THE MAN AND HIS DUSTY CAR

I would love to tell you the story of the house help everyone had come to call Aunty. I would love to tell you about how the entire house smelled like her skin bleaching lotion at seventeen hours and how she only bleached her face. Her hands were black and calloused from hard labour. Her face was yellow and had the strange supple texture of an overripe mango. This gave all her facial expressions an extra dash of drama. She spoke very little English and only knew swear words. When she was listening to a shocking story she would shout “SHIT!” When she broke a glass she would yell, “BASTARD!” Nobody knows who taught her those words, but she used them often.

I would love to tell you the story of Aunty but this is not about her. This is about the man who parked his dusty car at the gate and dropped off Lily. Aunty was the first to notice that Lily no longer complained about bus rides and long walks. Aunty was the first to notice Lily’s long phone conversations on the veranda after dark. Aunty kept the secret, she knew that at the right time everything would come out and then fall into place.

The man who drove the dusty car never called Lily by her name, he called her Beautiful One. He called her that from the first time they met. Then it was just a compliment; an appreciation of her white eyes and full thighs. The more he saw her, the more he knew her and the more beauty he saw in her. She laughed too loud, cared too much and scrutinised the details so much that she missed the big picture. It was all so beautiful to him. Beautiful One was a mouthful, they drew closer to each other and her nickname became Beautiful. All the friends he introduced her to called her that. Even when they argued he would say it, “Beautiful, I don’t understand why your phone was busy when I called you at midnight!” Around him she was no longer Lily, she was Beautiful.

Lily was originally bored by the man who drove a dusty car. He wasn’t like anyone she had known. He wasn’t exactly quiet, he spoke quite often but only to say serious things. He laughed at dirty jokes like they were a secret shameful treasure or as if Jehovah’s Witnesses were watching him. She was bored by how simple he was. He worked hard, he saved, he kept his promises and he was a terrible liar. It wasn’t long however that she began to see that nobody was simple anymore and that his simplicity was attractive. The rest of the emotions poured in after she started to miss him.

“You are so pretty,” He said. Lily remembered the words because he stopped thrusting, looked down at her and kissed her forehead. He had never used the word pretty. He called her beautiful so often she had forgotten how to be pretty, being pretty made her feel attractive. He sealed the deal with the kiss to her forehead.

Lily was no longer bored by the man who drove the dusty car. Instead of quiet she saw him as insightful. Instead of scatter brained she saw him as multi-talented. Every day she covered his short comings with reason. She looked forward to conversations in his dusty car and longed for the way he said the name he had given her. “Beautiful.”

Like I said, this is a story about the man who drove a dusty car and parked it outside Lily’s gate after dark. When he knew what Lily was like when she was naked and vulnerable some of her beauty was shed. He couldn’t explain it. Lily was no longer entrancing and captivating. Instead she was needy and too soft. Instead of sensual she was horny and possibly slutty. He called her Beautiful still but this time with less meaning, with less passion. He slept with her still but this time with less hunger. The less attention he gave the more she pined after him.

The house help everyone called Aunty noticed first that the man who drove a dusty car no longer parked it outside Lily’s gate after dark. She noticed first that Lily no longer made secret phone calls in whispers on the veranda. She noticed first that Lily no longer glowed and now walked home. Aunty noticed first that Lily was broken hearted. Every girl gets her heart broken before she is 25; then she becomes a woman.

Lily started to eat, she woke up craving chicken gravy every morning and at night she chewed on ice. She hadn’t seen the man who drove the dusty car in six weeks. Her heart was used to being sore. She chewed the ice loud and the sound of her cracking the cubes between her molars had become a regular one in the house. Aunty was the first one to suggest it.

“Lily, you are gaining weight. Are you sleeping with men?”

Lily shook her head and made the instinctive insulted facial expression she practiced for elders who pried into her sex life. Sex was a taboo. She denied hard and fast but the thought haunted her. She had trouble fitting her tight dresses but she thought that was normal. On her walk back home, she bought one home testing kit.

It was Aunty who said “SHIT!!” when Lily announced to her mother that she was six weeks pregnant. It was aunty who finally used the word bastard correctly for the first time in her life.

“THAT BASTARD!!” She said.

Lily was in tears, the man who drove a dusty car was gone, probably parking in another girl’s drive way; a girl he would call Beautiful too.