My Name is Nkosi

© 2012 by Lynn E Oliveira © 2012 by Q Unlimited Group All rights reserved.

My Name is Nkosi

My Name is Nkosi

www.MyNameIsNkosi.za.net info@MyNameIsNkosi.za.net Cover Design by Q Unlimited Group, Media division Book Arranged by Solly Motsoane My Name is Nkosi is a fictional book based on real life facts either observed and/or experienced by the writer Lynn E Oliveira. This book is based on actual facts and/ or collection of real life stories from different sources put into one.

This book doesn’t reflect the believes of the writer nor that of the publishers.

First Edition, Electronic Form (PDF), printed by Q Unlimited Group, September 2012.

ISBN 978-0-620-53946-3 Lynn E Oliveira, Writer

Vereeneging, South Africa Solly Motsoane, CEO of Q Unlimited Group

Braamfischerville, Soweto, South Africa

www.QUnlimited.co.za | info@QUnlimited.co.za

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My Name is Nkosi

ACKNOWLEDGE

I would like to say thank you to‌ Martha Matsaneng.

My friend, my neighbour, my guide into the beautiful Sesotho culture.

Phaladi Edwin Maleke for the introspective cover pose.

My kids, always being my support.

And Solly M (Solly Motsoane), sent to me by God.

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CHAPTER 1 LUST

My Name is Nkosi

The city pulsed all around him, he could feel his heart thud in time with the rhythm of all the various beats. One undertone, oonce oonce oonce, primitive and wild. The smells and sights and sounds made him forget that he was cold and hungry.

Excitement overcame his fear of being alone for the first time in a big city. He bounced down the street, fed by adrenaline. He had no direction, no money, no place to go but it didn’t matter. He was here at last. Those lights, only seen from a distance, that energy only imagined from far away, he was now part of it. His eyes were wide, his mind open, capturing everything. Home was far away, freedom lay before him like the eight lane highway he had just risked his life to cross. Jozi and all its splendours!

He wanted the life he had seen on T.V. and he knew it was here that he was going to get it!

The cars and the girls and the clothes and the house. All the bling, all the good things that life had to offer. He was 17 and free to grab the tail of his lucky star! The beat coming from the nightclub was pounding, the girls grouped outside so hot, the cars parked at the pavement gleaming, streamlined things of awesome beauty.

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He was standing staring at a shiny red one when a group of girls fell out the club. Two white girls and a black girl, all hanging onto each other, giggling, tossing back shiny hair, clothes barely covering bodies like he’d never seen before.

“Wa’ss your name?” Hiccupped the blonde.

“Nkosi.” He mumbled, dumbstruck.

“Ah, Jason.” The blonde slurred, pinched his cheek.

They all burst into a fit of laughter. He caught a wave of perfumes, lotions and the underlying smell of sour alcohol.

“Here!” The blonde tossed two coins in his hand and fell in behind the wheel of the shiny red car.

He stared down at the coins in his hand and then at the taillights of the car speeding away down the road.

“Haai wena!” He felt someone shove his shoulder.

“That’s my spot! Give!” No sooner did he have money when it was taken.

“You want to stand, go speak to Bossman!” His eyes followed the arm pointing up the road towards a HUGE man, ebony black, lounging against the hood of a silver Peugot. He looked like a rap star, all bling and black leather, pointed snake skin 5

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boots, cool shades resting on his forehead. He could see a rock hard torso under the netted black vest, abs ripped to perfection. He started towards him slowly, instinct made him wary. The big man engulfed one shoulder with a huge paw, turned him left and right, looked him up and down.

“You can stand, section 3, tell Jabu to show you.

What’s your name?” The huge man spoke in a soft lazy drawl.

He hesitated just a moment.

“Jason.” He might as well take a new name to start his new life with. An angel had christened him.

“Take these. Left pocket E’s, 50 bucks one, right pocket blunts, 10 bucks one. Tips to guard you keep, the rest comes to me!” Bossman’s low voice crept up and down his spine, his eyes took him in and nearly drowned him, black pools devoid of emotion probed his brain.

“Ok.” Jason felt compelled, driven by forces beyond his control.

“You owe me 80 bucks standing fee for tonight, pay me tomorrow!” Jason heard the silent threat.

He had a job and a new name! His dream was 6

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coming true, he thought. His first night he made 120 bucks. Eighty bucks for Bossman, forty bucks to keep. Enough for food, smokes, a cold drink.

Bossman made five hundred bucks off the drugs Jason peddled for him. A white girl touched me!

