[MABONTLE]
Watching my husband fall in love with his son at first sight can never be topped by any other feeling in the world. I cannot stop smiling at this sight and he doesn’t even see me because he’s so fixated on our baby.
‘Mhan’ Singi said I should ask you what his names are’
I’m lying on our bed and I feel like I’m about to sleep. The exhaustion is weighing me down, even taking a bath was a mammoth of a task on its own. I had my doubts about a home birth but Mhani proved to know exactly what she’s doing. We have our own squabbles but I don’t know what we’d all do without that woman. I truly wish her long life without any health complications because we cannot afford to lose her.
‘His name is Fikani, what else?’
I laugh at how he says this. I can’t say I’m shocked. The men of this family like naming their sons after them. From the great grandfathers than have passed, to the uncles that still live amongst us down to the twins and their peers.
‘Please be serious’
‘I am. He’s Vukosi Fikani-Junior Ngobeni’
Royalty? That’s a befitting name. I like it. He carefully puts him down on the bed and tells me that he has asked Kuli to go get baby things. I wanted to do all that before giving birth but he said no. Apparently it’s not allowed to buy a baby anything before its born; it’s bad omen.
He comes and kisses me on the forehead before sitting next to me.
‘Thank you baby. There’s truly nothing bigger you can ever do for me’
I return the smile. I love it when we’re like this. Our fights never end well.
‘One down, nine more to go’ he says and watches for my reaction.
‘That’s a miscount. Four. Four more to go. It’s actually three because you decided to have one outside our marriage’ I just had to. I don’t know what that awkward smile on his face symbolizes.
‘Let’s not do that, please’ he kisses my hand.
‘I just hope my son won’t take after you’
He laughs. ‘What do you mean now, Mhana Vukosi?’
‘Troublesome. Pushing limits. Toxic’
He gasps. ‘I’m toxic?’
‘You are!’
‘I plead the fifth. Anyway, I need to go let the council know that their future king has been born so we can plan his appropriate rites’
‘I don’t want you to go. And we need to talk’ I really don’t want him to leave.
‘I won’t take long baby. This is something I have to do in person’ he brings my chin up so he can kiss me then leaves after getting one last look at Vukosi. He comes back a short moment later and tells me that Aunty Basani is here to see me. I am not in the mood to get up from here but I have to because she can’t come into Fikani’s room. I cover my head and change into a dress, then take Vukosi to the guestroom she’s waiting for me in. We’re not allowed many guests but she’s one of those who have free will to come see us. Fikani has already smeared him with whatever is needed to protect him from external energies; on his fontanelle, back of the neck, belly button and under his feet. I didn’t want to ask what it is because he blatantly refuses to tell me some of the stuff.
Her face lights up when we walk in and she extends her hands.
‘Yhuu yhuu yhuu… tana. Tana ka kokwani. Come to your grandmother’
I can’t help but smile as I cautiously hand him over.
‘Finally you arrive, handsome boy’ she says in that playful voice people use to address babies. I’m still sore. If it was up to me, I would be asleep right now. I am dreading the fact that I need to go see my doctor tomorrow morning.
‘What’s his name?’
‘Vukosi’
‘Avuxeni Mlambya. Well done, Nwa-Khalanga! Cows did not go to waste here. How are you feeling?’
‘Physically? I’ll be fine, aunty’
‘Exactly. That’s how a real woman should speak. Emotionally?’
I sigh. How am I actually doing, emotionally?
‘I hope you and Mlambya are no longer fighting now. It would be bad for the baby’
‘We wouldn’t if he was honest’
‘What do you mean? Don’t tell me you’re still on that Nqobile topic’
I keep quiet.
‘She birthed him his firstborn child. How do you expect her to disappear?’
‘He promised not to take a second wife’
She laughs, hard. She laughs like I’ve just told an iconic joke.
‘Are you serious?’
I nod. ‘I hate his dishonesty. Had he been honest about his ways from the start, I certainly wouldn’t be here’
‘And you wonder why he doesn’t tell the truth? He wants you here but because you’re stubborn, he has to come up with tricks and do underhanded ways because you refuse to listen. Name one king who lived and eventually died with one wife?’
‘There’s a first time for everything’
She looks at me like I’ve lost my mind. I mean what I’ve just said.
‘I feel like for as long as you’re in this marriage, you’re going to give me a headache. Do you think I enjoy receiving phone calls from the guardians of this palace?’
I should’ve just kept my mouth shut. I don’t know what possessed me to vent to her.
‘If you want to have peace in your life, I suggest you remove yourself as an obstacle between him and the mother of his child, and any other woman who manages to pull his eye. Otherwise you are going to drop dead here from a heart attack, as young as you are’
Vukosi wakes up and starts crying. She moves her eyes from me and focuses on calming him down.
