John Davis - Roots of Outrage

Oh Jesus. He said grimly: ‘You’re right, I’m not prepared to fight for it – because you can’t win, because they’ve got all the big battalions. All the laws. But I’m prepared to work for it –’

‘By leaving the country?’

‘By writing about it. Creating a fuss, raising public awareness, international public awareness –’

‘From outside the country.’

‘Jesus Christ , I only want to leave so that I can live with you! As we can’t do that here we’ve got to do the best we can from outside. You can’t fight if you’re in jail, Patti.’ He glared at her. ‘Tell me how you’re going to fight, Patti.’

She said grimly. ‘Ask no questions and you’ll get no lies.’

Oh Jesus, words like that frightened him. ‘For Christ’s sake! Tell me what you’re doing! So I can evaluate it!’

‘Evaluate it? And if you don’t approve?’ she said grimly. ‘What you don’t know you can’t be forced to tell Colonel Krombrink next time he pulls you in.’

‘For God’s sake! Do you think I’d betray you?’

‘I think our cops can make anybody betray anybody. Unless you throw yourself out of one of their upper windows.’

He paced across the room. ‘Patti – I can’t live like this, tell me what you’re doing. So that maybe I can … help you. Pro tect you.’

‘Help me?’ She smiled fondly ‘You weren’t meant to be a fighter, Luke. You’re a great guy, and I love you to bits, and you’re an adventurer, but you’re not a warrior, you’re a worrier – that’s why you’re such a good writer. You’re a wordsmith – that’s what nature intended you to be, and that’s wonderful.’

He was stung. Not a fighter? He sat down and took her hands. ‘But you are a fighter?’

‘Yep.’ Then she closed her eyes. ‘Darling, I’m doing nothing.’

‘I don’t believe you.’

She snorted softly. ‘Too bad. Nor would Colonel Krombrink.’

He glared at her. Too bad, huh? He stood up angrily. ‘Okay. That’s it. You don’t trust me. And I don’t trust you not to land us in the shit. So neither of us trusts the other. And we can’t live inside the country, and you refuse to leave. So you don’t love me enough. So there’s no future in this relationship. So? So I’m off. I’m getting out of your hair.’

She looked up at him. ‘On the contrary,’ she said quietly, ‘I love you with all my heart.’

‘But not enough to run away with me!’

‘I’m not a runner. I’m a stayer.’

He glared at her. ‘Goodbye, Patti. It’s been great. I really mean that.’

Her eyes were moist. She said: ‘Next weekend I’ll be here.’

It was a long week.

‘I love you,’ he said.

‘I love you too,’ she said. ‘But as you say, there’s no future in it. So let’s just have fun. Fun-fucking, that’s all we’re really good for, Mr Mahoney. So, tell me a fantasy.’

He wondered if he’d heard that right. ‘A fantasy?’

She smiled in the dark. ‘A sexual fantasy. Everybody has them, so tell me yours.’

He was astonished. ‘You are my sexual fantasy.’

‘I can’t be, because you’ve got me. But you can have a fantasy involving me. Wouldn’t that be fun? Exciting?’

‘ Involving you?’

She smiled. ‘For example wouldn’t you like to fuck two girls at the same time – me and another girl?’

It shocked him. And it was wildly erotic.

She grinned. ‘Poor baby, do I shock you?’

‘Why are you telling me this?’

She smiled. ‘Because for all your maturity you’re a well-brought-up Anglo-Saxon who believes in love and marriage and being faithful.’

‘And you don’t?’

‘Oh I do, I’m well-brought-up too. But I’m an Indian girl in South Africa so I’m not allowed to have love and marriage with you. I’m not allowed by law to be jealous about you. So I’m making myself bulletproof. So, tell me your fantasies.’

‘I wish we could stop talking about apartheid.’

‘So do I – oh don’t I just. I wish apartheid wasn’t there, to be talked about, but it is. So, I can’t be jealous.’

‘Are you unfaithful to me?’ It made his heart squeeze to think about it.

She smiled. ‘Ask no questions, you’ll get no lies, Mahoney.’

Oh God, not that one again. ‘For God’s sake. Don’t you care if I’m being unfaithful to you?’

‘Oh yes I care. But there’s nothing I can do about it, I can’t compete with another woman, I can’t move in with you and make myself indispensable, I can’t throw a tantrum outside your door or scratch the other woman’s eyes out. So although I care like hell, it’s impractical to have sleepless nights over it. So, I’m busy making my heart unbreakable.’ She was silent a moment. ‘Are you? Unfaithful to me?’

‘As a matter of fact,’ he said grimly, ‘I’m not.’

She smiled in the dark.

‘I didn’t think you were. You’re too honest to be much good at cheating – unless you didn’t care about me.’ She sighed. ‘And, I’m not being unfaithful to you either. Which, in the circumstances, is dumb, Mahoney – for both of us.’ She sat up and swept back her long black hair. ‘ Dumb ! Because … Oh – I’m so sick of talking about it! But dumb it is! So shall we please stop? And think about something practical .’ She added: ‘Like sexual fantasies?’

‘Sexual fantasies are practical?’

‘More practical than “ us ”.’ She snorted. ‘And the other good thing about fantasies – so I’ve read – is that when you fulfil your partner’s fantasy, you’ll find –’ she fluttered her eyelids – ‘that they’re eternally grateful to you.’

He didn’t know what to make of this. But it was wildly erotic. ‘Where did you read that?’

‘In some wicked magazine smuggled into this country. Or was it Freud himself? So, what’s your fantasy?’ She waved a hand. ‘Is it leather? Is it boots? Is it plastic raincoats? Two girls? Tell me.’

‘Are you trying to make me eternally grateful?’

She looked at him with big liquid eyes. ‘To stop taking each other so bloody seriously!’ She glared, then strode to the bathroom. She ran the tap.

Mahoney followed her. He slipped his arms around her and cupped her breasts. He whispered: ‘I love you.’

She hung her head, so her long black locks swirled in the water.

‘And I love you. And that’s the bloody problem – I’m not allowed to love you.’ Then she threw back her head, so her hair flew, and looked at him in the mirror. ‘So the answer is to brutalize it.’

He stared at her in the mirror. ‘ Brutalize it?’

‘So we stop taking each other so bloody seriously! So we just treat it as fun. Because there’s no other way to treat it!’

He didn’t want to hear. ‘And how’re you going to brutalize it?’

She looked at him in the mirror. ‘And you’re going to be eternally grateful.’ She closed her lovely eyes and turned and slipped her arms round his neck and held him tight. She took a deep breath. Then, as if she’d resolved to be happy, or suddenly saw the funny side of it, she giggled. ‘Gloria Naidoo, that’s who we’ll start with. Don’t all you guys drool over Gloria?’

He was astonished. ‘But she’s a lesbian.’

‘A bi-sexual, darling. Maybe more lezzie than bi, but bi she is.’

He grappled with all this. ‘And have you and Gloria …?’

She leant back in his arms. ‘Ever got it together? But of course, darling!’ She made big beautiful eyes. ‘What do you expect two good-looking Indian girls to do in sunny South Africa where all they’re allowed is nice Indian boys?’ Then she dropped her head and giggled. ‘The look on your face .’ Then she kissed him hard on the mouth. ‘Can we please stop taking life so seriously? And I refuse to talk about it any more … !’