The thrill of it kept him warm that first night in the alley, sleeping on top of some boxes under his makeshift blanket of newspapers. He blocked out the moans and cries of misery, held his dream close.

Days and nights started running into each other.

The rhythm of the streets made its own time. He was soon earning enough to pay for a room, his own room! Bossman ran the rooms too, he had a finger in every pie, a beautiful girl or two or three every night. Jason was in awe of him. Bossman’s darkness scared and thrilled him, his power intoxicated him. Somewhere in the back of his mind a warning bell tinkled but he stilled it, silenced it. It was easy enough. He allowed himself two spliffs a night. To keep the cold out, to silence his mothers voice inside his head, to be in touch with the vibe. To feel as though he were a part of it. Every weekend the blonde showed up. Gorgeous and untouchable, a goddess, his dream in the flesh.

Jessica!

In his room, his hovel, his hole he could conjure her up at will. He could replace the smell of piss 7

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and beer, fish oil and something darker, the smell of despair. He could replace the stink with her perfume, her lotion, her essence. He could block out the darkness of his tiny hole of grime filtered light, could conjure up her bright blonde light to fill all the murky corners of his existence. He filled his head with her laughter to drown out the fights, gunshots, babies screaming for food, sounds of flesh hitting flesh, pitiful sobs lasting way into the night. He filled his eyes with her beauty to block out the beggars, drug dealers, whores and pimps.

Little boys sucking plastic milk bottles of glue like it was oxygen. The filth and the rats and the hopelessness he refused to see. It was temporary, he thought, a step on the ladder, he thought.

His second month he bought a hotplate, a kettle, a cup, a plate, a spoon, a new blanket. Treasures stored, bolted into his little home. His third month he bought shoes, a jacket, a belt, trousers.

The streets of Jozi were literally lined with good deals. There was always a bargain to be had.

Commerce on the streets was informal, haggling over price accepted as the norm. He avoided the drink, avoided the glue, avoided the many routes of escapism by sheer will. His only concession was his two joints of dagga, his herb, good medicine.

His dream was alive, his will strong. He would show them! He would return to his village one day in a shiny car, rich and fat and successful with beautiful Jessica at his side. It would happen! He 8

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watched the T.V. He had big plans! Next month he would buy a bed.

The wee hours of the morning in July is ice cold in Jozi. As he made his way home from work he could hear the moans from the alleys. The braziers were burning low, old men and young boys died regularly in the concrete jungle, stalked by the bitter cold, attacked in their various states of chemically induced sleep. There was no place to hide. He thanked his God for his room as he wended his way through the sleeping and drunk on the stairway.

The bolt securing his door was a battered hunk of metal, the door stood wide open. Everything was gone, even his small stock pile of groceries. His stomach sank, he couldn’t banish this reality with dreams of Jessica. It was pointless to try find his possessions or call police. In this warren of rooms silence was the golden rule. In this city of cities possession was nine tenths of the law. He sat in the middle of the floor and cried. Eish! A seventeen year-old man crying! Then he got angry, then he got determined! At least he wasn’t in the alleyway, he thought.

He slept under newspapers again. He awoke with a new resolve. If he could do it once he could do it again! He would just stand double shifts. He would not give up. To go back home now would be 9

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too humiliating, a defeat, a failure.

So he did stand doubles and peddle Bossman’s drugs and become bone weary. One day, he thought, the money would not just pass through his hands, it would stop at him. One day! Just to find a way. Drugs he could peddle but the Nigerians owned the game, he would only ever just be a player. To cross Bossman would be to shoot himself in the head. Car guard was small change.

Not a way to get where he wanted to go.

On a beautiful Spring night in September, after the dry freeze winter, Jason felt his future coming towards him. The night buzzed as only a Spring night in Jozi could buzz. His eyes were still wide his will still strong, the city around him was electric, full of promise. 11pm Jessica blew into his spot, bounced out the car. A group of four beauties, already half gone, wanting more. Eight E’s, no make that 12! Tonight’s going to be a good night. All that sex and excitement caught him up in its vortex. He was important to her. To buy the drugs she’d pulled him in close, he’d become a co-conspirator to her, an essential part of her evening! He stared after her as she swept into the club, heels clacking, skirt swishing, a wink just for him over her shoulder. So bright and dazzling, on top of her world.

3am he was leaning against Jessica’s car, dozing, 10

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when the big Nigerian bouncer tossed her in his direction.

“Get this one out of here!”, he barked.

