Cafe Babanussa (28 page)

Ruby called home the next day. “Mom, it's me. Listen, sit down—I'm gonna tell you straight out. I'm pregnant. And I'm coming home.”

“Oh, Ruby, that's wonderful! How far along are you?”

“Four months.”

“I'm sure you've thought this out carefully.”

“Mom! Of course I have.”

“We'll be glad to finally welcome you home. Here's your father.”

“Is that my youngest daughter? What's this I hear? You're pregnant? You better be packing your bags to come home.”

“What about Issam?” Ruby's mom interjected. “What does he say about all this?”

“He's been planning to leave Berlin for a while.”

“Is he coming with you?” asked her dad.

“No, he's going home to Sudan.”

“Oh my, that's going to be hard on you,” said her mom.

“Yes, it is. But I'm just trying to hang in there and stay calm. I'll be home by September.”

Two days later she got a call from Jessie.

“I'm not going to hide my feelings. I think you're making a huge mistake. Knowingly having a child when you've not been well.”

Ruby had expected as much from her sister after their conversations in Berlin. “Sick? You don't think it's possible that I might have long phases of well-being? Look at Mom—she hasn't had an episode in years. I'm fine now, Jessie, and you better damn well get used to the idea of becoming an aunt.”

“Your life will change forever. Are you up for that? What the hell does Issam say? I bet he's not happy.”

“You're right, he's not. But it's not up to him anymore. I will love this baby more than anything in the world. I will find a way to make it work. Hell, I'll even find a therapist when I'm home again. I owe my baby that much.”

Jessie held off on commenting any further and their conversation wound down quickly.

Ruby planned to spend the night before Emma's flight to London at Emma's place so they could break bread together in the morning. When the time came, she was feeling the worse for wear, physically and psychically, and she constantly drank ginger tea and carried candied ginger with her wherever she went to ward off nausea. She didn't know how they would say goodbye, but she needed to confide in her friend one more time.

“I hope to go see Melvin Burns and confront him. I will ask him why he did what he did. I have to. I don't see any way around it.”

“What if he tries to hurt you?”

“He's already hurt me. I can't get him out of my head. He takes over wherever he wants. I almost died the last time it happened.” She told Emma about the incident at the pool.

“Oh my god, Ruby. Why didn't you tell me before? That's awful!”

“I'm tired of trying to explain the vagaries of my mind.”

“Still, you should think long and hard before making yourself vulnerable to him. You just don't know what will happen. Anyhow, how do you think it will help you?”

“I don't know—maybe I'll just be able to stare him down and sense whether he did it or not. I know that sounds crazy, but maybe I won't feel so crazy myself if I see him.”

“Take someone with you if you have to go, Ruby. Don't go alone.”

The women ate dinner together on a patio and then went for a long walk through Charlottenburg, arm in arm, pointing out various restaurants and bars that they had once frequented.

“Aha! Do you remember this place?” Emma asked, pointing at the Schlosspark hospital.

“Oh my god, of course, how could I possibly forget? And not far from here lives Abena's friend Mouna. She used to braid my hair.”

They kept walking, determined that nothing would break their conversation. But then they arrived in Moabit after an hour of meandering and decided to look in at Café Babanussa, for what would be Emma's last time.

Ali and Issam were working the bar, and there were a few other regulars hanging around. Joe, the resident musician, was playing a jazzy version of “Moon River” on the piano, and Ruby slipped into a momentary reverie as she listened to the tinkling of the keys and thought of her father. It was short-lived, however, because as soon as Joe had finished, Issam turned the stereo on, and the thumping bass beats that inevitably belonged to Bob Marley and his Wailers charged the air, filling every last space in the café. Walid, a fellow Sudanese, joined them at their table. He was young, tall and lithe, with
the most beautiful smile that radiated out from his mouth and up to his big, round doe eyes. He put that smile to good use, as he loved to laugh. A little while later, “Is This Love” came on. Everybody hooted and cheered, and Walid pulled Emma onto the dance floor. Ruby grabbed Issam from behind the counter and they swayed in each other's arms like in their early days. Others joined in, and soon the café was glutted with bodies slipping and sliding across the floor. Joe danced by himself and then took turns with all the women. When the music ended, Joe went back to the piano and played a raucous rendition of Louis Jordan's “Yeah, Yeah, Baby” before easing into a quiet and reflective version of “Stardust.” He kept accompanying their conversation through the night, and they were well into the wee hours of the morning before Ruby and Emma headed home, both a little teary-eyed.

