When Elephants Fight Read online

  But now, I tell Grandpa, I don’t want to be a pilot anymore.

  He looks sad again when I say this, and tells me there’s still plenty of time to decide what I will become. To take my mind off things he gets out his mancala board and we play for several hours.

  Later that afternoon, Chieng joins me on my rock and we sit with our legs hanging over the side, looking out over the village. I’m amazed by the transformation. Where this morning Pacong was silent, as if nothing would ever be the same again, now people are working in their gardens, talking and going about their business. Birds are singing, the flies are out and biting. The sky is vivid blue, dotted with puffy clouds like sheep in a heavenly pasture. It all looks so peaceful that for a moment it’s hard to believe what’s happened.

  Chieng hasn’t talked much since the bombing. He just looks stunned. But I know his mother has been very kind. She is a beautiful and hardworking woman, while Chieng’s father is lazy and leaves most of the work to his wife and Chieng and his two brothers and three sisters.

  Their father’s saving grace is his singing voice and his skill as a dancer. Chieng has told me that this was how his father won his mother’s heart. Now his father spends most of his time composing songs for the men in the village. He says that any man who owns a beautiful bull with a red nose, a black and white hide, and a white patch that shines like a star on its face doesn’t work in the garden. I don’t believe him. Many people in the village have beautiful bulls and they still work in the garden.

  Because we are boys, I’m allowed to go and sleep at Chieng’s house if I want to, and he’s allowed to sleep at mine. Girls aren’t allowed to do this. But I go home to sleep that night. Except I can’t find sleep. As soon as I lie down my heart feels like a hunted gazelle. I listen to Mama’s breathing in the dark, and the slow breath of Nyanbuot. Lucky them. Thon twists and turns. I wonder if he’s having bad dreams. Branches scrape against the side of the hut and I imagine bomber pilots outside, trying to get in. It’s the wind, I tell myself. That’s what Mama always says.

  After a while I give up. I get out of bed, grab a stick and steal outside into the darkness.

  A cluster of stars hangs above like ripe fruit and the moon beams down as I walk the path through dew-soaked grass to Grandpa’s hut. I know he will still be up, he always goes late to bed. I watch my steps, swiping my stick from side to side on the ground in front of me. The night is alive with sounds and movement, and the breeze is soothing, like the caress of Mama’s hand. I stop for a moment to enjoy it, and feel better until a fox darts across the path and sends my heart into my throat. An owl flies close beside my head, the wind from its wings catching my ear.

  I find Grandpa sitting by a small fire in his hut with his legs folded beneath him. He doesn’t close his door sometimes because he says he likes fresh air. Momo is snoring softly on her mat on the other side of the hut.

  ‘It’s late, Juba,’ he says softly. ‘Why have you come?’ The sound of his voice is soothing as always, even if it still seems a little sadder than usual.

  ‘I can’t sleep,’ I say. Creeping into the moonlight from the window, I settle beside him, and he tells me a story about when he was in the church choir as a child. He performed for the bishop, he says, and was nervous for days.

  ‘We were dressed in our choir clothes. White shirts and black trousers for boys, white shirts and black skirts for girls. And red vests with three crosses on them, two small ones and a big one. We got divided into two groups, a line of boys standing on one side of the path and a line of girls on the other, from shortest to tallest. Then we heard voices. They were coming. The bishop, the ministers, the pastors and priests.’

  ‘How many of them?’ I ask.

  ‘Over five hundred.’

  I stare at Grandpa in awe.

  ‘They went into the church and we followed. The congregation stood when we walked in and sang our hymns. It was wonderful, Juba.’

  We talk until I finally drop off, and I wake to a milky orange light spilling across the room as the sun peeks at the land.

  Back at home our goats are crying. They haven’t eaten for a day and a half. Because of what happened, Thon is afraid to tend the goats on his own. I release them and herd them into the fields. A bee-eater rides along on one of the goats. Another chases a grasshopper and soon a large flock have gathered overhead. Under the trees the sunlight is dappled and makes me feel safe. For a moment I even forget about the bombing.