She fell against him, uncoordinated, limp, vomit matted her hair, make-up streamed down her face. She tried to look up at him, tried to focus, retched onto the pavement. He had to get her out of here! He fumbled in her bag for keys, bundled her into the passenger seat, sat in the drivers seat and went blank.

“Calm down!” He said to himself.

This is just like the farm truck. Newer, fancier but just like the farm truck. He’d watched her disarm the alarm countless times, had watched her every move with obsessive intensity.

“Just copy what you’ve seen.” He told himself.

He pulled out slowly into the road not knowing what direction to take or where to go. He wanted to get her somewhere safe to sleep it off, to park somewhere and watch over her till she got better.

Protect her. He stopped the car under an overpass in the deep shadows, covered her with his jacket.

He dozed off in the cocoon of the car, soft leather cradling him, his dream girl a reality by his side.

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My Name is Nkosi

He woke up feeling strange, displaced. It took a moment for him to recall, get his bearings. It was bliss! His first blowjob! Jessica was going at him like a demon. He pulled his mind back, grabbed her head in his hands, looked in her eyes. Her cheeks were red , mouth half open. Her pupils were pinpricks in her Oh so blue! Irises.

“Fuck me!” She begged in a raspy voice.

Jason felt powerless to resist, didn’t want to resist. His dream girl wanted him! He took her, gave her what she wanted, what she screamed for! He was inside her when he saw the change of expression in her eyes. He saw her mouth contort.

The realization of where she was, what she was doing, who she was with was like a shadow playing over her features right in front of him. He felt the scream build up in her, instinctively he pulled away from her, grabbed his jacket and scrambled out of the car. The terrible shriek!

“Rape!” Ringing in his ears, filling his head.

He looked back for one instant. While her mouth screamed, her eyes registered nothing but hatred, for him, for herself.

Jason ran. That endless screeching followed him down the deserted road. He ran and ran and ran.

Bobbing and weaving into unknown streets, dark12

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ened alleys. Hands grabbed, obstacles appeared and disappeared and still he ran from the nightmare that had been his dream. He recalled being a boy, drew strength from the memory of running pell-mell up the dusty track to his village. Different screams reverberated in his head, cries of innocent joy, a group of boys racing as fast as the wind for no good reason at all.

He ran till he felt his lungs would burst or he would fall down dead. In a doorway of a derelict building he fought to catch his breath, retrieve his faculties. He still had Bossman’s take for the night in his jacket pocket, had his own tips, a couple of joints unsold. Enough to get himself away. He could never go back, never! She would never be able to see him again and not want revenge. She would never acknowledge the truth. He had seen the disgust in her eyes, felt her rage. Besides, Bossman would kill him for making off with the nights take, no excuses would be heard. Best to go away.

He followed the halo of lights in the distance. The sign of any big town, that shining halo. He walked through the night, through the next day. Cars, trucks, buses, bikes all whizzed past. He gave them not a passing thought. He kept on replaying the transition from heaven to hell over and over in his mind. His face burned with humiliation. He felt so stupid. All those nights spent with 13

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an angel in his mind, all his idealistic dreams of her reduced to an overwhelming stench of vomit and the look in her eyes of pure hatred or terror.

He didn’t know which. He marched on, head and shoulders into the onslaught of that recollection.

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CHAPTER 2 PRIDE

My Name is Nkosi

The highways turned to suburbs, he felt as if he was far enough away to try thinking clearly, to try to figure out what his next move should be. When he finally started to pay attention he saw that the houses he was walking by were big, stately.

Like in the movies. Past elegant gates, long driveways led to mammoth residences that could just be glimpsed through the lush spring foliage. Fine spray from sprinklers caressed his skin intermittently, the fresh smell filled his nostrils and his head. He felt rejuvenated, washed clean. Peace came back to him. Walking along the oak shaded avenues, tranquillity reclaimed his soul.

“Watch it!” He heard the shout just before he felt the impact. Just below his knees, knocking him on his arse.

“Oh shit! I’m so sorry.” A flurry of fussing hands.

“Are you ok? I’m so sorry!” Again.

Jason felt his legs. They were sore but intact, his tailbone hurt! He took in the flashing gold, heavy perfume, fluffy blonde curls, rich plump curves. ”Is there anything I can do? Somewhere I can 15

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take you?” Staccato voice dripping concern, big green eyes oozing empathy.

“I’ve got nowhere to go.” Stated Jason softly.

“Well that won’t do! Do you know gardening? Of course you know gardening!” All organization and purpose. “It’s the least I can do after knocking you over!”

