DUST TO DUST Part 1

                                                     DUST TO DUST 

                                                    By Nzinga Nzinga

Part 1

Lulu was looking through the set of photographs her son had handed her with comments on each one.

“You have to check the photo prints anytime you go to collect them from the shop because you don’t know when you going to come away with the wrong ones. That place is so busy, they can make mistake.” Barry accepted her advice with a nod.

“Look at Mirrie, though. She looks just like a movie star. And look at you and me hugging up so tight is like we fighting.”

“Mama, look at you and Daddy. What a nice picture of the two of you. You should enlarge it.”

“Wait a minute. It is not thirty-six prints. Is only thirty-four. Barry, you have to be more careful. Let me see the envelope. Oh, I see. It’s ok. They have taken pay for only thirty-four. Let me look at the negatives they didn’t print. Thirty-two, thirty-three, thirty-four. They didn’t print the last two and they look all right to me. That’s another thing. You have to ask them why they didn’t print those two. Don’t bother. When I go to the market next week, I’ll check it out.”

“I’m going to study with Jean, Mama. Miss Belle should be here anytime now and you two will be so busy labrishing you won’t need my company.”

“I won’t stop you, but make sure is study you children studying and not movies you watching. Exams are just around the corner.”

“Don’t worry, Mama. We are really revising for exams. Jean is so serious even if I wanted to joke around she wouldn’t allow it. She is really going to be a good teacher one day.”

“That’s good to hear. I am glad you study together. Belle and I used to study together too and we really benefitted from each other. You and Jean both contribute to these sessions, you with the maths and geography and she with the Spanish, history and Latin. I really like that girl.”

“Me too, Mama,” he said with a big grin as he ran away before his mom could probe deeper into his feelings for his classmate.  

About half an hour later, Belle arrived. Lulu did not hear the car drive up at the gate. Belle was knocking at the door.  

“Coming, Belle. I didn’t even hear your car. I was around the back so I left the gate open for you.”

“Thanks. I closed it. You looking as beautiful as usual.”

“You too, my dear.” They embraced each other with the usual tight hug and three pecks on the cheeks.  “I thought you were coming for breakfast. You must have left Town late. I was getting a bit worried.”

“Sorry about that. I got held up.”

“What? Gunman hold you up?”

“Take it easy. Nothing of the sort. Something I had to attend to came up just as I was about to leave. Let me take my stuff outta the car.” 
While they were transferring the things from the car to the house, Lulu asked, “Care for something to eat?”

“Not yet. I ate at Aunt Valerie’s restaurant. You know very well that I can’t pass there without stopping and she must feed me with bammy and fish and ginger beer. See, she sent some stuff for you.”

Belle’s aunt had a popular restaurant in Old Harbour, famous for curried goat, jerk chicken, ackee and saltfish, escoveitched fish, johnny cakes, breadfruit, bammy, sorrel, ginger beer and potato pudding. Unlike other eateries which serve sorrel only during the Christmas season, she served sorrel right through the year because she cultivated an abundance of sorrel which she dried and stored for the off season. She had sent a quart each of the sorrel drink and ginger beer plus some fish and bammy for Lulu. Lulu was overjoyed because her whole household comprised of a husband and a son, loved everything that Aunt Valerie sent.

The two friends whose relationship dated from secondary school days sat under the huge almond tree which spread majestically at the back of the house.

“Come and look at my beautiful family in pictures.”

“Who took them? Barry? If Barry took them they bound to be good pictures. He’s going to be a really great photographer when he grows up,” said Belle taking the pictures and admiring them. She said sincere compliments from her heart that delighted her friend and in handing back the photos said, “You must tell me where you take your pictures to be developed because our last batch was catastrophic.”

“Is that so? These people are okay except that they didn't print two negatives that look alright to me. I was just cautioning Barry to make sure and check the pictures before he leaves the studio so that there is no mix-up.”

“You're so right, Lulu. Speaking of mix-up, just the other day I learnt that some big church minister, whose name I am not going to mention, went to collect holiday pictures of his family only to find when he got back to his office that the pictures were not of him and family but of his wife in the most compromising poses with another man whom we all know. I heard the story from two friends who shall remain nameless. She told me that the husband man says he doesn't want anything more to do with said adulterous woman. He is calling her some names that rhyme with Charlotte, glut, pitch and shore.”

“So it is really true that he gave her her walking papers and is keeping the three children.”

“If she walking, she don’t walk pass my way yet or maybe she walk in the dark. Look like the news all over the place if I can stay all the way in Kingston and hear it and it happen in Negril. I was hoping to be the first to tell you but obviously somebody first me. Anyway I still don't see how the photoshop could mix up the pictures unless they were deliberately looking to cause trouble.”

“Yes, Belle. Is the same thing that puzzled my first informant but my second informant explained the whole cause of the mix-up. The parson’s wife left her roll of film with only the initial of her first name and the parson did likewise. They both have the same first initial.”

