I don’t know how long I stood there before I heard Karina’s voice singing a sweet melody. I peered through the cracks of the wood in my door and watched her stroll my direction, in her hand was the hand of the little girl with the missing arm. I studied the girl, finally able to really look at her.
She was no more than three years old with big, round, beautiful brown eyes, perfectly white, straight teeth and a smile as wide as the Nile. They were singing and laughing together, throwing their hands back and forth without a care in the world. When they got close, I backed away, my calves catching on the foot of the bed letting me know I could go no further.
Karina knocked softly. “Sophie, sweetheart. Are you up?”
“Ye-yes!” I called out after a moment’s hesitation.
“We’re here to walk you to breakfast!” she said cheerfully.
“Oh okay,” I said through the door. “I’ll be right out.”
I stepped in front of the small square mirror that hung loosely above the sink basin and checked myself. Simple makeup. Simple hair. I didn’t think I’d ever looked so droll before. I wanted to laugh at myself. I wouldn’t dare walk into public back home looking like that.
o;It’s so nice to meet you, Sophie!” she sang in a lovely English accent, London if I were to have guessed.
“It’s nice to meet you too, Karina.”
I silently thanked the almost mute Dingane for mention of her name earlier. It would have been so embarrassing not to be able to say her name after such a warm hug.
“I suppose I’ll help Din with that fence then. Let the ladies get acquainted.”
“Yes, yes,” Karina said, shooing Charles with her hand and leading me toward a cluster of buildings just to the left of the main building. She stopped and turned to her left. “Kate! Kate! Please see that all the children wash before bed?”
“I will,” a dark, beautiful African woman answered before gathering children’s hands and singing them to their destination.
Kate was tall and exquisite. She looked like a supermodel, to be frank. If I had seen her in Paris, I’d assumed she was there for the catwalks. It astounded me that she worked in the orphanage when there were so many outside opportunities to be had for her.
“This is to be your bedroom,” Karina said pulling me from my thoughts and pointing to what I thought earlier was an outhouse. I almost blurted, “you can’t be serious,” but stopped myself immediately, remembering the missing arm of the little girl from minutes before. “It’s actually separated into two rooms,” she continued, swinging the door open to the room on the right. It was about as big as the toilet room in my bathroom back home. I peered inside and took in its contents.
Though it had a roof and floor, it didn’t have much else. There was a sink basin to the right but no faucet and a simple bed, smaller than a twin, and no real floor. Essentially, it was uneven planks of wood on the floor, walls and ceiling and a makeshift door.
Karina took in my face and smiled. “It’s not the Ritz, I admit, but it is a roof, my dear,” she added sweetly. “I’ll have Samuel bring your bags in for you. If you have no net, I can provide one for you.” She swung me out onto the red dirt path and pointed to the door next door. “You share a wall with Dingane, but he’s rarely there. Besides, both of you will be so busy and by the end of the day you’ll be so exhausted, your room will be used for sleeping and not much else. Any noise won’t bother you. You’ll get used to the night noises here as well. ”
I gulped, not really sure I could get used to any of it: rooming next to someone who obviously found me repulsive, though I found myself a magnet to, “night noises” or the exhaustion part.
“Have you eaten dinner?” she asked me.
“Yes,” I lied again. Too many butterflies had taken residence in my stomach anyway even if I had been hungry enough to eat.
“Are you sure?” she asked again, eyeing me like a mother hen.
“Yes, Karina.”
Her eyes crinkled around a smile. “Come. I shall show you the showers.”
Karina led me outdoors and back toward the gate where I spied two square hut-like objects. When we came upon them, I noticed they were crawling with five-inch bugs I’d never seen before.
“Oh my God!” I shouted, grabbing onto her arm. I stared at the extreme creatures with the same horror they presented themselves to me with. A land of extremes.
Karina giggled. “They won’t bother you if you don’t bother them.”
“Are-are they always there?”
“Yes, love but don’t fret. You get used to them.”
Oh my God, I’m going to reek like a freak. I’m never going to shower.
“You must shower, Sophie,” Karina chimed in, revealing psychic abilities. “This land is not kind. You must wash regularly to keep yourself free of disease.”