She helped him up, ushered him inside the gate, bustled him up the driveway, whisked him past the house and deposited him in an outside room.

“Rest for today, you can start tomorrow. I’ll get Rosie to bring you some food. Now now!” And she was gone and he was alone and his head was spinning! In the ensuing quiet, Jason took in his surroundings and wondered at the hand that fate had just now dealt him.

The room was large with a bathroom attached.

A shower and a bath! He felt like a king in this room! The bed was soft, the windows clean, the carpet like thick summer grass under his feet. He could hear birds singing all around, could feel the garden shift and sway outside the building. The sound of traffic seemed far away, muted by the moat of greenery. There was a homely sound of pots and crockery in a kitchen, the soulful notes of an African M’ma singing along to gospel from a transistor radio.

He could garden! Everyone from his village could 16

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plant and grow just about anything. It was born and bred into him to take care of things that grew, how hard could flowers and plants be? Plants to eat and plants to look at had the same needs.

He could see his patch of earth in his mind, the mielies grown tall, rustling overhead. The rows of cabbage, spinach, carrots, tomatoes a bountiful oasis in the surrounding dust. He had had to walk far to collect the water to nurture that patch, had painstakingly weeded and protected his harvest.

With all the tools at his fingertips he could not fail.

“Dumela Boetie.” He was brought out of his reverie.

“Dumelang M’ma.” Rosie he guessed.

She was round and jolly and made his heart long for home. He could feel the traditional connection, was enveloped by the simple goodwill. The plate she brought him was loaded! All the good things he had taken for granted. The streets of Jozi were more for fast food, packaged food, movie food.

He attacked that plate of pap and stew morogo with relish. With a hunger of the soul not of the belly. Rosie watched him and laughed a great big laugh, took his dishes when he was finished and left him alone with his thoughts. He had a job and a place to live! God was smiling on him, his dream was still alive! Jozi started to drift away from his mind. He felt safe.

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My Name is Nkosi

He fell asleep with the mid-afternoon sun streaming in on him, dappled by the leaves of a huge oak just outside his window. He slept right through to the next morning, a sleep of the dead or of the innocent. He awoke excited, feeling the newness of his surroundings. Rosie knocked with his breakfast, a big smile slid easily across her face when she saw him.

“Watch out for that missus!” She wagged a plump finger at him “That missus Allison no good!”

Jason couldn’t put the warning and the person together in his mind. Fluffy, kind, concerned and danger? No way! Missus Allison was harmless.

“You young, strong handsome boy. Itlhokomele for missus!” Rosie bustled out leaving him very confused. He was not going to give up this job for anything! He had it made.

He left his room and walked into his workplace.

As close to his vision of paradise than he had ever been. Missus Allison was waiting on the patio in a bright pink track suit and a pair of Nikes that would have cost him a months tips. While she directed his days work the gold jangled and jounced, clinked and blinked. He was mesmerized, at times blinded. She punctuated every second word with a touch or a squeeze on his shoulder, bicep, forearm.

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My Name is Nkosi

The jobs seemed simple enough, clean pool, dig and weed beds, trim, cut. All manageable. He was capable.

Jason got to it. Life fell into a new rhythm, a peaceful pace in a heavenly place. He felt healthy, he was fed well, he slept like a baby yet there was an ominous undertone. The weekly routine was simple and unhurried, the house ran itself. Mr Banks drove his silver Mercedes out of the driveway every morning at 6:00 am to go to work.

Missus Allison surfaced at 11:00 am and for the rest of the day did whatever she chose, which was mostly shopping. Weekends the Banks’ children were home and the house came alive.

Andrew and Sarah were twins his age, yet worlds apart. They lived in a reality he could barely even imagine. They rushed in on Friday afternoons with stories from a school that sounded like the most fun Jason could imagine. They came home to beds in bedrooms the size of most township houses, beds laden with gifts. Every week. Clothes and jewels and music and equipment. Yet all he overheard was complaining and whining. Jason was invisible to them, but they were not to him. He made sure on a Friday that he was working the section of garden with a view into their rooms. Trying to catch a glimpse of this unimagined world, this land of plenty.

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The twins wanted for nothing. Every thing they could possibly need or desire was provided for them. They oozed confidence, safe and carefree in a world that held no monsters, no poverty, no hunger, no suffering. Jason was in awe of them, these creatures born into the same world at the same time as him, yet so far ahead. Andrew and Sarah both drove already, both had shiny new cars in the garage that he would wash every Friday.

