his congregants had broken away from the traditional churches- Catholics, Anglicans, Salvation Army, Baptists, Seventh Day Adventists and others to forces under the umbrella of the now ubiquitous Apostolic churches. These churches started with a few people, but later huge crowds congregated anywhere and soon several new sects sprung across the country. These churches were famous for their dress and mode of prayer. Both men and women wore long white garments. The men kept their heads clean shaven and grew their beard long while they carried long wooden staffs. It gave the church a semblance of the biblical Apostles of Jesus Christ. They did not have buildings to worship God in, but conducted their services in the open, at times spending several days at one place where they prayed all night and danced to loud music. Most of the sects did not have hymn books but plagiarised songs from established churches and modified them to suit their liking. Prophet Jacob saw a huge gap for him and his hundreds of followers to make money. He sold what he termed Holy water, also called Anointing water, which he claimed was a vaccine against the Covid-19 virus. His gullible congregants ed the project, selling this liquid in small bottles for as little as two dollars each. The bottles were sold in hundreds and Prophet Jacob made a killing. He would stand in the middle of his congregants, with buckets full of water for which he prayed before selling to them at the nominal price.

It was roaring business and hundreds of people, including those who did not belong to Jacob’s church flocked to buy the Anointed water for use. “People are afraid of death,” wrote one journalist. “ Daily they troop to the gatherings of the Apostles of God Church in Harare and elsewhere to buy small bottles of Prophet Jacob’s Anointed water that he claims is a vaccine for the Covid- 19 virus,” the journalist added. With the prevalent Social media in a society that was easily swayed, even by the incredible, messages of the powerful Anointing water from Prophet Jacob’s church became gospel of truth on WhatsApp platforms. The cunning Prophet Jacob would cry out, “Buy the Anointed Water and cheat death!” And the gullible congregants bought the small bottles of water. The wily cleric warned of the eternal damnation that would befall those who defied his word on the Anointed Water. One local newspaper, The Clarion, carried a front-page story of the congregants buying the Anointed water to take home. The editor had assigned a news crew to attend one of the services pretending to be ordinary congregants. They bought the so-called Anointed water and took it to the newsroom. The Editor sent the water to a reputable clinical laboratory to its properties, but the laboratory discovered that it was ordinary water, taken from the tap. The reporter then accosted Prophet Jacob and asked him if there was anyone who had contracted the Covid-19 virus and had taken the water and was cured. “I am selling this water for people to use as a vaccine, just as health officials are doing with other vaccines,” the clever cleric replied. Asked if he believed that the water had curative properties to act as a vaccine, Prophet Jacob replied, “I pray for the water first. Those who believe will be saved. This is what the Holy Scriptures teach us. Unless you believe, my son, you will not be saved. I

urge the nation to come in their thousands to buy my Anointed water and drive away the killer virus.” The water was sold in small bottles that had special labels stuck on them announcing that it was holy as it had been blessed and anointed by the Prophet and would ensure that anyone who drank it would not suffer from the killer virus. Prophet Jacob also sold the people masks which he prayed for, claiming that his word would ward off any virus. Out of reverence to their leader, hundreds of congregants bought the masks and the Anointed water as a special package for a small fee. None of them paused to think of how much money their pastor was making with the water. Alerted by the police, the Health Ministry called a Press conference at its head office and invited both local and foreign media. The Minister of Health accompanied by his deputy and the Permanent Secretary were flanked by two senior of the police to indicate the gravity of the situation. The Press Officer in the ministry introduced the government officials. “Ladies and gentlemen of the Press. It is my pleasure to introduce to you the Minister of Health Dr Edward Feelgood. He has a statement to make in connection with the Covid- 19 and the sale of Anointed water.” The Minister, looking serious, stood up and introduced his deputy and the permanent secretary as well as the two senior of the police to the media. “Ladies and gentlemen, we have a genuine issue before us, and I appeal to you all to assist us. I am talking about this,” and he raised the small bottle of the so-called Anointed water in his right hand for all to see. “This is the so-called Anointed water being sold to people by of the Apostles of God church led by one Prophet Jacob.

For your information, this is ordinary tap water that has no curative properties at all. Neither does it act as a vaccine against the killer virus Covid- 19. We as a ministry strongly discourage people from buying that water at all. We have approached our experts at the government laboratories to test the water and they discovered that it is ordinary tap water without any medicinal properties at all. It does not prevent or cure the killer virus Covid-19 as claimed by of the self -styled Prophet Jacob of the Apostles of God Church. I appeal to of the Press to help spread the information that the public is being taken for a ride by of this dubious church. The church is making money from desperate people and we all know that under the trying times that we face, people will engage in desperate activities. The law enforcement officers have assured us that they will summon Prophet Jacob to their office and order him to stop selling the water under the pretext that it is a vaccine for the killer virus Covid -19. I know you are terribly busy in your newsrooms. I will allow a few questions directed at me or the senior of the police here present. Thank you for your usual cooperation,” the Minister ended his brief statement. A few hands went up. The Press officer took charge. “James Mlilo from The Nation. What will the police do if the church continue selling their Anointed water?” Assistant Commissioner Takura stood up. “We will summon Prophet Jacob to our offices tomorrow. In fact, we have already sent him a letter requesting that he visits our offices. We will direct him to stop selling the water under the pretext that it is vaccine for Covid -19, because we know it is not at all. If he continues after that directive, the law will take its course.

