Hiding in Plain Sight

5

After her long sleep, albeit one interrupted by the bad dream that was terrifying in the extreme, Bella feels restored enough to plan the day ahead. She gets out of the bed naked and opens the curtains wide to let the morning in. Instantly, she senses there is something open-ended about the African dawn, as if each day were a new offering, each hour a mystery unfolding. She takes a brief moment to watch as a couple of sparrows come to her side of the window, chirping, singing to her, welcoming her, her first dawn in Nairobi, a city that has the potential of becoming one of her favorite cities, except when she thinks worriedly about its violent nature. But that is not what she is thinking about now, the mayhem that is synonymous with this city, the bombings, and the reckless killings. Rather she is thinking about all the things that need doing — and there are legions of them, so many she would lose count were she to list them. Then with a frightening inevitability, she remembers why she is here: Aar’s death in Mogadiscio and her nephew and niece who need looking after. And the ache in her heart, rapidly increasing, dampens her spirits and she moves away from the window, turning her back on the morning and on the birds whose chatter she no longer hears.

Her change of mood leads her to the bathroom, where, in hope of regaining a firmer foothold in the slippery realities that are claiming her attention, she takes a hot shower. The stream of water jets out, hitting her body from all sides as she soaps herself, as she shampoos her hair, as she watches the brownness of her dirt fleeing fast down into the waiting drain under her feet, and this helps her remain a little aloof for the briefest time possible.

Toweled, she emerges from the bathroom and runs a comb through her dripping wet hair, then uses the hotel dryer. She oils her body with moisturizing ointments and then changes into a custom-made power suit her favorite tailor in Rome, a half-Somali living in that city, designed for her. Bella is pleased with the suit, delighted she could afford to pay for it, as it is out of her league. She brought it along to wear on a day such as this.

Finally, she packs a medium-size bag, into which she puts her most expensive cameras, her cash, her passport, and her computer, from which she has downloaded the attachment to Mr. Kariuki’s e-mail giving her the directions to their home and then copied it by hand since she has no printer in her room. But she doesn’t go down to the lobby immediately, because she is caught in midthought, which unsettles her; she is thinking about where she and Valerie will meet when her sister-in-law arrives in Nairobi tomorrow, something for which she must prepare well in advance. And Bella comes to an instant decision: It would be better if she kept her hotel room for one more day. That way, instead of inviting Valerie (and Padmini, if indeed she is coming) to Aar’s home, where she and the children will have been installed, she will have a neutral place to receive her. After all, you can never tell with Valerie.

Before leaving the room, Bella makes certain to secure all the locks on the hard cases and put the DO NOT DISTURB sign back on her door. And when a woman at the reception desk calls to inform her that her limousine is here, she realizes that she does not have ample time to eat breakfast and settles in her mind for a takeaway coffee in a styrofoam cup and some fruit, which she thinks will be sufficient, as she can’t bear the thought of eating anything; she is antsy, her heart beating needlessly faster, as she thinks of all the possible skirmishes that lie ahead. She walks into the breakfast hall and helps herself to the coffee and grabs a banana and an apple and, smiling, waves away the attention of one of the waiters, who is eager to know if he can assist.

At the reception desk, she identifies herself to the concierge, alerting him that she will be ready to join the driver of the limousine soon. Then she cashes more euros, and with the key to her room safely in her bag, she goes out to meet the limousine. The driver turns out to be a very pleasant elderly man from Eldoret. Bella insists that he tell her the route he plans to take to get to the Kariukis’ home before she gets into the vehicle. She compares the options he gives to the directions Mr. Kariuki has sent her, and when she is satisfied that he knows the route, she climbs into the back and settles in for the ride, anticipating the meeting with Salif and Dahaba with equal parts of joy and dread.

—

Traveling through the city in the back of the limousine, Bella feels almost in her element again. In recent years, her most obvious link to the African continent has been her brother and his children. Yet she is often happiest here. She feels connected to the soul of the continent, even though she knows that, almost to a man or a woman, any African would say that she is not of them. Playing the music of Baaba Maal, Cesária Évora, Toumani Diabaté, or Miriam Makeba calms her nerves and transports her to a world beyond memory, where sadness cannot reach her.

She is most conflicted when it comes to Somalia, her natal country, where bloodthirsty “nativists” claiming ancestral ownership of the land on which the city of Mogadiscio was sited ten thousand years ago have made the city ungovernable. According to what Aar told her when they spoke on the phone or met, the city had lost its charm under the repeated incursions of the clan-based militiamen recruited from communities in south-central Somalia. Then Ethiopia took it, at the behest of the U.S. And then came Shabaab.