They spoke of subjects and situations that Jason had only seen on screens, confirmation that his mother was wrong, that T.V. world did exist! He could see it in real life right in front of him, could reach out and touch it if he wanted to.

The flurry of the weekends was accentuated by the stillness of the week. Mr. Banks worked, Mr. Banks worked late, Mr. Banks worked weekends, Mr. Banks brought work home. Jason could see the light burning in his study till all hours. Missus Allison shopped and went to the gym and ‘did lunch’ and drank. Every night six o’clock, drinks by the pool, after drinks at lunch, drinks until late at night. Alone. Always alone. Drinks until she would nearly fall into the pool on her way inside if Jason didn’t help her.

He couldn’t understand why people living in a movie were not happy, joyous. Weekend parties started with drinks and ended with drinks.

Overloud laughing, roaring engines, gold and dia20

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monds. Women so thin that he just wanted to feed them, but they never ate. All that food and they only nibbled. He watched through the lace of his tree weekend after weekend. He listened through the filter of space to snatches of conversations, forced laughter. An effort in frivolity. But what he saw was the emptiness in over-sparkling eyes, witnessed the pairings of men and women in the bushes who did not arrive together.

“Talking of jungle fever!” He heard Missus Allison shrill one drunken Saturday night.

“You must see my Jason!”

“Come Jason!” He heard a chorus of raucous female voices, a tone that scared him. His door was banged on, squeals and drunken giggles. He was nervous to open, instinct told him that this was not good, but curiosity won. A sudden desire to be part of the madness pulled him across the room, opened the door. Bejewelled female hands grabbed. The throng shepherded him over the lawn to the pool.

“C’mon Jason, take it off!” They cheered as one.

They clapped and writhed in front of him like a snake of many parts. Desperate lust.

Most of the men sat on the outskirts, eyes cold and calculating, drinks in hand. An undertone of 21

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hatred. Jason couldn’t help but feel a sense of power. He felt as though he was outside his body looking down, removed from immediate reality.

The music changed the rhythm was his, to dance was at the core of his being. His body moved of its own volition, he was fluid and tall and strong, all eyes were on him, the rhythm in him. The dreads that he had grown out in Jozi swept across his powerful shoulders, beads clinked. It was hypnotic to hypnotise. He could feel his own power over these silly, desperate women, could feel a sense of superiority over their fat, aging men.

Jason was down to his boxers when Mr. Banks slammed off the music.

“Enough Allison!” His voice was ice, his eyes as hard as stones.

Allison went red, then laughed. All the women laughed. He was left standing in his underwear, not sure what to do. His momentary power was gone with the music. He felt like a fool under their gaze.

“Shoo, shoo now boy. You’re too young for this party!” A big man, belly hanging over his belt, big red nose, two sheets to the wind.

Jason was dismissed like a fly from a plate. He felt whipped, fumbling and stumbling in the effort 22

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to retrieve his clothes and leave. In the privacy of his room his cheeks burned as he sat in the darkness and listened to the laughter, shrieks of un-mirthful mirth. Rosie came quietly in and sat next to him on the bed, one plump protective arm around his shoulders.

“Eish!” Was all she said, comfort was all she could give.

The next day he hid, Monday he worked. Nothing was said, not a thing. He was invisible again.

Flat screen T.V.’s, microwaves, computers, houses, cars, jewels, clothes, people. All just things to be shown off. Commodities brought out for parties, kids paraded around for friends, price tags gloated over, names dropped, Rosie’s cooking devoured, Jason stripped bare. All just possessions in an endless stream of purchases. A mountain of shiny shit. How he detested having to help Misuss Allison to her bed that night when she passed out in the pool chair. How ugly she looked to him, slack jawed and drooling. Where was the jangly, bubbly picture of perfection now? Mr. Banks cursory nod in the morning looked exactly like what it was, a disdainful gesture of superiority. Where was the non-racial philanthropist now?

Once his Eden, the garden began to feel to him like a rotting grave. All he could smell was the decay. Spring had given way to Summer, the 23

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scents on the breeze should have excited, but they cloyed. The rose garden suffocated him, the jasmine blocked his chest, the pollen made him sneeze. Three more times he was dragged poolside to perform, three more times he acquiesced, three more times he wished to be someone else, somewhere else.

On a beautiful Saturday on the 12th December, he celebrated his eighteenth birthday. Quietly, in his room, with Rosie who had procured many treats from the overstocked kitchen. This birthday was so different from the loud celebrations that would have taken place in his honour at home.

