Guyanese Literary Fiction, a short story set during the 1980’s in a country suffering from import restrictions, and US political and economic pressure…
Mr. Worry was in a bad mood that Wednesday morning, “Oh Lawd another stinking hot day in this so-called tropical paradise! He flipped to another page of the Guyana newspapers, “Not a damn thing happening in de whole world.” He peeped closer at an article and then sucked his teeth loudly, “No mattuh whey yuh go, every government corrupt and stupid.” He flipped to the back, “Well at least a new film opening at de Globe dis weekend.”
His mistress, who was cooking breakfast at the kerosene stove, flipped her loose plaits off her breasts and rolled her eyes. She squared her shoulders, her back to him. The coconut oil hissed gently as she placed slices of ripe plantains in it, then she cracked six eggs into a blue plastic bowl, and a single one into another small dish before she quickly flipped the plantains to crisp up on the other side.
He glanced past her out the kitchen window to see a pair of bright kiskadees chirping on a branch in the mango tree, “Them damn birds never get tired of singing all day? Tweet-tweet-tweet my ass!”
Mrs. Worry placed a big cup of Red Rose tea in front of him, sugary sweet just the way he liked it, along with a banana and his breakfast plate “Put down that newspaper and eat yuh tea.” She placed a hand on her hip, “You better get your breakfast at Shanta’s Snackette today, ah didn’t keep back anything fuh your lunch kit.”
He folded the paper neatly in half and eyed the plate in front of him as she walked out the kitchen door into the hallway. The golden plantains were soft and crisp with little caramelised bits that got kissed harder by the fire. The eggs had that nice lacy brown frill and white skirt with the yellow yolk in the middle. “This egg look just like a ballerina dancing nah, eheh.” He mused to himself.
Before he could take three bites of eggs, six children trooped in. They looked no different from a descending ladder dressed in blue and white uniforms, “Good Morning Daddy.” One after the next until he was swimming in good mornings.
The littlest one’s smile was missing a piece and he frowned, “Yuh lost your front teeth last night?”
“Yeah, big brother tied a string around it and pull it down.” She grinned from ear to ear, which made the space appear charming, “He gave me a sweetie afterwards for being brave.”
Their mother returned to the kitchen neatly dressed in her going to market daisy-flowers-printed smock dress, and cow leather sandals, and her hair in a neat bun on the back of her head.
She dished up their tea as she counted each plate twice, one egg per child, and some fried plantains and peppersauce for herself. Finally, after she had tidied up she pulled out a chair for herself “Come now children, eat up your tea and hurry up and go along your way to school.”
She swallowed her last bite and looked at her husband, “Man, what are you doing sitting down here still, nah? You have to drop off de bag of shoes for repair before yuh go to work.”
Mr. Worry smiled for the first time that morning, maybe it was for the children’s benefit who knows, “Nah, no worries today, Simon said he will keep a seat for me in his hire-car.” He flipped his wrist to look at the gold face of the Timex watch he wore with pride, a gift from his father back in 1965. “He said to wait for him outside at about eight o’clock.”
“You gon be late fuh work!”
“I will get off at the shoes-repairman and walk the lil piece to Fogarty’s. Don’t worry so woman, I will be at my desk sharp-sharp at 8:30.”
All eight of them crowded out the door, they mingled about the small verandah until they were shooed down the stairs by their mother. She turned the key in the lock and jiggled the door a few times before she followed them down the stairs.
The wife surveyed the house, a replica of every house on the street with pale-yellow siding, red tin roof, and concrete pillars with steep front and back stairs that started from tiny verandahs. The Worry’s lot was devoid of garden or trees, for Mr. Worry in his worries about snakes and such had paved over the whole yard.
Mr. Worry waited impatiently for the hire-car to arrive. He swung the flour-cloth bag of shoes in need of repair, “Yuh know what woman, dese school shoes will cost a good small piece to fix up.”
She sighed, “Dem is cheaper than new ones, man. And besides, we lucky bad because school is free fuh all Guyanese children! Is only a uniform and socks and shoes we have to buy, eheh.”
