A Morsel Of Luminosity

He had given her some sooty powder to spray in and around the old homestead to exorcise the demon of a relationship By Nhamo Muchagumisa Mona and Chama rose just before sunrise from the dusty floor where they had lain all night. Their hair was matted with morning dew and a damp chill conveyed a plastic numbness within their joints and nerves. Yes, she had in a single breath accepted his proposal for a conjugal tie with him, but she had refused to be his wife throughout the night. "The joy of finding each other is enough for tonight," Monalissa had told him. The story Mona had cooked up about her father having acquired the abandoned homestead and the farmland within its immediate surrounding, to build a retirement home, would soon be withdrawn, now that Chama and Mona were going to be husband and wife. Chama had intended to travel back to the city the previous day but he had met Monalissa in the roofless remains of his old home.