A Brief History of Seven Killings

Part Three is set on February 15, 1979. Every time Kim Clarke gets on a bus, she feels sure it is about to explode. Her boyfriend Chuck tells her not to get on the bus if she hates it so much. When Kim walks home she feels that people look at her funny, as if they are wondering how a black woman can walk into a house like this as if she owns it. She wonders if they think she is a sex worker or a maid. Kim and Chuck met at Mantana’s Bar, a spot popular among expats. She promises that today, she will “love his hair.” Yesterday she resolved to love how he calls her “miss Kim.” Kim doesn’t enjoy the sex she and Chuck have, but she likes his enjoyment of it. 

Kim concludes that Chuck is “sweet” and “nice.” She misses him when he is gone because she hates being left alone with her thoughts. In her mind, Kim calls herself “Kim Clarke” and is surprised, because she used to be called another name. The other day Chuck called her his “sexy little slut,” which she hated. But she reasons that he is “not bad looking, even handsome,” and that other Jamaican women must be jealous of her. Kim resolves to clean the house even if she and Chuck are leaving at the end of the month. She dreams of having a white Christmas. Chuck is from Arkansas, which Kim at first thought was near Alaska.

Chuck frequently rants about the PNP and how Jamaica is supposedly becoming communist. Kim pretends to be stupid around Chuck because she thinks that is what he will prefer. Kim feels confused and guilty because she wants to be with Chuck but also wants to be alone. She promises herself again to love his hair and other small details about him. The previous night, Kim realized that she was capable of killing anyone, even a child, who got in her way. Chuck loves when Kim cooks ackee, which he calls “that scrambled egg thing.”

The house is too quiet but Kim refuses to turn on the radio because she hates hearing the news. All Kim wants is to move to America and start again “as blank a slate can be.” She and Chuck have been dating for sixth months, and Chuck took them out dancing for their sixth month anniversary. The day they met, Kim had been sexually harassed by her boss and felt exhausted by life. She lives in Montego Bay now, not in Kingston. She has been stealing small amounts of money from Chuck and is worried that he is going to find out. Kim thinks about different nationalities of white men and the ways each of them have sex.

Kim envisions Chuck kicking her out and her screaming in protest. Earlier she had sex with a man in order to get a passport and visa, closing her eyes and thinking “of Arkansas.” She asks herself if it was worth it, and concludes that it was and she would do it again. Now she needs to wash the smell of this other man off her before Chuck comes home. She told Chuck she already had a visa and curses herself for not getting pregnant with Chuck’s child already. She wonders if she will one day get bored of life in America. She thinks it is important that she and Chuck get married soon, to ensure that he will take her with him.

Kim wonders if she should pack. She imagines telling Chuck that she wanted to be “proactive.” Chuck once told her that he expected Jamaican women to be more like black American women, and was surprised to find that Jamaicans were “sexually conservative.” Chuck comes home without Kim noticing; he has overheard her talking to herself. Kim starts cooking ackee for dinner. Chuck tells her that he got a memo from his company, Alcorp, saying that their work was ending quicker than expected and that he will be flying out next week. At first Kim is excited, talking about what she should pack. However, eventually Chuck says that he is leaving without her.

The ackee Kim was cooking burns and the room fills with smoke. Kim begins laughing hysterically, which angers Chuck. He points out that he never took his wedding ring off, and when Kim asks the name of his “white wife,” Chuck replies that she isn’t white. He then adds: “She’s blacker than you.” Kim grabs the newspaper Chuck was reading and goes into the bedroom alone. She tells herself to calm down. Chuck knocks on the door but she tells him not to come in. She looks at the newspaper and sees that Kim-Marie Burgess is a finalist for Miss Jamaica 1979. She glances at an article about Papa-Lo and Shotta Sherrif, all while urging herself not to look. 

Kim has been running for two years but feels she has been found. She sees a picture of the Singer in the newspaper and remembers waiting outside his house. She started running on December 3, 1976 and never stopped. In her mind, she almost says the name “Nina,” but then stops, telling herself: “That is a dead name of a dead woman in a dead city.” Kim lights a cigarette and takes a drag. She then stubs the cigarette on the newspaper, lighting it on fire, and throws it on the bed. The bedroom goes up in flames.