Buffaloes in the Garden

The buffaloes walked into the garden, trampling the chrysanthemums and daisies my grandmother had planted years ago. Mother saw them a fraction too late, and her voice shot through the kitchen window, piercing the afternoon air.

“Kingston!”

I ran from the back of the house, praying she had not cut her wrist again. Turning the east wall, I collided with one of the animals. It grunted and turned its head to me, chrysanthemums in its mouth.

“Stop staring and chase them out stupid,” laughed Mother.

“How?”

She climbed out the kitchen window, jumped over the young bougainvillea tree below it, and picked up a bamboo stick lying nearby. 

Smack!

She aimed for the ankles and chased them out the wicker gate, pulling it shut as they trundled back to the fields.

“I told your father to fix the gate but he never listens.”

I stood silently watching her as she stared at the animals and then at her nails, picking out a splinter.

“Ma dad isn’t around anymore.”

“Hush Don’t talk like that about your father He’ll be back soon.” She ruffled my hair and climbed back onto the kitchen window sill. “Lunch will be ready in ten.”

*

It was a cool Sunday evening when mother cut her wrist for the first time; the skin below her left forearm, like flaps hanging to the side while blood trickled out. It flowed down her knuckles and dripped all around her. When I entered the bedroom, asking if she would like to go for a walk, she was swooning in the chair. I ripped a curtain from the pelmet and used it to stop the bleeding. I, then, ran downstairs to the telephone. She rambled on about her schooldays and the time when she bumped into dad for the first time, as I sat next to her rubbing her cold forehead. “Kingston I feel drunk and I’m sorry.” I didn’t know what to say so I asked her about grandma. She tried to smile and talk, and by then we could hear the ambulance siren near the field. They took her away on a stretcher and I was left behind on the porch, staring at the blue light flash as I thought about dinner.

*

There was a cup of mashed potatoes, chicken roast in a bowl, a loaf of bread and salad on a platter for lunch. We sat across each other and mother served me first, piling a plate with my favourite chicken pieces (breast and leg), onion rings, lettuce and a large spoonful of potato mash.

“Fix the gate tomorrow?”

I had food in my mouth so I nodded.

“If they come in again I’m going to shoot them.” She held up an invisible rifle in her hands aiming at imaginary buffaloes in the kitchen.

“We don’t have a gun.”

“We should get one.”

“The knives aren’t sharp enough for you?” I regretted it as soon as the words came out my mouth. But mother laughed, loud and clear. She reached across the table, hand outstretched, for a high-five.

“Good one,” she said, knocking over the cup of mashed potatoes with her bony elbow.

She got serious after that and picked at her food, as I continued eating. Outside, the crows were having a noisy conversation and sunbeams streamed in through the open doorway, allowing us to keep the lights off till the evening was upon us.

“Please don't tell your father about the knife incident He’s got enough on his mind already.”

“I won’t.” That brightened her up and she asked if I was up for a walk to the lake.

“Let’s go in the evening Ma It’s too hot outside.”

“Kingston stop being so serious all the time.”

*

So, at three in the afternoon we stepped out of our house. Mother asked me to wrap a wire around the broken latch and the stake. “In case those stupid buffaloes come back We really need a gun.” We walked in the shadow of the old trees towards the lake that was at the end of the field, near the dirt road that led to the city. Mother had on a light blue dress with off-white flowers. She kept trying to straighten out the collar but it was stubborn in its wrinkledness. She gave up and started humming a tune that sounded familiar.

“I think I’ve heard that before.”

“No you haven’t I just made it up,” she grinned. “I hope we don’t run into your father on the way You know how he gets about gallivanting in the heat.”

I wanted to hold her by her neck and shout right into her eardrums that dad wasn’t around anymore but she hadn’t looked this contended in a long time. And as we got near the lake, mother screamed in delight. The water was a magical shade of blue-green under the sun and we had company. The two buffaloes were lying by the side of the lake, one of them resting their head on the other’s belly. They stared sullenly at us in a way only buffaloes and urchins have mastered over the years. Mother walked over to them, picked up a flat pebble and sent it skipping all the way to the other side of the water. “Can you do that?” she asked them.

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