It is the emphasis on what passes for clan, ethnic, or religious identity that makes her lose hope for the place. Just because she is a bit light-skinned and has a father from elsewhere is not reason enough to deny her the Somali identity to which she has legal and natal rights. That kind of nativist backward thinking reminds her of the American “birthers” who question Obama’s right to be the president of the United States. For that matter, it reminds her of how some Zambians challenged Kenneth Kaunda’s right to be the country’s first president even after he’d been in power for twenty-six years because he’d been born, they claimed, a kilometer over the border with Malawi.

She hopes that her luck will hold and that she will not find Salif and Dahaba in worse shape than she has been. At the very thought, her eyes fill with tears again, her chest heaving. She pulls out a towelette, the type airlines supply their passengers with before serving meals. She doesn’t want Salif and Dahaba to see her disconsolate. Or at least she doesn’t want to be the one to lead off the wailing.

And then she finds it startling to be staring into the vehicle’s side mirror. Mirrors have always had an immediate impact on her thinking, and seeing her face so unexpectedly reflected in it does not only surprise her but also imposes on her mind a humbling rationale: that she is alive and Aar is not. In an instant, her face, unbidden, runs with buckets of tears making their way down to her cheeks and staining her power suit. And her hand reaches up toward her eyes that are too unhandsome to behold. But when her wandering gaze encounters the driver’s worried look in the rear mirror, a shiver having its origin deep in the seismic tremor that has occurred within her produces a brief muscle spasm. Several seconds go by before the shaking slackens and she is able to wipe away the wetness from her cheeks.

By then, she senses the car slowing down and she assumes that they have arrived at their destination. The driver, discreet as ever, does not delve into the matter in any manner or depth. Nor does he say, “We are here,” even after he has stopped at a manned boom gate, where a uniformed security guard approaches her side and asks her to fill in a form and wait. Bella pulls herself together and does as instructed and gives the clipboard back to the man, who goes into a cubicle and then emerges to tell the driver, “The principal’s house is the biggest bungalow to the left. You can’t miss it.”

A few minutes later, they stop in front of a large bungalow. Bella gathers her thoughts in silence and then tells the driver to wait here, as he will take her and two other people back to Nairobi. But before stepping out of the vehicle, she is suffused with a mixture of anxiety and foreboding, and in a momentary fit of delirium, she wonders if she has the mental strength and physical stamina to maintain her self-control and make sure she won’t lose hold of her emotions and burst into tears the moment she sets eyes on Salif and Dahaba. Eventually, a woman Bella presumes to be Catherine Kariuki opens the door and waits. Bella, unsteady on her feet, somehow makes it out of the car and moves toward the woman holding the door, and her arms open to embrace her.

—

In spite of herself, however, Bella is sniveling again the instant Catherine says, “Bella, sincere condolences for your loss and ours,” and wraps her massive body around her. Then both women let loose a torrent of damnations aimed at Aar’s murderers, at which point the mention of his name brings forth a salvo of blessings. They stand like that, two grown women, one in flat shoes and a flowery summer frock, the other in a power suit and beautifully designed Italian shoes, each repeatedly pleading with the other to please stop crying, please, neither obliging until soft steps descending the stairs behind them make them go silent.

But it is not the children; it is the dog in playful but silent pursuit of the cat. Then the dog starts to bark and Catherine shushes her, saying, “Quiet, you silly thing. It is Bella.” She fetches a toy for the cat to play with, and the two women pause in their grieving, as if attempting to recast their roles in the tragedy they are reliving. The dog disappears and then reappears, holding a leash in its teeth: She wants to go for a walk. Catherine pays no attention but the dog, as if seriously offended, barks fiercely. The cat then turns its back on the goings-on and strides into the inner part of the house. Bella waits, as if expecting that the cat might come back with something in its mouth too, maybe its bowl, to indicate its owner has forgotten to put food in it. Or maybe it will return with a dead mouse, not so much to feed its hunger but to receive a pat on the head. Meanwhile, Catherine holds the dog by the ears, pulling the leash free of its jaws and hanging it on a hook with the promise of a walk in a minute or so. Catherine says to Bella, “As you can see, I have my work cut out for me.”

Bella is not unhappy that they are talking about ordinary matters. She is glad for anything that will occupy her mind and make her forget her pain. She says, smiling, “Now dogs insist on their rights? Dogs?”

