56 - One Night and a Killing

Elijah Vincent Thomas. That was his name although, these days, he preferred the simplicity of ‘J’. Not the ‘Jay’ that might have been short for a Jonathan or a Cjay – whatever that too might have been short for, but, the J that defied logic. The ‘J’ that made him something akin to the bad-ass assassins on Tv; ‘J’, just ‘J’.
Once, years ago, his younger self would religiously recite his genealogy with pride, a lineage going all the way to the generation of slave traders and first contact with the Portuguese. He knew them all – his fathers before him that is; he knew them well – once, but now, not so much. These days, he found himself going no further than the last two generations, their piety scratching at the entrails of his memory. Memories he had chosen instead to forget; memories like the fact that he really did not have a father; Memories of his mother.
In his heavily tinted Honda Accord, an invisible hand clutched at J’s chest and held on tight. Mentally, he attempted to sweep away painful memories. Memories so burdened by time that he could almost taste the cobwebs; memories of his mother. He saw her now, her coarse, short hair roughly tucked into a poorly tied scarf, her eyes laughing as he pronounced ‘community’ as ‘commumity’. She managed to correct him every time but still, Sigh. It has been years since he last thought about his mother, years since he last allowed himself to remember but today, while strange cars flashed their headlights at him and darkened trees hurriedly whispered secret nothings, he did, and he did so vividly.
He recalled peaceful Sundays with solemn church services: the biting cold of the morning, the stinginess of the communion portions while hunger gnawed his insides, the walk back home. He thought of Sunday afternoons: the bustle of preparing lunch, bubbling stew and then regret because he had gotten too close, downing huge cups of water to quench fiery peppers, late afternoon siesta with his arms around mother. ‘Mother’, for that is what she had insisted he called her.
Behind the wheel, J compelled his car to roll to a stop. The bright lights and thought of possible human company warmed him up. He approached the reception desk. Absorbed In a movie of some sort, the receptionist, once or twice in reference to one of the actresses, uttered the word ‘ashawo’. When she eventually noticed him, it was not with the enthusiasm of having received a new customer or tired traveller, rather, it was with the irritability of one having been disturbed from her favourite pastime.
“Yes?” Caught unawares, he stammered through his request for a room
“Upstairs or downstairs” she asked while snapping her chewing gum “er.. Upstairs” he almost couldn’t hide his disappointment, and he wasn’t sure if he even had a reason to be disappointed. “Okay, please wait” Snap, snap, snap. J consciously resisted the urge to claw at her face. Snap, snap, snap.
“Cash or card” she asked, this time before blowing up a bubble in his face. “Cash I think. How much is the room?” she told him. “Name?” pause “sir please your name oh” “Sorry. J, just J. I, I do not have a surname”. “J…” she said slowly “as in J.a.y?” “No, just the letter J”. “Hmmm na wa o. Oga please sign here”. More snaps as he signed. She handed him a key, attached to a tattered tag. 101C it read. For a second, he thought he remembered some warning about a room 101. He mentally shrugged off that memory. “If you want dinner, just call from your room and order” she called to his retreating frame. He felt her watch him walk away - although in truth, she would have described it as more of a pitiful wobble - before a final snap as though to say ‘good riddance’.

