XXIII

Christmas cracks me. I cannot face it, instead I walk for 20 km. I give all my money away to poor people. I refuse to open or have anything to do with Christmas presents, despite my mother trying to give them to me. I can’t face it. My wife loves presents. Christmas just brings the whole nightmare back. Loss. Emptiness. Loneliness. Murder. Patricide. Matricide. Psychopaths and Borderline personalities. All the vivid uncompromising detail of the truth in all its gore and bloody pointless hatred, spite, and greed and jealousy. Anger.

I cannot keep it out my head, cannot distance it from myself and just enjoy Christmas with my family. This is worse than if she died, in some ways. At least in death there is closure and finality. Now, I can only imagine what Christmas has been for them. What I have done to them. Even if I had to make all those decisions over again, I would just have hoped to do it all sooner. Its not guilt though, its just sadness at the way it all is. Fated. Has to be like this. Where did I ever have a choice? Perhaps on a normal Christmas day, I will look back and make an extra effort to enjoy the day. It took 5 hours to walk 20 km, and the whole next day I have a migraine headache.

That night I email the New Zealand immigration department and inform them that my wife is working illegally. I feel like a coward, turning her in, but it’s the only way I can get her out. If I go back now, it won’t work out, she will still be under his influence. For the rest of her life. He will break her down until she eventually…

That was the day of the Tsunami. My trivial life seems so unimportant next to that, but as of the New Year, I start writing this story. Trivial or not, it is my life, and I will live it truthfully, honestly, and with authenticity. Open to the world, without fear. It’s initially a cathartic artwork. Then, a legal defence, then it starts evolving into a master’s degree. And finally, as there is no end in sight to the story, I will have to publish it as Online Reality Literature. The story must be told. In case something happens to me.

I walk past a bookshop, and see a familiar cover. Her latest favourite reading. I have never met anyone read as quickly and as avidly as my wife. She consumes books like most people breath the air. The title with the beautiful cover is striking. ‘Kushiel’s Dart’. Just before I left New Zealand she had insisted that I read the book. I had tried. Despite being exquisitely written, the storyline was almost too painful to read. Kushiel is an anguisant, a whore who feels no pain, living in a fantasy world that is riddled with war. She is hired out to the worst soldiers, demented masochists who enjoy inflicting sexual pain. But if she gives the key word, then her client must stop. Kushiel is the most desired of the anguisant. She has never needed to give the key word. She has never experienced pain that she cannot withstand. I could not read all the book. It was just too painful, made me feel sick. But she was sending a message. She had insisted that I read it, she was so incessant about this. She had been giving me clues like this ever since we were together. Would tell me bits of information over and over again, repeat stories that she knew she had told me. Making sure I had known they were relevant. And the bits she had repeated echoed all the louder now. You don’t know who you are dealing with.

There are so many pieces of the puzzle still missing. Seeing the book ‘Kushiel’s Dart’ has shaken me. Made me realise how bad it all is. It will be impossible to “put this all behind me.’ Every time someone says that I can feel my blood boiling. I still hear this every day from people I have told the story to.

I look through her boxes for clues. Its very difficult, as I am constantly reminded of my loss. I can only manage a half hour of looking before I break down into tears. But I don’t turn them off. I let it bleed. It makes my love stronger. True love. For all. Even him. It probably looks like I am coping well from outside. And in truth, because I allow the tears to flow when they need to, I am able to keep in touch with my emotions, and with my memory. Nothing of this will get pushed into my subconscious. I will not become an unfeeling monster like he is. Like she is becoming, maybe already she has become like him. Finally, I find another clue.

Its an extract in her hand-writing. Something she wrote when in London:

The Ravings of a Nutter:

“Who are you - you’re 4 people in one. A fashion exhibit. She is like that, C.J., isn’t she?”

Oh God. Oh Christ. What am I about to do?

I’d sooner slit my wrists than…

‘I’m sorry, sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt you’ etc, etc, etc…

When I was born my fairy God mama must have said:

‘And you sweet thing, your gift will be insanity - you can make people mad, drive them bats, this will be your power.’

How else can I explain the general trend away?

It should be my major selling point “Hi - be my friend - I guarantee an extended stay in the mental asylum of your choice. Comfy bouncy padded walls, free drugs, come on, How can you say no?”

Of course we all can exaggerate sometimes. We all say things like “I could kill you”. It probably is normal to dodge a flying coffee-mug on your honeymoon, and watch it smash against the wall only inches from your nose. And I do hope that I am a normal 30-something going through a routine divorce. But I can hope as much as I want. I may not have every single piece of the puzzle in place, but the picture has not changed significantly in my mind for 3 months now, except become more vivid. There are dozens of little details that there is just not time to repeat. New little details oppoing out of my memory every day. And, I can do little more than ponder it all, and write. Its not a pretty picture at all I am afraid. She had tried the S&M suggestions in the beginning, the whole key-word to stop thing. Perhaps I was expected to do such twisted things to her that she would own me through fear that they would be revealed. Perhaps the whole thing was a scam and she was just a porn-pawn. If so, then she wasn’t supposed to fall in love with me. But I feel that she did.

