Nadine Gordimer - My Son's Story

She's cut off her hair.

I had come back from classes to the empty house and parked my motorcycle on the stoep as I always did for safety, and when I opened the door someone was standing there. She'd heard me thumping the bike up the steps and she was waiting, presenting the surprise of her return. I recognized her as you do someone in a photograph taken at a time and in a place when you didn't yet know them, or after they were as you had known them. The shape of her face was changed by the short curls brushed around it, the small flat ears with, always, some little decoration dangling from the lobe, had disappeared, the polished curve of the forehead was hidden by a fluffed-up fringe. She flung her arms round my neck and hugged me. A line drew between her beautiful eyes with the joyful intensity with which she looked at me, took me in. My mother was never demonstrative like that. But they were her eyes.

— What happened?—

She was laughing with pleasure. — Oh everything's fine. Baby is blooming. You wouldn't know her, so grownup, completely in charge.—

— What have you done? Why did you do it?—

— You mean this? — she poked her fingers through the curls. — Oh this. All those years. It was enough. Don't you like it? Don't you think it's nice, Will?—

I could only smile and move my shoulders; I'm not her husband, she doesn't have to try to please me.

We went into the kitchen, our old place to talk. She took my mother's chair at the table, she made tea. She was telling me about where Baby lived, what good friends Baby had, responsible people who looked after her, not at all what one thought it would be, considering some of the people she'd mixed with here. — They made me so welcome. She shares the house, of course, but can you imagine, she's planted herbs in the garden — Baby!—

— She didn't leave to go gardening, though. What does she do — or couldn't she say.—

— Well, you don't ask questions, of course, but she was quite open, she seems to be busy with the reception of refu-gees — not exactly refugees, people like herself, who come out. They have to be investigated. You know. — The big eyes moved over me.

So my mother understands the ambiguities of liberation, now, the screening and interrogation carried out not by the Security Police but by her daughter. Baby has instructed her.

— Was it Baby's idea? — She knows I mean the hair.

— Will! You'd be so pleased to see how she is. She was watching me brushing it one day and she said, how old are you now, Ma? She never remembers! She always thinks I'm younger than I am. So I reminded her. She said, and how much of your life have you spent doing that — so next day we went to the hairdresser and I had it off.—

She turned her profile to me as if to let me acknowledge the full effect.

I said nothing.

— I feel so much lighter. — She was looking at me shyly to see if I would not be glad of that. — And has everything been all right?—

We don't mention him by name, not yet. She's thinking of police raids, no doubt; of his safety. Could I tell her something else, that he's been home a lot, even playing chess with me? But I can't because that would be a comment on what we're both not supposed to know, the reality I protect her from. — Oh as usual. Except the yard's a bit of a mess. I did get round to cutting the grass once, but my work-load's quite tough, I've had a lot of reading to do.—

— Did you eat?—

And now we both smile. — I cooked. It seemed to be okay.—

She knows I fed him, she could count on me, now she wants me to like what Baby has done to her, her hair.

— There's more to tell but we'll wait until your father comes in.—

So he's there, spoken out loud between us. — What's it all about? Why not now?—

— Because I'd only have to tell it over again.—

This woman with dull permed curls. She's never put us in the same category before, him and me; since when are our unspoken confidences the same as the sort of silences between them?

She never came back. Cut loose. She was gone for good: my mother.

Aila's mission was the kind to be expected of her; she has brought women's tidings, a mother's news. Baby is married. But for security reasons not even that domestic intelligence could have been transmitted over the telephone or by letter; not to this house. Baby hadn't told her father herself. Couldn't. Sonny was informed along with his son, by his wife. A family matter. There should have been kisses, handclasps, a Saturday tea-party with beer for the uncles, Aila with her shining coil of hair, wearing a new dress home-made for the occasion.

The boy said nothing, as usual. Apparently he had no feeling for his sister. Aila had met the man, Aila thought he was nice, steady, good enough for their — Sonny's — daughter, his Baby; he had not been asked. On the contrary, the fact was accomplished without him and now he was the one humbly to put questions. Aila confirmed that the young man was someone Baby had known before she left: so they left together, then, and that was something else that had not been confided in her father. She went away with a man, she had been living with a man while he was with his woman in the cottage. As discreet, not only politically, as the father himself.

The young man — husband! — was one of their own kind, not some white foreigner (apparently poor Aila had feared that?) his Baby might have been expected to pick up. 'Steady'—as if Benoni standards could apply to the life of a Freedom Fighter. poor Aila! He was known by his code name, was something quite important among the younger people in the movement, one didn't ask, he and Baby didn't talk about it. maybe even she does not know exactly. He has been trained in other parts of Africa and overseas. He has a family here at home but thinks it best they should not be contacted to toast the alliance — for security reasons.

— His family aren't involved at all. — Aila is quite self-assured about the whole business, for once she's taken on responsibility for something all by herself, she's the one who's given approval in this matter of his daughter's future.

Out of his hurt, Sonny felt a heavy sense of lack of occasion in all three of them, Aila, Will, himself. He made some effort, before them, for them. — Well, that's good news, let's hope they'll be happy. and strong in their work.—

The presence of the boy makes everything he says sound fatuous; the moment the boy's mother is back he withdraws again from any male understanding. And Aila gave instructions: —We won't talk about the marriage to anyone.—

What idea was that? Since when did Aila decide what was politically expedient? Since when did she think she understood such things? Did she really believe the Security Police weren't aware by now where Baby was and what she was doing? — Why not?—

She felt the gibe in her husband's remark and turned her head away from the two men. — I have to be able to go back.—

The day of her return ended as all days do in a marriage, with them alone in their bedroom. Sonny and Aila. No matter what has happened during the day, there is no escaping that dread conclusion. They performed the rituals of preparation for bed that had preceded all kinds of nights, years of nights, for them; drawing curtains, washing, brushing teeth as had been done to be pleasing in the taste of kisses, undressing before each other as they had done in the delightful gaze of desire. His bundle of sex hung like something disowned by his body. She folded her garments one by one over the chair, the stockings holding the form of her legs and feet. She began to unpack toilet things from a floral-printed bag. — I didn't want to say in front

of Will— Aila stood there in her nightgown in the middle of the room as if it were somewhere she had entered without knocking. He was setting the hour on his bedside alarm radio, and he looked at her at last. — He's not a child — what's the matter? What is it? — A thrill of fear for Baby flashed through him impatiently.