The Go-Away Bird

‘That close, eh?’

‘So close. I think it knew that it did not have to be scared of me.’

‘I am sure it knew. I am sure.’

Mum is back, crouching by the water, filling the last can. When she finishes she gives one to Jeanette, places one at Dad’s feet – for me, picks up the other two herself and marches off up the hill towards home. I stand on Dad’s arms as if they are the branches of a tree – they are as thick and as strong – and clamber up from his chest to his shoulders, as far from the heavy water can as I can go! He does not complain, he just bends his knees, scoops up the can and follows the others, with his free hand wrapped warmly all the way around my little, cold ankle – his one hand goes easily round it, but my two arms just about reach around his neck. I have to hold on tight as I bounce around high above the sloping path on the side of the hill. So my voice wobbles when I say,

‘Tell me a story! Tell me a story, Daddy!’

‘Mmm…’

His voice vibrates against my hands wrapped round his throat. It is such a big voice that it vibrates all around his head and so my tummy buzzes with it. Because I am so high up on his shoulders, all I can see ahead of me are the sky and the many hills in the distance that still look blue at this time of day. It is like a fresh blue piece of paper that I can paint onto, paint the picture of the things that the voice tells me about. Dad’s voice. But I can’t see Dad from here, I just hear his voice, like a magic voice bringing characters to life in my mind and on the paper in front of me. That is why I always ask for a story when we are walking like this. I think Dad expects me to ask too, because he only hums for a second before he starts.

‘Many years ago, a man called Sebwgugu married a young and very beautiful woman. The day after they were married there was a severe, terrible drought. Food and water became very scarce.’

I paint the hills a hot, dry red – the colour of the main road to Kigali.

‘One day,’ Dad’s voice warms my belly, ‘Sebwgugu’s wife set out to collect firewood. And, while walking the forest floor, she came to a clearing and happened upon a thriving pumpkin patch…’

Trees cover the red hills and there is Sebwgugu’s wife clapping her hands,

‘…pleased with such a rare and lucky find, under the dry conditions. Carrying as many pumpkins as she could possibly manage, she returned home. That evening she and Sebwgugu had a delicious pumpkin meal. The newlyweds were very happy.’

I dare to lift my hands up from Dad’s neck and hold onto the top of his round head instead – still looking ahead at the scene, I can feel a big round pumpkin beneath my hands.

‘Miam, miam! Pumpkin!’ I giggle, and bounce my teeth carefully off Dad’s short hair – carefully because we are still wobbling on up the hill and I do not want to knock my teeth out on his hard head, or hurt his head, because then the fun would really be over. My giggle sounds funny and muffled when my mouth touches his hair so I want to do it again, but suddenly I feel Dad’s hard hands on mine. He scrunches up my hands like they were just leaves – he does not hurt me, he just slaps my hands back around his throat and the voice comes back. He has not finished.

‘One morning, Sebwgugu’s wife noticed their supply of pumpkins was running low. She decided to walk back to the patch and collect more. Out of curiosity, Sebwgugu followed his wife. He simply wanted to see from where the pumpkins were coming. When Sebwgugu arrived he suggested to his wife that the pumpkin patch be weeded in hopes of growing bigger pumpkins. She disagreed and kindly asked that he leave the patch be and let it grow naturally. The next day, without his wife’s knowledge, Sebwgugu returned to the patch and weeded the entire area.’

I hear a sharp click – as if it is the sound of my painting snapping in two because it falls away from my eyes now and I see real life again all around. The dusty path ahead, the banana plantation now very close by, Jeanette down below and the back of Mum’s head, where the click came from. She is unhappy about something and I think that it is either Dad or Sebwgugu himself. As Dad continues the story quickly, I put my picture back together, but I have a good look at the banana trees first. Just hundreds of bunches of smooth green bananas under the shade of big shiny leaves. I can see each one clearly, just trying to grow. The giant scary creatures that I thought I saw from a distance are not here.

‘Soon after,’ booms the voice, ‘the pumpkin supply at home was again low. Sebwgugu’s wife returned to the patch and found it dry. There were no more pumpkins. Although very upset that he had weeded the patch after she had asked him not to, she said nothing to her husband. The pumpkins stored at home were quickly finished. The morning after the last pumpkin was consumed, Sebwgugu’s wife told him that she was going to search for water. She lied. Still upset that he had weeded the pumpkin patch, their only source of food during the continued drought, she decided to run away.