He thought back to his last birthday, consoled himself with the recollections of a communities love for him on that day. The perfect harmony of many voices, coming in together from all sides as traditional hymns were sung while the women prepared the food. Such joyous voices raised in praise to God for the blessing that was him. Such a feast laid out!

Dumplings, chickens, vegetables, Sorghum made the traditional method. His mouth watered for the food as his mind recalled, his spirit cried for a community he had left behind. The celebrations would have started mid-afternoon and carried on late into the night. No-one could celebrate like an African could celebrate! The rhythm of the drums passed through his body like a ghost, the smells 24

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and tastes and sights of home filled his being. Jason felt an ache in his heart that surprised him, felt the pull of his roots strong in his being.

“Big party tonight.” Rosie looked at him out of the corner of her eye. “You dance tonight?”

Jason hung his head. Not today! Please not tonight! He could go out. Go to the tavern. Hide.

When the cars started arriving he quietly slipped out of the room and down the drive. A bedecked and bejewelled stick grabbed him! He could not believe it!

“Allison, he’s trying to run away! Come here dahling!” It hissed, it drooled, it cooed.

“You’re not going anywhere!”

He was trapped, a fly in their web. He waited, he got called, he danced, he sat on the edge of his bed, his mind snapped. No more. Not for the money or the food or the room or the garden would he disrespect his ancestors this way! Jason packed quietly and left. Party still jumping, booze and drugs still flowing. He slipped away quietly, this time he walked away, almost slinked, head hung, with his own deep shame. The money he had saved weighed heavily in his pocket. He made for the tavern. He was eighteen today. He would 25

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drink today.

The tavern hopped with another vibe, primordial.

Roughshod groupings of tables, quart bottles and R1 glasses everywhere. Voices were loud, the tension palpable, violence always 10 seconds away.

Tempers were fuelled by cheap beer, unfair treatment. Lives lived always on the edge of poverty.

Beer and pool a cheap, necessary escape from an unenviable reality. But businessmen were dotted here and there in this crowd. Men of means loathe to let go of there roots, unwilling to let go of who they were. The familiar energy would always feel more comfortable than the stiff enjoyment they could now afford, but wouldn’t.

Jason went to the counter, ordered a Zamalek through the thick steel bars. He had heard that real men only drank Black, so Zamalek it was. A quart and a glass and he was set to celebrate his birthday. The taste was bitter, but the gas was good. The first glass went straight to his head but he carried on. He was determined to drink the first half of this night out of his mind, to banish his actions to a corner of his brain that he would never look in again!

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CHAPTER 3 ENVY

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He sat in amongst the Saturday night mayhem and drank two more quarts. Way more than enough to make him not know who he was. Things appeared fuzzy, out of focus, but his heart felt light.

He found himself laughing and joking and shouting and dancing and singing and it felt good! So good. So good. So good.

Not so good! His head was pounding, his tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth. He was stiff and sore. Jason opened his eyes, mere slits, to see where he was. The ground was cold and hard under him, something was pressing painfully into his side. A terrible stench filled his nostrils! Pungent urine, rot, shit. He was in the alleyway behind the tavern. He had come out here last night to take a piss, that was the last he could remember. His head ached! He explored his skull and found dried blood caking his dreads. Glass from the broken bottle that had done the damage was digging into his side. His jacket was gone, his bag of clothes – gone. He sat on a dustbin. Despair, shame, fear, hopelessness all washed over him. And he had his first hangover. Happy birthday Jason!

“Haai! Shaya wena! Get out of here!” The man from behind the bars the night before.

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“They robbed me!” Jason’s voice was dry and raspy.

“You were drunk. Easy target. Shaya now!” The older man insisted, impatient to get on with his day.

“Nowhere to go – just lost my job – my money!”

It dawned on Jason what a predicament he was in again.

The little man stood and looked him up and down, hesitated a moment.

“You’re a good boy, honest. Stupid but honest.

You can work here R300 a week. Open to close, every day, sleep up there.” He pointed up at the crumbling brickwork of the back of the building.

Jason could see two storeys of windows covered with sheets, newspapers, blankets. He nodded.

“You start tonight.”

Jason’s first night was hectic from start to finish. He had never seen so many beer bottles! He shoved one crate after another of empties into the storeroom. The clink of bottles, clack of pool balls, music blaring from BAD speakers pounded in his hung-over head. He resolved NEVER to drink again. NEVER! As time wore on he learned how to listen over 28

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all the noise, pick up conversations from table to table. To live in the lives of the story tellers. He heard so much. So much anger. So much disillusionment with a world that wouldn’t listen to the man in the street. Everyone had a tale to tell of unfair treatment, unfair dismissal, low wages, no wages. Most of these lives were lived hard. Many hours of work, very little to show for it. The opulent houses just blocks away were a million miles away in terms of attainment. The lifestyle he had just seen played out in the property of Mr. Banks, never to be achieved by most of these drinkers.