He is lying to the people and he is selling what he should not be selling. Those are two separate offences. Both punishable. This is a matter of life and death, ladies and gentlemen and we will not stand by while unscrupulous people cash in on a crisis that has affected everyone in the world. I hope you, from radio and television will broadcast this information tonight so that the sale of the water ends tomorrow, even before we meet the prophet. I thank you,” said the police boss. Another hand went up. “Rosemary Mugwanda, from the national broadcaster. What if of the church stage a demonstration against the directive that you will issue tomorrow? What will you do?” “We will make sure any demonstrations are quashed. We have enough manpower to deal with that sort of thing. They will be arrested and charged accordingly,” Assistant Commissioner Takura replied. There were more questions as the show of hands indicated, but the Press Officer said, “The Minister and the Police chiefs have other pressing issues to attend to shortly and must leave at once. I am sorry we can’t take more questions, ladies, and gentlemen but I must thank you all for your .” The journalists shuffled back to their newsrooms to prepare the next bulletins.

The end.

Whispers from Mzilikazi Township

Qinisela Possenti Ndlovu

There came whistles in form of songs from a diminutive, light skinned, lass. Bekezela Dzowa shone like the sunrise, as her beautiful smile radiated the powerful sharp sun rays. She heralded the dawn of a new day in Mzilikazi Township. A sprawling community of close neat houses separated by Durawall and hedges, nestled between Makhokhoba and Barbourfields township in the City of Bulawayo, Zimbabwe. To know the popular townships was to know the heart-beat and the barometer of Bulawayo city and its peoples, because the townships were melting pots of the razzmatazz that Bulawayo brewed and spat, it was so dangerous yet so seductive place to visit in Zimbabwe. The township boasted the popular gateway roads in and outside of the Bulawayo City, 3rd and 6th Avenue which had the largest volume of traffic. Also, there was the biggest police station, Mzilikazi Police station next to the biggest rural, bus terminus, the Renkin Bus Terminus. Further, there was the Mpilo Central Hospital, the biggest referral health centre south of Zimbabwe. Also, Barbourfields stadium, the football Mecca of Zimbabwe’s southern regions. There was Amakhosi theatre, Mzilikazi Art and Craft, McDonald Hall and two primary schools named after the Ndebele Kings: Mzilikazi Primary and Lobengula Primary. Her voice warbled into the township like a swan song. The early morning bird that gave a cockerel chorus of cock announcing a new dawn and that everything was, indeed, new. When Bekezela whispered, it was a silent plea to everyone in her midst, to begin day without broken pieces of yesterday. Everywhere when she smiled, she woke up in us, the first day of our lives. It was like falling in love again at the same time, knowing how the vulnerable love made one feel. There was a difference between like and love. Love was picked and plucked as a flower but when one was in love, they watered the flower. Love was usually defined as the innocence beauty which brought courage and determination to some but with others it brought fear and a sense of weakness. Bekezela, was an existentialist, a person of few words, with a gentle approval; but a giant presence to those who dwarfed the vicissitudes of her life. Her presence in the life of people of Mzilikazi Township then brought life because she was not fixed, Bekezela was a formless being. She took away any form which you liked, built,

