Peter Orner - The Second Coming of Mavala Shikongo

Ganaseb had got so free of Goas, he deserted the Catholic Church. The Lutheran parish in the location was packed. People swelled out the doors. Old women wailed on the steps outside. Boys dangled from the windows. The air was thick with competing perfumes. Obadiah led our entourage down the aisle, saying, “Pardon us, old friends, pardon us.” We made it to the third pew and squeezed in. I tried not to look at Mavala, who was wedged between Vilho and Dikeledi. She tried not to look at me. At that time everything about us — to us — was thrilling. I loved being close enough to touch her and to pretend I didn’t want to. I tried to differentiate the smell of her sweat from everybody else’s.

At last, the pastor began. Obadiah translated bits of the Afrikaans. “He says Ganaseb has only changed homes. From his modest house in Karibib to the Kingdom of Heaven. Yet he remains in our hearts.”

A woman in the pew in front of us hunched over and sobbed wildly. Obadiah made a fucking motion with his hips. “One of Ganaseb’s girlfriends,” he whispered. “He was into more than her heart.” He reached into his inside coat pocket for his flask. Antoinette’s crabbed hand whapped across me and seized Obadiah’s wrist like a talon. It remained there — welded to him — for the entire service.

Prayers, hymns, speeches, testimonials, weeping, more testimonials. When Ganaseb was justly honored, we shuffled slowly out into the sun and followed the casket. The dead man was sticking out of the trunk of his Volvo. The road to the cemetery was strewn with withered lettuce.

After the burial, we went to the Dolphin. Pohamba bought beers for the men and Cokes for the women (out of deference to Antoinette) and hard-boiled eggs for everybody. The women sat at a separate table (Tomo under it). The three of them, all beautiful in their way, sat there like a kind of cabal, a war council. Antoinette lording, trying not to judge everyone around her too harshly, trying to be a good Christian and love, love… Dikeledi so silent, taking everything in. She rarely came to town. I never knew she wore glasses. Mavala pops a whole egg in her mouth.

“It’s funny,” Vilho said. “A man dies and we all eat eggs.”

Pohamba took the salt and shook it over Vilho’s head. Then he got down to business. “With Ganaseb gone,” he said, “won’t Karibib hire a new teacher?”

“Faulty analysis, Teacher,” Festus said. “They’ll double up one classroom. And Kapapu will be the new assistant. Either Kapapu or Tjaherami.”

“How many learners can fit in one room?”

“As many as they want.”

“What about Hangula for assistant?”

“He’s Ovambo. Hereros control the district. Also, they say Hangula voted DTA.”

Mavala reached across the table and covered Antoinette’s hand with her own. Then she looked my way, found me watching her, and mouthed, Where’s O.?

I shrugged. Don’t know .

“Wait — Kapapu’s not Herero. Isn’t he Damara?”

“Yes, but his wife’s Herero.”

“Ah. And Ngavirue?”

“Ngavirue’s Herero, but nobody likes Ngavirue.”

Outside, Father began to honk for us. Impatient little priestly beeps.

When we’d all gathered back in the bakkie, it became clear we were still missing one of us. Antoinette groaned. This foray into decadence was enough for her without further humiliation. Festus and Pohamba checked the other bottle stores. Vilho checked the reeking public toilet. Then Antoinette sat bolt upright against the spare tire, her dress gathered up in her arms, and pointed to the cemetery with a long, unequivocal finger.

Together, Mavala and I ran down the rutted road. It was good to run with her. I wanted us to keep going. Near Ganaseb’s grave, I spotted a single battered loafer. He wasn’t far from his stray shoe, passed out, his face in the gnarled dirt. Mavala shook him. No movement. She shook him again. A limp hand waved her away.

“Don’t disturb the dead.”

“It’s time.”

“Time? Time for what?”

“Let’s go.” Mavala said. “The priest is snorting.”

He sat up and brushed a dusty sleeve on his forehead. His eyes were past bloodshot now. They were a kind of viscous brown, murked by tears and sweat. For a moment he sat there and stared at the fresh mound.

“I did it,” he said.

“Did what?” Mavala asked.

“Pissed on him.”

“Why?”

“A long piss. I’d show you, but it’s gone, evaporated. That too dries up.” He laughed, asthmatic, parched. “Didn’t I love him? Didn’t I?”

We pulled him up by the armpits. He felt light, too light for a man so tall. He looked around at the cemetery, at the rows of cardboard markers, plastic sunflowers, and sleeping dogs. We walked slowly back. It was late afternoon. Jazz was already playing in the living room of one of the houses closest to the cemetery road. Dust clouds from the taxis that roamed the location wafted above us. An old woman passed by wheezing loudly, holding a loaf of bread to her chest. When we reached the bottle store, the priest was revving the engine. Festus hooted at Obadiah’s dusty suit as the three of us piled into the back with the others.

Same place as always. In front of our doors. Mosquito carcass- bloody morning. Pohamba sitting on a rock and brushing his teeth, talks like he’s been smoking dagga, but we’re at least a month out of dagga. He spits out the side of his mouth, doesn’t look at me.

“Sooooooooo.”

“What?”

“Been good, ja bassie? ”

“What?”

“Good afternoons, ja? Siesta. No sleepy-peepy time for bassie .”

“Why are you talking like that?”

“Veld? Thorny but good, ja? No need sleep. Oh, bassie got juicy thing, happy!”

He brushes his teeth some more, sticks his tongue out, wiggles it, brushes it.

“What do you want me to say?”

“Say?”

And then him looking at me as if he’s only seeing me now for the first time. He points his toothbrush at me. “Don’t say anything.” Then in a low, officious growl: “ Sir, I’m afraid that’s highly classified, confidential information .” He sticks his brush back in his mouth.

A hen struts by and Pohamba stands, toothbrush-mouthed, tries to wallop it, misses. His flip-flop airborne into the acacia. The hen flutters, then begins to mosey around again like nobody just tried to murder her. Pohamba goes inside his room to rinse his mouth.

Let us now blame Kaplansk’s mother, Sylvia. At the League of Women Voters of Greater Cincinnati, Avendale Chapter, she mentioned it offhandedly to Ruthie Goldblatt, who mentioned it to Kitty Levine, who mentioned it to Bebe Pomerantz. Which was all it took. Sylvia’s son is teaching at an adorable little school somewhere in deepest Africa. I forget where. New Bubia? Anyway, they’re in direful need of donations. Simply in direful need. What sort of donations? Oh, any donation! A donation is a donation is a donation! And besides, Bebe, Kitty says, Sylvia says these children have nothing, nothing. Well, I do seem to remember an old piano in my basement, Bebe Pomerantz says. I think it was Miles’s mother’s sister’s. Died young, poor thing. They say she won contests.

Tremendous idea! Send Chopin! Send Debussy!

Four weeks later a wooden box weighing upward of two tons landed at the postkantoor in Karibib with the fanfare of a meteor. It had been delivered from Walvis Bay in its own lorry, and the postmaster called the principal personally to announce the arrival of a “mighty crate.”