  I try to imagine what Deng would do if he was still in Pacong. Before he left, it was his job to look after the goats. He took me with him sometimes, and the big boys would order us young boys to run after the goats for the whole day while they played. Goats keep moving from one place to another and it’s impossible to watch them all at once. I have got better at it but it’s still not easy. Sometimes they refuse the grass and run off into someone’s garden, where they eat the groundnuts or sorghum. I have to try to get them out while the garden’s owner shouts at me. During school breaks, Chieng, Majok and I often tend our goats together. It’s more fun that way and less lonely.

  When I come home Mama is pounding sorghum with a stick, to separate the grain from the stalk. She winnows the grain in the wind to get the dirt out and then grinds it into flour on rough grindstones. Some days, when she has the time and is not tired, she washes the grains after separating them and pounds them in the mortar and pestle. This way the outer part of the grain comes off and can be used in making the local beer, or given to goats. Then she grinds the white inner part of the grain, the best part. Mama sings as she does all this. They say in our village that if a woman isn’t singing while she does the housework, she isn’t doing much work at all. Maybe singing makes the long process easier.

  While Mama grinds, Nyanbuot shells groundnuts, then fries them in a pan and pounds them into butter for a sauce. Finally, Mama makes a heavy porridge. We eat this every day, with pumpkin leaves or wild spinach or okra, and occasionally meat or fish soup. Sitting and eating with my family makes life feel almost normal again.

  Because there are no classes, every student old enough to help rebuild the school joins in. Chieng, Majok and I remove wreckage and carry timber, which is split by the men. Others collect sisal and young palm tree leaves to be used as binding. Cement, boxes of nails, iron bars and iron sheeting have been brought into Pacong by truck. No more thatched roof for this new building. Like Waterman said, it’s going to be better than the old one.

  He’s here with his sleeves pushed up, moving wheelbarrows of rubble like the rest of us. It’s hard work but Waterman keeps us in good spirits. Everyone is doing what they can. I try not to think about Miss Ayen, and how she will never see the new school.

  Some of us are better workers than others. After a few days, Chieng loses interest and sits himself down in a wheelbarrow. He convinces Majok to give him a ride, and they rush wildly around people and piles of debris.

  I’m glad to see him play. Akol would have liked that. These days Chieng walks with his shoulders hunched forward, like he’s carrying something heavy. And Thiko’s eyes have the look of someone who’s just woken from a nightmare. Even Majok is different. I’ve seen him standing and staring at birds as if he’s never seen them before.

  Every Sunday we go to church. I don’t like going, although I do like the singing and drums and the way the girls dance with their eyes closed, swaying like palms in the wind, their faces serene, voices and hands lifted to heaven. You can feel God when they sing. But I don’t like all the praying we do. It makes me sleepy, kneeling in silence with my eyes shut for so long. If I make the mistake of falling asleep, I get a bony elbow in the ribs from Grandpa.

  Grandpa loves to pray and he always senses if I’m sleeping, even when he’s deep in prayer. I think he keeps one eye cracked open to track me. He talks about God all the time, as if he’s his best friend.

  Sure enough, I do fall asleep and Grandpa elbows me. The minister is saying we must not surrender to the work of evil. We must
stay strong and trust in the power of God, who will punish those who do evil. Life will go on, nothing can stop that. He tells us students to stay close together in this time of trouble, to be with each other as much as we can, until it’s time to sleep.

  So after church, Thiko, Chieng and Majok come home with me and we sit outside around a fire and wait for Grandpa to come and tell us stories.

  We all love listening to Grandpa’s stories. He takes a stool on the other side of the fire, and with the breeze blowing the warmth of the flames over our skin he tells the tale of the tortoise that ran faster than the cheetah, and another about how the hyena became limp. We’re happy to have something other than the bombing to think about.

  When we have eaten and everyone has left, I lie in bed and look out at the stars. The night is quiet. I’m not sure how long I’ve been lying there when I hear something that sounds like gunfire.

  At first I think it’s my mind playing tricks, replaying the day of the bombing, but there it is again. It’s definitely gunfire. It seems to be coming from the centre of the village, not very far away.

