When Elephants Fight Read online

  I’m standing in line with Thiko, Chieng and Majok. ‘Did you do your homework, Juba?’ Chieng asks. His voice tells me he’s done his.

  ‘I tried. I couldn’t do it. I can’t do maths.’

  ‘Yes you can,’ Thiko says. ‘You’re smart.’

  ‘He’s not smart at maths,’ Chieng says with a grin.

  The teacher arrives clutching textbooks in one hand and a thin brown cane in the other. He walks briskly into the classroom and we file in after him. Once we’re all in our seats he returns our homework.

  I close my eyes as he places mine before me. When I know he’s gone I open my eyes to see a big ‘F’ in red pen. I put my head on my desk.

  ‘Juba, come up here please,’ the teacher calls.

  Chieng and Majok are beaming with pride and Thiko gives me a worried look. None of them struggle with maths like I do. The rest of my classmates look at me with knowing eyes: I’m the only one who has failed the assignment. I drag myself to the front of the room.

  The teacher pulls the cane from behind his desk. I put my hand out and hold my breath but he pauses and stares into my eyes, as if he’s forgotten what he’s supposed to do. Maybe he’ll let me go, I think, and I breathe again. But next minute he brings the cane down on the back of my hand. I rub my skin to try to ease the stinging and the class roars with laughter.

  ‘Next time I’ll hit both hands,’ he says. ‘Now return to your desk.’

  I wince as I walk back, my hand throbbing and everyone’s eyes on me. How can I have been hit twice in one day?

  Maths is the longest lesson but finally it’s over. The teacher leaves and we wait for Miss Ayen to come and teach us history. She should be here already. She’s always on time, but the minutes pass, the classroom grows louder.

  I’m looking out the window when I see two men walking towards her office. One has a gun strapped across his chest and he takes long, proud strides as if he’s the king of the world. My heart jumps. They’re Sudan People’s Liberation Army rebels.

  Miss Ayen gets up from her desk when she sees them coming. I stand on my toes for a better view. Chieng and other students are looking now too. The men say something to Miss Ayen and she sits back down and puts her elbows on the desk, rubbing her brow as if she has a headache. Then she opens a drawer and hands them money. The man without the gun takes it, counts it, and stuffs it in his pocket with a satisfied grin.

  Luckily this must be the only thing they came for, because they leave. Miss Ayen stays at her desk, her face tight. At last she gets up and walks across the yard to our classroom.

  We’re all back in our seats when she comes in holding textbooks to her chest as if they’re babies. We stand as she enters. She says nothing, waves to tell us to sit. Normally she’d greet us.

  Her hand shakes as she writes on the board and the chalk snaps. She keeps turning to look out of the window. I can see that she’s sweating, like she’s been walking in the hot sun.

  When school is over for the day I leave with Thiko. It’s sunny and birds are singing in the trees. At the sound of a twig breaking and the rustling of leaves I hold my breath. I know it’s foolish, but for a moment I hope it’s Deng coming out of hiding in the bushes.

  Under the mango tree near our hut I can practise my maths in the dirt. I don’t want to fail the next assignment. When the sun cools down I go to work in our garden. This is the best time of day for outside work, in the magic hour when the sun dyes everything gold, before creeping behind the woven mat of branches and leaves like it’s shy. The scent of the moist earth makes me feel alive. Green flies play music on the droppings of a small animal, a fox perhaps. I don’t mind those droppings, they fertilise the crops.

  On this side of our garden we grow groundnuts, kidney beans, sorghum. Pacong is known for having the best groundnuts, because of its sandy soil. When we have excess we sell them in the market, and they’re transported to villages that don’t grow them. The planting season is April to June. July is weeding season, and late August to December is harvesting season.

  Planting and weeding are hard work because the gardens in Pacong aren’t small. Some are as large as five acres and we do everything by hand. The whole family joins in the planting, even Grandpa, although he’s getting too old to weed, too old for the sore ankles and aching knuckles. At harvest time, Grandpa and Mama give the first of the produce as an offering to the Lord in church.