“So the two envelopes carried the same initial and surname, with neither Mr. or Mrs.” Belle nodded her head in understanding.

“It was a simple mistake, mi dear. The reverend called for his pictures, the clerk saw his name on it and handed over the envelope. If even the title of Reverend was there, they could have avoided this catastrophe.”

“So if that foolish woman didn’t give out the pictures in her name, there would have been no mistake and right now she could be exalting herself at the ecumenical conference her husband attending in London. See how a person’s fate hangs on some trifling act?” Belle touched her friend’s knee and laughed. “Now everybody can see her dirty linen. Scandal travel fast, Lulu.”

“As you say scandal travel fast and I hear that already the church membership swelling with some ambitious women who fancy a chance at being mistress of the Manse.”

“I hear the same thing, Lulu. I was even surprised to hear that women leaving Baptist and Methodist to become Anglican for a chance to be in the runnings.”

“Belle, can you believe that a woman who was so full of importance could lose her place in high society because of the carelessness of a photo shop? It’s frightening. Suppose the parson was a man with murder in his heart? We could be reading about double or triple killings. These people who work in such sensitive jobs like photoshops ought to be more careful. It makes you scared to even buy medicine.”

“That reminds me, Lulu, of a true story I saw on TV where a man was told that his X-rays showed he had lung cancer and the doctors gave him three months to live. The poor man, who had a girlfriend he never wanted to marry because he felt she was not kind to his children, ran and married the woman, shared up his property among his five children and said he would rather die than take chemotherapy or radiation. The new wife, who was a good woman, forced him to seek a second opinion. 

He consulted a cancer specialist and lo and behold, the new set of X-rays showed no sign of cancer. Investigation showed that in the first instance it was a case of mistaken identity. Those X-rays belonged to another man who had been given a clean bill of health. I felt really sorry for that oncologist and the patient whom he had to call back and deliver the sad news that he had cancer. Can you imagine the drama? It was America so he sued the hospital and won too. He was so grateful to his wife for persuading him to get a second opinion that even though he was not the marrying kind, he did not regret the marriage. However, he sought in vain to get his property back from his children.”

“What of the real terminal victim? Did he sue?”

“I really don't know if he sued or not. If I knew, I have now forgotten. It was a long time ago.”

“You see that now? The parson should sue the photo people.” Lulu said. 

“For that matter, the wife could sue them too but as this is Jamaica and not America. All that would happen is that they would waste time and money and expose their private business to the whole world.” Belle volunteered.

“You want orange juice?” Lulu asked getting up from the veranda to go in the kitchen.

“Not really. I prefer to suck the orange. In fact I would prefer if we sit under that orange tree over there where I can pick my own oranges, peel them and suck them.”

“Alright, Belle, that’s a good idea. Save me from juicing them. I am going to do the same thing. You go ahead and I will bring two knives and this bench.” Lulu said.

“Here, Lulu, let me take the bench. I like to come to your place. Santa Cruz is usually hot but up here is cool. There is so much green space and it’s so restful and there are so many fruit trees. My place is pure concrete. It’s nice apartment but concrete for days.”

“Well, you can't have everything.”

The two schoolmates sat under the orange tree which was one of many on the two acre plot on which were planted several orange, grapefruit and tangerine trees. Lulu, short for Louise and Belle, short for Marybelle had attended Excelsior High School together and their friendship lasted over the years. They had a proud record of no lasting conflicts. Lulu was a teacher married to a teacher and Belle was a secretary in one of the embassies, still unmarried and likely to remain so.  

“These oranges sweet, sah,” Lulu said as she sucked on the one she had just peeled. Belle had a different method. She peeled six before starting to eat.

“Yes, your oranges are sweet like sugar. Not only these Valencia’s but the Parson Browns, too.” Belle agreed as she peeled another bringing her number to seven. She started her orgy and for a while as they sucked and squeezed and squeezed and sucked, they kept off the labrish. Belle sucked her number seven while Lulu was busy peeling her number four.

“Lulu, this thing of mistaken identity is a bitch of a thing you know. Reminds me of one of the worst cases of mistaken identity of which I have ever heard.”

“Do I know about it?” Lulu asked eagerly.

"I doubt it. You were studying abroad that time. It was just after I returned from England. Wait a minute let me pick another six. You know I have no limit when it comes to oranges, mangoes and grapes.”

Belle sat down again and started peeling her orange in the circular way peculiar to Jamaicans and other Caribbean people. She finished peeling it and held aloft the unbroken skin. “Look, Lulu, four new dresses!”

Lulu laughed and displayed her five whole skins. It was a part of the Jamaican culture to believe that if you succeeded getting the peel off the orange with the skin intact in that circular way, you were due for a dress from some quarter or the other in the same way that an itching right palm signified money coming in and an itching left palm, money going out. A jumping right eye meant laughter and good news and the left eye, bad news, trouble and sadness.

“Come on, Belle, tell me about this wrong collection that impressed you so much.”

To be continued
All the images were taken from the Internet and I claim no copyright.