  I jump up from my bed and find that Mama and Nyanbuot are up too. There’s another burst of gunfire. Mama motions us to be quiet and peers cautiously out of the window.

  I hold my breath. After a moment, I can’t help myself and whisper, ‘What can you see, Mama?’

  ‘Nothing. It’s too dark.’

  ‘Shall I turn the flashlight on?’ I fight to keep my voice from shaking. Next to me Nyanbuot quivers.

  ‘No,’ Mama says. ‘We don’t want to attract attention.’

  ‘I’m scared of rats,’ Nyanbuot whimpers.

  ‘Those we can put up with,’ Mama says. ‘It’s the two-legged rats we need to worry about.’

  We stand there feeling helpless, and when there’s been no further firing for a while Mama says, ‘Let’s go back to bed. Take deep breaths. Close your eyes. Pray to the Lord.’

  To reassure Nyanbuot, I crawl under the bed she shares with Mama to check for rats, and also snakes. There are none for the moment, but that could change. Once, when I was working in the garden with Grandpa and came inside to get a hoe, I found a large snake in the hut, black and thick with a broad head. It flicked its tongue at me but otherwise remained still. I didn’t know what kind of snake it was or how fast it might be, or how much poison it might have. I froze.

  ‘Grandpa!’ I shouted. ‘Get your biggest spear and help me!’

  He came to the door and looked in. ‘You don’t fight snakes with spears,’ he said, and reappeared a moment later with a stick in his hand. He killed the snake with it. ‘There, you’re alright now.’

  He put a hand on my shoulder to calm me and led me back outside. ‘You see that tree there?’ he said, pointing to the end of the garden. ‘If a snake ever bites you, you must use its roots for medicine. Dig it up, crush it or pound it and squeeze the juice into your mouth. And remember, a spear for a lion, a stick for a snake.’

  This scene lingers with me as I drift into sleep. When something brushes my leg I jerk awake, biting back a cry. I don’t want to scare my sister. I can hear a rat scurrying across the floor. I pull both legs in tight to my body, curling up like a cat, and finally fall back asleep.

  Then the sound of heavy footsteps reaches my ears. It might be a dream. But it might not be.

  I swim up through sleep and the noise is real. More footsteps. I slip out from bed and crawl to the window. The rest of the family are asleep. The moon is up now and I peek out just far enough to see while remaining hidden. There’s a man nearby. He’s little more than a silhouette, but I can make out the beret he wears. There are other men a little further off. I step back from the window and press myself to the wall, squeezing my eyes shut.

  Then suddenly the door of our hut rattles. My eyes fly open. Someone is throwing their weight against the door and I’m about to scream but Mama is beside me, putting her hand over my mouth and a finger to her lips. She pulls her hand away and hugs Nyanbuot, who has crept over to us. Thon slumbers on.

  ‘Use the butt of your rifle,’ a loud voice commands. The door holds firm.

  Time has stopped but I’m aware of every excruciating second. Mama’s hand grips mine. My throat is dry. God, please make them go, I pray silently, please make them go away.

  And unbelievably they do. There’s the sound of footsteps again, then silence folds over us once more.

  But we remain huddled, too terrified to move. A dog barks somewhere in the village, followed by a woman’s scream, and I know it’s not just our door they’re banging on. We stay quiet for a long time, fearful of making any noise.

  Finally I open the shutter and peer out. ‘I can see about twelve of them,’ I whisper to Mama. ‘They look like rebels. They’re standing by the big mahogany tree on the path to Chieng’s house. They all have guns.’

  I worry that they will go to Chieng’s hut but they turn away, down the hill, like they’re just out taking a moonlight stroll.

  ‘They’re gone,’ I say at last.

  Mama is not convinced. ‘They might be gone now,’ she says, ‘but this is far from over. We must pray.’

  When morning comes I don’t want to think about the night before. I want to scratch it from my mind, and I have the school rebuilding to help me. Waterman is there again to direct us. The women and girls from the village, including Momo, Mama and Thiko, bring food and water. We work hard, until gathering clouds send us home.

