Austerity

I clench my fists so tightly, I begin to feel a sting from the skin of my palm breaking under the pressure of my nails. It is all I can do to stop my self from screaming at the man trying to extort my father of all he is worth.

This 35-year-old man was the latest of four potential suitors who have answered my father’s invitation for my hand in marriage. My father had sent out more than 25 letters, over the years and only four had responded. To add insult to injury, after the second suitor it became abundantly clear that these “suitors’ were not here for my hand in marriage but to see whether my father had become desperate enough to give away our most fertile lands with my hand in marriage.

“Come on, Nhlaba, you know that I am your last chance at marrying off your daughter. Just give me the land and I will take her as my third wife tonight.” I was seething, my head felt hot, as though it were on fire. I close my eyes in an effort not to look as though I want to skin this man alive. I do not hear my father respond, I only hear his heavy sigh and know that he is waiting for my answer.

It is just as well, that I am not allowed to speak at these negotiations or else I would have told him off. I slightly lift my head and glare at the man who looks back at me, with disgust and disdain. I have been kneeling since they started negotiations an hour ago and not once, has he looked at me until now.

I feel for my parents as I am fast approaching my prime and after that I will be viewed as an old maid and will likely never marry into a respectable house. I want to rationalise what this man says but I already see that my future with him would not be pleasant. Marrying him and living the rest of my days as his third wife would not be worth the fertile land he seeks to extort from my father. I take a deep breath in, and I can hear my heartbeat pound in my ears, and as I breathe out, I resign myself to the ugly truth.

I would rather die alone than marry this man.

I shake my head and continue to breathe slowly. I am fortunate to have a father who considers my input in who I am to marry and respects my decision, even when he does not agree with it. “YOU UNGRATEFUL WORM!”, I hear the man shout so loudly it shocks everyone in the room. “ If it were not for your family name, you would be slaving away in some farm where no one would have to see your ugly face..”, “ENOUGH, get out of my house now or I will kill you where you stand!”.

My father rarely raises his voice but when he does, it sounds like the thunder that roars through the heavens announcing the coming of a storm. I am relieved that he intervened because if he had not, I am sure, my anger at the man’s words would have given way to angry tears from the pain I feel inside.

At the beginning of this week, this man tried to court me with charming words and an engaging smile. At the picnic just yesterday, he tried to convince me to give him my virtue and I hate to admit it but the way he looked at me, almost made me consider it. For a second, I thought maybe, if I gave him my body, he would leave my father’s land and take me for me.

I guess it was all an act because today his true feelings were revealed. I barely hear the commotion that follows my father’s threat as I feel someone’s hand grab me and pull me to my feet. I stumble from kneeling to long, but this does not stop the person from all but dragging me out of the hut.

It is my mother who is dragging me to safety and all I can think of while following her is that this is the last time I ever want my parents to face such humiliation again. I refuse to let man shame me before my parents again.

So much for their beloved child, their only child. I am the only child of my parents to survive childbirth. Before me, my mother had three miscarriages and two stillbirths. When she was pregnant with me, the healers were scared that neither my mother nor I would survive childbirth, but we did, at a great cost. My mother can never bear children again and all they have is me.

The ugly daughter.