"Drunkard of the River"
Michael Anthony (Trinidad)
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“Where you’ father?”
The boy did not answer. He paddled his boat carefully between the shallows, and then he ran the boat alongside the bank, putting his paddle in front to stop it. Then he threw the rope round the picket and helped himself on to the bank. His mother stood in front the door still staring at him.
“Where you’ father?”
The boy disguised his irritation. He looked at his mother and said calmly, “You know Pa. You know where he is.”
“And ah did tell you not to come back without ‘im?”
“I could bring Pa back?” The boy cried. His bitterness was getting the better of him. “When Pa want to drink I could bring him back?”
It was always the same. The boy’s mother stood in front of the door staring up the river. Every Saturday night it was like this. Every Saturday night Mano went out to the village and drank himself helpless and lay on the floor of the shop, cursing and vomiting until the Chinaman was ready to close up. Then they rolled him outside and heaven knows, maybe they even spat on him.
The boy’s mother stared up the river, her face twisted with anger and distress. She couldn’t go up the river now. It would be hell and fire if she went. But Mano had to be brought home. She turned to see what the boy was doing. He had packed away the things from the shopping bag and he was now reclining on the settee.
“You have to go for you’ father, you know,” she said.
“Who?”
“You!”
“Not me!”
“Who de hell you tellin’ not me,” she shouted. She was furious now. “Dammit, you have to go for you’ father!”
Sona had risen from the settee on the alert. His mother hardly ever hit him now but he could never tell. It had been a long time since she had looked so angry and had stamped her feet.
He rose slowly and reluctantly and as he glanced at her he couldn’t understand what was wrong with her.
He couldn’t see why she bothered about his father at all. For his father was stupid and worthless and made their life miserable. If he could have had his way Mano would have been out of the house a long time now. His bed would have been the dirty meat-table in front of Assing’s shop. That was what he deserved.
The rascal! The boy spat through the window. The very thought of his father sickened him.
Yet with Sona’s mother it was different. The man she had married and who had turned out badly was still the pillar of her life. Although he had piled up grief after grief, tear after tear, she felt lost and drifting without him. To her he was as mighty as the very Ortoire that flowed outside. She remembered that in his young days there was nothing any living man could do that he could not.
In her eyes he was still young. He did not grow old. It was she who had aged. He had only turned out badly. She hated him for the way he drank rum and squandered the little money he worked for. But she did not mind the money so much. It was seeing him drunk. She knew when he arrived back staggering how she would shake with rage and curse him, but even so, how inside she would shake with the joy of having him safe and home.
She wondered what was going on at the shop now. She wondered if he was already drunk and helpless and making a fool of himself.
With Sona, the drunkard’s son, this was what stung more than ever. The way Mano, his father, cursed everybody and made a fool of himself. Sometimes he had listened to his father and he had felt to kick him, so ashamed he was. Often in silence he had shaken his fist and said, “One day, ah’ll – ah’ll…”
He had watched his mother put up with hell and sweat and starvation. She was getting skinnier every day, and she looked more like fifty-six than the thirty-six she was. Already her hair was greying. Sometimes he had looked at her and thinking of his father, he had ground his teeth and had said, “Beast!” several times to himself. He was in the frame of mind now. Bitter and reluctant, he went to untie the boat.
“If I can’t bring ‘im, I’ll leave ‘im,” he said angrily.
“Get somebody to help you!”
He turned to her. “Nobody wouldn’t help me. He does insult everybody. Last week Bolai kick him.”
“Bolai kick ‘im? An’ what you do?”
His mother was stung with rage and shock. Her eyes were large and red and watery.
The boy casually unwound the rope from the picket. “What I do? He said. “That is he and Bolai business.”
His mother burst out crying.
“What ah must do?” the boy said. “All the time ah say, ‘Pa, come home, come home, Pa!’ You know what he tell me? He say, ‘Go to hell, yuh little bitch!!’”
His mother turned to him. Beads of tears were still streaming down the sides of her face.
“Sona, go for you’ father. Go now. You stand up dey and watch Bolai kick you’ father and you ent do nothing? He mind you, you know,” she sobbed. “He is you’ father, you ungrateful---” And choking with anger and grief she burst out crying again.
When she raised her head, Sona was paddling towards mid-stream, scowling, avoiding the shallows of the river.
True enough there was havoc in Assing’s shop. Mano’s routine was well under way. He staggered about the bar dribbling and cursing and yet again the Chinaman spoke to him about his words, not that he cared about Mano’s behavior. The rum Mano consumed made quite a difference to Assing’s account. It safe-guarded Mano’s free speech in the shop.
But the customers were disgusted. All sorts of things had happened on Saturday nights through Mano’s drunkenness. There was no such thing as buying in peace once Mano was there.
So now with trouble looming, the coming of Sona was sweet relief. As Sona walked in, someone pointed out his father between the sugar bags.
“Pa!”
Mano looked up. “What you come for?” he drawled. “Who send you?”