and shaped a roving artist. Bekezela lived in Mzilikazi, however, that was not her actual address. It was where you lived or wanted to live and that’s where she was. Her address was her thoughts which could not be confined by her geographical location. Her residence was virtual, always accessible anywhere and by anyone. Her thoughts wandered as she moved unobserved by the weight of her low peers and colourful community. Bekezela was a cat at night, stealth moving with majestic form, without alerting everyone. Her life, feelings, experiences where whispered in the howling wings of the dust plains of Mzilikazi, crowded in open spaces. Her whispers were cleverly hidden, coiled changed colours like a chameleon wrapped as green in the evergreen hedges that divided the houses. The ingotsha hedges were a fortress of neatness that separated the linear houses from each other. Her whispers were buried like the snakes in the life holes and dramas of Mzilikazi township scandals which made everyone eager to know the diminutive, light skinned, angel of African beauty in a sea of black faces. Bekezela whispers were caresses, hugs, and kisses of gentle doves in places where you were no allowed to touch, glean her. Her whispers were questions, accusations, of why life was defined through the lenses of boys and stares of men who were fond of winks from girls. Her whispers said I lived where I lived as a mystery but did not expect me there because I was formless. My address was anywhere. Her whispers were of giant in stature, but a diminutive, light skinned or dark-skinned sister attempting to free herself from towering patriarchy. Her whispers were of lioness dominating the hunter, forever fearless and pursuing with fights, attacks, deadly contests, saying ‘siyekeleni senze lingasijwayeli’ (leave us alone, we do our thing, do not provoke us). Bekezela lived the life of a detective, always following, watching, spying on everyone with enthusiasm and interest. Simultaneous, she lives the life of a criminal, always hiding, in counter-surveillance, retreated, tracked her intentions to the multitude of Mzilikazi Township. This made Bekezela, the celebrity of Mzilikazi and the moreish of Mzilikazi, she was dangerous and sexy, hated and avoided but interesting, and everyone wanted to know who she was. She was a player, match official, the ball; the spectator all rolled into one in the sport you chose to feature in. Bekezela enjoyed the notoriety and the mystiques of a whispered woman, so near and yet so far. Her whispers were graffiti drawings of art hung on the walls of society, deleting masculine levels, and replacing them with doses of feminine levels. Her whispered life to the best of the best worlds was of an androgynous misfit. In someone’s body, she remained a tattoo that could not be defaced. Bekezela stripped her clothes, whispered, and started to talk about her nudity in a soliloquy, but seemed to address a familiar crowd:

‘I do not what to call myself, but in me, three women live together crowded. They have tried to maintain a social distance towards each other but meet in the centre because they are alike, I am Sibahle, I am Ntombi and I am Bridgette and you cannot separate me from the schizophrenic trio. As Ntombi, I do not have a birth certificate and national registration identity card. I have not taken any, because I cannot. If I am not Zimbabwean, I do not know which nationality I belong to since I have always thought I was born in Zimbabwe and have resided in Zimbabwe since I started to . I cannot prove who I am, because there was no record of my birth and any parent or relative to claim me. I am just who I am, some demigod creature in form of human being, a homo habils in evolution . I have written Grade 7, Form Four, and Form Sixth examination using a candidate number with a name, therefore the results cannot be proved that they belong to Ntombi which happens to be my moniker for now. I am impostor of the real Ntombi, an impostor of own life. Where I live at shelter, I was told that I was adopted from Mpilo Central and abandoned by a woman who was my mother. Through mysterious whispers and rumours which were not meant for my ears; I heard shocking news. I understand my biological mother was a mad woman who had not particulars, next of kin and did not know that she gave birth to a child. She wandered from the hospital, never to be seen again since she did not know what was happening to her and the baby. She gave birth to me in a nearby busy and police had managed to rescue the child and the mother were both taken to the hospital for safety and recuperation. However, upon my mother gaining her strength, she walked out of the hospital and never to be seen again. I then became, a Mpilo Central hospital baby and was given a name Ntombi. As everyone’s child, I trusted everyone who is interested in me but had a poor opinion of adult women because I thought they would abandon me like my mother. To be brutally honest; I hate women because till to date, I have never seen or heard about the whereabouts of the source of my misery, the woman who brought me on earth. Each day was my birthday, I do not know my actual birthday and age and I do not know who look like me or have a picture of anyone who resembles me. To me, people are distant objects. What interest me are men, maybe because I think they can love me better. The hospital then took me to a home which I have known ever since. Who is my father; it might be a prominent person or a hopeless person but both could not stomach to reveal their identity because they had slept and impregnated a mad woman; my mother. Other girls and women at the home have reunited with their families and received identity. I do not know whether my mother’s people cannot

recognise the features of their mad relative in a crowd. Getting an identity card has been a nightmare that has haunted every day. Will I ever know who I am, or find relatives or will forever remain a scar that keeps shining? Will I forever, parade myself as the whisper of Mzilikazi Township, always a mystery, enchanting black, coloured, and seductive princess? As, I asked myself all the questions without answers, I bumped into another mystery woman in the corridors of girl centre where we had inhabited as the virtual. ‘I am Sister Bridgette.’ Tall, slender and with a nonchalant attitude of a person who has been there and seen it all; Been there! Done that! Bridgette began to talk aloud, with sharpness that bad mouthed Bekezela Dzowa. ‘I am Bridgette,’ she repeated her introduction a second time aloud for everyone to hear, ‘a rural girl who has become an urban, slick petite and sophisticated lady. I have blisters and my hands are testimony of hard breaking rural life. My hands have a cup grip of typical mother that protects loved ones. The grip is so strong that it does not let go whoever it dares to touch. I have a long giraffe neck so tall is the neck that I can see the vision of my dreams ahead. My neck can bend with flexibility and agility. Also, it can balance a bucket of water and a thicket of firewood. My head is so balanced that it can host any wig or hairstyle you can find if it’s an African hairstyle. The head can be wrapped around in unique styles of headgears that African maidens in their prime are jealousy of. My face is plain and ready to be decorated by any make up. Also, my lips are a huge set of hugs; juice looking. They are always moist dripping of honey like saliva that sticks if you kiss them. Once anyone gets stuck in them, they cannot free themselves easily. I lived like any boy of my age in the rural areas. The family I stayed with punished me and preferred me to do all the chores on the homestead, no matter how difficult they were. Some of those chores were traditional meant to be done by boys and sons. I herded goats and later when I grew a bit, I graduated into herding cattle and made sure I found the grazing and greener pastures for the livestock. To do this, I had to compete in that space with big boys, sometimes fight boys who were physically stronger than me to earn a grazing patch and their respect. If not, the livestock would grow thinner and be lost in the wilderness and then one would receive a severe beating from my uncle and aunt because I had failed to be a