What had happened in London? Her father had found out she was ‘up to something dodgy, he just knew!’ She had been involved in taking money off immigrants by standing around in her underwear. She had only told me this because she had confided in a friend who had threatened to tell me. I reread her literature. The Piltjinaer tales, and realise that the last of these short stories had been to heavy for me to finish reading. I thumb to the last story ‘Destiny and Decline’. It’s a twisted version of the dodgy stuff she got up to in London, before her Father found out and ordered her to go to University. With what intention? Her story is online You can read it here: http://www.otterit.co.za/PukPix/Piltjinaer/Destiny.htm

Those half dozen or so visits to her grandparents that disposed of a good portion of my disposable income were an honour. He was a war veteran, like all of us in one way or another. But he joined 2 years earlier than he was allowed to, and was signed in by his uncle. Not, his own father-who-is-never-mentioned. Why? My own family went through awful internal feuds at this time, being part British, and part German. Her family had followed the same migration patterns as the German part of my family. From Germany to South-West-Africa-Namibia, then South Africa. A damn tough migration, with violence the chief means to survival. Nobody talks much about those migration routes. Genocide was the trail of blood in those uncompromising footsteps.

Charles had told me that members of his family had killed one another at the start of World War Two, but he did not say who it was at all. His father was said to have died at this time, if I remember correctly. And something had made such a big impression on him to join up at age 16. And his uncle had broken the law to allow him his choice. A big risk for him to take, and for what gain? Charles also had such a strong set of values that he was willing to risk his life to save the honour of a Zulu girl. Even today, few white men would do that. In those days, it was less likely. Especially as the previous generation had fought and killed the Zulus. And been killed by them. The great grandfather had a hole in the back of his head you could put your finger in. A hole caused by a Zulu spear.

The only guess I can make out of all of this is that teh grandfather possibly killed, or played a role in killing his own father, for having Nazi values, the type of values that treated women as possessions., and members of other races as inferior. Charles had a vibrant liberal attitude and sensitive respect for everyone he spoke about. His son, my wifes father, was a notorious racist and could easily justify his actions to kill Charles, based on the idea that he had done the same to his own Father. But this time the ideals were reversed. This time it’s the Nazi who wins.

And yet, even this text that I write is a symbolic attempt to repeat the pattern. My moral imperitive is without doubt guided by Charles’ spirit. The cricket bat I bought with his wedding present to me, lies next to me in my bed. Just in case I need something to protect me. Some weapon that will be guided from beyond the grave. And those of you who read this, those that are materialist and do not believe in life after death; you should still be able to understand this on a material level.

Whenever my will wavers from my goal, I feel distraught, angry, frustrated, bitter. But when I read this text over and over again, making sure I have not missed any detail, making sure I have as much truth as I can find, then I feel resolute, and my mind is whole. My emotions are intact and authentic. Nothing else makes sense.

For a week before the day I bowled the cricket ball at the wall. The day that the veil fell from my eyes, November 15^th 2004. For that week, and the week thereafter, I woke up and went to bed, and most of the day, contemplated a clear image in my mind’s eye of Charles. He reminded me of Albert Einstein. Open soft eyes. I had told my wife through SMS that I kept seeing a picture of her grandfather in my mind, and that I could not understand why. I said this at least three times. She never responded to it. So when I left that message on her phone that said “I know your father killed your Grandfather”, and still I got no answer, then that should have been reason enough to believe completely.

But I am a scientist, and know that there is never 100% certainty. Always leave room for doubt. Always a 5% margin of error. But the only other possibility is that he had intent, more than one motive and every reason to commit patricide, as he felt deprived and humiliated for having his daughter taken away from him. Now he could take revenge. But maybe, despite all this he did not do it. Perhaps he had an accomplice? There was the other brother in the business, as well as his new wife. Perhaps nature did perform the act he had wanted. Perhaps it was all just one big coincidence.

It is now nearly mid-February, she has not spoken to me in 3 months. But I can imagine how she feels. Frightened into silence. If she was not she would have told me to stop being ridiculous by now. But her father’s lawyer has ordered her into silence. The first sign of legal guilt. Those who live by truth, speak openly, have nothing to fear. Have no lies to be caught out with. We embrace communication. We welcome being proved wrong, because it adds to our understanding and insight.

The truth floats.

There are so many details more than all this. The ex-boyfriend who coincidently also made a lot of money writing computer software, and who went completely nuts. He ended up ejaculating on some porn photographs and sending them to her father. The photos were of someone that ‘looked so much like me that my folks were unsure if it was or not.’ In the end they decided it was just someone that looked like her.