“Normally, my husband takes her out first thing, but he had a family emergency in his village and he drove off as soon as we got back,” Catherine says. “He hopes to be back in time to see you.”

“I hope it’s nothing serious,” Bella says.

“Emergencies are a daily routine in our country,” Catherine says, shaking her head. Bella knows what she’s alluding to. In a place where violence is endemic, sudden death, car accidents, family feuds over land and other matters, witchcraft killings, and other deadly rituals are not uncommon.

Catherine says, “Do you mind if I leave you in the house with Salif and Dahaba while I take this dog for a walk?”

“Where are they?” asks Bella.

“Up in their rooms, both of them,” Catherine says, “probably surfing the Net and catching up on text messaging with their friends.”

“Are they already up?”

“I know Dahaba is. She came down when she heard James getting ready to leave. She thought it might be you. She and I had breakfast together.”

“And Salif?”

“He said he wanted to wait and eat with you. He acts tough sometimes, but he’s actually very sensitive. Deep down, he has a big soft center — you’ll see.”

“Just like his father,” says Bella.

“Eggs and bacon and tomato ketchup, those are his morning essentials, he can’t live without them. But perhaps he’s gone back to sleep.”

“Good for young people to sleep; that’s how they grow so big these days.”

And just as Catherine gets hold of the dog’s neck to put the leash on her, Dahaba hurtles down the stairs in a precipitous headlong rush and throws herself into Bella’s arms, her head finding familiar comfort in the curve of her aunt’s neck. A tremor as quietly invasive as it is sudden runs through Bella’s body and transmits itself to Dahaba, and suddenly she is crying out in pain. As if she can’t bear the sight, Catherine slips out the door with the dog in tow; her presence now is redundant.

“I know, darling, I do know, I do,” Bella whispers.

“Why should it happen to us?”

Bella thinks, why indeed? But she doesn’t say this aloud.

Dahaba clings to Bella until at last she is calm enough for Bella to release her. But when she looks up into her aunt’s eyes, a fresh sorrow touches off a new round of weeping. Bella kisses her niece on the cheeks. Dahaba says, “We don’t have another parent.”

Bella wants to say, “I know,” but she thinks of Valerie’s impending arrival and simply says, “You have me, darling, for one. I am here, to be with you and look after you.”

“Thanks, Auntie,” says Dahaba. But Bella pushes on.

“For another, you have a living parent, your mother.”

At that, Dahaba pushes Bella away, and for the first time the two of them stand apart, Dahaba staring at Bella with a look of anger that she has insinuated Valerie into their conversation. Bella won’t pursue the topic now; now is not the time. But Dahaba isn’t quite ready to let it drop.

“Remember, Mum went on a walkabout.”

“Regardless of what she did, she is your mum.”

“We don’t wish to see her,” says Dahaba.

“She loves you, in her own way,” Bella insists gently, remembering that Dahaba was especially close to Valerie at the time when she abandoned them.

“She called here last night,” Dahaba says. “But Salif wouldn’t talk to her.”

“What about you? Did you speak to her?”

“He hung up on her before I got the chance.”

“When did she call?”

“Yesterday evening, just after we got here.”

“She called just the one time?” Bella asks.

“She called back again later.”

“And they talked, did they?” Bella says, sensing that this is the case.

“They spoke a long time,” Dahaba says.

“What about?”

“He won’t tell me.”

“And you didn’t speak to her yourself?”

“I didn’t want to. I’m still upset from before.”

None of these goings-on surprise Bella, and she sees that Valerie’s blowing hot and cold conjures a parallel pattern of anger and yearning in her daughter, and no wonder. Yet again, Bella marvels at the woman’s narcissism, which seems to know no limits.

Dahaba dries her cheeks and leads Bella by the hand into the living room. Suddenly, she turns and says, “It’s wonderful, wonderful that you are here.”

“You are my only darlings,” Bella says.

“We love you too, you know that.”

“I do, my sweet!”

“So you are here for a week or something, right?” Dahaba asks, as if afraid to venture more.

“No, darling,” says Bella. “I am here forever.” And at the moment she says it, it dawns on her it is true.

“Forever, Auntie?”

“I am not going back to Europe.”

“And you’ll be our mum?”

“Yes, I’ll be your mum and your dad too.”

This time it is tears of joy that wet Dahaba’s cheeks. She takes hold of Bella’s hands, kissing each of them in turn. Not for the first time, Bella marvels at how easily a child’s mood changes.

“And so we don’t need to go boarding, do we?”

“No, you don’t.”

“Wait until I tell Salif!”