good steward of their livestock in the grazing lands. I chose not to run away but fight and grew up to become brave enough to take part in stick fights or even gruesome fist fights to protect the grazing territory. At times, I became a slave of fights to earn respect. Since childhood, I have put on old tros to hide I was a girl, because if others found out, I was going to be bullied as a weakling. Therefore, my shabby, baggy tros handed down to me by a benevolent male relative made me to be accepted amongst cattle herders. I had to earn my name through endless fistfights and stick fights. The boys in our home who happened to be my nephews and older were not allowed to herd livestock because it was regarded a menial task done by an outsider. I was despised, an outsider in the family I stayed with. However, I became a legend in the fist and stick fighting. The boys there respected me despite finding out that I was a girl. My life was miserable, but I do not have regrets because it shaped who I am today. I was told and reminded by my cruel aunt and uncle that my mother had died a when I was still an infant, I was lucky to be looked after by them. I was reminded that some orphans did not have anyone to look after them. Other orphans did not have extended families. Affording me with a roof, my aunt and uncle had provided me with a blessing I was reminded of every day. I do not know who my real father was but I was told through gossip, which were not meant for me, that my mother was impregnated by my uncle, her brother whom I now lived with. Therefore, my uncle was my biological father. What an embarrassment? My aunt, upon discovering the secret of the incest between my mother and uncle, was hurt. The affair and my presence in my aunt’s life nearly broke her marriage. As an act of revenge, my aunt had poisoned my mother to death; this was according to family whispered secrets. The family whispers made me to stay in constant fear of my aunt. There were times when I slept without eating, in fear that my aunt would poison me, strangle me, or hire a person to murder me. When my aunt discovered that I did not take the meals which were meant for me; she started not giving me meals. Her son (my nephew) would offer me his portions secretly and we grew closer to each other. I did not see it coming, I thought my nephew was genuinely looking after me; then one day when I thought he had smuggled food for me, he sneaked in my room, violently forced himself on me. My nephew raped me, it hurt so bad he repeated the act frequently until I mustered courage and reported the incidents to my aunt. Surprisingly, my aunt sided with her child she said I had seduced her

son because I was a child of whore. My nephew was sent away to protect him from imprisonment and the seductress who happened to me. I was the one who corrupted her innocent child because I was my mother’s daughter who was described a whore by my aunt. I did not want to be my mother’s daughter because of the shame it brought on me, but I had to live and survive as my mother’s daughter to survive. I continued living with aunt and my uncle whilst he smuggled and gave me small portions of food to survive. When my aunt visited the city, nephew my would manipulate me, and tell me, I owed him. My uncle told me that I had remained living at the homestead because of his benevolence, my aunt had wanted me to leave but he pleaded with her. To pay off my debt I had to sleep with him. When I refused, my uncle forced himself upon me, numerous times. He simply took over his son’s crimes and sins and continued. I did not report it to my aunt, and this shattered my belief in love and family relationships. I died and was buried in the sins of family love and secrets. I kept quiet! I thought about committing suicide but if I did my story would not be told. What kept me going was the agony of untold story and the need to exact vengeance and kill my uncle, my nephew one day. I was driven by fury towards my studies and ed my O’ Level and A’ Levels with excellent grade. I wanted to see my uncle and my nephew cringe and coil because I was rising like a phoenix. After completing my A ‘Level, I was told that university was out of my league, there were no fees for me, and I should find a job. There were no jobs in our rural locality, and the available government jobs needed work experience. Even shop assistant jobs were no way to be found. Working as maid; washing clothes and looking after children didn’t pay enough. The rural area was not a place to seek for employment. It was a land of for the minors, sick and those who did not have dreams. I had to go to town and if I had no transport to go there, I had to walk and if I did not have any relative, I was going to sleep in the streets and hope for a miracle to happen. I left my rural area at night, on foot, believing in miracles and hoping that something better would come my way. I went to town and ended in a girl’s home. I walked long distances from the rural area to town on foot not using the main road; I feared to be abducted or worse, raped. Every time traffic approached, I hid in the grass or behind an anthill, climbed a tree. Herding cattle had prepared me to survive in the rural area, I knew to smell grass which was harbouring snakes and learnt to read hooves and separate marks of domestic