The next day Ruby had to make the final decision on whether to bring Luna home with her or not. This little creature had brought her love and a stabilizing, almost spiritual element to her during her last psychotic phase. Many times Luna had nudged her or flicked her tail to suggest she move or look in another direction, which would somehow help clear her head. She had sat faithfully at Ruby's feet when she was scribbling in her notebooks and had curled up with her at night. Ruby felt as if the cat was working on her behalf, helping to guide her through her turmoil.

Ruby had called the airline but she hadn't told her parents.
She was worried about their reaction. Her mother preferred dogs, and her father did not share Ruby's love for animals at all. He disliked cats almost as much as he disliked birds. She paced her bedroom floor. She could not leave Luna behind. Issam wouldn't look after her. Emma was gone. Luna had to come with her. She would be living in her parents' basement, where the cat would be out of the way. Half out of fear, half out of stubbornness, she chose not to tell them. It would be a surprise.

Issam refused to accompany Ruby to the airport. He said he wasn't good at long goodbyes. He gave her some karkar, a Sudanese scented oil, and a leather amulet and held her for a few minutes before brushing her away. He stepped out the door, turning only to say, “Take care of the baby. Call me when it's born. Call me before then, too, if you feel like it.”

He walked out the door and out of Ruby's life. Ruby felt sick to her stomach. Her indigestion and nausea had lessened in the past month, but here she was again, rushing to the bathroom to throw up. After cleaning herself up, she popped some ginger in her mouth and called a taxi to take her to the airport. She opened the door to the flat and there stood Abena.

“You didn't actually think I'd let you leave by yourself, did you?”

Ruby was thrilled, but it didn't stop her emotions from spilling over. Huddled in the back seat up against her friend, tears flowing down her cheeks, she suddenly realized the strangest thing about the city she was leaving. Berlin had introduced her to Africa and its music, literature and cinema.
Café Babanussa, Issam, Abena and the others had taught her to reach back into her own blackness and find comfort and a place of identity far more than that which she had derived from her own family. Having a child by a Black father was a way of growing even further. It seemed the natural thing to do.

The Edwards family sat gathered at the dinner table at the house in Don Mills, downing the last remnants of a roast lamb and scalloped potatoes that Ruby had prepared for the occasion. Ruby stepped into the kitchen to make tea and put the last touches on the linzertorte she'd made from raspberries, picked earlier from her mother's garden. Ruby had laboured over the lattice topping, as she knew this was her mother's favourite dessert.

Her family had been careful not to pepper her with too many questions in the past weeks. Ruby had made it clear that she was tired and disoriented from the move. Yet her parents had held out their arms to her and offered all the support they could to help her prepare for the home birth she wanted to have come autumn. Jessie was the exception. Ruby began collecting the dinner dishes from the table. If she looked closely at Jessie's hazel eyes, she could see laugh lines etched like feathers. Jessie and Ruby had scrapped a lot as children, but strangely all the fighting had just made them closer as adults. But now it was as if a wall had grown between them.

Ruby and Jessie descended upon the kitchen. The kettle whistled merrily, and Jessie grabbed it from the stovetop and
handed it to her sister. She watched Ruby as she prepared the tea and finally blurted out, “You don't know what you're getting into.”

“I know as much as I possibly can and that's good enough for me. Anyway, I don't want to talk about it if you're going to be rude, belligerent and inconsiderate.”

“I'm just talking straight. No one else seems willing to.”

“Jessie, what's the point? I can't turn back the clock now. I'm six months pregnant, so there's nothing to be done except to recognize that fact and get on with it. I love you. If you can't love me back and support me because of this, then I feel sorry for you.”