‘Later that evening, Sebwgugu’s wife stumbled upon a splendid house. She knocked on the door but nobody answered. Surprised to find the door unlocked and needing a place to sleep for the night, she entered the house. Although there was nobody home the house was filled with food. She cooked herself a nice dinner and went to bed. The next morning, Sebwgugu went looking for his wife and found her at the splendid house. She told him that she had got lost and had to spend the night. He believed her and they sat down for dinner.

‘While eating, Sebwgugu’s wife shared that, the night before, a big and mean animal arrived to the house and asked for help unloading what it was carrying. Scared, she told the big animal to go away, locked all the doors to the house and went back to bed. She then asked Sebwgugu to please not help the mean animal if it returned.

‘Sure enough, later that night under the moonlit sky, the big animal knocked on the door.’

I am glad that Dad says that the night was lit by the moon, because I am having trouble painting such a dark scene – the sun is quickly climbing in real life, beating us to the top of the hill and shining straight into my eyes. So the moon in our story is very, very bright, OK?

‘Sebwgugu answered the door and the animal asked for help. Ignoring his wife’s warning, Sebwgugu obliged. When he stepped outside to help, the big animal ate Sebwgugu in one bite – RAHH!’

My heart jumps and I hold tighter to Dad at the beast’s roar. Jeanette turns her gasp into a little giggle. She must have slowed down to let us close the gap so she could enjoy the story also. When I look down at her I see that Mum is now closer too. And because the sun rises in front of us, I can see Mum’s thin shadow stretching out towards me, and her other shadow next to her – Jeanette.

‘Proud of his tricking Sebwgugu, the animal yelled into the forest, “I have eaten a man and will now look for a woman to do the same.” Startled by this, Sebwgugu’s wife jumped out of bed and grabbed a machete to protect herself. When the mean animal tried to enter the house, Sebwgugu’s wife smote it in the head, killing it at once.

‘She then found a drum and beat it joyously as the sun rose, all throughout the day and all through the night. The entire forest echoed with her brilliant drumming. The next morning a handsome man appeared. He was the king of the forest and the owner of the splendid house, yet was frightened away by the big and mean animal. Hearing the familiar drum, he returned to investigate. Sebwgugu’s wife told the king all that had happened to her. IMPRESSED BY HER BEAUTY AND BRAVERY…’

Dad’s voice became much louder right then – my hands could no longer touch each other as his neck grew thicker to make the sound – and he raised his head as if he was shooting the words straight towards Mum. At this she slowed down even more and cocked her head to one side, as if my dad’s great words weighed heavy on one of her ears.

‘…IMPRESSED BY HER BEAUTY AND BRAVERY, the king asked for her hand in marriage. She agreed with a smile; they were married and lived happily ever after.’

Jeanette and I both cheer at the happy ending, but Jeanette’s cheer is a little breathless – I think she has had enough of carrying the can up the hill.

‘Why do we tell the story of Sebwgugu and his wife, Clementine?’ Dad says seriously, like a teacher at school.

I think I know the answer, but I am scared to say it, just in case it is not right after all and I disappoint Dad and look silly in front of Jeanette.

‘Clem?’

The pathway stops rising as we enter our village and Dad puts his one free hand behind his head so that I can hold on as he lowers me to the ground. As my feet feel warm hard earth again, Dad, crouching down, is looking straight into my eyes. He is looking for the answer to his question. And now I do not mind trying to tell him, because I can start my answer slowly and I can see from his face – the way his nose moves and the way his eyes change shape – whether or not I am getting things right.

‘It tells us…to not waste…the chances,’ I can see that I am right and I just want to kiss his cheeks as they rise with his eyebrows, ‘the chances given to you in life.’

‘And…?’

The words come rushing fast, now I am sure, ‘And be satisfied with what you have.’

‘Very good!’

I take my kiss and he returns one on my forehead, holding my shoulders as he does so, otherwise I am sure I would fall over with the force of it.

‘And…?’ Mum has stopped outside our house. She sounds stern like a teacher now. ‘What else does the story of Sebwgugu and his wife tell us?’

