Lions and Wildebeests

Chapter 3

                                                                        Chapter 3: Saburi

                                            The blessing of a sister is forever cherished.

                I returned home as my family was blowing out the candles of our hut. I sat the water in the kitchen and retreated to my cot in the corner across from the twins. Betserai was already wrapped up in his blankets across from me.

            “Where have you been? You have been running with the lions? What did Mother and Father tell you today?” Saburi hissed.

            I made out her shape as I settled into my thin blankets. “Who cares what they say? They don’t care about me, so why should I honor them?”

            “It is well in the sight of our ancestors and the spirits; it is respect…”

            “I don’t serve the ancestors,” I pointed out; still, God does say honor thy father and thy mother for long days on this earth. But did I really want many days in my life of disgrace? Nevertheless, it is a commandment.

            “I’m sorry,” I responded to my sister’s silence. “I am sorry, but I still I don’t feel I should have to honor them. I feel…so unwanted.”

            “It is not what you feel, it is what is right, but I understand,” she whispered in her gentle manner.

            I thought about tomorrow and about my life and how it may change with the day of my rite of passage. I looked at my sister, now, and the lines across her face from her own rite of passage ceremony.

            “Saburi, do you think we all have a destiny?”

            “Sure.”

            “Me too?”

            “I think so. You have some reason for being here even if you do not acknowledge our ancestors and the spirits but the God of your ancestor.”

            “But he is you ancestor too.”

            “I can disclaim him, for he did not mark me.”

            “Even with my grey eyes, do I still have a destiny?”

            “Yes, I think that you do, and tomorrow, you will find it. You will become a woman, and many boys will look at you in a new light. They will see your matured beauty because you will not be a little girl anymore…”

            “Perhaps I will find a husband and bring honor?”

            “I will not speak of what will change. Everyone’s experience is different.”

            “You cannot speak of what you found, can you?”

            “No, just like you will not be able to, but we will see as it unfolds in your life.”

            Her words were comforting and patient. Even before her rite of passage last year, Saburi had retained these qualities maturely beyond her own years. It was rumored that she would be the next prophetess, but I know one thing: besides Abdel, she was my best friend and seemed to accept me rather than tolerate me.

The thought of what might happen tomorrow scared me and sent anxious shivers down my spine. I could not sleep as the moon shined through the window above me. I looked over my siblings to make sure they were all asleep, and ten minutes later, the sands were meshing between my toes as I journeyed to find Abdel with a blanket around my shoulders.  When I got far enough from the village, I began calling in a lion fashion like the howl of a jackal or a dog mixed with the roar of a lion. It was to lions a warning, but from me to Abdel, our own secret call to each other.

            “Abdel,” I whispered.

            I made it miles away from our village, close to the Zambezi River. Yet, I could still see the shadows cast by our huts against the prairie. I stopped at the river when I realized that a herd of zebra were there, which cut out any chance of Abdel being present for a night drink. I called one more time, and some of the zebras flicked their ears to study me. Assured that I was but a thin girl, certainly no threat to them, they continued their drink and departed. Crocodiles hissed as the zebras passed, but there was still no sign of Abdel.

            “Abdel!” I called louder.

            He did not come. I walked along the river, quite alone and feeling lost, though I could reach my village in a matter of ten minutes.

            Finally, there was a rustle in the bushes, and Abdel appeared with his slow, majestic strides. He nudged me with his head and went to the river, not much caring about the hisses of the crocodiles.

            I sat near a tree to watch. I could tell he had just hunted because his belly was distended. He plopped down next to me and pawed at the blanket over my shoulders with his four inch claws. I draped the blanket over him and lay against the trunk of the tree as he put his head in my lap. The familiar beat of his heart was calming to me as I stroked his mane absent mindedly. Slowly, my anxiety left me, and I could say a prayer for the peace of Jesus. Still, I did not want to go back, so I remained with Abdel, my very calm and easy lion companion who was there for me even when my village was against me and considered my presence a tragedy.