Destroyers by Dave Mckay
"Thank you," she said, leaning her head on his shoulder. And once again, there was not a hint of her habitual foolishness.
Moses did not know if the hug meant that she was going to stay; he did not want to know just yet. It was just good to have her there. So they worked together quietly on fixing dinner, ate in relative silence, and then sat together in the yard, after the sun had gone down, just looking at the stars.
"Do you believe in God?" Rosy asked, when they had not said anything for quite some time. It was a deep question coming, as it was, from a twelve-year-old. Throughout the conversation that followed, she never laughed once.
"Yeah, sure," Moses said. "Why?"
"Does he talk to you?"
"Talk to me? Of course not! I just believe in him; I'm not a prophet or something," Moses retorted.
"Do you talk to him, then? Do you ask him what he wants you to do?"
"If I can't hear him, how can he tell me what he wants me to do?" Moses laughed. "Rosy, I just try to be nice to people, that's all."
"Everybody likes you," Rosy said.
"Right, and if you're nice to people, they'll like you too," said the big brother. "It's the best way to get ahead. It worked for me... in America, and in my business."
After a long silence, Rosy asked, "But what about God? Don't you try to be nice to people for him?"
"No, I do it for myself, Rosy. If you don't take care of yourself, no one else will."
Another pause. Then Rosy said, "God talks to me."
"Wah!" Moses turned around to face his sister as he asked her quite earnestly "What does he say?"
"Not like a voice, but like in my heart," she said. "Like I know I have to do something." Disappointment showed on Moses' face, as Rosy went on: "I know I have to go with Winky. He wants me there. It's about something big that is going to happen."
"Are we going to go back over that?" Moses asked angrily.
Rosy did not answer. And Moses did not say anything more.
An hour later, Rosy went to the mattress on her side of the hut, lay herself down, and fell asleep.
The next morning, when Moses got up he noticed that his sister's bed was empty. She must be working in the shamba, he thought. But when he went out in the yard there was no sign of her.
He raced back into the hut, pulled a box out from under her side of the couch, where Rosy kept her clothes, and it was empty.
Table of contents
Chapter 15. Destruction
Moses never fully recovered from Rosy leaving him. In some ways it was harder than the loss of his parents. But his special ability to direct attention away from personal pain was enough to carry him through. He tried to look on the positive side: There was nothing stopping him from visiting Rosy, and now there was time to make friends with the other boda-boda drivers.
In the end, however, his resolve not to drink, and the extra demands of doing Rosy's work in the shamba did not allow for much time with anyone apart from his best friend, Jiddy. His left arm had become so strong that he had little difficulty swinging the jembe, and he even learned how to do a reasonable job of laying bricks, with Jiddy's help. They were making plans for Jiddy to move in with him when the house was finished.
Then, in May of that same year, when Moses was still only fifteen years old, something happened which shook the entire world. It was not the immediate sensation in Shinyalu, tucked away in the Kenyan interior, that it was in the rest of the world, but Kenyans did have radio contact, and word of mouth travelled almost as quickly.
Something terrible had happened in America. The whole country had been attacked in a huge air strike... practically blown off the map. Millions of people were dead, and those who were still alive were fleeing the country to escape radiation, disease, and starvation. It was the biggest loss of human life in the history of the world.
Moses tried to text Ray but could not get through. Weeks later, Ray texted him with a new mobile number. He had been out of the country, in England, when the attack took place. Some of his relatives had survived but were stranded in the U.S. Nevertheless, for Moses, even Ray's family and friends were just statistics. Others in the village were even more indifferent to the actual sufferings of people they had never met. It was not so different to how Americans would have felt if they had received word that a village in Kenya had been wiped out.
Moses knew that his friend had bigger worries than sending messages to some teenager in Africa, and so he tried not to text too often; but each time he did, Ray was kind enough to send a short reply. He asked Moses to pray for his family in particular. Ray had never said anything to sound religious before that, but the boy could appreciate that, at a time like this, almost anyone would be praying. It was some weeks later that Ray's family escaped the holocaust and joined him in England.
The fall of America was a turning point in world history. It was understandable that people talked about it constantly. Those who had no radios would crowd around those who did, in order to get the latest updates. And newspapers sold out as quickly as they arrived from Nairobi. But apart from talk, life was surprisingly normal there in the village. People still worked their farms; made the long walk into Kakamega to sell produce, get supplies, or visit the hospital; and they still plied their trades, which, in Moses' case, meant taking customers up and down the dirt road to their various destinations.
One Saturday, two weeks after the attack, Josephat returned. Moses had been off on a fare to Kakamega when the itinerant prophet did his post office talk, but he learned from others that Josephat was claiming that he had predicted the fall of America. People accepted that he had been talking about destruction for "those who had destroyed the earth" before it happened, but most could not agree that he had specifically indicated that it would be America.
Moses was passing Amy's place late that afternoon. He was without a customer, so he decided to pop in and see his sister. Josephat was in the front room with three of the children, who were at a table doing their homework.
"You were right," Josephat said to Moses, when Amy had left to get Rosy from the backyard.