Jason slipped through the crowds, invisible with his broom and his crates, watching as young girls were bought and sold, cheap drugs changed hands, crimes were planned, justice meted out at the will of the crowds. He watched the easy targets, like he had been, get taken in and spat out again. What the world did to them outside the thick steel doors, they did to each other in their place of respite. A perpetual cycle, the abused became abusers, the used became users.

Monday mornings, when all the beer and glass and blood was off the floor, the place took on its real shape, not bad actually. “Lucky’s Tavern” looked like a cavern, housed as it was in a 1960’s building with walls as thick as his arm was long. The pressed ceiling was high above, the room huge and deep and dark. Lucky had taken Jason under 29

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his wing, Mondays they played pool or watched sport. Or Lucky gave him driving lessons, that was the best! All the while Lucky spoke, tutored, advised endlessly in a soft, gentle voice. He made no mistake that Lucky was tough and connected – he had to be to own a tavern – but with Jason he was kind. Lucky’s own son had been killed in a shootout just outside on the pavement. Jason suspected he was a replacement for that loss.

It seemed that whatever advice Lucky was currently giving, a similar situation would play itself out in front of him. It freaked him out that Lucky was so often right, could almost see into the future.

Lucky told Jason about the way things really were not the way they were promised to be. Jason resisted with all his might. If the things about life that Lucky told him were true he would have to start killing his dreams off one by one. Jason wanted all that he had seen life could be. He refused to allow himself to think that he would one day be like these men. He had a desire, an addiction and it had to be fulfilled, sated. If there was one Jessie in the world there must be another one, if the Banks and their children could live in a dream world, he could too.

Lucky was negative! It made Jason cross. All the movies he had ever seen, all the songs he liked 30

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to listen to told him to just dream it and it would come to pass. Lucky was trying to trap him there, to make him take the place of his dead son! Lucky was just a tired old man, he thought. 40 Years old – he was over, a fool. He didn’t know the things that Jason knew. Didn’t know the truth. He had seen with his own eyes that the world was full of things for the taking.

He had seen houses and cars and ships and airplanes. Men his age with jewels and cars and mansions to live in. He just needed to find a way to get it! The people he saw on T.V. were not like Lucky, tired and old carrying crates and sweeping floors, working seven days a week till late into the night. The T.V. people sang or acted or joked around and the money rolled in. He just needed to dream it and wait. Lucky sounded like his mother back home, full of warnings and rules and “go to school”, and work hard. This was not the way!

And there were other young men that agreed.

Every weekend groups of them came in and drank with money to flash around to the best looking girls that they took off with in big flashy cars. One group in particular noticed him, or rather one of the girls took a liking to him and he was slowly accepted into the crowd. Inch by inch. And one Friday night they clarified for him how they could roll the way they did. They needed a lookout. One of the guys had been caught the week before in 31

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a house breaking gone wrong. Tough luck. Jason could take his place, supplement his meagre income.

Cruising in the BMW, looking for likely places to rob, all the dead rappers urging them on, making them as fearless as the coke they snarfed for courage, this felt right. Jason’s first experience with coke was incredible, amazing. The prostitutes that rented the rooms around him always had coke. After “work” there was always a private party in one of the rooms. Cocaine put him on top of the world, where he felt he belonged, it made him feel invincible. Everything came into clearer, sharper focus. He could dance and talk and screw with such ability. The innocent wreck of a boy that had hightailed it away from Jessica was dead! He had no worries, he was untouchable, soaring high above the peasants on the ground.

Snarfing with the gang was mandatory. They had to psyche themselves up for the job. To become invincible. To do what had to be done. Robbery posed no moral dilemma for him. Yes Mma had taught him not to steal but she didn’t know the rules of the real world. This was a world that if you didn’t take what you wanted you would always have nothing. Besides all these rich people had insurance. Everything that they took would, and could, be replaced. If people got hurt along the way the Fuck it, they asked for it, wrong place 32

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wrong time!

Jason felt that he was finally getting what he deserved. He could dress sharply, afford the pretty girls. He no longer needed to work for Lucky, didn’t need to listen to the boring shit that poured out of Lucky’s tired old mouth day after day. Now he could sit and drink at the tavern instead of work there, and not just beer either, he could have single malt scotch if he wanted. Which he often did.