The car he he awaited slid to a halt and he hopped into the red vauxhall. The other two men in the front seat squished harder against the driver so Mr. Worry could slam the door shut. The five-person car sped off carrying the eight passengers and the driver.
The little Worrys’ hustled to catch up with their six friends from next door and the twelve children trudged off to school in the same direction, some to St. Mary’s Primary and some to Christ Church Secondary.
The mother watched them go, eyeing their hair for neatness and their uniforms for cleanness. Satisfied, she nodded to herself and turned away to wait for her friend, Gloria, the only person who called her by her name.
Her neighbour’s yard was a riot of pink, white and red hibiscus bushes. The only fruit bearing trees in the woman’s lot were the big mango tree with the still-singing kiskadees, and a swaying coconut tree in the backyard heavy with green nuts.
Worry’s wife watched her neighbour latched her gate behind her. She waited with pleasure to be acknowledged, and her neighbour complied. “Joy dear, how you doing this fine morning, girl?”
“Good morning, Gloria! I am good-good. Mr. Worry read his newspapers and complained about how nothing is happening in the world. The children dressed themselves nice this morning, so I got a little time to myself to make the market list. And them plantains we bought yesterday was just nice and ripe for today.”
The women chatted about the price of rice, and the freshness of coconut oil as they shopped. They exchanged recipes ideas and discussed training brassieres for their eldest girls. Along the way, they greeted everyone by name. They gaffed about the roughness of the ocean with the fishmonger, they discussed the arrivals of fabrics from China with the seamstress, and the cane juice man told them about the big scandal about a milkman in Rossignol diluting the milk with trench water and how the whole village sick-sick. And at last, their market rounds completed, the women turned for home with their string bags bulging with cassava, fresh fish, two pints of rice, one pint of coconut oil, callaloo and seasoning.
“Joy girl, yuh read the newspapers today? This morning news not so good, eh? Look at how dese poor people in Ethiopia starving out. You and me know how hard it is to make the little money we get stretch to feed our families.” She rubbed her forehead like she had a headache, “Thank God for the little we can grow in this country otherwise we would all be starving too, not just mostly-starving, “ She gave a derisive chuckle.
“The rain barrel running low-low, ah will have to fetch water upstairs to cook and wash de dishes.” Joy replied as she looked at the sky, “I hope the rain comes soon, that standpipe water is rusty looking lately.” The far-away drought jolted Joy’s constant water concern.
“Well, that is life nah? It’s one thing or de other. No rain, no food, bad government, bans and sanctions, you name it girl.” Gloria sucked her teeth in frustration.
Joy sucked her teeth in empathy with her friend’s frustration, “Look at we here in Guyana, ain’t no different with the government committing their crimes and we Guyanese suffering all the punishment. What can we do eh girl? What can we do but pray the Ethiopians get the strength to find their way. We? all we can do is take care of the problems right in front of we face nah.”
“Talking about problems, Joy, you know where I can buy some contraband flour? I am feeling the taste for a slice of bread or a flour roti.”
“Ha! My dear Gloria, wid these bans and a brokes country, and wid all dat pressure from America and de rest of de world too frightened of them, we might never taste a roti again!”
The women parted ways at their front gates, each went into their homes to make the beds to tuck the sheets in tight and fold the light blankets just so.
They did the washing up and set the dishes to air dry on the kitchen ledge where the sun shone hottest.
They dusted the shelves and tabletops and swept the floors for in a hot city the windows must be thrown wide open to invite the cooling ocean breeze.
They both boiled rice and strained it, saving the rice water for afternoon porridge. They both fried the fish in a few drops of oil, then used the pan to cook the callaloo. The scent of coconut oil and onions simmering perfumed their thoughts, covering up the sadness of a world far away, of the world just outside their windows.
At the noon hour they watched their offsprings eating their breakfast in contentment, they both sighed with gratitude for being able to provide for their children, that day.
Gloria gazed at her children as she thought, maybe one day these children will grow up and save the world, but my job right now is to keep them safe and healthy.
As Joy spooned food into her youngest child’s mouth, she thought, let the world take care of what’s over there, and we will take care of what’s over here.
