Transparent City by Ondjaki

Author:Ondjaki
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Biblioasis
Published: 2018-04-10T16:17:50+00:00

i entered that building

a coolness dampened my skin, i know that area well and i had never felt such coolness, i saw some cracked steps and i thought it was better not to tread them, i jumped, i climbed further, the seashells in my bag got noisier, yet my heart told me to keep climbing, i continued,

an elder-like child passed me going downstairs with a huge watering can, he was a drawer of water, without a doubt; on the second floor i still hadn’t seen anyone else; on the third floor i saw no one, fourth floor, a neighbour woman peered at me without seeing me; fifth floor, a huge stockpot was on the floor, i had to walk around it to get by and on the sixth floor i knew i was there, i did as i always do in places i want to scope out, i spoke up,

“look at the pretty seashells, who wants seashells...?”

i carried on, it wasn’t necessary to knock because the door was open and Dona Xilisbaba—i was seeing her for the first time—came to shout down the hall

“hey, Nelucha, i left the pot on the fifth floor”

only then did she look over and see me, she looked me in the eyes

“Auntie, i’m here to sell seashells, i only sell pretty seashells”

she went in and lingered, at first the door almost closed, then i heard the words of

an argument, the voices stopped shouting and i had to peep in, i trembled, it was him

the gent was backlit by the window and i was afraid again, the light went straight through him like a bullet, you could see the inside of his body, just like that, if you know what i mean, it’s not so as though the gentleman’s body was missing much, it was more like he was not of that body

“that’s him,” the gent said to the woman

she pushed him into the darkness of the kitchen, they disappeared, then i peered in even more carefully

the living-room floor looked emptied, there was little furniture, a big chair full of holes, a black-and-white television, a candle in front of the television

and i saw the prettiest eyes in the world emerge out of another darkness, the timid eyes of someone who cries often, i wondered at that gaze as at the gaze of the whelks i can’t be bothered to harvest

she approached slowly to gaze more closely at the seashells i had hung from my belt, all of my materials, my oh-so-beautiful seashells, dried algae, the bones and scales of big fish, stones and trash from the sea

she approavched and the conversation in the kitchen stopped, back there the gentleman and the lady didn’t make a sound

“do you have more seashells in that bag?”

i looked at the gentleman again, you could see in his eyes that he was her father, he moved his eyes up and down, the girl moved her eyes also

“i’m selling seashells from the sea, i only sell pretty ones”

i hauled the bag

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