Jessie backed away and slammed her fist on the counter. “Don't you see, you're ruining everything—for yourself and for the family.”

“If I didn't know better, I'd think I detected just a hint of jealousy there.”

Her father's voice boomed out from the dining room, “That's enough, you two. Jessie, quit worrying your sister. There's enough love here for everyone, including the baby.”

Then, as if to deflect her sister, Ruby said, “Look, I've brought something to show you.” She stepped into the dining room, reached into a bag that lay on the floor and pulled out piece after piece of colourful concrete. “Here it is, graffiti and all. Little pieces of history tumbling from my hands. I went and chiselled off a few pieces before leaving. Everyone is always trying to grab a bit of that wall. I hope it comes down someday soon.” She gathered the rugged fragments of the
Berlin Wall into a large circle and then tried to arrange them as if they belonged in a certain pattern.

“Well, history and all, we're glad to have you both back,” her father rumbled with a strange mixture of grumpiness and tenderness. He got up and motioned to Ruby to follow him.

They went into the family room at the back of the house. He put his hand on his daughter's shoulder.

“I am so glad you have come home. It's been a long time since we've heard the friendly tinkling of your voice around here. I'm so happy that I haven't even said a word about that damn cat of yours. Keep it downstairs and out of my sight.” Ruby nodded in earnest agreement. Her father paused.

“I can't say that I'm not dismayed at your circumstances, but the main thing I want to tell you is that you are loved and you and the baby may stay here with us for as long as you see fit. I do think, and I want to stress this, that you should find a job by the time the baby is about six months old, so that you're not just sitting around. You have a child to look after now and you'll need a regular salary.”

She hugged her father long and hard and then dried her tears. “Thanks, Dad. You don't know how much your support means to me.”

Ruby felt an aching twinge every time she thought of Berlin. She missed Issam, she missed Emma, Abena, and Ali and his Café Babanussa. Would she ever find such a group of friends again? Such a wonderful place to gather? She felt lonely and
somehow small again back in Don Mills. It was hard to get up in the morning and not see any beauty around her. The architecture in Toronto seemed so bland—new and ugly high-rises stretched out everywhere. Almost every night she went to sleep crying for what she no longer had. She thought of Issam and his gentle caresses and cried some more. Ali had called to enquire about her, but the father of her child had not. Ruby cried herself to sleep and then wept again in the morning. For weeks she wrestled with the dark clouds that seemed to follow her wherever she went. She was tired and listless. Her family was gentle with her, yet they tried not to let her lie around too much. Her mother would always come down to the basement and say, “Ruby, it's time to get up. You need some fresh air.” Ruby felt she had made a mistake, that she shouldn't have left Berlin after all. It was so hard, leaving all those good people behind, leaving her beloved Europe behind.

In time she came to accept that there was no going back. She had made her bed and now she would have to lie in it. Her father would offer to go for walks with her to get her out of the house. Her sister would do the same. Often she would sit outside on the back patio with her mom, who would regale her with tales of Ruby and Jessie's childhood. Everyone put in an effort to keep her going and not let her sink. Eventually, with her family's quiet insistence and her own need to move on, she pushed through the sorrow. She was determined to find her place in her family, to rediscover Toronto, to find joy wherever she could.

Toronto had changed while she was away, and was
changing still. She loved catching the College streetcar from Main Station out to High Park and then ambling through the grounds before heading up to Bloor Street to window shop. She carried her camera with her wherever she went, snapping photos of the pastel-coloured houses that greeted her eyes in Kensington Market. Here was the Chinese pastry shop where her father had so often taken her and her sister when they were young. Nothing about the eatery seemed to have changed, especially the old bench where she could sit and gorge on the barbecue pork buns and almond cookies. She strolled along the boardwalk by the lake and sat on the rocks, gazing out to the skyline. Staring into the distance where clouds and turquoise sky met the deeper blue of the water, feeling the spray of mist murmur against her face, she felt renewed.