Marlon James - A Brief History of Seven Killings

— Kimmy, stop moving up and down like some damn monkey, my mother says.

— Yes Mummy, she says. I want to repeat it like a teasing six-year-old. Yes Mummy my ass. The way Kimmy jumps back ten years to make her parents baby her, you’d almost think she was a son and not a daughter.

— And my own daughter. Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ.

— Mummy?

— Talk to your father.

— About what?

— I said talk to your father.

— Talk to Daddy about what? I say that to her, but I look at Kimmy, who is now making a show of not looking at me.

— Even a coolie would have been better but… My God… it’s so nasty I can smell it on you.

— What you talking about, Mummy?

— Don’t you dare raise your voice at me! Don’t you dare raise your voice in this house. All those years of bathing and I still couldn’t wash the slut out of you. Maybe you should have get more beating. Maybe I should have just beat it out of you.

I’m standing now. I still don’t know what you talking about, I say. She is still not looking at me. Kimmy finally looks around and tries to give me a blank stare, but she can’t hold it. She looks away.

— So you’re a whore now or just his whore?

— I’m not a whore. What the hell—

— Don’t swear in my damn house. I heard all about you being the whore for that damn singer in his house. How much he paying you? All these months you not having decent work I’m here wondering, How is Nina getting by without gainful employment? How, since she not asking for money and she don’t have any friends—

— I have plenty friends—

— Don’t interrupt me in me damn house. I buy this damn thing with me and Mr. Burgess’ money.

— Yes, Mummy.

— Pay for it cash with no damn mortgage either, so don’t think you can back talk me in my own house.

My hands are trembling like I just spent three hours in a deep freeze. Kimmy starts to walk to the door.

— Kim-Marie Burgess, you keep your backside quiet. Tell your sister how it’s the big news clearly that she’s debasing herself with that, that Rasta.

— Debasing myself? Debasing myself. Kimmy has a Rasta boyfriend.

— You comparing him with what you’re wasting your privates on? At least he’s from a good family. And he’s going through a phase. A phase.

— A phase? Like what Kimmy is going through.

— I swear every time I think of you and that singer, in some nasty bed smoking weed and getting pregnant, I want to vomit. You hear me, I want to vomit. You is such a nasty little girl, I bet you just bring all sort of head lice into my house.

— Mummy.

— All those years of schooling to become what? One of him woman? That is what high school education provide for these days?

Now she’s sounding like Daddy and I wonder where he is. Kimmy. She did it. My mother is shaking so hard that when she gets up she falls back down in the chair. Kimmy rushes to help her like a good daughter. She told them. She told them something. And she knows me too. She knows I’m not going to tell them about her because one bad daughter would depress my mother, but two would finish her off. She’s counting on me to be the good daughter who will take anything and she’s right. I’m almost impressed by the bitch.

— All I can think of is you bringing that ganja smell and frowsy arm into my house. I can smell him on you. Disgusting. Disgusting.

— Oh? And you can’t smell it on your other daughter?

— Don’t bring poor Kimmy into this.

— Poor Kimmy? So she can sleep with Rasta.

— Don’t you dare get impertinent in here! This is a God-fearing house.

— God know that is nothing but hypocrite in here? Kimmy get to mess with Rasta—

— He is not a Rasta.

— Go tell him that. In fact go tell your daughter that and see if she stay with him.

— From when you were a young girl you always going after your sister. All this hatred and envy for what? We never treat one of you better than the other. And yet you just have that nasty streak in you. I should have beat it out, that’s what I should have do, beat it out.

— Oh yeah. And when nasty man was beating that jewellery and savings out of you, you did like that?

— Don’t talk to my mother like that, Kimmy say.

— You shut you r’asscloth, you little bitch. Like say you good.

— Don’t talk to your sister like that.

— You always take her side.

— Well, I need one daughter who is not a slut. Even a coolie wouldn’t be so bad.

— Your damn daughter fucking a Rasta too!

— Morris! Morris, come down here and talk to your daughter. Get her out of my house! Morris! Morris!

— Yeah, you call Daddy. Call him so that I can tell him ’bout your little favourite little girl right here.

— You shut up, Nina. You already do this family enough damage.

— I’m the one saving this damn family.

— I don’t remember asking any of my children to save anything. I don’t want no damn room in some Rasta compound with no wife sharing and little children smoking ganja. Morris!

I want to grab something and fling it at Kimmy who still has not looked at me once. You’re probably already carrying one of his children already, my mother says. She sounds like she’s crying but no tears are running down. Kimmy is rubbing her back. She’s thanking Kimmy for helping her poor mother through all of this. I’m done. There is nothing left to say. There is nothing to do but wait for my mother to say something. I thought I would want to just go over there and grab Kimmy by the neck but I watch her rubbing my mother’s and feel sorry for both of them. But then she says,

— Mummy, tell her about the waiting outside his gate.

— What? Oh my God, now she’s waiting outside his house like some lady of the night. Even he now realizes she’s trash. Lord, look what me family coming to.

— You fucking bitch, I say to Kimmy, who looks at me blank.

— I said I don’t want such language in my house. If you can’t helping being a damn slut at least try to not talk like one when you’re in my house.

I want to say, And what about the slut that’s now rubbing your back? How no matter what Kimmy fucking says or do, they always have an excuse or justification for it as if they have been back-stocking on excuses from the day she was born and can pull one without a second’s notice? I want to say it, but I don’t. Kimmy knows I won’t. Kimmy knows I’m the good daughter who’ll stay good even when it’s worse for me. I’m almost impressed by how much I underestimated her. I’m almost impressed by how far she has gone and will more likely still go. I want to say that at least no man will ever beat me and leave me to think it’s just a strike for the struggle but I don’t. Instead my heart is pumping and I can only think of grabbing a knife, a dull one, a dinner knife, and walking to her with it in my hands, not stabbing her or cutting her, just have her see me coming and there is nothing she can do about it. Here I was in this fucking house with people I spent all day with yesterday, standing like a goddamn fool for something that I don’t even want to do anymore. I bet Kimmy is happy. She gets to take goody goody Nina down a peg.

— Down there not scratching you with all that lice? It not biting you down there? How can you even stand there? Dear Lord, what kind of nasty daughter me have? I want to vomit. Kimmy, I want to vomit.

— Is alright, Mummy. I’m sure she don’t have no lice.

— How you know? Them Rastaman nasty you know. I don’t care how much money he think him have. They is all just nasty and chupid. Stand twenty feet away you can smell them coming.

— No, it not scratching with lice. Him did smell better than baby powder, I say and regret before the last syllable comes out of my mouth. I want to grab Kimmy and just shake her. Just shake her hard like a damn baby who won’t be quiet.