  Pacong is beautiful. Mahogany trees and tall palms line both sides of the main dirt road that passes through the village. From this road, paths curve off into each neighbourhood, like the veins on Grandpa’s hands. Our huts are mud with grass-thatched roofs. Near the centre of the village, where my family lives, they’re closer together, but further out they’re wide apart, with room for farming. Beyond the village, the main road winds over the hills and through the trees. It’s orange dirt, cracked and potted with holes that turn into puddles in the rain. The River Nile is twenty minutes away, and everywhere there are streams flowing from it.

  Our geography teacher told us that about twenty-five thousand people live in Pacong. A large fig tree marks the village meeting spot where the Paramount Chief leads the councils. He’s a respected man, and Grandpa says he’s well known all over South Sudan. The chief has two hundred and fifty sons and a hundred and ninety daughters, from nearly ninety wives. He spends most of his time solving matters under the fig tree.

  A horsefly distracts me from my work in the garden. It buzzes past my ear and settles on my cheek. I slap at it just as it pierces my skin. The pain blinds me for a moment but I know I’ll be okay. It’s not like the sting of the scorpion I stepped on last year. That made my muscle cramp and I cried for two days.

  I chop the hoe into the soil and feel the air change. Dark clouds slide over the lowering sun, filling the whole sky. Thunder rattles. Then suddenly the rain comes and I drop my hoe and run as fast as I can to our hut. There’s a slick of mud outside the door and I slip and fall. From the doorway Thon, my little brother, laughs.

  I scramble to my feet and run inside, slamming the door behind me. My shorts and T-shirt are heavy with mud.

  ‘Change your clothes,’ Mama says in the kitchen, ‘or you’ll catch cold.’

  The cooking fire has sucked up all the fresh air, making it hard to breathe. I open my mouth and inhale like a fish. Except when it rains, we cook in the open kitchen outside. Thon cries whenever he gets smoke in his eyes, and only cries louder when I tell him not to be a baby. Nyanbuot is helping my mother cook dinner. She loves helping with the housework. There are little beads of sweat on her arms and face in the sweltering hut.

  Our hut stands inside a circle of four palm trees, and off to the side is another hut for the goats and chickens. Ten chickens and a big red rooster, also a small white rooster that likes to practise crowing when the big one isn’t nearby. The hut is close enough for us to hear if there’s any trouble at night. I keep a fire burning permanently to protect the goats from hungry hyenas, and the chickens from wild cats. I sleep in there sometimes, when we have important visitors.

  My family’s hut is really just one big room divided into three by a low mud partition. I share a bamboo bed with Thon on one side of the hut, with a mat that needs replacing, and Nyanbuot and Mama’s bed is on the other side, covered with a piece of dyed cloth. Mama had to sell a goat to buy her bed but I made mine myself. In the centre of the hut sit three carved wood and bamboo stools and a small table with a broken leg, which I bound with string. The smoke-blackened kitchen is behind this area.

  The storm is a strong one, it’s making the walls of the hut vibrate and I’m afraid it may break them. Rain pounds the roof as if the sky is flinging arrows at us. It’s male rain. I don’t like male rain, with its thunder and lightning. Female rains are soft and gentle.

  With clean clothes on I sit by the window and watch what’s happening outside, where everything is enveloped in a grey haze. The grass at the edge of the yard is dancing wildly, bats are swaying from branches, l
eaves are falling. Clouds curdle like bad milk in the heavens and the wind whistles and hisses in the palm trees.

  I can hear hyenas howling somewhere, a sound that always sends shivers down my spine. They prowl the village at night, sometimes coming into huts looking for prey. When that happens I call Grandpa to come with his spear. Old as he is, he fears nothing. But right now he’ll be in his own hut with his wife, Yar, who we call Momo. Our real grandmother died young of an unknown disease. Momo is nice, and I like the smell that spikes the air when she cooks fish. Grandpa never leaves her side. They don’t shout or yell at each other, not like our neighbour who fights with his wife every night. Grandpa used to run in and break them up but he doesn’t bother these days.

  At last the rain slows to showers and the storm clouds fly away to the north. After eating dinner I lie on my bed and listen to the music of rain. The next thing I know the cock is crowing and it’s morning. I’m late.

