CHAPTER SIX

The interview was short, but it went far back in time. Slimkat told Jessie about the Bushmen’s ancient and sacred relationship with the earth and the stars. And then he spoke of the many ways that people, animals and plants were being killed today.

‘We must leave this highway of death,’ he said. ‘This road of hatred. We must return to the path of love.’

When they were finished, Jessie walked out with Slimkat and Ystervark, and I phoned that FAMSA number and made an appointment.

When Jessie came back to the office, she told me that Ystervark had not returned her knife.

‘It was weird,’ she said. ‘He looked up and down the street as if someone might be following them, and he wouldn’t let me near the car. There was someone in the back that I couldn’t see properly, wearing a woman’s scarf. I got my pepper spray back, but he shook his head when I asked for my knife.’

‘What did Slimkat say?’

‘I don’t think he realised what was happening. We’d said goodbye, and he was getting in the car.’

I clicked my tongue. ‘It wasn’t right to take your knife.’

‘Maybe he needs it more than I do,’ said Jessie.

Later that morning, I sat in a soft orange armchair in a small room at the Ladismith hospital.

‘So . . .’ said the counsellor from FAMSA. She also sat in an orange armchair. She was young, with wide eyes, blonde curls and a matching blue top and skirt, just like a little doll. A poppie. She looked down at some paper on her clipboard. ‘First, I need to tell you that I am a counsellor in training, but I’m perfectly qualified to assist you.’

She looked up and gave me a bright smile, then clapped her hands together like a kindergarten teacher on the first day of school.

The room was clean, the walls lemon-yellow. There was an orange couch and a white plastic table, and in the corner, on the floor, a box of children’s toys. High up was a long narrow window with white curtains that waved softly in the breeze. Between the curtains, I could see a grey-blue piece of the Swartberge and a section of sky.

‘So how can I help you, Mrs, um,’ she looked down at her clipboard again, ‘van Harten.’

‘Ah,’ I said.

‘English or Afrikaans?’ asked the poppie.

‘Um . . .’

Her questions seemed so difficult. I looked at the window.

‘Are you cold? Shall I close the window?’

‘No,’ I said. ‘No, thank you. I like fresh air.’

I struggled to sit up straight in the armchair; it seemed to be swallowing me. She was perched on the edge of hers, her head tilted to the side, like a bird. Her birdie-poppie eyes were bright, but it did not feel like she could see me. How could I describe to her the dark things from my past that still live inside my head? And my very personal problems with Henk?

‘What’s on your mind?’ she asked.

I stared down at my hands.

‘How about,’ she said, ‘just to get us warmed up, I’ll give you some abstract pictures to look at, and you tell me what they remind you of.’ She pulled some sheets from her clipboard and handed three of them to me. ‘Just look at the top one and tell me what it reminds you of.’

That was easy. ‘It’s a pumpkin fritter with lots of syrup and butter.’

‘Okay. And how does that make you feel?’

‘Hungry.’

‘Okay. Let’s have a look at the next picture, shall we? What can you see there?’

‘A group of people dancing around a fire. And on the fire is a potjie pot, with lamb potjie in it. And here, in the middle of the flames, are two big black eyes staring at me. They can see right into me.’

‘What do they see?’

I shrugged.

‘Hmm,’ she said. ‘What do you think of the third picture?’

I looked at that one for a while.

‘Arms and legs and blood,’ I said. ‘There’s a woman who’s been torn in half, and a man who has been stabbed in the heart. See, here is the knife. And they have both been run over by a tractor; look at the tyre marks. They are all flat and squishy, like a pumpkin fritter.’

‘All right!’ she said, sitting so far forward in her armchair I thought she would fall onto the carpet. ‘And how does that make you feel?’

‘Hungry?’ I said. ‘It’s nearly lunch time, isn’t it?’

‘Hmm,’ she said, and wrote something on her clipboard.

I swallowed. ‘My boyfriend . . .’ I said. The word felt funny on my tongue, at my age.

‘Mm?’

‘Henk. He wanted me to get help. He thinks I’m traumatised after my kidnapping. There was a murderer . . .’

‘You were kidnapped?’

‘And locked in a freezer, but I escaped, although he nearly shot me, with his bow and arrow.’

‘Gosh,’ said the poppie.

‘But it’s not that, it’s not that giving me the trouble.’

‘The trouble?’

‘Nightmares and shaking and that. Anyway, I haven’t wanted to tell Henk, but I know my troubles are not about the murderer. He’s dead and gone. My trouble is with him, Henk, coming in to my life. Getting close and all that,’ I said.

‘You are finding intimacy with him difficult?’

‘No. Yes. What do you mean by intimacy? I really want it to work out. But it’s just getting worse. Getting close to him makes me worse. It brings up the trouble. Especially when we . . . if we . . .’

‘Yes?’

‘Isn’t our time up?’ I said.

She glanced at her little silver watch. ‘No, we still have plenty of time.’

She looked at me, and I was quiet. She lifted her eyebrows to help me continue, but I held my mouth closed. It just wasn’t right to tell this young girl about my private life. I looked at the window. The curtains were still now. Still and heavy.

‘Mrs van Harten,’ she said. ‘Perhaps tell me about some of the difficult feelings you have. And anything you have noticed that makes your feelings better or worse.’

I sat thinking on what she said. A little breeze moved the curtains again. A Karoo robin caught my eye as it flew past the window.

‘That’s an interesting question,’ I said.

I tried again to sit up, but my feet didn’t quite reach the floor and that armchair wasn’t letting go, so I just leant back into it.

‘When I feel worried,’ I said, ‘potato salad – with cream and mint – makes it a lot better. I still feel lonely sometimes, although it’s a different kind of loneliness from the one I used to have, before Henk. In some ways it’s worse, because he’s right there, but . . . Anyway. Cake. Chocolate cake helps with loneliness. And with frustration, if it’s a good cake, that is – a satisfying one. With peanut butter. Cakes help with lots of problems. And you get so many different flavours. But you know, now that I think about it, you have to be careful. If you are feeling guilty, for example, and you eat chocolate cake, it can make it worse. Of course, cakes are perfect for celebrating. But you asked about difficult feelings . . .’

I was excited now and waving my hands about. This was important stuff. And very helpful for my recipe advice column. I should make a chart of foods to go with each of the problem feelings.

‘Shame . . . and guilt – these are my most difficult feelings,’ I said. ‘I can’t sleep and I shake and I remember . . . things. I see things that happened long ago as if they are happening now in front of my eyes.’ I closed my eyes, took a deep breath. ‘And I’m scared of what might happen, in the future.’

I paddled myself forward with my hands so that I was now on the front of my armchair, my feet back on the floor.

‘I must give it more thought . . . I’ve been eating chocolate cake for shame, and I don’t think it’s the right thing. I think maybe I need something lighter.’ I looked at the orange chairs and yellow walls. ‘With citrus. Maybe a lemon meringue pie . . .’

‘Mrs van Harten . . .’

‘Call me Maria,’ I said, feeling friendly now that the counselling was helping me so nicely. ‘Tannie Maria.’

‘Tannie Maria, do you maybe eat as a way of escaping your feelings?’

‘No . . .’ I said. ‘I’m trying to help. To help my feelings. Trying to feel better.’

She looked down at her skinny legs and then up at me, her eyes running across my length and width.

‘Have you ever been on a diet, Tannie Maria?’