Room 101C seemed to have been hastily squeezed into the corner at the end of the hallway. J actively ignored a nagging worry - surely a 101 should have come after a 100, no? Perhaps, perhaps. But now, his mind was preoccupied. He was thinking about the scent that slapped his senses as soon as he had stepped over the room’s threshold.
It smelt vaguely familiar; as if somehow, innately, he understood its source. It permeated the entire surrounding: the curtains, the carpet, the couch, his clothes. Again and again, his brain took him on a journey promising answers, but stopping short of a dense wall. Every time. The answers were so close yet, far enough that he couldn’t grasp them. As he scrubbed off the physical markings of his journey, he reminded himself once more that he was hungry, that he had called the reception desk multiple times, and that he was appalled by the receptionist’s nonchalance towards her job. He wondered if they would have breakfast tomorrow, if his alarm was not set for too early.
He scratched the scar on his belly. The wall shattered, he began to remember.
That smell, that uncanny mixture of sugary sweet Dodo and roses. That sound, the sound of the shower running. For the first time in years, he saw himself run across the large sitting room, oil matting his lips, a wilting rose at his lapel, mother’s eyes laughing, laughing at him, wet hair matted to her scalp.
“Come” she whispered, ‘come’ the breeze echoed playfully. He ran to her wards then dodged, laughing, his oil-kissed lips contrasting heavily with pearly whites.
“Come” she insisted with urgency, ‘come’ the breeze sang. Come, and he went. He felt the pinch of cold steel slice through his stomach, the suddenness, the pause. He saw the confusion that clouded the emotions of his younger self, the shock of realisation, panic. He felt terror as he fought off his mother, as he fought for his life. Back at the hotel, he did not feel his body hit the floor. He did not hear himself mutter the words ‘mother’ over and over again.
When she eventually came, she came as an apparition. Her image so fragile he might have torn her with mere fingers if he had so wished.
“Mother?” “You killed me” an accusation so simple it was scathing “No, no. Mother, No!” he tried feebly to protest. He failed. “You killed me” she repeated, ‘you killed her’ the breeze sang, ‘you killed your own mother’ And he was killing her again. He was fighting her off, punching, biting, scratching. He pulled at the knife dangling from his belly and slashed at the air; at her face, at her throat. Blood spurted.
‘I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die!’ This was the mantra that would keep him alive and to it, he hung desperately, without even realising that he was holding on too tight. Now he was sitting astride her immobile body, stabbing laboriously at her stomach, his face, a messy run of sweat and blood. He didn’t stop, he couldn’t stop. Again and again he stabbed, retracted the knife, and then stabbed again until her belly was a jumble of wasted flesh and intestines; until the carpet where she lay was darkened with her blood. Then he was killing her again; slashing, stabbing, stabbing. And all the while, her honey-sweet voice cried “You killed me” and the breeze agreed, picking up the words and running swiftly. ‘You killed her, you killed your mother!’
The images kept coming, flooding. First, they were by the riverside, the fishes skipping then, he was killing her slashing, stabbing, stabbing. Another minute, he was sick; her cool hands comforting him, her words promising that his father was on his way and then, he was killing. Slashing, stabbing, stabbing. They were laughing, she was feeding him, he was crying, she was crying; slashing, stabbing, stabbing. And all the while, her voice reproofed him. “You killed me”, ‘you killed her’.
“Murderer!” “No, I swear, I didn’t mean it, I swear, It was a mistake”. “Murderer, murderer!” “Stop, please, stop” Until he was a pitiful slob of excuses and tears. Now he was crying. Great sobs racking his dry chest, the scar on his belly burning with pain – he scratched at it until he could smell blood.
“You killed me. Murderer!” ‘You killed her. Murderer!’ over and over until the words were muddled, warped into a mesh of gibberish but, he knew what they were saying. He knew. Now he was at the sink, breaking apart his shaving blade. Then he was slashing his wrist; his throat; his chest.
‘Yes, yes’. It prompted him. Willing him to slash and slash, as deep as the blade would go, as much as his already bloodied hands would take. So, he kept on slashing. His wrist, his throat, his chest.
Then he remembered. The sound of his little feet as they thumped the untarred road; the shy red of his blood as it seeped through his shirt; the sound of his haggard panting as he ran, farther from home than he had ever gone before. Away from his mother; he had been running all his life.
He saw her now, more clearly than before, her coarse, short hair, peeking stubbornly from underneath her scarf. Her eyes, her eyes laughing; they were laughing at him, his stupidity. He should have killed her earlier. He knew that now. In the deep recesses of his brain, even as his consciousness faded, he heard his alarm ring.

At the reception, the one who was the receptionist groaned to a slow consciousness. Her shift was over. She hated this job; she hated the people she had to meet. She hated spending her nights thus. She did not remember a certain Mr. J from last night. She did not remember a room 101C. On Sunday, in church, she would thank God for miraculously blessing her with N35 000. The other members of her church will “key” into her testimony.
MeL