It strikes Bella only now how child rearing requires a sort of unconditional internal commitment to the task. Everything to do with raising children has its own rationale, she thinks, constructed along the lines of a minor and a major premise and a conclusion bizarrely drawn from neither. For every child is in a world of his or her own making, and everyone else remains outside of it until there is need to involve them, to invite them in — and then only provisionally, and for self-serving reasons. She remembers a Somali saying something to the effect that one’s children are not one’s parents. Which means, in effect, that we think far more often about our children than they are likely to think of us. Even if you are sick or having money problems or other troubles, she realizes, you must not expect them to respond to your needs in the way you’ve responded to theirs. You won’t be able to sleep when they are sick, and you’ll do whatever you can to alleviate their pain or allay their fears. But do not expect them to feel anyone else’s pain the same way! Until, of course, they become parents themselves and have their own children.

“Is Salif still in bed?” Bella asks Dahaba.

But it is Salif who answers, “I am awake,” and, turning, they see him: a gangly youth trying his best to grow a beard and not succeeding. His face is pimpled, his pajamas are missing a couple of buttons, and he is barefoot. Bella instantly suspects that while Dahaba will benefit greatly from her presence it is Salif who needs more care, however he might insist that he needs no one and nothing.

“Hello, my darling!” Bella says.

But Salif is not in a pliant mood, and he won’t rise from where he is crouched on the bottom step of the stairway. Nor does he attempt to take the hand she offers to lift him up. At last Dahaba goes to him and whispers in his ear. He is not moved.

At last, he says to Bella, “When did you come?”

Dahaba, intervening, says, “Don’t answer him.”

“Yesterday,” Bella replies.

“And why didn’t you tell us you were coming then? We would not have gone away!”

Bella looks him in the eye, aware that this sort of conversation so soon after her arrival does not bode well. “There was a misunderstanding about the time of my arrival,” she says calmly. “I was exhausted and upset, and I sent the wrong information.”

“Have you spoken to Mum?” asks Salif.

Bella hesitates. “Not yet. But I will.”

“About our future?”

Again Bella pauses, wondering how best to proceed. “Of course. That will need to be discussed.”

“She gave the impression you did,” says Salif.

Bella is fairly certain that the cold shoulder she is getting is the one he intends for Valerie. Or perhaps he is just going through a phase where he needs to assert his positions and know that he is being taken seriously. At any rate, her instinct tells her to let him bully her a little. She senses that Valerie is a presence in nearly every conversation Dahaba and Salif have right now, the children taking out their anger and uncertainty on everyone else. She examines her fingernails, as though examining them for structural weaknesses; lately, they have been cracking. Then she looks out the window and spots shadows and the shapes of birds high up in the trees. But she is too far away to hear their chirping. Dahaba joins her where she is standing and the two lock arms, the little one placing her head once again in the curve of Bella’s neck.

“Would you like your breakfast, Salif?”

Salif’s expression darkens with unspoken outrage that Bella won’t engage with him in conflict. He has always hated it when adults change the topic of conversation to mundane matters, like food or sleep. When he was younger, he would create ugly scenes when that happened. He was notorious for his ill-timed tantrums, especially in public places — airports or the homes of his parents’ friends. He seemed, in fact, to take great delight in embarrassing his father in front of his friends. As a result, Bella knows, Aar seldom brought anyone home, and until Gunilla, he had never brought home his women friends for fear that his children might behave badly or speak spitefully in their presence. Bella wonders if Salif will one day revisit these ugly confrontations with self-loathing. Just now, he is biting hard on his thumb, as if to keep himself from speaking.

Bella says to Dahaba, “Do you cook?”

“I can make spaghetti and sauce.”

“And what can Salif make?”

“Nothing, not even his favorite bacon.”

“At nearly seventeen, he should be able to make something, surely,” says Bella, opening the fridge and bringing out the butter and then going to the cupboards to find a frying pan. She has difficulties turning on the gas, but Dahaba helps. Then Dahaba takes a seat, gazing at her auntie in delight, in contrast to Salif, who stands silently in the kitchen doorway, pretending still to be angry.

Bella says to Dahaba, “Do you eat bacon as well?”

“Yes, I do, Auntie.”

“And yet you claim to be a Muslim?”

Dahaba nods her head and says nothing.

“We do eat it and are proud of it,” Salif says defiantly.

Bella opens the packet of bacon and begins to separate the stringy rashers and lay them in the frying pan.

Salif adds, “Our father always insisted on us being Muslim, culturally speaking, even though he partook of the odd glass of wine at birthdays and other celebrations, and occasionally with his meals.”

