This is an extract from Skin Costs Extra.
Simon Mashaba accepted the New York posting reluctantly. It was so inopportune, barely two months after he and Nomsa had — finally — moved out of their small Soweto home into a house on a quiet, tree-lined street in the northern suburbs.
He had remained faithful to his late father’s request: “Stay true to your roots, live among your people” for as long as he could. It was Nomsa who had pointed out that many of his comrades in the struggle — some were now his colleagues in government — had all fled the township as soon as they could. She was a professor at a prestigious university close to the city and she resented her daily commute along roads clogged with crazy “kombi” taxis as a needless —Quixotic — gesture.
Despite the lingering sense of guilt, he soon came to like their new home as much as Nomsa did. It was large enough for them to have separate studies overlooking different parts of the garden. He was able to walk from his desk to a stone bench nestled in the shade of a giant old jacaranda tree with gnarled but sturdy branches that defied the wind and hardly creaked. She often fell asleep, a book clutched to her chest, beneath an even older magnolia tree that flowered only in the evening, giving off a strong, womanly fragrance. At the centre of the garden, water gurgled from the mouth of a metal bird standing in an ancient fountain, adding to the gentle texture of sounds.
The whole place had an air of serenity that helped bring them closer together, overcoming the distance that had somehow grown between them in recent years. After spending time on their own each evening they looked forward to having dinner together, watching television and creeping into bed. Their lovemaking became more frequent.
Then, unexpectedly, he was appointed “special investment adviser” to the consulate in New York. He had to be there as soon as possible, so that he could familiarise himself with the “intricacies of the world’s commercial heart”, what motivated the people who controlled so much of the world’s wealth, something that his predecessors failed to grasp. But he knew that this was an exaggeration, that he too would find it very difficult to persuade wary investors to put “billions” into South Africa.
Why, he asked himself, could we not accept that we are an ordinary nation now that apartheid is gone, and that we have to wait our turn like the rest of Africa?
He was being deployed — a favourite word in the government’s increasingly arcane lexicon — to soothe the irritation of someone high up.
Mashaba knows economics, and he’s one of us.
That much was true, anyway. He had been a commander in the movement’s underground army, and later obtained an economics degree from an English university where a former president had also studied. After liberation, Simon was unable to exploit either of his talents, and had become neither a general in the army nor anyone important in the ministry of finance.
He was too diffident, people said, lacking in passion, and far too willing to accede to the viewpoint of others. So, at the age of 50, he was being sent to New York to do a thankless job. He accepted, believing that he had no other option.
You are too generous, his wife Nomsa said when he informed her of the transfer. With my life as well as yours, she added bitterly.
Nomsa was even more horrified when she saw her visa for the United States. It described her as a “dependent spouse”. She imagined those smug immigration officials smiling indulgently at her: poor, helpless woman.
However, she was not the kind of person to carry on complaining. After she had agreed to join Simon in New York, she resolved to make the best of things. She told him that she needed time to wind down her affairs at home, and talk to people about helping her find a suitable position in New York. It was useless asking Simon to use his contacts. He was just no good at asking for favours.
She would join him after a month or so.
Strange Pilgrimages is published by Picador Africa