The next moment she was a pod.īut then Tia was born. Nausea plagued her for seven months on end, and worse than the physical discomfort was the sense of resentment: one moment she was free, her life uncluttered. She would not have thought it possible, all those years ago when she was carrying Tia. She never ceased to marvel at the strength of the bond between them. She felt a sudden rush of love for her daughter. Klio was still smiling as she hung up the receiver. And I promise I'll call you if I need to talk to you. As they spoke for a few more minutes, Klio sensed her unease. A very good day.'īut Tia seemed unwilling to hang up. It always acted up when Tia was troubled. She would be concentrating intensely, trying to gauge every nuance of her mother's voice, her face completely still except for the tiny tick at the corner of one eyelid. She could picture Tia's face at this moment. 'A good day?' The hesitation in Tia's voice was scarcely noticeable. And Maria will be over later to help me clean the house.' But when she spoke she kept her voice light. Actually,' she paused for a moment and the words came out in a rush, 'I don't think I'll be able to make it today.' It's going around campus everyone has it. She spoke carefully into the mouthpiece: 'Hello, Klio speaking.' For a moment she tensed, but then got to her feet quickly, killing the urgent, sharp ring of the phone by snatching the receiver from the stand. Sit outside on the verandah at nightfall and watch the moon rise slowly in a sky crazy with stars. They'd have lunch together, maybe go for a walk. How distressing it must be to watch your mother do battle with invisible demons.īut today would be a happy day. She needed to feel Tia's small hand holding her own to hear her say, 'Hang in there. When the pounding in her head became intolerable, the sounds around her toxic and magnified beyond all imagining, Tia's presence calmed her fears. She had come to rely so much on these weekly visits from her daughter. Today, though, she was expecting a visitor. It was five miles to the nearest neighbour another ten to the nearest town. It showed no sign of life: but then, it rarely did. From here she could see all the way across the vast expanse of yellow veld to the thin black line of the road pointing south, snaking up a far hill and then disappearing from sight. Breathing deeply, she inhaled the smell of grass and growing things wet with dew. She slid the bolt from the back door and sat down on one of the shallow steps. The air was cool and the sky not yet intensely blue. These days she usually avoided looking at herself: the wild-eyed woman staring back at her made her feel afraid. As she stood up, she glimpsed her moving form in the mirror on the dressing table. She placed her feet into the slippers next to the bed and draped the thin robe over her shoulders. She lay with her eyes shut and she could almost visualize the quiet: a beautiful glinting thing - silvery, insubstantial - stretching into every nook and cranny of the room, creeping into every nook and cranny of her mind. She woke up feeling clearheaded and calm. Fluisterwater, Northern Province, South Africa
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