HIS ROYAL BRIDE

CHAPTER 46

CHAPTER 46

[KULANI]

I’m back home. I’ve taken a bath and I’m a lot calmer than I was this morning. I’ve been sitting on the balcony by myself, listening to the serene chirping of the birds that always find a way to surround me. There’s also a bee that’s idling on my toe. It has been there for the past fifteen minutes and I’m allowing it to do its thing while I sit with my legs crossed. To say there’s a lot on my mind would be undermining the true current activity of my thoughts at this moment. I have tried to get some sleep but it’s been a futile exercise, hence my decision to come out here for some fresh air. I see one of the cars driving through the gate, and Larona comes out. I wonder where she’s coming from. Mhan’ Mavis, one of the helpers, opens the sliding door and asks me if there’s anything she can get or do for me.
‘I’m fine thanks, but you can take this with you’ I hand her the tumbler I’d been drinking orange juice from. She always bends both knees when giving and receiving stuff. She’s the humblest of them all but I can’t shake of the feeling that there’s something bothering her, and it has everything to do with her teenage son. However, right now is not the time for me to be an empathetic and try to carry everyone’s burdens on my shoulders. I have enough on my plate. I’ll talk to her about it when I have the emotional capacity to do so.
‘And can you please call our guest to come join me up here’ I quickly add before she can disappear.
‘The new bride?’
I nod. She nods back after me and leaves. It’s eleven in the morning. After this conversation, I want to turn this into a maintenance day. I need my lashes, nails and hair installed. If Rhandzu and I were on good terms, she’d be doing my cornrows right now. I need something to make me feel good; I need to cheer myself up. Probably should’ve went earlier because I also need to get some shopping done, but we’ll see what I can and cannot do.
Larona appears and greets me with a smile. She looks nervous. I return the same friendly energy and offer her a seat.
‘Would you like anything to drink or snack on?’ I ask.
‘Nah this is fine’ she lightly shakes the half-full 500ml of sparkling water in her hand. I nod. I am all forms of exhausted and I’m afraid I might be looking like my problems right now. I introduced myself to her last night then claimed I had a terrible headache and needed to sleep. The truth is, I was avoiding her and the mess she comes with.
‘I’m not here to cause any trouble, Kuli. In fact, I am going back home first thing tomorrow’
This comes as a shock to me. Going back home?
‘May I ask why?’
She looks to the green mountains, looking defeated.
‘I had only one goal when I came here. It did not go as planned so there’s nothing for me here anymore. Even though I know my dad will chase me away when I get to North West, claiming that I’m bringing nothing but disgrace to the Mokwena name. That’s the only thing he cares about’ she responds with growing disdain on her face.
‘I don’t understand…’
She scoffs. ‘Where do I even start?’
‘You don’t have a great relationship with your dad? And why did you come here if the intention was never to stay?’
After a heavy sigh, she puts the bottle of water on the glass table and changes her sitting position.
‘If you want to know who my father is, think Osama Bin Laden. Or General Aladeen if you’re movie person’
I laugh out loud. He can’t be that bad.
‘Come on?’
‘I am telling you. It’s either his way or the highway. I once ran away from home in high school because he wanted to put me in boarding school. I was gone for so long people began speculating that I was dead. It even came out in the local newspaper. Do you know what he said when I was finally found?’
I shake my head with anticipation.
‘Tantrums are for people who are capable of independence, not spoilt brats like me. That’s what he said’
‘You lie?’
‘I’m telling you. He was never worried. And then he took me straight to the school I was running away from the very next day’
‘That’s…’ I really don’t know what to say.
‘That’s when my hatred for him grew stronger. I’ve always wished for a normal childhood, a normal life free of everything that comes with being a princess because wow. It’s hell in there. You’re always seen as commodity in exchange for resources and alliances’
‘I know exactly what you’re talking about’ I relate. ‘What happened after high school?’
‘I went to do law. He wasn’t exactly chuffed about that because he believed Joburg would corrupt me and I’d come back unfit to be a married woman someday’
I nod, wanting her to carry on. She’s a good storyteller. I don’t know if it’s that or the radio host voice of hers.
‘There I was graduating, not knowing what the future held for me’ she grabs the bottle and takes a sip. The look on her face tells me she’s about to tell me some seriously gloomy stuff.
‘Stuff happened while I was still in varsity. And I appeared in papers, in a negative light, again’
‘What stuff?’
We look eyes and I see her jaw tighten.
‘In second year, I…’ she stops. The empath in me is starting to absorb the pain she’s busy recalling. I honestly hate that I’m in this person. I don’t disturb. I’m just sitting here, quiet and waiting.
‘I went to his office to consult. I remember that day like it was yesterday. I was wearing blue denim shorts and a pink shirt’
Oh Lord. I just know where this is going and I don’t like the direction this conversation is taking.
‘Larona…’
‘He…’ – she scoffs humourlessly– ‘Let’s just say I stopped wearing shorts that day and I stopped going for consultations by myself’ she wipes the single tear that just dropped to her cheek with her index finger.
‘And the funny part is that that’s not the worst of it. I eventually reported the incident and it became a case of my word against his. He was the favourite sweetheart lecturer so you can just guess who people believed’
‘Babe…’ I have no idea how to comfort her right now.
‘After that, every time I tried to secure articles, my own father made sure that all the newspaper articles ever written about me got to my potential employers. Nobody wants to work with a “troublemaker”. That’s how he stood in the way of me becoming a lawyer because he believes it is not a job for women. In fact he believes women are born to make men comfortable. That’s the only thing we should focus on, according to him’
I am still listening attentively. Every single day, I learn that everyone has a backstory; that no scar can go unaccounted for.
‘So when I heard of the fact I was getting arranged for marriage, I lost my mind for like a week. I even had thoughts of running away from home again but let’s be honest. Where would that have taken me when the cards I use are being controlled by the self-appointed god of my life? I fell back into depression until I found out which family I was actually getting married into’
I don’t know how to process that.
‘I meant it when I said I’m not here to stir any pots, Kuli. I respect your husband, or rather I used to before coming here. No offense’ she raises both hands to exempt herself.
‘What is that supposed to mean?’
‘The intention was to ask him to be my mentor because I want to write my bar examination next year. Today, he told me to my face that I’m not cut out to be a lawyer’
‘What?’
‘I have no reason to lie’
I’m sorry but that sounds nothing like Kurhula. Okay I know how big-headed he can get but to go that far? She’s talking but I’m no longer listening. I hear her voice as the background of my thoughts.
I see an image of her carrying a baby on her back. One that’s a splitting image of AK but a younger version of him. Wow. This woman is here to stay and she doesn’t seem to know it yet. This imagination carries on to a point where I realise that the baby is actually mine, not hers.
‘Kuli???’
‘Hm?’ I respond. I had zoned out.
‘I was saying that I actually need to go pack right now because my aunt thought it was a good idea to unpack for me. I don’t want to pack in a hurry and risk leaving some of my stuff here’
I simply nod. She gets up, gives me a subtle awkward smile and leaves. I can’t deny the clean aura that she carries. It’s a little… overwhelming.