  I walk outside and brush my teeth quickly with a brushing stick. I’ve been using this stick for a month now and it’s getting shorter. I’ll get a new one after school today. I go back into the hut, grab my schoolbag and bolt without saying goodbye to Mama. I don’t always like how she fusses with my hair and clothes and tells me to take care. I’m not a baby anymore.

  Mama doesn’t want Thon to go to school because there’ll be no one to take care of the goats. Mama says that if I become important I’ll be able to buy cows, and Thon will take them to the cattle camp and look after them there. Grandpa doesn’t want Nyanbuot to go to school either. He says she should stay home until a man can pay a good dowry for her.

  My feet bounce on the dusty road as I walk and I keep myself busy practising maths problems with my fingers. Thiko is running ahead with some other girls, her schoolbag dangling on her back. Chieng and Majok join me on the way and we arrive together.

  There’s a car outside the school, which means Waterman is here. He must be bringing more supplies.

  Waterman is white. The first time I saw him I wanted to touch his pale pink skin to make sure it was real. I wasn’t the only one who felt that way. All the kids chased his car as he drove through the village, we all wanted the chance to touch him because his white skin looks like an illusion.

  For a while I thought Waterman himself wasn’t quite real, that he was a dream we all shared. And in fact he is something of a mystery to us. Where is he from? Why is he here? I mean, I know he’s here to bring supplies to our school, but why isn’t he in his own country? His car was the first to ever come to our village. It made us feel like we lived in a big city.

  I still haven’t touched Waterman’s skin but by now we all know that he is real. Today he’s got textbooks, exercise books, and boxes of pens and pencils and coloured chalk. I’m not sure where he gets this stuff from but he always seems to have a large supply.

  The last time he came he was with two white women, nurses who gave out oral polio vaccines in the village. Waterman told two boys and a girl it was not the work of a witchdoctor that caused their legs to feel like they had no bones in them, it was polio.

  We don’t have a clinic or doctor in Pacong. If people need to clean a wound they boil tree roots and leaves. Once, a woman in the village had paracetamol tablets sent by a relative living in a distant country, but they quickly ran out. So the parents of the children with polio went to see a powerful witchdoctor, who instructed them to kill two white and two red roosters and put their feathers behind the huts, and in two corners inside, to cure the disease. It didn’t work.

  So when the nurses came with the vaccine, many women lined up with their children. Chieng, Thiko and I helped to translate, because the mothers speak only Dinka. After the women had gone home, the nurses asked us to have a picture taken with them. We stood in a group and Waterman took the photo.

  ‘Smile,’ they said. I didn’t want to smile, but thinking about being asked to smile when I didn’t want to made me smile anyway as the camera clicked.

  ‘Beautiful,’ said Waterman.

  Now he’s busy talking with two of the teachers, but he nods at us as we walk past. Everyone is always happy to see him, especially the teachers. Even Miss Ayen clamours for Waterman’s attention, laughing at his jokes and thanking him profusely for whatever he’s brought. We all look at him with admiration and I wonder how that must feel, to walk through a village and know everyone in it appreciates you deeply.

  The school bell rings. We take our bags into the classroom and come back outside to sweep the compound. The yellow and orange disk of the rising sun is brightening over the sky. Miss Ayen is supervising. She’s wearing her rainbow-coloured shoes today. I don’t know how many pairs of shoes she owns. Sometimes she comes in with shoes that make her look as if she’s walking on her toes, and I wonder how she can be comfortable in them.

  Many students stop work when she looks away or goes over to the other side of the yard. Some of the kids have brooms that are too big for them. They chase each other around, dragging the brooms behind them, kicking up dust, making even more of a mess. Dust wafts into my throat, my nose, my eyes.

  ‘It’s sad when you have to have a girl stick up for you.’ Bol’s voice comes from right behind me. I turn and immediately feel his hands on my chest, shoving me backwards.

  ‘Are you growing any balls yet?’ he snarls. ‘Let me check.’

  He moves to grab my genitals and when I push his hand away he slaps my hand and squeezes my balls hard. I gasp for air.

  ‘Do you think your balls are big enough?’ Bol’s face looks so ugly right now.