I look to Jeanette – she is too busy shaking her aching arm about. I look to Dad – his lips are squeezed tight. Either he wants another kiss or he is trying to stop a smile.

‘Respect what your wife has to say!’ I did not hear Pio come to the door. Mum does not seem surprised, though. She does not even look at him. She keeps her big eyes on me – and Dad – and says,

‘Well done, Pio. Respect what your wife has to say. Remember it well.’ And she turns and steps past Pio’s smug face, with both her shadows following closely.

‘Remember it well,’ whispers Dad like an echo as he rises – I cannot tell if he means me to hear it or if he is only telling himself.

‘It is no great thing that you know the answer,’ I say to Pio’s face which is frozen in its know-it-all grin at the door. ‘You are older than me. Four years older than me – you have probably been told it hundreds more times than me.’

‘Or perhaps I am just smarter than you, my little sister,’ and he says these last words in English as if to prove how smart he is.

But I understand it. I am doing very well at English in school, so I say – in English – as I step inside,

‘Excuse me, brother, I will take my breakfast now,’ and I prod him in the stomach and run before he can return it.

We stop running almost as soon as we start because of the look Mum gives to us through the doorway to the back yard where she prepares the porridge.

‘What shall I do, Mummy?’ If I help then it will feel like that look was more for Pio than me.

‘Bring the sorghum.’

I prefer the porridge when it is only made from corn, but we grow the sorghum ourselves so we have it nearly all the time. Dad is good at growing things. Everyone says so. People come to him for advice about their fields sometimes. They say he is a natural. They say it is his ‘Hutu blood’, whatever that means.

The porridge is OK today – I put extra milk on to make it sweeter. The milk comes from our cows. Granddad gave them to Mummy when she married Daddy.

‘Miam miam! The porridge is lovely!’ Jeanette says to Mum. I am not sure whether she really means it. She says it every time. Her family does not have any cows though. I know I am luckier than her.

And that makes me think of this morning down by the river and the birds with the red eyes – and the one that seemed to blame me for the things that Jeanette did. And the eyes make me think of Uncle Leonard so I say,

‘Where is Uncle Leonard today?’ because he has been sleeping at our house so often for the last few weeks.

Mum gives Dad the look that she gave him when she asked me the meaning of Sebwgugu’s story.

Dad adds more sugar to his tea and as he stirs it says, ‘Uncle Leonard has gone away. He has gone far away, so we may not see him for a very long time.’

‘Where has he gone to, Dad?’ Pio seems as surprised as I am to hear the news.

‘He has gone to England.’

Lord, that is far away. I have sometimes dreamed about going to England – by aeroplane.

‘Why?’

‘Pio, it is complicated, but he was not very happy here any more. He needed to make a fresh start.’

It feels like Dad does not want to say any more, and so I say something to stop Pio asking more questions,

‘One day perhaps we can all visit Uncle Leonard and Auntie Rose in England!’

Dad finishes his tea, gets up, kisses my head and grabs his machete from its place by the door.

‘It is time for me to go to work and you to go to school. Nice to see you again, Jeanette. Say hello to your mother and father for me tonight.’

‘I will!’

But as Dad walks out into the brightness, Mum hurries after him.

‘Finish your breakfast and prepare for school,’ she says over her shoulder. Then in her stern voice we hear, ‘Jean-Baptiste!’

Pio and I look at each other for a moment to see if the other is going to do as they were told or do what is more tempting. We quickly jump up and go to the doorway, being careful to stay just inside where it is dark, and we listen.

‘Jean-Baptiste, do you leave me to explain the truth to them when they see Rose is still in Nyamata?’

‘She rarely comes this way and it is not likely they will go that far if they think she has left too.’

‘Do not fool yourself; they will see her eventually and they will ask her where Leonard is if we have not told them the situation.’

‘I will explain later, darling.’ Dad sounds tired suddenly. ‘I will!’

‘You tell that story to Clem this morning to mock me then.’

‘No! Chantal, perhaps I tell that story to tell myself what an idiot Leonard has been. But he needs help too. He is my brother and I pray he will find the help he needs in England.’

‘You pray he will not bring shame on your family, so you help him to go as far away as possible.’

‘It is for the best. Especially now.’

