Chapter 14

I now have every reason to believe that my grandfather has lived way past his limit. All his brain cells may be extinct by now. I gave him my predicament expecting him to rule in my favour, well, he didn’t. He didn’t also tell me that my father ws visiting and talking with my grandma inside the smoky hut. He laughed as he always did when i told him what was going on. I sat waiting for his toothless rasp to come to an end but when it did, i wished it would have continued. This is because he called out his guest from the kitchen and he came running. I never knew my father would do that.

He of course asked where the cows were and i told him, fear nudging every joint in my body. He asked why i was away while peeling a cane from the euphorbia hedge and my grandpa answered before i did. He threw away the stick he had and picked a hoe stick when he heard. My grandpa may be old but i loved him more that day.

He stopped my father from beating daylights out of me, and did it himself. I hated him again. My father’s punishment was worse though and i wished he would have beat me to death. He said that i seemed not to have enough to do. He said that i was jumping into old people’s stuff like marriage yet i hadn’t even learnt how to wipe mucus off my nose. The death sentence, which would probably kill my street credentials, was that the little negro had to go to school. He said that i was wasting quite a lot of time and space and i needed a place where they would whoop my behind better. I tried picturing myself in some oversize short and shirts and ‘i love my teacher’ bag and that truly doesn’t make a joyful noise in my head. Well, it wasn’t to be that way and my imagination was wrong for ii wasn’t getting any bag or new shorts. Timotheo, my distant cousin had outgrown some trousers and i was to get into them.

I now hate everyone who led me to this predicament, Chero, Her new-found love and al they believe in. Come next week, i’ll be the bearer of shame in form of a woven bag and tattered books. Well, my grandpa laughed off the whole Chero thing and i now am a fool, a fool who was going to get his stupidity exorcized in a correctional facility.