Beneath the Lion's Gaze (7 page)

“It’s about the famine, and the emperor. The whole city’s been so quiet today,” Kifle said. “My sister in Gondar said they’re all waiting to get the news. None of the officials up there have come out of their houses all week.”

The doorbell rang and Kifle stiffened. No one moved until Sara came in from the dining room.

“It’s just the children,” she said. “Even though there’s no bonfire tonight, at least all traditions won’t get thrown out this year.” She opened the door and smiled down at a group of little girls holding
meskel
flowers, the yellow petals vibrant against their new
habesha
chemise. She fished in her pocket for coins as they started singing. “
Abebaye Hoy!
” she exclaimed. “I used to go to every house in my neighborhood and sing the same song on New Year’s Eve,” she said to them, taking the flowers and dropping coins into their palms. The little girls squealed excitedly
and
ran to knock on another door, their new white dresses stark against the setting sun.

The record scratched to a stop.

“I’ll put the music on when the announcement is over,” Dawit said to the guests.

Hailu swallowed his anger and forced himself to smile. “Wait and I’ll fix it.” The record was one of Selam’s favorites, the collection of 45 singles among her most prized possessions. “You’ve ruined it.”

Radio Addis Ababa blasted on and a breathless announcer reminded all citizens to watch special programming on Ethiopian Television that night.

“Hailu,” Kifle said, “let’s enjoy. It’s a little girl’s birthday and tomorrow is the beginning of a new year.” He raised his glass. “To Ethiopia.” He extended his glass in a solitary toast and froze as yet another announcement came on asking more government officials to report to the palace and turn themselves in.

“If they don’t call your name, then they come to your office or find you at home,” Kifle said. He rubbed his neck. “No one’s safe.”

“Nothing’s going to happen. Their lawyers will clear everything,” Hailu said, patting the man’s arm. Some of those whose names were read aloud were close friends of Kifle. “Tefera will be released soon, you’ll see.”

Yonas walked to the group of men, his camera in hand. “It’s purely symbolic. These military advisors want us to know who’s in charge.” He adjusted the lens. “Did you hear the new name they have for themselves?”

“I forget. It’s not an Amharic word, is it? It’s much older,” Kifle said.

“Derg,” Hailu said. “They’re calling themselves the Derg. It means committee in Ge’ez.”

“Why use the ancient language of priests for this debacle?” Kifle muttered.

Yonas held up the camera. “A picture, please.” The men gathered close together and stared sternly into the camera.

“Kifle!” One of the women on the sofa gathered her purse and hat as she called to him.

Kifle turned to Hailu. “We have to get home.”

Kifle’s wife Aida approached Hailu. “Prime Minister Endalkachew was arrested. Did you hear?” she asked. She glanced in the dining room where Mickey sat in his uniform. “The military makes me nervous.”

“Mickey?” Hailu said. “You’ve known him since he was a boy.”

In the dining room, Dawit, Mickey, and Lily watched the elders with curious intensity.

“We turned in a timetable for a transition to civilian government after the emperor’s gone, but the Derg hasn’t responded.” Dawit turned to Mickey. “Is the military going to talk, have you heard anything?”

Mickey shook his head and smiled proudly. “The major was happy with my report. He wants to give me a chance to rise.” He waved cordially to Kifle, who took one last glance at the party before leaving. “The committee said people would be punished.” The smile slid from his face.

“Only those who should be.” Dawit patted his leg. “I’m glad we’re fighting these people together. You and me,” he said.

SARA LIT THE FOUR CANDLES
on the round, freshly baked
dabo
she’d decorated with small plastic yellow flowers the way her own mother had done for her birthdays, and ran a hand down her daughter’s back. “Who am I if not your mother?” she whispered. She kissed Tizita’s forehead and took the knife before the excited girl tried once again to grab it. She cut the loaf of bread.

Lily clapped her hands and hugged Tizita. “You’re grown up now!” she exclaimed. She turned quickly to kiss Sara’s cheek. “Congratulations,” she whispered. She kissed her cheek again. “You have a beautiful girl.”

Sara felt herself reach up to pat her hair in place. Lily’s energetic personality, her wild curls and exotic beauty made her feel plain and simple. The younger woman was dressed in the popular denim jeans and wide-collared shirt favored by college students, an American style that contrasted with the more formal Ethiopian way of dressing. Sara’s skirt suddenly seemed matronly.