animals and wild animals. Sometimes I slept near kraals to hide from people who would question me where I was going or attempt to harm me. I carried my birth certificates, identity card and academic certificates. It took me two days to reach the town. When I did, I was exhausted, feeling dizzy and hungry because I had lived on wild fruits and drank water from streams. I was picked by the police and given to Social welfare workers who sent me to a girl’s home for orphans or abandoned girls. I was presented as a vagabond, an orphan, they enquired about my biological parents and extended family. I told them I did not want to go back because of how I was treated. I was then kept at the girl’s centre and received counselling so that I dealt with the skeletons in my past. The two incidents shaped my character and made me hate myself and wish to kill them both, my uncle, and my nephew. I was an angry young HIV positive woman. What drove me to take anti-retroviral was the need to live and complete my revenge against my uncle and my nephew and tell my narrative. Questions without answers remained in my mind. Would I love again? Would I love a woman or man? What would I do with this simmering argue to kill my uncle and nephew which I had nursed for years? Also, after the hideous murders, would I need also to kill my aunt who killed my mother?’ In group counselling at the shelter, I met Ntombi who wanted to find a family at all costs; yet I did not want a family. This made us inseparable because her story gave me a fresh perspective as women at the shelter. However, our lives were incomplete we met Sibahle another girl who completed the trio with schizophrenia. Sibahle was an epileptic woman who collapsed, screamed, and yelled insults when attacked by an unknown beast. A gentle soul, short, light, and beautiful but with tears in her eyes Bekezela sat tired from these narratives and she knelt as if in prayer; politely began another narrative. Sibahle was a known cry babe. We needed to cry to express our anguish, once we cried, we started to heal and shared what made us who we were. When we cried, we lifted the burden of generations. Once we cried, we started a conversation with oneself and made our soul self-introspection. The conversation would ask the following questions; why we cried? What made us cry? How did we cry? What happened when we cry? Sibahle’s eyes were red, face swollen and her voice was gone because of knots of pain she felt when she wanted to share her world with anyone. Her face was wet with tears as if she had a shower, still damp before the towel could dry them. The tears were endless

whips, sjamboks, beatings, insults, indescribable pain which Sibahle had collected, endured, lived with, and experienced in her short life. She had so many tears as if one could count them which meant too many stories to tell at once. But she did not know which story to start with since all had contextual and underlining meanings. Sibahle realized that her first story was going to be her DNA of the themes of the other stories that followed. However, it was difficult to know the order of arrangement which story came first, and which story came last. That bit was left for the reader of the story to solve and rearrange the complexity and sophistication of her narratives. When she started to talk, streams of tears were introduced as preliminaries to her stories. They laid the foundation of the stories with their fluid nature and one expected to read the fluid nature of the story that followed no pattern or a structure. The tears were salty as eyes seemed clouded and they left a white paste on her eyelashes. She watched as volumes of her tears bathed her light face which looked radiant and spotless clean, the previous wrinkles on the face had disappeared. The two handkerchiefs she carried in her handbag were no match for the tears; they had become damp with wetness and failed to dry the tears. She put the handkerchief on the desk and used her hands to wipe the tears and her face became wet in an instant. That is how I met Sibahle for the first time, the Queen with a wet face. ‘I am Sibahle, I get better each day when I do not have an epileptic feat. However, each time when I feat, I make one step backwards, I am losing myself. Every time, I see what I cannot describe I go into attack. In the attack, I attempt to fight this monster; which I hate so much; but I do not know and have never seen. But those who will be watching me say; I scream, yell, scratch and collapse shouting insults. Sometimes, I want this monster, to rip it with a knife and blind it with my finger tails but when it comes, it enters my body so fast that it makes me weak ad unable to fight. I refuse to give up, but I will be better. I do not want to attend counselling sessions; because I am not sure when this monster come out again, I will be able to deal with it. I fear that I will have a nervous breakdown; what if something; I know and someone I have known and loved, and they continuously do these unkind to me? What will happen to me? I do not want to know, I just want to leave with it; leave with one day at time? When the beast attacks me, I ran away from home and from my siblings. It is more alive when I am at home and do not want my siblings to see me in a sorry

state. They also ask what it is? How do I know and have never seen it? I do not want to know it. My mother works in South Africa and has promised to pay for medication. I do not want her to do that, I want her to live us, my sibling sisters and I, and to protect me from the beast! I believe if I stay at this home, this beast will finally go away. I cannot go home and because it lives there. Here, I am at peace, the beast does not come frequently. Maybe it gets lost in the streets and avenues of the city Life. I do not want to die, since I have met Ntombi and Bridgette I am stronger. The beast does not eat me anymore. It just torments me! I wonder if I let go of them, they go their paths, the beast will come again. I do not understand such cruelty in our lives, but I believe telling the stories, the three of us, will one day be better individuals. For now, we live with our angel Bekezela, who has allowed us to house and accommodate our miserable three lives in her body.’ Bekezela whispered and whistled as she smoked a t of marijuana and seeped a glass of beer to the amusement and amazement of her followers in Mzilikazi Township.

