Thokozani S.B. Maseko - Like a Lily on a Mountain, Love Grows on Rocky Terrains

“I Suppose that would be under Thabani,” Themba said with a smile, but his smile disappeared as Mandla frowned.

“No one is mounting anyone,” he said with a crisp finality. “And someone mind Topsy. He might be hungry. The damn dog’s howling is driving me nuts.”

He motioned with his head and Hannah followed him. He pointed to a door at the end of the hallway. She smiled her thanks and went in, closing the door behind her. Then she took off her boots, removed her wet socks, and crept into the weird bed. It stunk as if horses and mules had used it for mating, but it was smooth and warm, and she was totally exhausted and bushed.

She wondered if someone else had noticed yet that she had dropped off the face of the earth. She was certain that Musa’s mother and grandfather were frenzied by now, and that they had obviously called Sophia at the office. For a second, she wished that she was a significant person. Right now, her disappearance could warrant a police search.

Oh, please, she whispered into the night, let someone come searching for me.

***

Dawn presented Welcome with a surprise he wasn’t anticipating. He’d taken care of his needs and had his breakfast and lunch just before sunrise. He had been sitting on the ridge for just a short while when Thabani Dlamini’s horse came down to the river’s edge bearing two riders. Thabani turned around and let down the lady who Welcome had seen the previous day.

She wasn’t wearing her Guess jeans anymore but had wrapped herself in some kind of long wrap-around skirt and a t-shirt Thandi often wore. Thabani lowered a soft sack and mumbled something to her. Welcome tried to listen but he couldn’t catch a word. He saw Thabani point towards some rocks, and the woman shaded her eyes from the morning sun as she gazed in the direction of his finger. She glanced at her wristlet and nodded. She stood looking at Thabani as he directed his horse to the rocks he had pointed at, and slowly he disappeared. Hannah picked up the bundle, hesitated for a moment, as though she wasn’t certain what to do, and then went closer to the water.

Gosh! She possibly couldn’t teach a chicken to squawk, Welcome imagined as he looked at her approach the river, with her shoes on, and skirt hauling on the soil, mindless as the baby whose napkins she was no doubt about to wash. He pursed his lips and battled the urge to utter some words that had quickly leaped into his mind. ‘A stupid idiotic woman.’ But what more could he expect from someone who stayed with the Dlamini gang? He massaged his leg that was sore from remaining in one position for too long and counted himself in the same category.

A few metres from the river, the woman sat down on a tiny rock to take off her shoes. She had forsaken her boots for soft flat shoes. From his point of view, they looked like genuine leather shoes, but he couldn’t be certain. He had heard that the Dlamini boys had some kind of arrangement with the South Africans and the Mozambicans, trading with them stolen rifles for various goods and services. He’d gathered, too, that the Mozambicans had offered their women. But this was no Mozambican, whose very light skin legs were now exposed as she tucked the front of her skirt up into her waistband and waded into the river with the bag of dirty clothes.

He hadn’t seen women’s legs in over a year; apart from the exhibition this one had given him, of course, when she’d jumped into the river; sixteen months if he were to be precise; And the way things were now, he wasn’t certain if he’d ever be between a pair of them again. He was still sure of his prowess at it, all right. He’d tested that with a willing Mozambican woman who had pleasured him right in the presence of the traditional healer’s own son. But the bullets that had pierced his body had left his right leg nearly useless, and he was sure that between the scars and the clumsiness, that he was now a pitiful excuse for a man; surely no woman’s dream anymore.

He remembered the girls who used to avail themselves after winning horses and marathon races in Big Bend, or those who had run after him when he had visited Lavumisa or Big Bend for leisure. Boys in the area always complained that there were not enough ladies, but they were always abundant for him, waiting for him after a contest, offering him home-cooked meals, offering to wash his clothes.

Suddenly the woman screamed as she slipped in the water and caused Welcome to laugh. A fly on a mare’s ass had enough intellect to seek higher ground when flying across a river, but not her. The flipside edge of her skirt had become soaked that its weight had finally dragged her down. She squatted in the river, her buttocks half socked. She attempted to right herself when the current started to sweep her along.

Thabani, who was seemingly taking a bath further downstream, ran towards her in his long dripping johns, slithering and slipping on the rocky base, shouting curses. By the time he got to the woman, she had started drifting down the stream, and the river was beleaguered with buoyant bits of dirty clothes that Thabani picked up as he ran after her in the angry water flow.

“For life’s sake, woman!” he yelled after her. “Hold on to something!”

“I’m fine!” she shouted back at him, wading her way to a ledge of rocks. “Pick up my jeans!”

“What?” he yelled as he picked up her overalls and pulled her uncouthly from the water. She was painstakingly wet, and even from two hundred metres away Welcome could identify two dark nipples through the soaked fabric. Or perhaps he just imagined them – he wasn’t certain.

He thought perhaps he would be treated to an exhibition, as Thabani stood there with her, staring at each other, the water dripping from their clothes. But Thabani just whistled, and his horse came running from farther downstream. Taking the blanket from his saddle, Thabani gave it to her and took the horse’s reins. He went back to his bathing site, not even glancing over his shoulder.

Possibly it was not Thabani’s girl, Welcome figured. And certainly, someone this imbecilic couldn’t belong to Mandla. Themba? Yeah … she was just right for Themba. Two semi-idiots. Weren’t there laws forbidding mating of imbeciles? The thought slithered out of his mind when the woman removed her clothes for a second show in a row. She draped the blanket around herself and then attempted to pick up the clothes that had stuck to the rocks.

“Thabani,” she shouted. “Are you there?”

“What now?” he yelled in response.

“Just remain where you are till I tell you, all right?”

No answer.

“Okay?”

From where Welcome was, he could see Thabani hiding behind the rocks, not more than ten metres from where the girl stood waiting for a response. Thabani’s face was inclined against a rock, and Welcome deduced that he had a great view of her through a fissure, but she couldn’t see him.

“What’s the matter?” Thabani shouted back, but somehow his voice was soft.

“Just don’t move, all right?”

“Okay,” he answered.

Welcome shook his head. ‘Dirty moron,’ Welcome thought as he watched her remove the blanket and run stark-naked into the river, retrieving the clothes as swiftly as she could.

A piece of navy-blue fabric lay on a rock at the far end across the river, and she waded in to pick it up. Midstream, she leaned her head back and soaked her hair. Her face turned up towards the sun, a generous grin on her lips, and Welcome wished that she had opened her eyes. He could almost take a good look at her. He cursed the fact that he hadn’t bought those binoculars he’d seen as he passed through Big Bend, but he didn’t want to draw any attention to himself. He’d only been there briefly, just to pick up a few things, and no one had taken any notice of him with his new beard and thick hair. It wouldn’t have been a good idea to throw money around, even in a little town like Big Bend.