CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

‘My intention,’ said Ricus, smiling, ‘is that we all heal; that we become the best of ourselves.’

Ousies dropped a twig of wild camphor onto the coals.

‘Now, back to our senses,’ said Ricus, clicking his fingers. ‘Most of us experience flashbacks. It is one of the common PTSD symptoms. Things that have happened before seem to be happening again.’ He frowned. ‘Like a nightmare, but we are awake.’

‘Ewe, Bhuti,’ agreed Tata Radebe, and Dirk nodded.

‘What makes the memory so powerful,’ said Ricus, tapping his temple with a fingertip, ‘is that it’s not just visual. There are other senses that make it seem present and alive: feelings, smells, sounds.’ He touched his nose, his ears. ‘When we bring awareness to these sensations, we begin to see and accept them. Only then can we let them go. It is hard to drop something if you don’t know you are holding it.’

He looked up at the goshawk. It was sitting very still, but I could see its white chest-feathers ruffling in the breeze.

‘One of the things that I still experience,’ Ricus said, ‘is a burning sensation on the inside of this wrist.’ His fingertips touched those white scars again. ‘Where my so-called father would hold the cigarette. I say so-called because I believe I was snatched as a baby from a supermarket, but that’s another story . . .’

He brushed a hand across his knee, as if cleaning off some sand.

‘When my wrist starts to burn,’ he said, ‘I can hold it under running water, or put ice on it, but the pain stays. My father would hold the lit cigarette there and say that I had to tell my mother – the woman he called my mother – that I loved her.’

‘Eina,’ said Dirk. Ouch.

‘But I never said it. Never,’ said Ricus. He made a movement with stiff hands, as if he was cutting the air. ‘I’ve never said it to anyone. Even to the man with the panel van who rescued me, the one I grew to love like a father; or to the woman I later fell in love with . . .’

‘It is a big thing to tell someone you love them,’ I said, thinking about Henk’s words to me.

‘Ja,’ said Ricus. ‘It is.’

He looked into the fire as Ousies added another twig.

Fatima said, ‘You say you loved a man? Who was he?’

Ricus smiled. ‘His name was Ted; he was delivering a vacuum cleaner. I escaped from my home by hiding in the back of his van. A panel van was my first place of safety.’ He reached out towards the white Renault van. ‘By the time Ted found me, we were far gone. He saw my burns and let me stay. I drove around the whole country with him. My interest in mechanics came from fixing his cars. Years later, when Ted died, he left me his transport company. I sold the business but kept some of the vans.’ He looked round at his circle of beloved cars.

‘And who was the woman you loved?’ asked Dirk.

‘Enough about me,’ said Ricus. ‘The point I was making is about the burning on my wrist. How the memory of trauma often comes with a physical experience. Maybe some of you have strong sensations that are part of your flashbacks?’

The goshawk in the thorn tree watched us as we sat in silence for a while. Johannes was rattling quietly under the Renault.

‘For me it is the smell,’ said Fatima, in her gentle voice. ‘I went back with my uncle to the village. It was black. Burnt. When we got to the huts . . . It was hot. The . . . bodies had been under the sun for too long . . . The smell stuck to my skin.’ She pulled the cloth of her dress away from her arms. ‘And stabbed deep up here.’ She poked her fingers towards her nostrils.

She gasped as if she could not breathe, and then put her elbows on her knees and hid her face in her fingers. I reached out and put my hand on her back. Her shoulders shook as she cried. Ousies brought her a paper napkin, and Fatima wiped her eyes and blew her nose.

‘Then we came to South Africa,’ she said, ‘and I thought I’d never smell that smell again. But then they attacked the Somali shops and that man. They burnt him . . . I was there.’

She buried her face in her hands again. Then she looked up and into the fire.

‘The frankincense.’ She took in a big sniff. ‘It cleans the smell out. From the inside.’

Ousies leant her witch’s broom against the black Defender and went to the fire. She threw some dried herbs on the fire and lit another piece of frankincense. The thin line of smoke headed straight for Fatima. She pulled it around her like a shawl.

After a while, Lemoni said, ‘I can smell the Psari Plaki. That divine smell of baked fish just from the oven, tomatoes, garlic and parsley. It’s steaming, and on the table. But before we start to eat, the men break through the door and come in with their guns. My husband can do nothing. They steal everything.’ Her hand went to her left ear. She had pierced ears but no earrings in them. ‘All my jewellery. My precious . . . I was so frightened.’

Lemoni took a handkerchief from her bag and scrunched it up in her hand. She looked angry. I shook my head sympathetically. Foei tog. I would have been angry too. Not only did they steal everything, but they ruined a good meal.

Lemoni wiped her hands and polished her turquoise fingernails with her handkerchief, then put it back into her handbag. Again there was silence, apart from the soft sound of Johannes clinking under a car and Ousies’s broom on the sand. She was sweeping again.

I waited for our leader, Ricus, to say something to comfort her, but it seemed he was allowing the quiet of the group to do the holding. The silence was not awkward; it was full of caring and understanding. We had all suffered. We were all there to heal.

‘The wet canvas bag over my head,’ said Tata Radebe. ‘Eish. Like drowning. It comes back to me in the night, and I cannot breathe.’

He made a clicking sound with his tongue and shook his head. He picked up his stick and put it across his thighs, then carried on with his story.

‘Tyhini. They did a lot of kinds of torture. No sleep. Shocks, and other things . . . that I cannot say in front of ladies. But it is that bag that I can’t get off me. When it happens, I must get outside or get to a window, or I will die. I must find air. When I can feel the air moving, I drink it and drink it. Awu. I am afraid that one day I will not get the air and I will die.’

He was sweating. Ousies gave him a napkin, and he used it to wipe his forehead.

Ricus said, ‘I would like to show you a breathing exercise that calms the mind and helps the air flow easily.’ He put his furry hands on the sides of his big belly. ‘Hold your hands here, on your lower ribs. Breathe in through your nose.’ Tata Radebe put his stick beside him and did as Ricus was doing. ‘Let your fingers feel the ribs rising, as the air fills up your lungs. As you breathe in, count inside your head. Notice what number you get to. Then as you breathe out, count again and notice the number. Let’s all do it.’

We put our hands onto our sides. Apart from Ousies, who was poking some coals under Fatima’s aluminium pots.

I counted to four in, and five out, and the next time it was five in, and six out.

‘The in-breath and out-breath don’t have to be the same length,’ said Ricus. ‘But allow the rhythm to become the same.’

I relaxed into five in, and six out, and I kept that rhythm. After just a few breaths, I felt quite calm. My mind open and my muscles soft.

‘Practise this just for a few minutes every day,’ he said to Tata. ‘Then, if there is a time when there’s no moving air, this breathing will be your window.’

Tata Radebe closed his eyes, a frown of concentration on his face. After a while, the frown relaxed and there was a soft smile on his lips.

He opened his eyes and said, ‘Ewe, Bhuti. Yes, I can see it. The window. Camagu. Thank you.’