  Thiko comes with me, and once the rain has stopped we go to find Chieng and Majok. She takes my hand and we run. The sticky heat of the air has lifted and the mud is smooth and warm between my toes.

  We both love running. We run to school, run home, race in the fields where the goats graze, and whenever Thiko and I run, Majok and Chieng can never keep up. They follow us now, until we come to the shop near the school road. The building has holes all over it from being shot at.

  Thiko lets go of my hand and crosses the road. ‘Juba, come here,’ she calls in a bubbly voice, the one she has when she’s excited. ‘That Oprah show is on the television again.’

  Chieng and Majok look at me eagerly and the three of us rush over to the shop. The owner charges people to watch his television but we don’t have money. One of the bullet holes gives a good view of the television, though, and Thiko is looking through it.

  ‘She’s talking to that girl Claire, from Playing God.’

  ‘Her real name is Angelina Jolie,’ I say. ‘Claire is her name in the movie.’

  ‘She’s so beautiful,’ says Thiko. ‘I like her.’

  Chieng is growing impatient. ‘My turn,’ he says, pushing forward. And soon Majok nudges him aside to take a look. He giggles at something funny, which makes us all want to watch together. I grab his shoulder and pull him away and then put my hands on the wall and peep through.

  The people in the shop watching Oprah laugh when she and her audience laugh. I’m at the peephole for only moments, it seems, before Chieng says it’s his turn again. I soak up the bright image for a few seconds longer then step aside. When Thiko taps him on the shoulder with her well-shaped fingers and clean nails he snaps, ‘A minute.’

  ‘Be fair, Chieng.’ Thiko crosses her arms. I cannot think how she keeps her nails so clean.

  ‘I am being fair. You be fair.’

  ‘You’ve had a lot longer than I did,’ I say.

  ‘You would take her side, Juba.’

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘Come on, Chieng, move,’ Majok says.

  ‘In a minute!’ Chieng is yelling now and it brings the shop owner bursting around the side of his shop with a stick.

  ‘Pay or get out!’ he yells. He doesn’t wait for any offer of payment but is already swinging.

  Chieng and Majok race away like cheetahs. Thiko grabs my arm and we set off after them, up the little hill behind the shop. The owner won’t go too far from his shop while there are people inside. At the top of the slope we stand defiantly, waiti
ng to see what he’ll do.

  He shakes his stick at us then stalks inside, leaving us giggling. But then he’s back out with a bowl of water in his hands. He throws dirt into the bowl to make a paste and he smears this over our peephole.

  So that’s that. We go back to the school and start work. As I hand things up to the man doing the roof, I keep thinking how wonderful it would be to be wealthy and have my own TV. I could watch Oprah, movies, anything I wanted, right in my own home.

  Once, Waterman paid for some of us to watch Oprah inside the shop. Afterwards I asked him who else watched Oprah and he said the whole world did. Everyone sitting in that shop today was watching and listening so intently that none of them moved or spoke. I think Oprah must be a very important person.

  Next day, I discover that Thon has lost one of our goats, but instead of getting angry I pat him on the shoulder and say, ‘It’s okay, it’s happened to the best of us.’

  ‘I didn’t mean to,’ Thon says.

  ‘You can look at it as a reminder to be more careful next time, and to pay attention. Don’t let the goats be smarter than you.’

  He lifts his chin. ‘I am smarter than a goat!’

  Thon is a funny boy and can be stubborn. A couple of months ago we were eating a chicken thigh. He ate his share and then demanded mine. When I refused he cried and ran to Mama.

  ‘Juba ate all the chicken,’ he said between sobs.

  ‘Juba?’

  I didn’t answer, I just continued to eat my chicken.

  ‘Juba!’ Mama said more loudly. ‘Bring your brother’s chicken right now.’

  ‘Mama, I took half and gave him half. He ate his share. Then he wanted mine.’

  ‘You know to let your brother take the biggest part. You’re older.’

  ‘But if I did that, your wicked boy would have eaten the whole thigh.’

  Mama slapped my leg then and sent me to fetch water.

  But now I don’t slap Thon, I tousle his hair. ‘Never fear, Juba is here. I will find that missing goat.’ I grab my stick and dash out the door.