The end.

The Walking Dad

Matthew K Chikono

You finally see him on a Thursday evening. He is walking alone as always. You reach into your pocket to grab your phone and take a photo of him to prove to your friends of his existence. Your pocket is empty, yes it means the phone is not there. You take a closer look at your pocket and discover a huge hole, wait, a huge hole where the thief might have cut with a razor in order to steal your cellular phone. They call them smartphones these days and everyone has one, the man walking towards you might have one too. Or maybe not, he doesn't look like the usual dad who buys his wife and daughter an iPhone each whilst he is using an Android lollipop phone.

Who said anything about him being a dad? He might be a dad; you try to convince yourself. No, you correct yourself, he is just a father. A father is a man who produce offspring and a dad is a man who takes care of children: you mentally clap your hands for yourself, proud of your unquestionable wisdom. He might be a dad, he looks old and tired, all family men working and toiling for their loved ones do. His face is full of scars, you observe. From his face you assume he is in his late sixties. " He is just fifty-five." You recall Samson's words. Yes Samson, you now, he is the one who took your phone because you couldn't pay him for his weed you took from his stash without his consent.

There is a huge reed hat on top of the man's head. It came from Malawi, the weed not the hat. You smoked the high-quality stuff for the entire week without any side effects, well except that last time you thought you saw the dad carrying a satellite dish on his head instead of a simple weed hat, sorry reed hat.

You believe that the price of clothes has doubled since they legalised marijuana that is why you are not surprised to see the walking figure clad in his birthday suit. Before you can cover your own eyes, you see threads and shreds of rags that are covering the father's essentials. His pride is hanging on a thread, literary. If anything were to happen to those tatters would he be able to scrap it from the sand, you wonder. You are not sure what 'it' is. He does not care, you conclude, he is living in perpetual misery and walking past naked is not a problem to him at all.

You each other at proximity, too close you can say. He nods his head at you, and you mumble a greeting in return. "You stink old man!" You almost shout at the father as the smell of a body deprived bath for several weeks hit your nostrils hard, awfully hard. He is short and older than you have seen during those close encounters. He smells and his hands hang loosely on his shoulders. He walks with a slight and almost unnoticeable limp, you already knew that, he is missing few toes from his stint during the bush war. His feet are tiny and black with dirt, you couldn't have missed them since he is walking barefooted.

After you each other you stop and turn back. For a moment, just a tiny moment, you feel pity for him. You call his name, you know it, it's also yours. He turns around and look at you with a deathly pale face. "Loose change in your sock!" your mind screams at you. You take them out and count them. Seventy-three cents. You throw it at his feet. He picks it up and shove it in what might have been a pocket if he was wearing real clothes. His ‘thank you’ is almost like a whisper carried by a breeze. Before he turn his back on you to continue his journey to where no one knows, he looks at you one last time, his white eyed blank face shows no sign of recognition or gratitude. You hate him for that, but you continue staring at his back until he disappears out of

your sight.

You turn and start making your way back to Samson's place. You start to think how you are going to tell your cousin that you gave his uncle some lose change to buy a half loaf of bread, that way he won't die yet to escape from his misery. You sit on the rock near the road and start to think if you should tell Samson that you waved your father goodbye for the last time, you hope not to see him ever again, just like he hoped when he abandoned you and your mother.

The end.

MHINDURO

Charlton Nyoni

My name is Answer Reply Mhinduro, and don’t you dare laugh or make fun of me. The lord knows how much I have been made fun of because of that name. Like I said my name is Mhinduro and I am no friend of yours. Not if you still have wishes in you. If you happen to be looking for a weapon, I am the weapon. If you are ready to use my hand then you are ready to have no more worries, but still I won`t be a friend of yours. Tall, that word doesn’t apply to me, and it makes it so easier to mingle with the ground that you don`t my face. Those that ever are never alive to tell the tale. I don`t look tough and I know I am not tough, I don’t even wish to look tough! I am just a weapon. I don’t use emotions so don’t play them on me. Those are the rudimental.