…

[LARONA]

Aunty and Kago are not here. Probably sitting with others in this yard. Either that or they have went sightseeing. I’m just happy they are both not here. I am not interested in what they’re up to.
I release my braids and scratch my scalp. That conversation was unexpected. I hadn’t spoken about that incident in a very long time and now it feels like I was picking at a scab. I did go to therapy but still, I am not willing to forgive nor forget. If I were to get locked up in the same room with that professor, I would certainly kill him with my bare hands. And I cannot believe the nerve of that one called Kurhula. For him to say I allowed my personal life to mess with my academics? ALLOWED? If there was a glass of water on top of that desk, I would’ve baptized him in the face.
I keep letting out breaths of laughter because what the hell? The audacity to tell me that I am not cut out to be a lawyer? The cracks in this country’s justice system keep me awake at night. If this simplicity in my passion does not convince him, I have no idea what will. I hear screaming coming from downstairs after I take off my dress. Lege bare di voice dia tshwana, the person screaming is my aunt. I grab my gown and quickly tie it to go see what’s going on. When I get there, I find the lady whose name I forgot strangling Aunt Mmamosese to the floor.
‘You call me ghetto, I show you ghetto!’
‘Aunty Lydia!’ Kuli is trying to separate them, with the help of the chef. I go in as well and we manage to get this woman off my aunt.
‘Yohh my eye! You have blinded me. She has blinded me!’ aunty Mmamosese continues crying. I know she’s lying.
Kuli is trying to see this eye that is being spoken about and my aunt’s palm is strong against it. I laugh internally.
‘Let me leave before this woman finishes me off’ she says through sobs and goes away. She’s going to get up there and call my father. I am enjoying the consequences of their actions a little too much.
‘Yes, RUN! You greasily bxtch!’ Aunty Lydia continues cussing her out. Her Peruvian wig is all over the place, including the front of her eyes. I fail to contain my laughter and Kuli gives me a look.
‘I’m sorry but…what happened here?’
‘Shouldn’t we be taking your aunt to the hospital?’
I waft away this suggestion.
‘She’s not bleeding, right? She’s just being dramatic as always’ I assure. This is my father’s sister. I know her very well. Kuli looks hella worried. She keeps looking up the stairs in the direction that my aunt went.
‘I’m telling you. She once pushed me and when I tried to hold on to her so I don’t fall, she screamed like there was burglar in the house. When everyone came, she claimed I was trying to push her over the balcony. She said I was trying to kill her in broad daylight’ I cross my fingers. I’m not lying.
‘I can’t say I find that shocking. Pack your manipulative mongrel in a cage and send her back to the zoo she came from’ Aunty Lydia says and refills her white wine.
‘How can you say she’s from the zoo when you’re the one behaving like an animal?’ Kuli castigates.
‘Exactly. I belong in the wild. I will wound her!’
‘Are you going to tell us what happened here?’ Kuli impatiently says to her.
‘I am not going to waste too much of my breath but to summarize, we were having a civil conversation until I said marriage is not the end all and be all in life. Did she not say she could tell I was a feminist and that feminists are miserable people? That I should start my cat collection since I’m not woman enough to raise kids? If she hasn’t been told, please do your mother a favour Larona and tell her that I was arrested overseas on several occasions in prisons she wouldn’t be able to pronounce. I am a mobile hospital for retards. I will not hesitate to rearrange her guts if barking mad is a habit of hers. I’m not the one’ she raises her wine bottle while downing the liquid in her glass then walks away.
Hee banna. I never thought for one second that such a pretty lady could be this gangster. Is this the same person I was getting classy and super posh vibes from last night?