The way in which casually her best friends had mentioned that her father was the worst person in the world. Openly, in front of her, about a half dozen of us were there. It did not seem to phase her at all.

The e-mail which claimed I had deserted her, and left her behind in New Zealand.

When I visited her father’s house for the first time, and asked for a cup of tea, she snapped “You know what a kitchen is, make it yourself.” In her own house, she had been the perfect hostess. Unless there was a subgtle memory of him. That first big fight we had, had been triggered by the arrival of her father's furniture. And the obsessive dinner rule.

The way she told me that all her father’s ex-girlfriends had been whores or worse. His latest was by far and away the nicest.

The way she seemed to think that her father was really good at understanding law. While on the run from the South African Revenue Service.

She had never been allowed animals growing up, so when she had the chance and acquired a fluffy stray cat, and her father had visited, his comment was “I’ll kill that thing.”

Her answer had been “Nonsense, you love her.”

When my brother had exchanged cars with us, at the time of the funeral, he reported that her father had made some derisive comments about me. Couldn’t remember exactly, but “he definitely had it in for you.”

The way her father had tried to convince me that he had this special formula for gambling that just could not lose!

The way she had flipped her lid when her real mother had examined her cat’s kittens with a cigarette in hand. She had been thrown out the house, told never to return, and in fact we never saw her again.

When we first arrived in New Zealand and had gone out to eat, we had breen told by her father to squeeze into a car illegally. Her father had said with a big grin on his face “Here it’s the passenger that pays his own fine in overloading situations.”

I had walked into a room, before they left for New Zealand, and I overheard her Father’s new wife (then girlfriend) saying: “See I told you Lianna was not your friend.” Then they had noticed me, and all looked about as sheepish as any prospective New Zealander can. Lianna was her longest friend.

Again I walked into a conversation I was not supposed to. This time in New Zealand. They were discussing our immigration situation. I had not been invited to join the conversation, and when I entered the room, the conversation died down, and was changed to something else.

He had said to me on arrival: “You don’t ever need to go back to Africa. You can both let your tickets fall away.” Like I will never want to see my family again?

The neighbour of his who had taken the photos of our wedding ‘as a wedding present’, then asked us for 500 bucks afterwards because the wedding album had cost so much. He had not seen this as wrong. The neighbour was obviously returning his sense of ethics to him, as he had actually paid the money in the end.

The way he said he aimed at hedgehogs in the road, intending to squash them. Then he smiled.

The way he does not even try and hide his lack of emotion or empathy.

Eventually he had been instructed not to call black people kaffirs as they were friends of hers, and also her research subjects. He had referred to all black people as “research subjects” from then on, making the quotes with his fingers in as sarcastic a manner as possible.

The way she broke contact with all her friends in South Africa, even the ones she had grown up with

When we moved into the rented house in New Zealand, I noticed that the bed-frame was buckled so badly, curved as much as four inches. No wonder my back had hurt after ten minutes. He had insisted that it was fine. An old army tactic that was. Someone in discomfort is easier to break down. He kept trying to basger me into using it. Most people must have buckled beneath his oppression easily. Believing what he said out of fear of him. Despite the obvious truth in front of them.

I could go on and on for quite a while like this, but the problems have been exacerbated by the blatantly corrupt New Zealand immigration department. Since July, 9 months ago, I have made 8 attempts to get my wife deported on the basis that she has been working illegally. I have had nothing but the standard “It will be attended to” response. While in New Zealand, the press had made a big song and dance about deporting a Sri Lankan rape victim who had fled her home with her grandmother. It had resulted in the head of immigration losing her job, as far as I remember. There are constant reports in the press of how inept the social services system is in New Zealand. I only received two one liners in response to my 20 requests to various agencies reputedly experts in family violence, bullying and intimidation.

They even had someone promoted to a top police job, only to find that he had numerous gang-rape charges laid against him. All of them had been swept under the table. Him and his brave comrades had committed the gang-rape using a police baton. Serve and protect, is the motto.

My guess is that because my wife is white-skinned, young, without kids, and damn good-looking. And because she has tattoos and piercing, she is seen as a potential victim for their newly legalized prostitution business. Borderline Personality Disorder: victim, prime candidate for a whore. Either that or her father’s bribes are keeping her there. Or both.

The racism and sexism is so blatant, they don’t even bother to respond to my threat to expose their one-sided immigration laws to the international media. Perhaps the corruption runs so deep that it does not matter? My reports had been not only to the immigration department, the head and the deputy head, but also the two political parties most up in arms over immigration. The Nationalists, and New Zealand First. The latter political party seems to have no other agenda, but to stop immigration. Obviously they don’t mean white immigration. Nuff said. I have had no response.