Snap jack pages aligned

Snap Jack

Nathalie Botha

Š Nathalie Botha 2015 First published in 2015 by BK Press ISBN 978-1-928245-17-9

Prepared for publication by Ginny Porter

All characters in this work are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, translated or transmitted in any form by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the written permission of the author.

Dedication To all the nasty, dick-ish dudes out there, and all the blameless, hapless ladies who have to deal with them!

Also to all the sweet, loving, caring ones who don’t fit the stereotype – you know who you are...

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Acknowledgements

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would like to give thanks to all my friends who believed in and encouraged me throughout this process, Sidley du Preez, Nadia Kahn, Lavona Martin, Tara Ison, Karabo Tlokotsi, Sepheu Masemola, Madoda Ndlovu, Andre van Niekerk, Father Charles Uloko for his care and Christian counsel at all times, and my darling Dalmari Schoeman whose insights were, as always, perfectly spot on. Special thanks to my close friend Hendrien Pieterse-Smit, who has always taken the time to read every little silly thing I would write and never stopped encouraging me to write what I felt. Special mention must also be made of my best friend, Mokgadi Mashaphu, the girl who always stood beside me, no matter what and whose love and friendship mean the world to me. To Mrs Allais and Mrs Hendry, my English and Latin teachers from Parktown Girls’ High School many moons ago, who lit the candle within...

To all my friends and family whom I love and treasure so much and were a constant source of support, the Sinclairs, the Fraysters, the Botha, the Moshoeshoes, my dad and the Reshas. My love and eternal gratitude always go to the two most important people in my life, my mother Val and my little brother Jamille Botha without whom I would not stand, much less achieve anything. I would like to

thank Ginny Porter, without whom this book may never have seen the light of day, thank you for recognising something small in my expressions and seeing enough potential in it to help it become what it is now. Your care and commitment were like a buoy in the middle of the ocean to a novice like me, and my gratitude to you cannot be put into words!

You were my editor, my mentor. You found and listened to my voice, as insignificant as it was and you helped me reach for my once seemingly unattainable dream.

I would also like to thank God, not only for always being there for me and helping me survive my little heartbreaks, but also for putting all these angels in my life to keep me believing in myself and the voice that He had given me.

Prologue

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ankind just doesn’t seem to have got this pairing thing right – in many millennia of existence. If not arranged marriages, then its marriage within class structures, marrying daughters off to unify countries or pacify chiefs. Now it's this concept we have called “love”. What is it and is it really working? I know it has for some, but I mostly know people who are married but are still out there every chance they can get, still looking for someone worthy of their “love”...

When I was young and innocent I used to think marriage was a haven of security, contentment and peace. This was because Hans Christian Anderson and those guys, when they wrote Cinderella and stuff, they ended their stories at the wedding with “…and they lived happily ever after”. They didn’t tell us the rest of the story! Why didn’t they tell us: “and then one day, when Cinderella was home minding their six-month old twins who were niggly with colic, Prince Charming rode his big white horse over to Snow White’s house when the seven dwarves were out and was like, “Hey, check it out, I bought you a Coke.”

Three years later Cinderella found out that they had been having an affair since that day. She and Snow 1

White duked it out at the village market, scratching, kicking and pulling each other’s hair, using PG-cuss words at each other like ‘husband-stealer’ and ‘husband-loser’! All you could see from a mile away was a flurry of fairy dust, butterflies and talcum powder as the two chics ferociously engaged in full hand-to-hand combat. After that Snow White and Cinderella both got a divorce. Snow White’s prince was gay anyway so that suited him just fine, too.

Prince Charming moved into Snow White’s castle and approached the King’s court to sue his ex-wife for parental visitation. Cinderella put her profile onto fairytalesingles.com leaving out that she now had four children, and using an old picture which didn’t show that she was now 20 kilograms overweight.

And they all lived very complicated lives... ever after.... ‘cos that’s just how it is sometimes...”

So what are we really doing here with each other, as men and women?

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The Very Notion

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he idea came to me suddenly. I was out with a group of friends, relaxing at a nice, quiet park in Rivonia. As usual the girls were sitting together and the boys on the opposite side of the hall. I was particularly quiet that night. My ex-boyfriend was a common friend of all of ours and was there with us that night. It was a remarkable night, because for the first time in months we were able to be in the same place at the same time without any awkwardness. We would even chat with each other intermittently as the night wore on.

I became aware of how the talking point among the girls was always the same – “...then he said, then I said, can you believe it?...”; “...and he came home at that hour, and I was like “couch, dude”...”

It struck me that as I was quietly listening I was actually looking at my ex while he was talking to the other guys. A quintessential charmer he was: tall, broad shoulders, gorgeous long legs, milky brown skin, a stunning, sexy smile and the loveliest “hold me close arms”.

However, the fact of the matter was that he was a tissue. He was the very personification of the concept: you could only use him once on a “wet spot”, no more than twice, after which he had completely outlived his usefulness to you. There was no more you could possibly want to do with or say to him. I watched him standing there and I thought about how I wouldn’t mind every bit of what he physically was, but without all the bull dust.

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Exactly how he was: looks, body, charm - just without the junk part of him. In other words, his actual personality.

I sat back in my camp chair. It was December, and the typical Johannesburg Summer’s evening, warm with a bit of a cool breeze. I was on orange juice, as usual, and loving the buzz made by my progressively drunker friends, lined by the pleasant beat of unidentifiable house music coming from someone’s car. I quietly sipped my drink and a silly smile started to form on my lips as my concept started to take shape. Snap Jack! That’s what he is - I came up with the name right then and there. In my head I was writing specifications for how he would work and how I would go about it. My train of thought was suddenly interrupted by a whiff of familiar men’s cologne and a soft whisper in my ear.

“Do you like what you see?” he teased me.

He had turned at one point to catch me watching him. He had no idea I was more looking through him than at him, but he was the type that even if I had told him that, he would’ve thought I was just trying to cover up the undying infatuation I must surely have for him in my soft feminine bosom! His voice went tingling down my spine, making the hairs on the back of my neck stand up and causing that dampness of recognition in my strategic area.

Although he could still light my fire, I knew that he would never again be able to cook his wors on my braai-stand.

So I smiled seductively and turned to look in his eyes.

“You already know it!” I responded.

He smiled. He was one of those who knew exactly how sexy he is. “Well, we will just have to break you off a little piece of this then, won’t we?”

“I can’t say no to that.” I answered, in the sexiest tone of voice I could pull off.

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