Hailu called Tizita into the living room.

“Let’s go,” Yonas said, taking Tizita’s hand. Sara let her daughter go.

Lily hugged Sara. “I have to go soon, I’m sorry.”

“Can’t you stay?” Sara grinned. “We haven’t started asking you when you’ll accept Dawit’s marriage proposal.”

Lily sighed. “Mickey started that fight already this afternoon.” She shook her head. “How can I think of anything else when I have these exams?” She checked her watch. “Tell Dawit I’ll call him later. Mickey’s leaving, I’ll follow him through the side door.” She went down the corridor.

In the living room, Yonas and Dawit were glaring at each other. Sunlight spilled and widened in the gap between them. Sara approached with square slices of
dabo
, hoping she could defuse what seemed like an escalating argument.

“What do you know about peasant rights?” she heard Yonas ask Dawit. He had both hands shoved into his pockets. Yonas’s temper was as volatile as Dawit’s, but his control over his emotions was far better than his brother’s, though today he seemed close to an outburst.

“Here,” Sara said, handing him a plate.

Yonas pushed it away. “Have you ever been outside the city? Have you ever tried to learn about the people you say you’re speaking for? All your demonstrations are about higher pay and lower petrol, middle- class elitist concerns, how does that help the poor in the countryside?”

Sara shoved a plate towards Dawit. “Take it,” she said. “And remember we have guests.”

Dawit lowered his voice. “Who’s going to speak up for them?” he asked. “People like you, who just want to hide until things get better?” He tore the square chunk of bread angrily and shoved a piece in his mouth. “At least we’re trying to get things changed.”

ALL THE GUESTS WERE
gone and the rest of the family was changing clothes. Sara sat alone in the living room and smoothed the place next to her where Selam used to sit. She missed Selam’s friendship, her vibrant womanly presence in a house otherwise dominated by men.

“It’s just me again,” she said to herself.

She switched on the television and watched the static skip before settling on a bland-faced newscaster. She didn’t want to think about Selam. It would only revive memories of her own mother and rekindle
a
loss that was as sharp as fresh sorrow. She frowned. What puzzled her was that more and more, she had to struggle to hold on to her father’s memory, even with the help of a faded photograph. She’d nearly forgotten his face. She could only hear, on the best of days, the faintest traces of his voice, remember the smallest fragments of his stories.

Sara curled her legs on the long floral-patterned sofa and traced the edges of a low-hanging beam of moonlight that laced through the empty living room and fell into shadows across her arm. The window was open, a cool breeze seeping through thin curtains to curve over her chest and soak into her blouse. She closed her eyes and waited for memory to come back to her.

Her father plants his finger in the middle of her palm and traces the longest lines of her hand to her wrist. Your mother and I ran away from here to there. We rode to here—he lets his finger draw a path up the length of one arm, across her back, down the other arm to rest in the center of the opposite hand. Then we did this—he takes her hands and presses them together in prayer—and then you came to us. My daughter. You are my daughter, he repeats.

Sara flexed her hands and found that years had darkened the paths on her palms; calluses now formed rounded hills on the journey her parents took to safety during the Italian Occupation. She was eleven when she began to wonder how her father could run away from an Italian contingent searching for a tall boy in resplendent white and a frightened girl who’d strangled an Italian general in his bed. He laughed when she asked, his eyes filling with a soft sadness she didn’t understand. I would have died to help her escape, he said. The nature of love is to kill for it, or to die. He stared at her then, his eyes turning liquid with emotion, one day you’ll know what a life is worth.

When Sara was seventeen her mother died, joining her father in their family plot and leaving her all alone. Sara cut her hair for the first time. She loosened each row of braid and watched it unfold behind her, dark and thick. Then she took her mother’s old scissors and hacked fists of hair. She stared in the mirror when she was finished and felt the prickly roughness of her naked scalp. Then, slowly, she dug the end of the scissors’ blade into soft skin. She dragged the blade across the middle of her scalp and watched as her pale brown skin became wet with blood. Then she said a prayer for her parents’ souls and asked
Angel
Gabriel to guide them to the girl with the scarred head, to tell them that even from the clouds, they would always know which girl was their daughter. She wanted them with her until it came time for her to have her own family, her own children. Until she was no longer alone.

