A Zimbo’s Quest

Cathy Simpson had never heard a voice like that. Nowhere in New York.

She had been standing and listening for three minutes in the doorway of the rehearsal room. She was sure that it was not one of the Simpson Records artists in there. It was the first time she would ever call a male voice 'sweet'. 

She quietly walked in.

The source of the voice had his back to her and was too lost in his piece of music to sense a human presence other than his own. Cathy was able to read the back of the singer's jacket. Alvarez Cleaning Services. A cleaner.

She tapped his shoulder. The cleaner jumped off the stool, eyes wide, and started to stammer an apology. The forgotten acoustic guitar, which had been resting on his right lap, was saved by its

 strap slung over his shoulder.

Cathy suddenly transformed from impressed to furious. The deal with the cleaning company had been simple: come after the close of business, do your thing and leave. No messing around with priceless musical instruments. There would be hell to pay. She would call Pablo Alvarez first thing the next morning.

"What' you doing with that guitar?" She demanded.

"Ma'am, I'm sorry. Very sorry, I..."

"I asked you a question." She crossed her arms and watched the man wilt even more.

"I'm cleaning, ma'am. Please, I..."

"Cleaning?" She snorted a sarcastic laugh.

" Not exactly. I've finished cleaning, and got three more hours to kill before..."

"Kill the hours, then, not our instruments."

She turned to leave. She had noticed something foreign about the cleaner. Something about his accent...

"What's your name?" She asked, turning at the doorway to face him.

"Mandla, ma'am."

"Amanda?"

"Mandla. Rhymes with Chandler."

"Where from?"

"Zimbabwe."

"Zi- what? Where's that?"

The guy looked surprised. "In Africa."

"Now listen carefully, Chandler Rhymes. I'm gonna speak to Pablo Alvarez in the morning and tell him how seriously you take your job."

The cleaner's knees seemed to buckle as he sat on the stool and said nothing. Cathy walked out.

**********

The less I have worth giving, the more I feel like believing....

The lyrics had been ringing like a brass bell in Cathy's mind ever since had left the Simpson Records building the previous evening. And the whole night after that. Even now as she was munching her breakfast. That cleaner guy wasn't just a raw talent, she thought. He was an undiscovered pro.

"Cathy, I'm talking to you," croaked her father, Charles Simpson, startling her. "Are you okay? You are smiling like a nutcase, spilling cornflakes and milk all over yourself. Is it finally a man?"

"No, it's nothing. I'm fine. It's nobody."

"Who is this Nobody?"

"Charlie," croaked her step mother. "Leave the girl alone and eat your food."

"Shut up, Maria. Cathy, who's this Nobody?"

" No one! I was just thinking about a song I heard at the studio last evening when I went back to get my flash drive."

"I'm not following."

"I found this guy singing and playing one of the guitars in the..."

"An intruder?"

"Not exactly, a cleaner. He..."

"What do we pay those guys for?"

"That's not the point, he..."

"Did you give his boss a call about it?"

"Daddy,no! He..."

"And there you are, eating like a toddler. That's because of a cleaner?"

"Dad, I rest my case."

"Nah, don't rest it. Tell Suarez, Alves - whatever - that he will lose the cleaning contract in less than a heartbeat if his cleaners mess with my studios like that."

Cathy stood up just then, her appetite gone. She called Alvarez's number on her phone.

"Hi, Pablo. Do you have a minute?"

"Always," replied the gruff, cartoonish voice.

"There is this cleaner of yours..."

"A human cleaner or a detergent?"

"That's too silly for a joke. He was in our building last evening."

Alvarez was quiet for a moment. "What did he or she do? I'll fire that person in a blink if..."

"Relax, nothing's wrong. He said his name rhymes with..."

"Chandler? The Zimbabwean?"

"I want his number and address."

"May I ask why?"

"Provided you will wait a few days to be answered."

"Miss Simpson, it's my duty to protection my employees. If..."

"Pablo, don't forget that your contract is a couple of months away from running out. And do remember that my father has a limited opinion about you."

"Okay, okay! Let me send the number. I don't have his address."

She smiled to herself and hung up.

Three hours later, Cathy parked her Bentley Continental in front of a McDonald's outlet. Mandla immediately appeared and hesitantly got in the car. Now he looked more confused than scared.

"First of all," started Cathy after the rather-too-formal greetings. "I'm sorry for last evening's outburst. It was just an awkward moment we both should forget. And of course, if you weren't singing so masterly, I wouldn't even be sorry about anything."

"I'm sorry too," replied Mandla, filling his own gap of the truce. "For touching your stuff without permission."

She eased the car out of the parking lot and headed towards Manhattan.

"Where are we going?" Mandla asked.

"Relax," replied Cathy. "I'm not interested in human meat. You will know very soon. How old are you?"

By the time they reached Manhattan, Cathy had gathered a near complete profile of the Zimbabwean. Mandla was twenty-two years old and he had migrated to USA with the hope of making it big in the music industry. He wanted to take the whole world by storm, and any musician who wanted that needed to be first endorsed by Americans. If Americans okayed you, Africans and Asians would then take you seriously. Especially if your genre was founded in America. Learned laymen call it media imperialism.

"So you still believe your dream..."

"I don't dream, ma'am. I plan."

Wow, she thought.

"Call me Cathy, not that."

She parked in front of a store and killed the engine.