“Ma say to come home,” Sona said. He told himself that he mustn’t lose control in front of strangers.
“Well!”
“Ma send me for you.”
“You! You’ mother send you for me! So you is me father now, eh-eh?” In his drunken rage the old man staggered towards his son.
Sona didn’t walk back. He never did anything that would make him feel stupid in front of a crowd. But before he realized what was happening his father lunged forward and struck him on his left temple.
“So you is me father, eh? You is me father, now!” He kicked the boy.
Two or three people bore down on Mano and held him off the boy. Sona put his hands to his belly where his father had just kicked him. Tears came to his eyes. The drunkenness was gripping Mano more and more. He could hardly stand on his own now. He was struggling to set himself free. The men held on to him. Sona kept out of the way.
“It’s a damn’ shame!” somebody said.
“Shame?” Mano drawled. “An’ he is me father now, ‘e modder send him for me. Let me go,” he cried, struggling more than ever, “I’ll kill ‘im. So help me God, I’ll kill ‘im!”
They hadn’t much to do to control Mano at this stage. His body was supple and weak now, as if his bones were turning to water. The person who cried, “It’s a damn’ shame!” spoke again.
“Why you don’t carry ‘im home boy? You can’t see ‘e only making botheration?”
“You’ll help me put ‘’im in the boat?” Sona asked. He looked unruffled now. He seemed only concerned with getting his father out of the shop, and out of all this confusion. Nobody could tell what went on below the calmness of his face. Nobody could guess the hate that was blazing in his mind.
Four men and Sona lifted Mano and carted him into the boat. The old man was snoring, in a state of drunkenness. It was the state of drunkenness when things were at rest.
The four men pushed the boat off. Sona looked at his father. After a while he looked back at the bridge.
Everything behind was swallowed by the darkness. “Pa,” the boy said. His father groaned. “Pa, yuh going home,” Sona said.
The wilderness of mangroves and river spread out before the boat. They were alone. Sona was alone with Mano, and the river and the mangroves and the night, and the swarms of alligator below. He looked at his father again. “Pa, so you kick me up then, eh?”
Far into the night Sona’s mother waited. She slept a little on one side, then she turned on the other side, and at every sound she woke up, straining her ears. There was no sound of the paddle on water. Surely the shops must have closed by now, she thought.
Everything must have closed by this time. She lay there anxious and listened until her eyes shut again in an uneasy sleep.
She was awakened by the creaking of the bedroom floor. Sona jumped back when she spoke.
“Who that – Mano?”
“Is me, Ma,” Sona said.
His bones too, seemed to be turning liquid. Not from drunkenness, but from fear. The lion in him had changed into a lamb. As he spoke his voice trembled.
His mother didn’t notice. “All you now, come?” she said.
“Where Mano?”
The boy didn’t’ answer. In the darkness he took down his things from the nails.
“Where Mano? His mother cried out.
“He out there sleeping. He drunk.”
“The bitch!” his mother said, getting up and feeling for the matches.
Sona quickly slipped outside. Fear dazed him now and he felt dizzy. He looked at the river and he looked back at the house and there was only one word that kept hitting against his mind: Police!
“Mano!” he heard his mother call to the emptiness of the house. “Mano!”
Panic-stricken, Sona fled into the mangroves and into the night.
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Analysis (at a glance)
The Author: MICHAEL ANTHONY
a Brief (a concise review)
- The dysfunctional family/family life
- Alcoholism ("Drunkenness") and the drunkenness of abuse, violence, dysfunctional family life, and hate.
- Abuse: domestic, physical and verbal abuse
- The entrapment of alcoholism and abuse
- Poverty (economic disenfranchisement)
- Isolation (socioeconomic isolation)
- Relationships: spousal, father & son
- Masculinity and patriarchy
- The role of men, women and children
- The role of the man: as father, husband, breadwinner/provider, protector and leader
- Home and community life
- Racial and ethic disparity/divide/fragmentation
- Violence (physical): a systemic social ill
- Despair and hopelessness
- What relevance does such a story have for families in the Caribbean today?
- What lessons can be learnt and reinforced in teaching such a story, especially to young males in our schools, some of whom may readily relate to such events?
- What would you have done in Sona's place, after suffering such humiliatingly vicious, physical and verbal abuse from your abuser (who happens to be your parent) and is now in your care?
- Consider a role reversal scenario. You are either Mano, Sona, Ma (Mano's wife and Sona's mother), or Assing (the shop owner). What would you do differently to bring about a positive change or outcome to the events in this story?
- Who is the "real" antagonist (an adversary) in this story, Mano or Alcoholism?
- Is Sona a victim or villain (of circumstance)?
- Is it a fair assessment to describe this story as "the author holding a mirror up to society—the sometimes (un)paradisiacal reality of West Indian family and community life?"
- Are Caribbean societies (islands) "states of drunkenness"? Are their citizens living in a "state of drunkenness?"
