Dark coffee

Chapter Twenty-five

The next day when I woke up, I thought about Darell. I missed him so much. I needed to sit and have a talk with him. I'll have called him, but at the same moment, I felt my stomach growled. I was unusually starving, probably because I had eaten a lot the night before. So, I got up from bed and went downstairs to the kitchen still wearing my pajamas.

Arriving in the kitchen, I saw Jamal and Lens who had each cooked a different dish without thinking of making some for everyone. I thought in a selfish way like them. I made my own omelets with sardines and I toasted my bread by threatening them that they were better not to touch my dish. When my food was ready, I sat down next to them and we had a chat.

We had been talking for a while when we heard Malik's voice coming from the living room, "Ubaba, Umama I need to talk to you both."

We stopped talking to listen from afar while continuing to eat.

My father invited him to sit on the couch. There was a silence before we hear him tell them, "I'm going to drop college. It isn't for me." 

"And what are you planning to do? Hang out around the house all day? Bring girls here like a motel?" our father asked in an upset tone with his South African accent.

"Cha baba! Just because I don't want to go to college anymore doesn't mean I'm not going to do anything with my life or that I will fail. Many people do very well without necessarily going to college you know?"
Zulu translation: "Cha": No

"Enough with your English! Wenzani? Do you know all the sacrifices that your motha and I made to give you the life you have today?" He said even more upset.
Zulu translation: "Wenzani": What are you doing?

When we heard the voices raise my brothers and I left the kitchen and headed to the entrance of the living room, but we did not step in so as not to disturb.

"I know baba but..." Malik said.

"But what Malik!" Our father yelled. Then he added, "I won't let you waste your life! You already do nothing!"

"I respect you a lot baba and you too mama, but I already dropped." As soon as Malik was done talking, I saw the anger on our father's face.

"Listen to me carefully! As long as you live under my roof, these are my rules and if you want to do what you want with your life the door is there!" He said pointing to the door.

I could feel Malik's disappointment and that he was deeply hurt. "Are you seriously putting me out baba? And you umama, you're just gonna say nothing to me?"  Malik said in a broken voice.

"Ubaba is right. Since a few years, you have been doing anything with your life indodana" Our mother said to him.
Zulu translation: My son

Malik seemed so upset that it broke my heart. I knew he was refraining from saying what he thought out of respect for them.

After a long silence, Malik spoke again. "The truth is, you never approved the fact that I am different, because I do not fit into your African rules of a village mentality!" 

There he had gone too far.

"Insolent!" Yelled our  father.
"We didn't make you come to Canada to tell us this kind of stupidity and disrespect your culture and us! African village rules you said? You will know that, here in this house, it is Africa! And I, myself, am the boss of this house! What are you going to do without a college bachelor's degree? Temporary Jobs? Students Jobs? Uber driver? With the intelligence you have, you can be an engineer and you ..." Said our father angry talking with a lot of hands gesture.

Our father stopped talking so much that he was upset.

"I'm sorry to disappoint you but I'm wasting my time in college and you're wasting your money! For what I want to do in life I don't need a college bachelor's degree," Malik said pissed.

"What do you want to do Malik?" Our mother asked in an exhausted voice

"I want to be a professional boxer," he answered.

"Aye! you think everyone becomes a professional boxer by snapping their fingers ? Maybe you are a magician? Why don't you take your big brothers as examples?" Our father said more calmly.

Malik got up and yelled with teary eyes while slightly tapping his left hand on the top of his chest several times, "In this house it's only for Jamal and Lens! That's the problem! I only hear Jamal here, Lens there! And me in all of this!"

He then put an emphasis when he repeated yelling louder "And me!" He swiped his tears off, " Am I invisible to you?"

My parents didn't answer, but I could tell they felt bad. After a long minute, Malik calmed down.

He added, "you never believed in me and my potential like you believe in theirs. Even Dahila is more considered than me! You want me to take the door baba? Well, that's what I'm going to do!" 

Malik Subsequently, left the living room pushing us on the way. As he climbed up the stairs, Jamal touched his shoulder to try to calm him down.

"Malik," Jamal said.

"Take the fuck off your hands of me!" He said with a look of hate.

Jamal withdrew his hands from Malik's shoulder. Malik then kept his way and we followed him. When we got upstairs, he headed to his room leaving the door open. We saw him packing his bags quickly with a lot of anger. Lens, Jamal and I looked at each other feeling guilty.

"Malik please calm down and drop off those suitcases! I'll talk to our parents to try to reason with them, but leaving won't help the situation!" Lens said to him.

He ignored Lens. He simple took a hair tie and tied his long locs.

"Malik!" Jamal said calmly.

"What!" he yelled with anger.

"Listen to Lens! You don't have anywhere to go! You just gonna go off like this? Where are you going to sleep tonight bro?" Jamal said extremely concerned.

"I'll sleep in the street if I have to!" Malik said stubbornly.

"I will never let my little brother sleep in the winter cold while I am warm and safe!" Jamal said.

Malik sighed desperately, "y'all don't know what it's like to have big brothers like you two! The pressure I have had all my life because of you! Everything always succeeds to y'all and I am the bad luck!"

At that moment, I only wanted to hug him, but Malik wasn't an affective brother or person at all.

"Malik, we've never been in competition with you," Jamal said.

"Tell that to our parents," He responded.

"You act like a child!" Lens said coldly.

"Lens!" I yelled at him upset.

"Dahila please shut up! Malik, do you seriously think leaving home is going to help your case? Think a little?"  Lens said pissed.

"Fuck you Lens and fuck all of y'all. You think I give a damn about your morals and your stupid lessons! I don't want to see y'all anymore! Get the fuck out of my room!"

Since we didn't move, he said even madder, "I said back out!"

We left his room, but we stayed close to his door. He ended up going out with his things.

"Malik please don't go! We love you and we need you in this family. Without you it's not the same." I told him shedding a tear.

He looked at me with compassion as if his brown green eyes, who is the only one of us to have inherited from our great grandmother, were addressing me to say, "I apologize for hurting you". Then he went down the stairs, slammed the entrance door and left.