"Right about what?" Moses asked.
"About America being the ones God was going to destroy," Josephat said.
"I didn't say he was going to destroy anyone!" Moses said defensively. "And you didn't either."
"But you said Americans were destroying the world, didn't you?" Josephat asked. "And that's the people God said he was going to destroy."
He wants to drag me into his stupid prediction, Moses thought. And he did not want to be a part of it.
Just then Amy came back, and the topic shifted.
"Rosy's just finishing some haircuts," she explained. It seemed to Moses that, in the short time she had been there, Rosy was learning more at Amy's than at school.
Benji had been teaching her how to play the guitar, and Amy had taught her some fancy cooking. Now she was learning how to cut hair, not that it took much skill to shave heads, which was the preferred style for both males and females in rural Kenya. Amy had hand-operated clippers with an attachment that would leave a tiny bit of hair on and still keep it the same length all over the head.
Josephat had offended Moses. He could see that. So when Rosy came in, he left the boy to talk with his sister while he and Amy moved to the other end of the room and spoke quietly with each other. Moses could not resist listening, even when it meant missing some of what Rosy was saying.
"What do you reckon it means for us?" Moses heard Amy ask Josephat quietly.
"I can't truly say," Josephat replied. "He didn't give me any other 'structions. We just hafta be faithful, sister. There's others waiting too."
"Are you listening or not?" Rosy had become an avid talker since moving in with Amy, and she wanted a listener. Moses was happy to see the change in her.
"Sorry, Rosy," he said. "The haircuts... yeah. Is this the first time you've done it?"
"Today, yeah. Ann
Then she shifted the focus. "How is the house?"
"We're getting there. Jiddy's parents are helping with bricks, because he's going to stay with me."
"First they give him that bike, and now this," Rosy answered. "They think he is a baby."
"I won't complain," Moses laughed.
Jiddy's parents were wealthier than most in the village, and so, when he had done poorly at school, they had decided to give him a head start as a boda-boda driver by getting him the best bike in the village. At least it had been the best until Moses had arrived with his.
* * *
Over the next year and a half, the house was built to the point where Jiddy could move in. Life in general improved in Shinyalu, and in much of Kenya. The fall of America was, indeed, a horrible tragedy, but the fallout had been mostly good for the Kenyan economy. The whole world was taking in American refugees, and benefiting from it. More than twenty thousand had been brought to Kenya, and their professional skills contributed to the economy without draining excessive profits away, as had happened in the past. The United Nations was taking responsibility for rebuilding the economy. The dynamic leader of this new world order was U.N. Secretary General Xu Dangchao. The power vacuum left by the fall of America gave Dangchao opportunities that no previous Secretary General had ever come close to experiencing. He was able to use his powers to both entice and punish various national governments, and he seemed to be using this strategy for the good of everyone. Kenya was one of many countries that benefited from it.
Government workers were getting better salaries now in exchange for restraints on bribes and other forms of corruption. Even the police roadblocks, which had been used in the past to extort bribes from matatu and truck drivers,gradually disappeared. The Kenyan Government was able to exercise greater control over foreign investments, and U.N. intervention (especially restrictions on foreign trade) was ensuring that the benefits gained through those investments reached the masses in a way that they never had before. Tea plantations were being ripped out and other crops planted in their place. This led to price drops for maize and other staples.
"Whatever it is, I like it, Stump," Jiddy said to Moses early one morning when they were planting beans together on the shamba, before heading off to work. Moses who was seventeen by this time, had to explain a lot of things to the youth, who was his senior by almost three years. Perhaps it was because of his low self esteem that Jiddy took to calling Moses "Stump", reminding his friend of his missing right forearm. When he first started doing it, Moses was too taken up with the privilege of having an older friend to think of complaining, and even though he said enough to let Jiddy know that it bothered him now, Jiddy persisted with the habit that had built up over the past three years.
"It's because people are sharing things more equally now," Moses explained. "It's bringing prices down. America used to waste everything when it wasn't their land that was being used. Now we have enough for everyone in Kenya, as long as we don't waste.
"Waste not, want not, Jiddy. That's what Winky taught me when I first started working."
"Waste not, want not," Jiddy repeated as he struggled to understand what it meant. "Thanks, Stump."
Moses had passed other wisdom on to Jiddy in the course of their friendship, and some of it was sinking in, especially now that they were living together. Jiddy was being more careful with his finances now, and it had helped him to achieve a modicum of business success. He had managed to save up enough (along with some help from his parents) to become the second boda-boda driver in Shinyalu to get a scanner phone. And this had led to even more benefits, because more and more people were getting the microchip implant now. It was truly the way of the future for both of them.
Table of contents
Chapter 16. God's Good Earth
"I'm getting one in Kakamega tomorrow," Jiddy announced one Sunday afternoon in May of Moses' seventeenth year.
They were talking about the microchip implant that had brought them both so much business over the past year. "Hey, Stump, why don't you get one too?"
With financial help from Jiddy's parents, they had finished the house well ahead of Moses' original target date, and they had been sharing it together for almost a year now.
