Free You Can't Get Lost in Cape Town by Zoë Wicomb Page A

much longer will she have to sit here and wait for time to pass? This time designated by strangers to mourn a man with a large head?For that was what the newspaper showed, a man with the large head of a bulldog, and Tamieta, allowing herself the unknown luxury of irreverence, passes a damp tongue over her parched lips.
    She will watch the plants in the concrete flowerbox by her side. She does not know what they are called but she will watch these leaves grow, expand before her very eyes. By keeping an eye trained on one leaf – and she selects a healthy shoot resting on the rim – she will witness the miracle of growth. She has had enough of things creeping up on her, catching her unawares, offering unthinkable surprises. No, she will travel closely with the passage of time and see a bud thicken under her vigilant eye.
    It is time to rise for prayer, and as she reminds herself to keep her lowered eyes fixed on the chosen leaf the plastic bag under her chair falls over and the overall, her old blue turban and the comfy slippers roll out for all the world to see. But all the eyes are shut so that she picks up her things calmly and places them back in the bag. Just in time for the last respectful silence. The heads hang in grief. Tamieta’s neck aches. Tonight Beatrice will free the knotted tendons with her nimble fingers. She does not have the strength to go into town for the wool, but Beatrice will understand. Tamieta is the first to slip out of her seat, no point in lingering when the rain is about to fall, and with her handbag swinging daintily in the crook of her right arm and the parcel of clothes tucked under her left, she marches chin up into the bush, to the deserted station where the skollie-boys dangle their feet from the platform all day long.

Y OU CAN’T GET LOST IN C APE T OWN
    In my right hand resting on the base of my handbag I clutch a brown leather purse. My knuckles ride to and fro, rubbing against the lining . . . surely cardboard . . . and I am surprised that the material has not revealed itself to me before. I have worn this bag for months. I would have said with a dismissive wave of the hand, ‘Felt, that is what the base of this bag is lined with.’
    Then, Michael had said, ‘It looks cheap, unsightly,’ and lowering his voice to my look of surprise, ‘Can’t you tell?’ But he was speaking of the exterior, the way it looks.
    The purse fits neatly into the palm of my hand. A man’s purse. The handbag gapes. With my elbow I press it against my hip but that will not avert suspicion. The bus is moving fast, too fast, surely exceeding the speed limit, so that I bob on my seat and my grip on the purse tightens as the springs suck at my womb, slurping it down through the plush of the red upholstery. I press my buttocks into the seat to ease the discomfort.
    I should count out the fare for the conductor. Perhaps not; he is still at the front of the bus. We are now travelling through Rondebosch so that he will be fully occupied with white passengers at the front. Women with blue-rinsedheads tilted will go on telling their stories while fishing leisurely for their coins and just lengthen a vowel to tide over the moment of paying their fares.
    â€˜Don’t be so anxious,’ Michael said. ‘It will be all right.’ I withdrew the hand he tried to pat.
    I have always been anxious and things are not all right; things may never be all right again. I must not cry. My eyes travel to and fro along the grooves of the floor. I do not look at the faces that surround me but I believe that they are lifted speculatively at me. Is someone constructing a history for this hand resting foolishly in a gaping handbag? Do these faces expect me to whip out an amputated stump dripping with blood? Do they wince at the thought of a hand, cold and waxen, left on the pavement where it was severed? I draw my hand out of the bag and shake my fingers ostentatiously. No point in