"van Groot, musical instruments..." Mandla read the shop's placard and looked at Cathy. "Is this what I think it is?"

"Just follow me, Chandler Rhymes," she replied with a smile.

She led him into the store, through the neat rows of various musical instruments and halted at a section tightly packed with acoustic guitars.

"Time to choose, buddy," she told him. "Take your time, and I'm pretty sure you'll find the one."

**********

"Where will I keep it?" Mandla asked as Cathy reversed the Bentley out of the parking lot. He hardly took his eyes off the new guitar.

"What do you mean?" She asked back. "Where do you stay?"

Mandla looked away and said nothing.

"Mandler, talk to me, all right?"

"I stay nowhere."

"What? You don't look like a bum to me!" She immediately regretted using the word.

"Well, I make some effort to look smart. I do my laundry at work and keep my few clothes in a locker there. I asked Mr Alvarez for nightshifts so that I'd stay busy while all of you are asleep, and then take a nap at a subway station or bus stop during the day."

"Isn't your salary..."

"I'm in the middle of recording, and five months worth of salary covers only one song at a backyard studio. I might need to save even more for marketing my work, you know, bribing a presenter or two..."

As Mandla was babbling about his plight, Cathy yanked her Galaxy S7 off the charger and dialled.

"Pablo, hi again. Are you able to excuse Chandler from work for a couple of days, starting today?"

"Miss Simpson, what's really going..."

"I have a task for him."

"Unfortunately, we are short-staffed here. I can't."

"Pablo, be nice with me."

"All right!"

"Gracias," she hung up."

Mandla cast a curious glance at her.

"You will start rehearsing today,"'she told him.

"For?"

" Your solo appearance at a fundraising dinner three days from now."

"What!" Mandla looked ready to jump off the moving car. "I can't! I mean..."

"Then you might as well commit to scrubbing floors until your visa runs out, after which you will have to drag your arse back to Zoo-baby"

"Zimbabwe."

"Right, sorry. I'm just trying to give you the 'big break' here. This bullshit plan of yours - sleeping in subway stations and saving bucks to bribe some bogus presenters - you're not the first to try it and you won't be the first to fail. If you don't take my offer, well, fine by..."

"I'll do it," Mandla quickly replied. "It's just that I'm nervous, you know."

"What nonsense, you came all the way from Africa to get nervous here?"

They drove in silence for ten more minutes. Cathy was now driving slowly, especially by the standards of her supercharged V8 machine. She caught him stealing a look at her cleavage. Again. She smiled and said nothing.

She finally swerved to the right and parked in the driveway of a Bed and Breakfast establishment.

"Here's what happens," she told him. "I'll get you booked in here, you make yourself friends with that guitar and be ready to impress me on Friday. I'll send someone to help you, and I'll get you dressed for the occasion. If you disappoint, I'll personally pack you in a plane back to Africa."

Mandla looked helpless.

"Hey, cheer up. You did a great solo at the studio last evening, so this time it's up to you to mess it or smash it."

***********

"Cathy, just listen to that!" Charles Simpson slurred as he downed his tenth shot of whisky, his left finger pointing at the solo musician on the stage.

The singer was supposed to have finished his work ten minutes earlier after doing his two songs, but the crowd of distinguished persons at the fundraising event had demanded an encore.

"He's pretty good, daddy," replied Cathy as she stood up and winked at one usher. She went towards the restrooms and the usher, whose tag read Hannah, joined her inside a minute.

"That chair is now occupied," said Cathy accusingly.

"Ma'am, there was no way I would refuse..."

"Well, make a plan! Put an extra chair at Pritchard's table! I want him right there!"

Cathy turned and walked back into the hall.

The singer was now being asked by the MC to step off the stage. The crowd of high-lives was booing the MC as the tall black man with an English-cut waltzed between the tables with a broad smile. He was led by an usher to a table with one chair too many; not that anyone had noticed the anomaly anyway.

"Cathy," spoke Charles Simpson in a panicked voice. "Do you see what I'm seeing? That boy has gone to sit next to Pritchard!"

Charles Simpson and Albert Pritchard had been bitter rivals since their nasty split, a decade earlier, when they had been in the same Rock group. The two men always competed over everything. The bitterness even spread to the artists: You either belonged to Simpson Records or to Pritchard Productions.

Cathy said, "Pritchard might sign him tomorrow morning if you..."

"Get him off that table, Cathy!"

"And then what, will you sign him instead?"

"Of course I will, weren't you listening when he sang? And do you think I can stand a phone call from Pritchard gloating like..."

"Dad, are you really sure..."

"Cathy!"

"He's the cleaner I told you about."

"I don't care! Wait a minute... you know him? Is this a doctored coincidence?"

"Sorry, dad. I had to. If you don't want the cleaner, Pritchard takes him."

**********

"Before you sign anything, Mr Mandla Moyo," said Charles Simpson as he paced around in Cathy's spacious office. "I want you to know that I love to be impressed. You are here today because I was impressed on Friday. If you drive me to losses, I will pack your ass into a cargo ship back to Africa in a click. And please, man, keep your eyes off my daughter's cleavage."

He walked out.

"Don't mind him," soothed Cathy. "Put some ink on those papers, boy. I've already booked a session for you. After which maybe I can take you out of your misery, you know, the cleavage."

Mandla smiled as he reached for the pen.