**** It was icy cold, and the wind was a gale. It would have stopped any man but then I have never considered myself a man, not during an operation. There were so many crosshairs looking dirty and nothing was supposed to stay in my crosshairs for more than a moment. This one was a matrix and I hate matrices. This eraser had one big rub ahead of it. No one was out, just as no one expected anyone to be out. But I was crazy enough to do so, and this ensured the rub would not be crazy enough to go out and spoil my crosshairs. There she was, sprawled on the bed with legs flung apart and she was completely naked. She wasn’t alone though, there was a hairy

monstrosity slowly balling and uncapping her cups but obviously exhausted too. A heap of clothes lay by the bedside with condom cases and cigarette stubs littering the rest of the floor. He wasn`t my rub and I didn’t want him on my crosshairs but I wasn`t staying for dinner. This one was easy. I pulled out my gasbag, opened it and pushed it through the door then pulled the door shut and stayed by it. They never knew what hit them. Knocking things and trying the door which I had conveniently put a chair by the handle. I could hear footsteps, probably a snoopy neighbour so I held my ground. Then I heard the main door open and I slid behind some furniture. “Huyautore!” a voice called, and shivers ran down my spine. He was on my crosshairs and was supposed to be miles away. I don’t like matrices. Like I said before I am not tough. I am an acid, I burn, eat, or worm my way and this rub was swimming on my lake. I let him take a few steps right in to the room then I came behind him, hooped some fishing line over his face and soon it dug his life away. I went into the bedroom, took my empty bag then my fish line and back to the woodwork. This day had some sort of beginning. **** I had begun my day well, way before morning, so I guess I had had a head start and no one was going to take that away from me. I went for a change of clothes; it wouldn’t do to be seen and recognised in my to kill clothes. You can well imagine where we get our rubs.

**** The park was my second home and I found solace there, between rubs and the little I had to call a life. The next rub was an enigma. I sat there gazing at the sky trying to make head or tail of it. They had only sent a drawing of a cat, seemingly done by a toddler. It had to have some significance but for the love of Mike I could not get what it meant. I sat there and muted, holding the paper in front of my face, then a kid that was

playing in the park made me jump when she asked, “Did Garfield die?” I asked, “Which Garfield?” “The one you are holding!” she pointed. Then it hit me like a brick to my chest. It was simple after all, Todd from my very own country Zimbabwe. Named after Sir Garfield Todd the one-time prime minister! Now I had my man. I gave the kid the picture and a buck, she had earned it. **** Now that my mind was at easy, I could feel the chilly wind on my face. How come the kid was playing in the park in that kind of weather. Looking at her scampering posterior I noticed she looked too clean to be a squatter and dull one to know that about cartoons. The world is good for small men in my business but it’s horrible if you are not smart enough. I shrugged I pretended to leave but hid in the nearby bushes. After about half an hour the little left and I made my way in that direction. Trailing the kid, I saw her get into a car and it drove off. I had seen that car before. It belonged to my target, so why was he giving me clues? You can`t be short and a fool. Not even the devil has managed to pull such a feat something the big guys will never know. These rich people play games a lot and this one was toying with me now. Well I wasn`t poor of brains, you can use me all you want but don’t take extras, my job has no freebees. His house looked impressively huge, at least better than The Best of Hollywood and I have worshipped those. These houses made you feel secure, but no one is safe from me. I am an eraser destined to rub off all unwanted dirty in the world. Few minutes later I was inside the corridors with my phone controlling the entire security system, I had a view of every room and I planned accordingly. I sealed the house then threw a powder into the air conditioner. Waited a few minutes then walked out. It was then I got the shock of my life. There was my rub driving in, did he clone himself or what? Good, I was now in the business of killing the ghosts. For the first time I would enjoy killing. He walked into the house leaving the motor running and I closed the door behind

him. Changing the lock codes and the security system overrides sealed his fate. I switched off the motor engine, closed the car door and was back in the streets like nothing ever happened. **** No one feels the presence of a not so bigger person unless they do something stupid of course. As a cleaner of human vermin or just an eraser I had learnt not to tangle with the pencils but to respect the paper that I rubbed upon. This one was wide a few inches past obesity swabbing the space in this room. I could see two holes on that oily face that made up for eyes as she struggled between looking down at me and that of sucking in air and letting some out. I seemed not to measure up and the breathing got more audible with the fat that now housed the skull refusing to think at all. A squeak from a chair somewhere beneath her volume brought me back to my senses as a screechy voice shot out. “You are black,” as if that wasn`t evident. A woman, I never like working for women not if I can help it. This one a blatant racist as well. The job looked simple enough two rubs and I am rid of her. “They say you are good,” she was much calmer now, “I will pay you well?” **** Strange things are happening outside. A new wave of atmosphere sweeping the entire street. At first, I thought my speed had slackened and I was caught up with events, being a facilitator gives you an edge and a wariness. For so long I have been a smooth cup or at least I tried and still try to keep my handle from people`s hands. I had no life, no family, or friends, I had no name that I could call mine and I tried to have no pattern at my work. Yet anyone who even suspected of my existence was my enemy. Of pencils, erasers, and paper, of the trio it was hard being an eraser. With every rub eating on your side. It was on my mind as I crossed the road. I saw him the same time he saw me; oh, how I hate tollage. The tollage was tall and lanky, but his eyes gave him away. Here was a snake, very lethal but I hate vermin. Here was a spitting cobra and with its tongue out. Twitching back, I heard the bang and knew this one was a

