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Xhosa woman no less, a culture whose women were thought of as particularly loudmouthed
and promiscuous. The two of them fought and bickered the whole time, and after that first
trip my mother refused to go back.
Up to that point I’d lived my whole life in a world run by women, but after my mom and
Abel were married, and especially after Andrew was born, I watched him try to assert himself
and impose his ideas of what he thought his family should be. One thing that became clear
early on was that those ideas did not include me. I was a reminder that my mom had lived a
life before him. I didn’t even share his color. His family was him, my mom, and the new baby.
My family was my mom and me. I actually appreciated that about him. Sometimes he was my
buddy, sometimes not, but he never pretended our relationship was anything other than what
it was. We’d joke around and laugh together. We’d watch TV together. He’d slip me pocket
money now and again after my mother said I’d had enough. But he never gave me a birthday
present or a Christmas present. He never gave me the affection of a father. I was never his
son.
Abel’s presence in the house brought with it new rules. One of the first things he did was
kick Fufi and Panther out of the house.
“No dogs in the house.”
“But we’ve always had the dogs in the house.”
“Not anymore. In an African home, dogs sleep outside. People sleep inside.”
Putting the dogs in the yard was Abel’s way of saying, “We’re going to do things around
here the way they’re supposed to be done.” When they were just dating, my mother was still
the free spirit, doing what she wanted, going where she wanted. Slowly, those things got
reined in. I could feel that he was trying to rein in our independence. He even got upset about
church. “You cannot be at church the whole day,” he’d say. “My wife is gone all day, and what
will people say? ‘Why is his wife not around? Where is she? Who goes to church for the
whole day?’ No, no, no. This brings disrespect to me.”
He tried to stop her from spending so much time at church, and one of the most effective
tools he used was to stop fixing my mother’s car. It would break down, and he’d purposefully
let it sit. My mom couldn’t afford another car, and she couldn’t get the car fixed somewhere
else. You’re married to a mechanic and you’re going to get your car fixed by another
mechanic? That’s worse than cheating. So Abel became our only transport, and he would
refuse to take us places. Ever defiant, my mother would take minibuses to get to church.
Losing the car also meant losing access to my dad. We had to ask Abel for rides into
town, and he didn’t like what they were for. It was an insult to his manhood.
“We need to go to Yeoville.”
“Why are you going to Yeoville?”
“To see Trevor’s dad.”
“What? No, no. How can I take my wife and her child and drop you off there? You’re
insulting me. What do I tell my friends? What do I tell my family? My wife is at another
man’s house? The man who made that child with her? No, no, no.”
I saw my father less and less. Not long after, he moved down to Cape Town.
Abel wanted a traditional marriage with a traditional wife. For a long time I wondered
why he ever married a woman like my mom in the first place, as she was the opposite of that