drags me into the kitchen. The pressure cooker is shooting steam all over the room. She reaches into a drawer and pulls out the wooden spoon. It has a name: Gemmy. This makes it sound friendly. But it’s not.
She always catches me if I try to run away, so I just show her the palms of my hands and sigh. Benny’s nanny isn’t allowed to smack him. But my father says Gemima’s mummy also had a wooden spoon on the farm and it never did him any harm.
I stare at Gemima with my hating eyes as she slams the spoon down. I don’t pull my hands away. She hits harder than usual, her face tight.
“That’s for not listening to me. That’s for playing your stupid game and teasing that poor old man. That’s for the loquats. And that’s to remind you to be good tomorrow.”
To get her back I’m going to wish the tokoloshe on her. It will eat her brains tonight when she’s asleep. I cross fingers on both my hands and make the wish as she tells me to sit down.
Gemima butters a slice of white bread, sprinkles sugar on top, and puts it on a plate in front of me. I keep my hands in my lap away from the bread until her back is turned.
I hear my father at the front door. He is putting his doctor bag next to the telephone table, his hat and jacket on the hook in the hallway next to my school blazer. He comes through to the kitchen, strokes the top of my head, and greets Gemima.
“Everything all right, Ntombi?” My father has always called her this, ever since they were children on the farm. It’s Zulu for girl. “How were things at home today?” He relies on her to give him a rundown of the day’s events. Whether my mother ate lunch, or left the bedroom to sit and sew. And whether I behaved.
“Was Margaret a good girl?”
I rub my red palms together. I know she’s going to tell on me.
Gemima smiles, her eyes steely as she glances down at me. “She was as good as gold, Doctor C-C.” Everyone calls him this. Channing-Court is a mouthful and a half.
She doesn’t tell my father about Mr Dickson and the gun. And I don’t tell him about the African I saw hiding from the police under Sophie’s bed. It’s our secret.
Some days, Gemima and I understand each other. Perfectly.
JENNA
Dear Teen Agony Aunt
I want to divorce my mother. Please advise me how to do this. ASAP.
Yours sincerely
Miserable At Home (15 years old)
Yes, I wrote this email. In February, a whole month ago. I’m still waiting for a response but I guess Aunty Agony thought I was trying to be funny and deleted it. Except, I wasn’t joking. See, my name is Jenna Moore but I’m also Miserable At Home.
I use the “home” word loosely. It’s just a house where I live with my mom until my dad discovers my existence and rescues me from domestic hell.
The idea of divorcing my mother didn’t come from nowhere. I read about a sixteen-year-old girl who actually tried it. In her case the dad was the problem. He was too strict on her. My mom doesn’t care what time I go to bed, if I do my homework, what my report says, or if I bunk school. She isn’t an uptight dictator, she’s just totally hopeless.
It’s dark outside, and I’m in bed listening to the rain thudding on the roof. Trickling down my bedroom wall. The cooking pot propped against my feet, catching the water dripping from the ceiling, is close to overflowing. Plop. Plop. Plop. I’m not kidding. The roof’s a colander.
My mother tiptoes into my bedroom and swops the pot with a bucket, trying to make as little noise as possible. She’s not big on confrontation and believes in letting dogs and hormonally challenged teenagers sleep.
“I thought you got the roof fixed?” My voice – soft, but hard – stops her at the doorway. Busted!
Our roof has been fixed more times than I’ve had sex. Not that I’ve had any, so it’s not such a hard number to beat. My mom collects hot handymen like spare change. The first “builder” was Useless Trevor, then Useless Graham and after them guys whose names I can’t remember. They all said that the roof was as tightly sealed as a priest’s lips after confession. They took our cash and ran, leaving us to deal with the leaks.
“Maybe I can track Phineas down. He was cute. But he must have overlooked a couple of things.” My mother shrugs, wrinkles her nose in a way some men find appealing. Yes, Useless Phineas, that’s him. He was the last one not to fix the roof.
“What an awesome storm!” She laughs as lightning cracks and rain slams down on our tin roof.
Yes, awesome.
If you met my mother you’d probably think she was cool. “Call me Holly. Mrs Moore is too old. Jenna calls me Holly too, don’t you, baby?” I do. Always have. Calling her Mom would be like Cinderella’s sister trying to squeeze her fat foot into the glass slipper. It could never, ever fit.
“I’m too young to lay all that mumsy crap on you, that’s for other people. We’re different, I want us to be besties.” She pulls me close and squeezes the breath out of me as she says this.
Like, really? Why would a fifteen-year-old girl want to be best friends with a thirty-three-year-old woman?
If your dad met Holly and me he’d look us both up and down and his eyes would settle on her. Maybe for a bit too long. On the belly ring peeping out from under her T-shirt or the daisy tat on her left shoulder. He’d probably say something like: “So, which one of you is the older sister?” It’s sickening.
I can’t introduce you to my dad because he isn’t around. Hasn’t been for the past fifteen years. A bit scarce, really, like world peace.
Holly got “knocked up” during her first year at university. Whoopsie! As if someone just knocked against her and she fell. Up rather than down.
Wingardium Leviosa! And there I was, her little floating bun, fresh out of the oven.
Holly was open with me about it right from the get-go. Some mothers don’t play it straight with their kids. Let’s face it, there’s a two-thousand-year religion, courtesy of a mother who didn’t ’fess up. No, Holly’s a fierce believer that honesty is the best policy even when it guts your four-year-old kid, and actually, a few white lies would have done the trick in the meantime.
“Sorry, baby, your dad and I just didn’t work out and he wasn’t too keen on a kid. He ran for the hills. But you’ve got me, haven’t you?”
Class act.
“He was a really nice guy, just commitment phobic. Maybe next year I’ll make contact and the two of you can meet up. Now’s not a good time.”
It was never a good time.
Holly fishes in my laundry basket and pulls out a red-and-white checked dress, giving it a couple of vicious swipes to straighten out the creases. “I’ll get to the washing later on. But this one’s fine for school today, isn’t it?”
“Please, just get out of my room and leave me alone.”