“How are Qamar and Zubair?” Bella asks, changing the subject. Qamar and Zubair are Fatima and Mahdi’s daughter and son, who are close in age to Dahaba and Salif and not only go to the same school but also have similar interests. Zubair, like Salif, is into soccer to the point of obsession, and Qamar, like Dahaba, is a budding feminist.

“We haven’t seen them for a couple of days,” Salif says, this time not sulking at the change of topic.

“I spoke to Auntie Fatima and Uncle Mahdi,” Bella tells him.

“Can we arrange to meet them?” Salif asks.

“As soon as you like,” Bella says.

“Tomorrow?”

“I can’t see why not,” Bella says.

Bella knows that it is only because Mahdi was away in Somalia at the time of Aar’s death, and Fatima had a medical procedure scheduled, that the children went to stay with James and Catherine rather than with these dear family friends. She also knows that Qamar and Zubair do not eat bacon and that their parents do not touch liquor at all. But they are tolerant enough of their friends’ “un-Islamic” ways.

She also suspects that Valerie would go bonkers if she knew about her children’s closeness to the family, who no doubt encourage them to identify primarily as Somali and Muslim. Valerie harbors an ancient antipathy to Islam, springing from a story about her grandfather being sodomized when he fell into the hands of a local militia in North Africa.

Bella puts a plate before Salif. “Here, done. Come and eat.”

Salif drowns the bacon in huge spurts of ketchup, and despite the knife and fork she has set by his plate, he uses his fingers, mopping his plate with the last rasher.

Then he says to Bella, “About our father?”

“What about him?”

“In his will, did he ask to be cremated?”

“Not to my knowledge,” Bella says. “But I have not yet seen his final will. Why do you ask?”

“Mum talked about cremation yesterday.”

“She mentioned nothing of the sort to me,” Bella says, reminding herself to stay calm.

“Where was he buried?”

Bella takes care not to give any more information than necessary, as it will serve no one’s interest. So she does not disclose all that she has learned of the circumstances of Aar’s death but says only, “In Mogadiscio, soon after he died.”

Dahaba asks, “Why did they bury him so fast?”

“It is part of the Muslim tradition.”

“No,” says Salif, ignoring her and answering Dahaba himself. “They bury the dead within hours because it is very hot up there, being closer to the Equator, and unless the corpse is embalmed quickly, it will begin to deteriorate.” Again that hostile edge!

He turns back to Bella. “Mum thinks it is stated in his will that he wants his body to be cremated.”

For the first time in their presence, Bella feels her temper flare. But before she can speak, Dahaba chimes in, “Mum has no business here.”

“As if she will listen to your advice!” Salif spits.

And just as the two of them face off, about to go at it, Bella clears her throat, making them turn to face her. Regaining her calm, she says, “Next time, please tell your mum to address any questions she may have about your father’s will, his burial, or his estate to me directly.”

But Salif isn’t finished. “Is it legally incumbent on the living to follow to the letter the will of the dead with respect to their wishes for the disposition of their bodies?”

“From whom does this question come?” says Bella, not answering.

“Does it matter?” counters Salif.

“It does,” says Bella. “And I don’t know the answer.”

Bella is more than certain that Valerie, whose nickname in some quarters is “Madam Confusion,” is the source of this line of questioning. Bella has a copy of one version of Aar’s will, and she knows it makes no mention of cremation, but she is not certain it is the most recent one. Still, she suspects that if there was ever such a stipulation it belonged to an earlier period, when Aar was interested in Indian philosophy, and to an earlier draft. A draft when Valerie and he still lived as husband and wife. She says to Salif, “What’s your interest in all this?”

“We should do what his will says.”

“And if it so stipulates, would you like your father’s body exhumed?” Bella asks.

“Why not?”

“And what if people — living people — find the idea inconsistent with their beliefs and abhorrent? Do you think this would bring comfort to your father? What would be gained?”

“I want to honor his will.”

“But that is ridiculous,” Dahaba says.

To Bella’s immense relief, at that very moment they hear a key turning in the lock. The dog enters and makes her way right for Dahaba and Salif, jumping boisterously on them. Catherine greets them and excuses herself to go wash her hands. The lucky arrival of the dog has defused a moment of tension. For the time being, the subject is dropped.

At the mention of the move back to their house, Bella offers to help Dahaba and Salif to pack. Dahaba says, “Yes, thank you,” but Salif says, “I can do my own packing.”

And they are ready to leave inside half an hour.