Moses Isegawa - Abyssinian Chronicles

The majority won, and the gift was accepted. The interesting part was watching Mbale and a few other men, who knew a lot about roofs and the price of iron sheets, capped and uncapped nails, beams, labor and the like, calculating how much money was needed to complete the job as quickly as possible. Virgin’s parents, dismayed at having failed to kick the traders out of the temple, could not bear the lugubrious look of the crucified Jesus and left the house. They went for a long, somber walk, bemoaning the shameful hijacking of holy matrimony by Mammon.

Serenity loved the histrionics. For the first time in living memory he did not begrudge the shopkeepers their earnings. He could already see the new iron sheets glittering in the sun. There was another fine twist to it all: the spirit of the corrugated-iron church tower he had wanted to destroy had invaded this house, and was about to shatter or dent this family’s very Catholic sensibilities. Here, it would not be a tower, but it would have as much power. Mammon’s profanity was going to shine. Strangers in sweaty overalls were going to invade this place, tear down the dilapidated roof and spray the air with rust, broken nails and rotten beams. Buried in the rubble would be the Virgin Mary, with her dead alabaster smell and promises. Up would go the new roof, proclaiming the rise of the new Virgin and her new wine. Up would go the new roof and the thrust of his new life, power and the glitter of his new dream. The heap of banknotes, a mini-tower in itself, made him feel happy. He was not like those grooms who promised heaven and earth before the wedding, and afterward failed to fulfill those promises, bloated with tactical amnesia. Everything was going to be on time: he was a doer, not a promiser.

Virgin watched the roofers, heard their oblique comments and resented them for sprinkling rust in the butter oil her aunt was rubbing into her skin to super-condition it for the wedding. Local butter oil redolent with a faint milk smell was used because it worked better than industrial products. It made the skin browner, clearer and tighter on the bones. Virgin, like most peasant girls not raised around cows and fresh milk, found the scent disturbing, almost nauseating. The fear of carrying a milk smell in her bridal garments and into her marital bed bothered her. One had to make a perfect first impression. One did not want a niggling imperfection wedging itself into the scheme of more important things. She was gripped by the fear that the baths, some herbal, would not defeat the smell.

Although she felt like exploding in kaleidoscopic displays of violent anxiety, she kept her temper under wraps. She wanted to maintain control of what was going on around her. But how could she manage to achieve that amidst all the hammering, the shouting and the leering of the roofers? How could she remain the center of attention when so many relatives, friends, villagers and strangers were milling about, calling, screaming, barking orders, contesting superior knowledge of decorum, custom, tradition, religion and nonsense? All the villagers who owed her parents a favor and those who didn’t were there, lending a hand, necessary or superfluous, adding to the madness. Most annoying of all, religion had been chucked to the sidelines. Nobody said morning or evening prayers anymore. People all around her were indulging their lusts without a care in the world. Her parents had given up trying to make them say grace before meals. Local beer was flowing down cheerful throats all day. In short: The Devil was winning when this should have been God’s biggest hour. And there she was, unable to do anything about it.

Amidst this physical and mental turmoil, the bride turned her mind to her father-in-law, and she experienced something akin to hot flashes. She did not like the man at all. All the vibes from that direction were wrong. Their two personalities were antagonistic, and yet she was destined to spend a number of years as his neighbor. How was she going to do that? She also worried about Serenity’s aunt. She did not like her either. Who could like a woman suffering from amenorrhea? It was whispered that she had menstruated only thrice in her whole life. Such people were often witches, people to be feared. Their tongues were often potent beyond measure, making things happen even if they did not mean them to. On top of it, the woman had had that buffalo dream. What was she supposed to make of it? How could she make something of anything when she was not in control, when the whole world seemed to be milling around on top of her head?

She could have called off the wedding, but who had ever heard of a peasant girl calling off a wedding? After all this? Who would listen to her? Which fancy reasons would she give? A bride’s sensitivities and anxieties? She knew nothing would wash with this crowd of lively souls. And she did not want to call the wedding off, even if she could. It was her show, her day in the sun. All the impotence and hostility she felt against Serenity, against herself, the roofers, Mbale, Sr. John Chrysostom (her erstwhile Mother Superior), and against the world, was a way of coming to terms with her new position in life, her new powers, her new expectations, her new dreams.

Serenity was in seventh heaven; Virgin’s family were quivering with the thunder of his power. His success felt even sweeter when put into proper perspective. As a typical go-between man, always relying on others to transmit his messages and negotiate on his behalf in matters of the heart, he had suffered terrible anxiety, a condition exacerbated by the second go-between’s long absences and mysterious silences. Had she betrayed him and chickened out? That was how people generally let one know that there was no hope. Such people assumed that it saved your feelings and your dignity a few ugly dents. Serenity always preferred to have the bad news up front: it hurt intensely at first, but the pain disappeared gradually into the mists of fate or in the vapors of another chance arising. Serenity was not the conquering type; unlike his father, he found the fear of rejection too real. He preferred the mediation of others and the time it gave him to digest and weigh all possible outcomes. He thought of himself as a crocodile, ever conserving his energy by waiting and letting the prey come to him. That anesthetized him against the guilt some conquerors felt when terminating relationships. He always felt that the prey had seen it coming. Virgin had delivered herself to him, and the intensity of the fire she had ignited in him, coupled with the psychological lift he had given her, should have canceled out any hesitation whatsoever. So why was she torturing him?

As the nights sat on him and the pressure and the pain permeated every fiber in his body, Serenity went over the course of his preliminary dealings with Virgin. He had surely not forced himself on her. The attraction had been mutual. In addition, he had shown her great respect. He had not blown his trumpet, or said anything to inflate his ego. If anything, he had given her the impression that her opinion was all that mattered. Why, then, was there this horrible news blackout? The weakness of the go-between system was that it left many questions unanswered for too long. How long was he supposed to wait? The days had now gone into high double digits. Anger and frustration had corroded his patience, his understanding, his hope. When the pain became too harsh, he contemplated dropping her. He could do it because he was a man aware of defeat in life; the feeling would not be new. He could call off the go-between, swear never to see Virgin again and crawl back into his father’s arms. He gave it three more days and nights. However, just as if Virgin had been spying on him, seeing into his mind and gauging his limit, he got a message from her two days later.