Becky strode gracefully along the narrow path. A twenty-litre barrel of water lay on her back held steadily in place by a robe wound around it and looped about her head. Her upper body leaned slightly forward, and her eyes were glued to the dusty road on which she trod.
When she lifted her gaze a little, she caught a glimpse of Pabonya – her husband's venerable paternal uncle. A jolt of tension ran through her. But she kept walking, certain of a critical impulse in his mind.
Closer now, she dared another glance. And it was just in time to meet his eyes shooting like daggers at her. He was leaning against the fence his arms folded across his chest. There was a weird smirk in his austere facade. And Becky's heart sunk in a sickening plunge.
In the recent past, Becky had routinely been in trouble with him. He had turned callous and generally scornfull of her. Every encounter felt as unsettling as stumbling into a swarm of provoked bees.
"Why won't you listen?" Pabonya barked suddenly that Becky gasp despite having braced for this. "Huh! How many times must I remind you never to dress in such atrocious clothes?" His voice was loud and sharp.
Anger welled up inside her. This was the hundredth time he was talking to her like this and about the same subject: the indecency of the clothes she wore.
"You've no shame , walking around naked? Look at you; wicked girl," he condemned.
Reflexively, Becky examined herself as though she had been oblivious of her attire: a tight, black miniskirt that barely reached mid-thigh, slit at the back; and a red tank-top.
She raised her gaze back to him fury flaring in her eyes. "I find it hard to understand why you are always making it your business to tell me how to dress. Judge me all you want, but my dress my choice!"
Shock flashed across Pabonya's face. And Becky noticed. Emboldened, she continued to torment him, stepping even closer and looking up at his face. "Isn't my husband comfortable with me?" she pressed, her tone steady but edged with vexation. "I won't be confined to the hopeless and old-fashioned social rules of the Kapsoket clan."
Pabonya's face tightened. Deep lines carved into his brow. He was used to women addressing him in reverential tones.
But this one dared to speak so insolently. Yet this was quite unusual and untypical of her. She had always swallowed his rebukes silently. How and when this peppery attitude crept into her, he could not tell.
Becky felt her pulse hammering in her chest. Hadn't she tolerated enough? It was time to stand firm.
She glanced at him one last time and caught a flicker of defeat on his eyes. She had not measured the sentences she had just spoken, but she nearly grinned fascinated by the success of her jab.
Defiantly, she walked past him, leaving him to stew in the sting of rebellion.
Pabonya helplessly watched her until she vanished beyond the bend. His heart pounded with humiliation and rage.
Utterly rankled, he turned and stalked down the path that led home. His blood boiled as he paced away swearing that he will institute a package of sanctions that would ensure that she paid enormously for that behavior.
She is brave, he thought, just brave and ignorant. He vowed to shatter that false confidence, to humble her until her spirit was bent under the weight of shame and sorrow.
***
Just before dawn the next day, he wriggled in his bed. Sleep had eluded him the whole night. The episode with Becky would not pass easily. He cringed as the memory of her words, which had played over and over in his mind, came flooding again brewing a dull headache behind his eyes.
No one had ever dared to speak to him so brazenly. Had he stooped so low that even a young woman could scorn him?
Hatred simmered and thickened inside him. The hatred that had not just emerged. It had been there for a while, buried deep in his bones. But now it began to manifest in every fibre of his being.
He flung his thin blanket off his body and lowered his legs over the edge of his bed. Rising to his feet and gathering his garments, he dressed himself and stepped out of the house.
It was dark. But the chirping birds heralded dawn.
He took a plastic barrel nearby and filled a basin with water, splashed it over his face and went back to his room, reached for a walking stick propped by his bed and left the room.
His resolve had hardened overnight; the young woman urgently needed enlightening about the few elders in the clan she should never mess with.
In a daze, he set out on his little journey. With every step he made, his stride lengthened and his walking stick swung to the rhythm of his pace.
He peered through the fading darkness. Ahead, across the shallow river that marked the boundary between Tirita and Kures, the ground rose gently into a hill. Perched atop it were Becky's two houses, roofed in corrugated iron and their mud walls smeared white.
Somewhere in one of them, The young woman might still be sleeping, unaware of the reckoning on its way.
Pabonya crossed the river, the dawn breeze whispering through the reeds, and began to climb.