Nobody is speaking. There is just the sound of the earth in our courtyard being scraped by a foot.

‘I must get to the field. I love you.’

I think I hear the sound of a kiss but Pio has run to our room so I follow before Mum returns. As she enters the house I hear her say,

‘Thank you, Jeanette, but you must leave for school now. I will clean things away.’

Lord, I bet Jeanette does not bother to help out so much at her house!

‘Clementine! Pio! Are you ready?’

We both shout out that we are as we gather our books, staring at each other – I think we are both trying to work out if we understood more than the other about what we just heard. But I think we are both still unsure of it all, except for the fact that Auntie Rose has not gone to England with Uncle Leonard.

We do not talk about it on the way to school much – I am not sure what there is to talk about. I do not feel so sad that Uncle Leonard has gone. For the last few months he always made it feel awkward or a bit frightening at home when he was there.

‘What is your Auntie Rose like?’ says Jeanette.

‘Haven’t you ever met her?’ says Pio.

‘Never.’

‘I am surprised, with the amount of time you spend at our house!’

‘Shut up!’

‘You shut up!’

‘Auntie Rose is lovely,’ I say before they start fighting in the road, ‘isn’t she, Pio?’ but he is marching off ahead.

‘Good!’ Jeanette says to his back. ‘I do not want to walk the next five miles with him. Is she as pretty as your mum though?’

‘Rose? No way. Mum is the most beautiful in our family. She is the tallest, the thinnest. It is because she is Tutsi.’

‘What is that?’

I was hoping she would not ask that.

‘I don’t know – beautiful, I suppose.’

Although Jeanette and I both speak Kinyarwanda and French, we do not know what the word ‘Tutsi’ means. Perhaps it is an English word. Or just a word in French or our own language that we have not learnt yet.

‘I’m nervous.’

I am surprised to hear Jeanette say this as we take our places in our new classroom. But I have not really thought about it, even on the long walk, a much longer walk to this school – the school for older children. All I have been thinking about is this new word. And Mum’s sternness this morning. And her conversation with Dad about Auntie Rose. I had almost forgotten my own nerves about starting at the big school today.

‘Hutus, stand up!’

The teacher’s voice makes me jump as he marches into the classroom. He looks as if he has no neck, as though his wide face is just stuck on the top of his enormous shoulders and, as three quarters of the class stand up, I can see that he is not really that tall either.

Jeanette is standing. I suppose I should too then. So I do. She gives me a quick, frightened look as my eyes rise to find hers – I am trying to find out why we are standing, searching for the answer in her face. ‘Hutu,’ he said, I think. He is taking each child’s name now and checking it against his list, and then he tells each of us to sit down afterwards. They say Dad’s Hutu blood makes him a great farmer. If he is Hutu, whatever that means, then I must be too.

‘Jeanette Mizinge.’

‘Sit!’

‘Clementine Habimana.’

The teacher takes a pause – he said ‘sit’ so quickly after everyone else said their names, but he does not do so after I speak. He looks hard at me, narrowing his eyes – I think he might need glasses.

‘Sit!’

I do quickly and search for Jeanette’s hand under the table. Her hand is damp, but I squeeze it anyway and she squeezes mine in return. This makes me feel better.

‘Twas, stand up!’

Only two boys stand – they look the same, perhaps they are brothers, but they look different from the rest of us. They are very short. I have never seen anyone else that looks like them before. Their names are unusual too – they sound almost as if they are speaking a different language when they answer the teacher. I feel nervous and strong all at once. Strong because I am glad it is not me standing up with just one other in front of everyone like that. Stronger because nearly everyone else is like me, a Hutu. But I feel nervous for the Twa boys – I have the feeling that they are in trouble with the teacher, in trouble for being…only two. Then my heart almost leaps into my mouth when the teacher shouts his next word as if it tastes horrible on his tongue.

‘Tutsis, stand up!’

There is that word again. Tutsi. I cannot believe it – we were only talking about it this morning on our way here. Tutsi – that is what they say my mum is. So I must be too. Nine or ten children in front of me start to rise from their seats, and some behind me too (I could feel them, hear them, I am not sure which because it all happened quickly in real life, only slowly when I remember it). I am not sure whether I even turn to look. But I feel myself untangle my hand from Jeanette’s, because she is not getting up with me, although I thought she would. She is my mum’s shadow. She thinks Mum is the most beautiful too. And if to be Tutsi is to be like Mum, then I must be Tutsi as well as Hutu. I look down at Jeanette as I stand as straight and as tall as I can. She looks confused and scared.