After their noonday meal, the children went back to school and Gloria and Joy washed the dishes and the pots and pans with tiny nubs of salt-soap and set the pots aside for the next round of cooking.
They met at the standpipe to do the washing. They both used the leftover slivers of salt soap to wash the clothes. They whipped their wooden paddles up and down until their arms were blurs. They beat the dirt out of the men’s hard pants, for after all what could a sliver of soap really achieve?
Finally, they prepared the after-school tea of rice-water porridge and cassava bread. Then they cooked their boiled and fried cassavas with saltfish and yams.
The children arrived home in a flurry of activity. They ate, played, finished their homework, and bathed. The younger children with one bucket of water and the older ones allowed to use the standpipe. They were fed their dinners and sent off to bed.
In the women’s moment of brief respite, Joy and Gloria bathed themselves in their respective wash shed, put on their colourful nightdresses and dusters and waited for their husbands to arrive bringing home tales of their trials and tribulations.
That one evening, just before the men arrived near seven PM it was, Gloria passed Joy a dry coconut for the next day’s cookup rice, and a glass bottle of coconut water over the fence, “Better than any sugarcake, “she said with a wink at the bottle.
Joy smiled to herself as warmed the dinner while she waited for Mr. Worry. Six days a week, ten hours a day the man works to feed his family, who am I to deny him his complaints eh?
Mr. Worry worried about everything throughout their dinner, he worried about the rent, the rapid rise in cost of living, he worried about inflation compared to wage increases. He worried about Guyana and Guyanese, about the families right on their street who couldn’t afford to eat. He worried about the current government. He worried about tomorrow, and the next and the next.
Joy cleared away the debris of their dinner, “Here man go long and sit pon the verandah, ah will bring our tea out deh.”
In the kitchen, she poured a generous shot from the quarter-bottle El Dorado rum she kept hidden in the basket hanging from the kitchen beam, she poured a small amount of coconut water into the glass, being careful not to over dilute the essence of the potent liquor. She lifted the glass to the light to admire its clarity, Guyanese rum must be de best rum in de world, she thought.
Then she made her own cup of tea, wondering if she will ever taste milk again, what with milk powder and tinned carnation banned and barely any cow milk making it to Georgetown, she had not had a drop of milk on her tongue in a decade.
Mr. Worry surprised grin was all she needed. He raised the glass of golden rum and clear coconut water, he swirled the glass just to see it grow comfortably cloudy, “To de future, woman, to de future.” He closed his eyes and took a big gulp, rolled it about in his mouth and swallowed bit by bit savouring every drop.
“I hope our children have a better world than this hard-hard life we have, eh wife?” He said as he passed his eyes over the street lamps suffering another blackout.
He took another gulp, his tongue savouring the deep mellow flavours of dark sugar and molasses, caramel and vanilla, spices all the tropical things he loved about his country, he trickled tiny swallow after swallow. Loving the flavours in his mouth and craving the burn in his belly. He raised the glass again and said to his wife, “Tomorrow will come, dis will all pass into the past, you wait and see, one day soon we will get out from under dis cross we bear, you just wait and see dearie.”
His wife gazed up at the star laden sky spreading like a silver blanket over land and ocean, “It’s not a bad life we have man. We have a roof over our heads, a little food in the cupboards, good bright children, and love between us, although sometimes you make me mad as rass. But all in all, husband, we have a good life.” She drank her sweet lemongrass tea and smiled a restful smile.
“This rum and coconut water taste good tonight, wife. I thank you kindly.” Said Mr. Worry as he drained his glass.
They both sat for a long while, silent with their thoughts, listening to the tropical evening songs…rustles and croaks and ribbits and soft whistles and fluffing feather, whispering leaves and ocean waves.
Just as frog in the trench at the side of their house bid them a rather loud ribbit, Mr. Worry stood up and reached a helping hand down to Joy. “Come now mistress, time for bed, dear.”
Notes from the author: In Guyanese culture when I was growing up, the meals were called tea, breakfast, tea, and dinner (in Western culture it is breakfast, lunch, afternoon tea, and supper.