miss. I have been shot at before, but no-one has ever lived to tell the tale, he wasn`t about to make a record. No-one kept my face, not even the clients. He melted right before my eyes, but I do melt too. Here was a pro but pros are measured, and I had him figured out. kicking out with my right leg, my foot connected with his pelvis and he went under a speeding truck, I melted before the tyres squealed. I had been paid up front in greens, so I had to stash my loot first somewhere safe. Having done that I went on-line, checking out my rubs and stuff then solving out how to. The fat lady was leaving her offices when I strung my arrow. Not bothering to remove it, I threw the childish bow on the back of a moving truck then went into the woodwork. Aiming when the receptionist was looking down, I floated into some company building and she didn`t even notice. Going into an office with skeleton keys I changed two bottles of water then stalled out. The owner of the office drove in just then and parked under his name then went on into the building. I took some vantage point where I could observe the goings on. He pulled out a drawer, took out his pills and a bottle from the fridge. Throwing a few pills into his mouth he took a long sip of the water. Hitting a homicide officer was easier than melting butter. A simple letter that I had asked some kid to write and yet another to deliver for me got him running. Squad car and all he screeched to a halt and wriggled out of the car rubbing his fat belly. I clobbered him from behind then pumped him full of coke then another pill, washed it all down with a bottle of his favourite whisky which I poured to the last drop. I packed my empties then left. **** This left me with just two rubs for the week. The next one was a cabinet minister, bodyguards, and all. There he was parked at his girlfriend`s house but there was too much collateral, so it had to be the car. The car was with the driver, a squat figure embroiled in his own affairs or rather the two women that set him drooling as they ed by. I garrotted him with some piano wire contraption I always had with me. Opening the hood, I twerked some cables, then opened the enger side door and placed

a few things under the seat. I got out, dragged the driver to some foliage nearby to give the ants something to bite. This wasn`t clean but there being no clean way to rub a politician and noone investigates their deaths anyways. The final rub was a funny one. I could not make him out till I discovered he was some traditional healer or witchdoctor like we have in Africa. Those people have a lot of leverage controlling most of the political mentality globally. One would have thought this was confined to blacks in Africa, but all political monkeys were the same. Strange things happen. He was waiting for me and even greeted me by name. No-one had used that in forty odd years. My face must have shown. This white wizard who openly vended necromancy gave out a chilling laugh that seemed to have been drawn from the depths of hell. Then my limbs started to wither and shrivel right before my eyes. I went for him then, I wasn`t going to miss a rub and this one I desperately wanted off the list of existing vermin. I threw a plastic bag full of gasoline at his being as he sat majestically and flicked a lighter which I also threw. He lost all composure then as I dived off his house to roll clear of the whooshing flames. He must have danced and danced till the house collapsed on him. I mused as I lost consciousness.

The end.

Contributor’s notes

Matthew K Chikono is a writer from Chitungwiza. He has published a short story collection entitled Dreams of Paradise, two novella entitled Shreds and Invisible Trails. His numerous short stories have been published online and in print. He is also the writer for the comic book Themba and editor for the blog The ion of Writer’s Pen.

Tafadzwa Chiwanza is a University of Zimbabwe ing student, currently with Deloitte. Born in Mashonaland West province of Zimbabwe, he relocated to the capital city of the country early 2000 with his family, where he still resides. A published author of a poetry anthology titled, No Bird Is Singing Now? Tafadzwa is currently working on two more collections: "Release the Kraken” and "The Rest Is Silence." He has had his work featured on various local newspapers such as The Standard and The Herald. He currently resides in Harare, Zimbabwe his homeland.

John Gambanga, of Harare, has published three Shona books of fiction, novels Tichaona and Manakira Kure and a play Mari Ine Chitema and an English book of short stories entitled: The Yellow teacup. His other short stories and poems in Shona and English appear in the publications, Gwenyambira, Two Tone, and now the poets speak, Matende mashava and Staffrider. He worked for the Catholic weekly Moto, the state broadcaster ZBC, The Herald, and edited the Manica Post and Daily News. He is a 1992 Commonwealth Fellow and has won two other international media awards. At The Herald he won six local media awards.

Qinisela Possenti Ndlovu was born on 28 January 1970 in Tsholotsho, Zimbabwe. He grew up in Barbourfields and Mzilikazi Townships in Bulawayo. He attended St Patrick’s Primary School, Sobukhazi Secondary, Christian and

Brother College School and Mzilikazi High School. He is married and stays in Trenance and currently a Lecturer in Business Communication and Public Relations at Bulawayo Polytechnic College.

Charlton Nyoni was born in Bulawayo in 1967. A visual artist and poet. First published in 1982 and never looked back. With work spanning across the globe, he has done collaborative poetry and performed in stages as well as appeared in Hollywood movies like “the power of one” and “King Solomon`s Mines.”