The teacher starts to take the names of all the Tutsis standing up – there are a lot less of us than the Hutus – but he stops suddenly. The sudden silence makes me look up from Jeanette and into the angry eyes of the teacher again.

‘Clementine –’ he is checking his list – ‘Habimana, what do you think you are doing?’

The children in front all turn to stare at me too and I know how the Twa boys felt now. What do I think I am doing? What…

‘Well?’ His wide head looks like it is swelling up, getting wider, perhaps going to explode. ‘You are either a Hutu or a Tutsi! Now, which is it?’

Which is it? You mean I can only be one or the other – not both? I am not sure what to do. It feels like an age before I decide. Most of the class are Hutu – it felt powerful to be the same as everyone else. Jeanette is Hutu. And we must be the same. But perhaps she does not realize if she is Tutsi too. So she cannot know how nice it is to feel special, not the same as everyone else, one of the beautiful ones. But it does not feel that good right now. I feel Jeanette’s hand on the back of my knee – she only touches me lightly, but I tell myself that she has almost beaten her fist there so I have no choice but to sit down, otherwise I might have been standing there all day! I want to tell the teacher that I think my mother is Tutsi and my father a Hutu, but he does not seem in the mood for any more words from me. He just stares through the standing Tutsis at me – I feel like an antelope hiding in the forest and he is the hunter peering through the tall trees trying to find me. He keeps looking, even as he starts checking the next name on his list. Then his eyes finally leave me and I start to breathe again – it is only when I start that I realize I had stopped!

Chapter 3

‘Tell me a story. And remember to breathe!’

‘What do you mean?’

I pressed ‘stop’ on the tape deck before the song kicked in again. Sometimes when I’m teaching I feel a right fraud, I tell you. I mean, when there’s someone in front of me with a great voice already, I just want to say, ‘Go away, save your twenty quid: there’s nothing I can teach you!’ But then I think about my own bank balance and I ask myself, why are they here? If they’re such good singers, if they think they’re such good singers, what are they doing coming to a teacher? So I start to look for faults, scribbling frantically in my important-teacher-looking file (99p WH Smith) as they sing Mariah better than Mariah again. That ‘all’ was a bit shorter than Mariah’s = she has a problem with her breathing. Hits every bloody high note without fail = needs lower range developing. Looks a bit nervous standing in a scummy room in the middle of the scariest council estate in London singing to a stranger with a receding hairline = has a confidence problem.

Bingo!

That’s why the singers who can sing come looking for a teacher – they lack confidence. It’s like paying twenty quid to go and see a therapist, I suppose, and I’m happy to play Dr Bolt for an hour – everyone’s a winner! Except…then I feel even more of a fraud. Me, teaching confidence. Hey, student, this is how I deal with my stresses: grab a knife, any knife, but it must be sharp, really sharp, then pull up a sleeve and find a bit of skin that isn’t already cut or scarred (obviously this gets more difficult the more you do it, but for a novice like you the world is your oyster), sink in that knife as if you were slicing bread, not too fast and not too deep (we don’t want to damage tendons if possible), just deep enough so that the pain blots out the stresses and the nerves. Some rock stars take copious amounts of cocaine to boost their confidence – OK if you can afford it, I suppose – but all you need is an everyday kitchen knife and you can manufacture your own drugs, your own anaesthetic, free of charge whenever you want.

That’s not what I tell the eighteen-year-old Mariah-wannabe fiddling with the edge of her lyric sheet, by the way! Because when it comes to teaching confidence in singing, really I’m selling myself short if I say I’m a fraud. If there’s one time in my life when I’m truly confident, when I don’t think for a second about cutting myself, or even so much as a little burn, then it’s when I’m on stage singing. One minute before I go on, maybe, as I pace the dressing room. Two seconds after I get off, probably, as I remember the tiny mistake I made that no one else noticed. But while I’m on stage…I’m in heaven, I tell you…If only the gig could go on for ever…And if only I could get a bloody gig these days.