Sara touched her scar and traced a path to her stomach. There was a pocket of warmth that still held the shape of two babies that had died inside of her. Every month during her cycle, she imagined her stomach contracting, trying to push them out once again. Some nights, the spasms were stronger than others. Her father would have pointed to his lame leg, an injury from war, and told her that what is left holds its own promises, that what remains will give birth to hope. Her mother would have understood the grief, would know, as only a woman knows, that it burns hot and rests close to the heart. Maybe, she thought, maybe the body can only contain so much of a given memory before it begins to make room for more. Maybe it is better that I forget some things, maybe there is not enough room in me for two parents, just as it was with those children.

11.

THE FAMILY SAT
together in front of the television, their cups of tea untouched in front of them. They were leaning forward towards the screen, repulsed and transfixed by what they were seeing. Vultures cawed and screeched, greedy and vengeful. They beat their wings furiously and fast, sent feathers tumbling into the eye of a camera. The steady glare of the sun shot balloons of light into the lens, forced shadows to skulk back into the sky. Under the vicious heat were flesh-covered skeletons that breathed. Covered in rags the color of dust, children crawled on all fours. Grown women with bones for breasts clung to emaciated babies. Defeated men let ravenous flies feast on their eyes. Naked bodies lay crumbled on cracked earth, scattered like ash.

“My God,” Yonas said, pressing a hand over his face, wiping dry eyes, “my God. These poor people.”

The camera was merciless. It swept past gaping faces, over destitute land, swung into the belly of the relentless heat and then down again to another body, another helpless mother, another bloated boy.

“Mickey was there, he saw for himself what this government has done. These thieves! These money-hungry bastards!” Dawit had stood up. Now he was pacing next to the sofa, watching the screen in intense fury. “All along, the emperor has been watching these people die like this. He was there last year, he didn’t do anything. This is why we need a change. How many more have to die before Ethiopia wakes up?” He pointed to the television, then sat back down. One knee jiggled uncontrollably. He chewed on his bottom lip.

“It’s because of the drought and some officials, you’re right,” Hailu said. “But not the whole government. Our leaders aren’t evil, not like this.” He straightened the table setting in front of him. “And this Derg committee, why didn’t they tell us sooner? They’re the so-called advisors
of
the emperor aren’t they?” He shook his head. “They couldn’t do something before tonight?”

The documentary suddenly jumped to grainy scenes of lavish palace halls, glided over tables heaped with steaming delicacies, spun past the emperor feeding his lions extravagant foods, his numerous Mercedes. Then back to the hungry, the skeletal, the dead littering the paths that led out of one dried-up village into another. One small girl, her stomach so distended it looked like it would split, gnawed on a stone.

“Did you see that?” Hailu said, pointing at the screen.

Yonas frowned. “Those parts in the palace are from years ago, aren’t they?”

“More propaganda,” Hailu said.

“He’s a rich man who’s lost touch with his people,” Dawit said. He’d gone to his room to bring letters back. “Look”—he flipped one page open—“Mickey wrote me, he heard rumors of grain being sold in other towns.” He poked a finger at one line. “That grain was supposed to go to these people!”

Hailu shook his head again. “Haile Selassie loves his country. We’re not being told everything.”

“There’s more,” Yonas said.

The family listened to the choked voice of the British journalist recount the numbers dead, devastated by the unimaginable famine. Biblical proportions, he whispered. A desolate valley, the sun too bright for shadows of death. Who will help them? he asked. Why haven’t they been helped by their government? he continued. Why has the emperor forgotten his own?

In the unblinking eye of the camera: a sea of bodies bleaching under a fisted sun.

Bizu, their elderly maid, was pressed against the archway of the dining room, her hands at her cheeks, her gray filmy eyes floating in unshed tears. “They’re in Wello,” she whispered. “That’s Wello.” Her hands beat her chest. Wello was a province far from Addis Ababa, in the north. “That’s where they’re dying like this.” She leaned against the wall. “That’s my home.” It was the first time she’d ever spoken of her life before coming to live with them. “They’re my people.”