Moses could see the good sense in what Jiddy was saying. There was an implant available which could be put on the forehead of anyone who did not have a right hand. Having his own implant would mean the bank could more or less do his books for him, giving him more time to stay ahead of the other boda-boda drivers. Government subsidies had made it possible for almost any business to get a scanner now, and implants were free. In the past month, three other boda-boda drivers had purchased scanner phones. As a result, Moses and Jiddy had lost some of their old customers.
"I don't know," Moses said. "I kind of promised Winky I wouldn't."
But it wasn't just Winky pushing Moses not to get an implant. He often shared his thoughts with Ray via text message, and he had been surprised when, in a recent exchange, Ray had said something that sounded a lot like Winky. In fact, it was even more like Josephat.
"Don't take it, Mo," Ray had typed into the handset. "Believe me, it will bring big problems."
Now what could Ray have been talking about? Ray had been a supporter of banks when they first met in Chicago three years earlier, although he had shared some thoughts about economics and life since then, which struck Moses as being a bit more radical.
"U said it urself: money won't fix things," Ray had reminded him in one text message. "Americans learned 2 late. Greed was our downfall." He said things against banks too, warning Moses not to trust them. It was so different from the man Moses had met in Chicago.
Moses did not get an implant with Jiddy, but he had a feeling that he would eventually. His dislike for Josephat was destined to overcome his respect for Amy and Ray.
Since January, Josephat had been turning up more often, accompanied by someone different each time. Together they would put up posters about his theories. He was doing something funny with Amy, and even with Rosy. Rosy had become Amy's main helper after Benji got a job in Nairobi with a trucking company, and after Anna moved in as housekeeper for a family in Kakamega. Amy still had the seven youngest children; so Rosy, now 14, dropped out of school to help fulltime.
Kyme stopped sending funds shortly after the fall of America. He apologised, and begged her to forgive him for it, but gave no reason, and neither Moses nor Amy questioned him further about it. Amy ended up selling the Hi-Ace and economsing in other ways to stretch the funds he had sent over almost two years.
One Saturday in June, just after Rosy had turned fifteen, Moses came to see Amy, and was surprised to find the house empty, apart from the old Aboriginal woman and four-year-old Karla.
"Where is everyone, Winky?" Moses asked cheerfully.
"They went with Josephat," she answered. "They're out exploring."
Moses scowled and said nothing. He had a right to complain about his sister being pulled into this, didn't he? She was his sister, after all, and she had only just turned fifteen. He decided to ask a few more questions first.
"Exploring what?" he asked.
"Exploring God's good earth," she answered.
"Yeah, but what part of it?"
"Now what difference could that make to you, boy?" Amy asked as she leaned forward where she sat, with both hands on her knees.
Moses had no answer for that, but he knew Amy was hiding something.
"I don't like Rosy being around him," he said after a short pause. "He's a 'nipulator, that's what he is."
"Moses, he's a good man," she vouched. "And Rosy likes him. True."
"Well, I don't!" Moses snapped back. "And I say she should stay away from him."
Amy thought for a while before answering. "I'm sad to hear that, boy. Yo
"And when will that be?" he asked.
"Tomorrow sometime."
"Tomorrow? Where are they going to stay tonight? And who's going to look out for Rosy?"
"Josephat is with them," Amy replied sweetly. "He and Rosy can take care of themselves; and, Moses, you must know the good Lord is there with them too." The tiniest twitch in Winky's eye did not go unnoticed by Moses.
Josephat was the one Moses wanted his sister protected from. And he hardly thought the good Lord would interfere if the man got some crazy notion to molest her. He was secretly determined to return the next day so that he could be waiting for Rosy... and Josephat... when they returned.
* * *
Shortly after the sun came up the next morning, Moses was biking down to Amy's house, so he would be there in plenty of time. He was surprised to see two of the children out playing in the yard. "Is Rosy back?" he asked Jo-Jo, who was now seven years old. "Eh," said Jo-Jo, nodding his head as he concentrated on throwing a ball in the air and catching it.
"When did you get back?"
"Last night," Jo-Jo said.
"Where did you go?"
"Exploring God's good earth," the boy replied, obviously echoing something that he and Amy had both been told to say.
Moses was seriously thinking of threatening the boy to get more information, but just then Rosy walked around the corner of the house.
"Hi, Moses," she said enthusiastically.
Just seeing her, safe and sound, and with such a cheerful outlook, melted Moses' resolve to make a scene. She was unharmed; they had not been out all night after all; and what good reason could he give for trying to tell her who she could or could not associate with? But she was evasive, like the others, about what they had been doing. That continued to bother him.
He voiced his anger with Jiddy that afternoon, as they worked together in front of their new home. It was harvest time and they had maize to be rubbed off the cobs.
Jiddy agreed, as Moses told him for about the hundredth time, that he did not trust Josephat. The more Jiddy heard it, the more he believed it. They both saw evil in almost anything the man did. As the pile of kernels grew on a mat in front of them and a pile of empty cobs grew on either side, their hatred for Josephat grew with it.