  ‘No,’ I whimper. ‘My balls are small.’ I glance around, trying to see if anyone is looking. Miss Ayen is nowhere in sight.

  ‘Good,’ he hisses. ‘I don’t want to see them grow.’

  ‘Okay,’ I squeak.

  He loosens his grip and I swallow air as he strolls off. My legs are wobbling. I feel like I’m about to crumple to the ground but I steady myself. I don’t want anyone to see me on my knees because of Bol, even if the pain is excruciating. I’m already ashamed of letting him play with my balls like marbles.

  The muscles around my groin strain and pull as if they’re trying to move my balls to a safer location. Maybe I should scream. I open my mouth but stop myself, letting the air out and gritting my teeth instead. The pain might go away if I stop thinking about it.

  I go back to sweeping. My muscles start to relax and the sun feels good. I close my eyes and let the rays bathe my face, but then suddenly Bol is back.

  ‘We didn’t finish our conversation,’ he says.

  ‘I don’t have anything to say to you,’ I tell him and he shoves me again, hard enough this time to make me lose my footing.

  A satisfied look flashes across his face. This is what he wanted, to prove he was stronger than me.

  ‘I don’t care if you have nothing to say to me. I have something to say to you. And that is to leave Thiko alone. I don’t want you talking to her anymore. Understand?’

  I get to my feet. ‘I understand you want to bother me for no reason at all.’

  ‘Are you stupid? Just stop talking to Thiko. Stop liking her.’

  So that’s it.

  ‘I don’t like her like that,’ I say. This isn’t quite true, but what business is it of his? ‘She’s a friend,’ I add.

  ‘Sure. That’s why you’re always following her around like a dog. Because you’re her friend.’

  I try to ignore the way my heart is thudding against my ribs. I remember Deng telling me once that it doesn’t matter how much bigger your opponent is, you must be brave and stand up to him. But I don’t know what it means to be brave. How many times can I tell Bol to leave me alone? And how can I tell Thiko I don’t want to be friends with her anymore because Bol ordered me to?

  ‘If Thiko doesn’t want me to talk to her,’ I say, ‘she can tell me herself.’

  ‘Ha!’ Then he appears to consider something. ‘I’ll tell you what, Juba. If you want me to leave you alone, beat me in
a game.’

  This is a surprise turn. ‘A game? What game?’

  ‘Wrestling.’

  ‘I don’t know how to wrestle,’ I say. Chieng, Majok and I have messed around a bit but there’s no way I could beat Bol at wrestling.

  ‘Then whatever, any game. That’s how much confidence I have that I’ll be able to crush you into the ground. Doesn’t matter what game it is.’

  The only thing I can think of at this moment is a foot race, and seeing as I’m the fastest boy in school, I should win. But I wouldn’t be surprised if Bol tried something dirty, like tripping me up or taking a short cut. Before I can even suggest a race, though, he shoves me so hard I go sprawling.

  He’s on top of me before I have time to move. I put my arms up to cover my face and deflect the blows from his fists. It’s all I can do. If I try to get a hit or two of my own in, it will leave my head vulnerable, and Bol wants nothing more than to break my nose and give me two black eyes. He sits on my middle and punches me in the throat. I stop breathing for a second.

  Over the sound of Bol’s heavy breathing, I hear other noises. And then a loud voice, Miss Ayen’s.

  ‘Stop this now!’

  The punches cease. My mouth is salty. There’s dust in my eyes and all over my face. My arms throb. Majok and Chieng are pulling Bol off me, and Miss Ayen is yelling at him. A crowd has gathered around us.

  ‘This type of behaviour will not be tolerated,’ Miss Ayen says. ‘Bol, I’m sending you home for the rest of the day. I’ll come later to talk to your parents. I don’t think your father will be pleased to hear you’ve been causing trouble.’

  Bol scowls in a fury but says nothing.

  I stand up, brushing myself off. In the crowd I see Thiko looking worried. I’m glad she didn’t rush over to help me. I’m glad I at least got up on my own. Miss Ayen is looking at me too, and for a second I think she will send me home as well, but instead she tells me to go and clean myself up.