Black Marionette

Nosipho Mbatha 

I always wanted people to take me seriously. I wanted to matter to people, I wanted to feel like my existence had value. I suppose it's strange that these are the thoughts I entertain on my commute to and from work every day. I hate my job. I constantly have people shouting out to me, "Zandi, do this. Zandi, do that! Some of them don't even know my name, I've been working there for eight years. I'm a nobody there. I've learnt that the most inconspicuous people are also usually the ones who quietly perform vital functions. The reason we become invisible is that we perform our duties so well that people forget it's not automatic and that things don't get themselves done.

Zandile. Because they already had five daughters when I was born. My name means "a daughter has been added" Zandile izintombi. My father was happy with all his daughters, my mother was disappointed that she had never had a son. The sister before me is named Ntombifuthi which means "a girl again". She loved us of course but it was hard to miss the sad tinge in her voice when she talked about other women's sons. I think it has something to do with the fact that my father had a child with another woman before Ntombi was born. My mother was a proud woman and I know that my sister and I were painful reminders of the time she tried to fight the other woman and lost. The other woman, Sis' Thoko, had three other children with my father, all boys. She was now, what I could best describe as an illegitimate second wife to my father. When I moved out, he cried. He told me not to tell my mother. They have a peculiar relationship. They've been married for 34 years and it seems like they're still hesitant to share themselves with each other.
How can you be with somebody for so long and still try to keep them at arm's length? I tried talking to my mother about it once but she told me I couldn't understand because I was single and lonely. My mother has been the loneliest person I've ever known, it's as though she's frightened to death of letting herself be seen as anything but solemn and stern.

Living alone has its perks, I can do what I want when I want. Nobody controls me. I had just stepped into the house and taken off my shoes when my phone rang. It was my sister Zethu. "Hi Zandi, has mom called you? She called me, she's having some kind of episode. She's losing it, she told me she's leaving dad. Talk to her, she listens to you. Well, bye. I have to go, tell me if she calls". That was my sister Zethu, the eldest of my sisters. She was so used to being in charge I don't think it ever crossed her mind that other people might have something to say. She would ask you a question and not give you a chance to answer it. She dominated conversations not because she was a great speaker but because she was so intimidating. She'd keep talking and nobody could ever tell her to stop, nobody was brave enough. She was a very subtle bully. I wanted people to listen to me like that, I wanted to command attention, make people listen to me. I want people to keep listening even if they want to turn away. I want to make them hear me.

Roughly two or three minutes after Zethu called my phone rings again and I know it's my mother. So I pick up even though I know I don't want to talk to her. "Hi Zandi, I'm really just calling to tell you that I've made a very important decision and I think it's important that I tell you girls about it". I waited for her to continue because I knew she wasn't pausing to collect her thoughts, she liked to create a suspenseful atmosphere. "I'm divorcing your father. It's really just the best thing for me. I've made this decision and I just thought you should know, the reasons are not so important. I'm glad we had a chance to talk about this". That was my mother discussing something with me despite the fact that I didn't get to say a single word. It's very easy to see where Zethu learned some of her more socially aggressive behaviours. My mother isn't a person who ever discussed anything with anyone, she would speak and your role in the pseudo-discussion was to listen, not interrupt her and not to contradict anything she said. She liked the control and she knew how to keep it.

When it was time for me to go to university my mother decided that I would become a lawyer. A young, black female lawyer. Those were in demand right now, she said. She had filled out the forms and packed my bags. She'd given me tips on how to do well in school. She never said she would miss me, or that she was excited for me. When I left I told her I loved and she told me to bring home As. What does a person even say to that? She's my mother and I love her but sometimes I feel like she's a mom-shaped concrete mould. Zethu turned out just like her. She treats her children
like strangers, guests who've overstayed their welcome but who she's too polite to tell them to go so she tolerates them. I decided quite a while ago that I didn't want children, it's just not something I see myself doing.

I remember when I got home after graduation. My mother had a huge party and she invited all her friends so she could show me off. She picked my dress, fixed my hair she even did my makeup. She wanted me to look perfect for her gloating moment. She wasn't proud of me, she was proud of herself. I didn't realize that until she introduced
me as "Zandile, the attorney", I was never just Zandile her daughter. She told them all how she did it by herself, got me through law school and had me produce excellent results. I greeted everybody politely just like she wanted me to. I shook hands and kissed cheeks, I made polite enough conversation with strangers. I later overheard one of the women in the kitchen telling another that I was very cold and aloof. I wasn't, I was just trying to do and say the right thing all the time. I felt like a Marionette and at that exact moment, my mother stood over me and pulled the strings and jerked my limbs every which way. I thought that would change when I left home but it didn't. I was the same mousy girl, the same little black marionette.

I just wanted to sink into the couch and melt away. Nobody would know I had gone. Instead, my mother would be upset that I had stopped answering her calls. I realised, quite early in my life, that I wasn't allowed to be my own person. I was whoever the people in my immediate vicinity wanted me to be. My mother, my boss, my sister. I
was born a blank canvas, and then everybody but myself got to paint the canvas. I didn't know who I was. Zandi was a stranger to me, she wasn't anyone I could relate to in any way. I don't know who I am but I know I'm not me.

I unplugged my landline and switched off my cell phone. I needed time and quiet. I needed to listen to the echo inside my own head and then maybe I'd be able to figure myself out. I had to get to know myself, I was finally going to live for me, I mattered.

All this deep thinking made me tired. I decided to go to bed without even having
dinner. I slept like a log, peacefully. When I woke up in the morning I realised I had made a mistake. I was laying in bed and I knew I would get up and go to work, I would go to my mother's just like I always do every Wednesday. I would do it because that's what she wanted me to do. What do I want? I don't know. Who am I? I don't know. What frightened me is the feeling that I would never know. But I guess there would always be someone to figure that out for me.

 Ghana Writes is pleased again to publish another intriguing short story by our guest writer of the week, Miss Nosipho Mbatha. This story, Black Marionette,  just like her ‘Mob Justice’, took our minds round and round and finally brought us that ‘oh I see. wow!’ feeling. In this story, Nosipho touched on another composite subject which is quite alarming especially in the lives of young Africans. Your parents decide what program you study at school without considering your passion and even go further to choose what would later become your nightmare: your job. In which case, like Zandi in the story, your life and happiness will be controlled by pull or push of the string in your parents’ hands like a marionette. A black marionette.

Nosipho Mbatha, Ghana Writes thank you for your informative and creatively penned stories. We have enjoyed your time with us this past week. We hope to read more from you in the not-too-distant future.