CHAPTER 5: Growing Apart

I wake up early to get ready for church. Dee is still fast asleep. I am not in a hurry, I plan to get to church when everyone is inside and service has just about started. While I’m having breakfast, Dylan walks into the kitchen to make coffee. He mumbles a good morning to me and goes out of the kitchen once he is done with making his cup. I am hurt, after the conversation we had two days ago, after he literally begged me not to give up on us, I expected him to be a bit more attentive to me. Maybe he is concerned with keeping the image of a good marriage than he is about keeping me. On the drive to church, I’m wondering how things have escalated, I’m suddenly faced with making the decision to divorce the man I love or not to.

The service has started by the time I quietly walk in and find a seat at the back. A receive some smiles and waves as I settle and try to follow the proceedings. The guest Pastor is teaching on forgiveness. I feel attacked as he talks about bitterness is a cancer that eats away at the one carrying it. Interestingly though, he mentions how forgiving someone does not mean that you become oblivious to their ways.

I am thinking about this as I drive to visit mhama and baba after church. When I get in , it’s clear they just arrived back from church themselves as mhama is still in her 2 piece outfit and big dress hat.

‘Ah ah Tanyaradzwa, come in, don’t stand at the door like a stranger’, mhama shouts from the lounge.
‘I’m taking off my shoes mhama,’ I know how much she hates people leaving shoe prints on her shiny floors.
‘How are you?’ I ask them both once I make myself comfortable on the couch.
‘We are alright, just that your fathers legs are still swelling, the new medication is not helping much.’

Mhama is always the spokesperson, baba is nodding in agreement as she explains his illness in detail. She fills me in on everything that has been happening with the neighbors, as is ritual when I visit. Baba once commented that it was wrong for her to gossip about people, mhama had laughed, clapping her hands and said to me,

‘Your father is too much of a goody two shoes, don’t mind him.’

I did not comment, stung by how mhama dismissed him and by how he just sat there, not objecting or defending himself. Church has softened baba, too much. Mhama never used to disrespect him in my presence, he is too withdrawn now. He keeps himself busy planning church projects and programs, almost like that is his escape. I do not know what happened here, how the roles changed like that. Mama is more aggressive, where that comes from is a mystery.

‘How is mkwasha? I haven’t seen him in a while,’ baba speaks after a while.
‘Dylan is busy at work baba, but he is okay. He will come visit soon.’
‘A busy man is good, don’t be sad about it at all, as long as he is taking care of you. You don’t want him to be sitting around all day doing nothing,’ Mhama is quick to interject, giving baba a meaningful side eye as she talks.

It’s clear she still hasn’t forgiven him for not being his best when we were younger. Lately I have been wondering if it’s too much of a dream to expect us all to move on from our past, to allow the wounds to heal and forget the pain we all once caused each other.

It’s almost dark outside when I start driving for home. Dee is not home, I have no idea where he is. I decide not to cook as I am still full from the late lunch I had at mhama’s. Finding nothing to watch on tv, I get comfortable in bed. I take out the diary and go through an entry that catches my eye…

25 August 1988

Garikai walked me home from school today. I felt like I had steel butterflies in my tummy all the way. He is handsome and all the girls want him. I know Nancy and Tariro will ask me about it tomorrow, they will want to know what’s going on. Nancy will probably warn me about Garikai in her annoying know it all voice, she gets on my nerves sometimes. I had not expected baba to be home when I got in, he saw me walking with Garry and he was not impressed. He told me that if I wasn’t careful I would become a prostitute because it is in my blood. Mama walked in while baba was giving me ‘the talk’. She stood by the table listening for a few minutes as baba continued to warn me about boys. She walked into her bedroom after he started telling me that I needed someone to guide me as I was growing into a young woman. Mhama then called me when he went out. We started talking about Garikai, she told me how beautiful I was growing to be and how it was easy to see why Garikai was following me around. Unlike baba, mhama didn’t warm me to stay away from him. Mhama understands me. ‘A man is supposed to take care of you Tanya, demand it.’ I do not miss the meaning of this statement….