Alcohol chased the coke around nicely in his system. Making him a man of steel.

Every weekend they robbed a house or two. That he heard screams and once or twice gunshots was not his business. He was there to keep watch and drive. Thanks Lucky. The gang became his family and as such could do no wrong. An enemy of any one of there number was an enemy of all of them. If some stupid person wanted to die for their possessions then so be it. After what he had seen and been made to feel at the Banks’ house, he felt that they all deserved a bit of pain in their lives anyway. Who were they to live the way they did when the rest of the world lived in squalor?

Why should they have so much when so many had nothing?

Jason was handsome and young and strong. Why should Mr. Banks’ put label clothes on his fat old body and Jason wear rags? A memory of Mr. Banks 33

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working endlessly made a futile attempt to nudge its way into his over-stimulated mind. No, he argued with himself. People like Mr. Banks couldn’t lose. They worked like that because they had the opportunity in the first place, never had to struggle to climb out of the dirt like him and his mates!

The Mr. Banks of this world had everything handed to them. The Jessica’s of this world had never had to go a day cold or hungry. They had never had to walk 8km to school, arrive so tired that they fell asleep in class. No these people had taken all the luck there was. If they ran out of luck now it was just the natural order of things.

Jason was more strung out than usual this Friday night. E’s and coke and single malt scotch chased each other around in his veins and made his head spin. Tonight was going to be fucking A! A big score. They had inside information so the job would be easy. No-one home, security slack.

A generous gift to the security companies night shift assured no interruptions. Easy. They could party hard afterwards. They arrived at the house just after 1am in the still darkness of the crisp Autumn night.

Skunk, their fearless leader, and three others exited the car silently, without fuss. Dark clothes, black skin blended seamlessly with the shadows, made them one with the moonless night. Jason cruised quietly two houses down and waited 34

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in the darker darkness cast by a giant old oak.

Shouldn’t be more than 20 minutes, he thought.

This job would see them living large for the rest of the month!

The gunshots carried crisp and clear in the still night air. Kpow, kpow, kpow. He didn’t worry, Skunk and his crew knew how to handle themselves. They always had the upper had, the element of surprise was always on their side. Fat, lazy homeowners were never adequately prepared to have their illusion of safety shattered. He backed up anyway, ready to speed off, pumped and alert.

He knew his escape route, went over the turns and twists mentally. He was prepared for his part in this job.

The shadows erupted, back door, front door opened.

“Go, go, go!” He could hear the urgency.

His body reacted, the car responded with smooth power. After the second turn he looked in the rearview mirror. Only two.

“Where’s Jabu?” He took his eyes of the road to look at Skunk. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

Skunk was leaning heavily against the door. Where his hands clutched his stomach, Jason could see a 35

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shiny slick seeping through and over his fingers.

A thick liquid that looked like oil in the dark, but couldn’t be, could only be blood. How? They were invincible. The armour of youth and cocaine and testosterone was impenetrable!?!

Jason drove. The powerful BMW held the corners and ate up the straights just like the adverts said it would. He could feel the urgency, the fear coming in waves at him from the two guys in the back.

Their faces were ashen in the rear-view mirror.

“Fucking private security!” The one called Stix muttered, incredulous.

Skunk moaned from the front seat. In the intermittent glow from the streetlights, Jason could see blood bubbling from between his lips. He had to get some help! This was bad, very bad. Jason changed direction.

“Where the fuck are you going!” The shorter, fatter man, Sipho shouted in a strained, panicked voice.

“We need to get some help!” Jason shouted back, taking control.

“Just throw him out, he’s gone!” Sipho hissed, glared, waved his gun.

“I’m taking him to the hospital.” Jason had become quiet, resolute. This idiot didn’t scare him.

If he shot him now at 130km an hour they would all be in shit anyway.

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Jason was not an animal, could not treat another human being like one. He did dump Skunk but not on the side of the road. He dumped him outside the security hut on the well tended lawn at the huge provincial hospital and peeled rubber out of there! They had gotten away with nothing, no fences to meet, no cash to collect, no girls to treat, no party to be had. Jabu, number three was lying with his brains spattered all over a strangers living room, Jason doubted if Skunk could lose that much body fluid and still live. He hadn’t even moaned when he hit the ground! His mind was surprisingly clear. They had to clean the car and dump it, fast. He would go to his room above the tavern and hole up for a while. No-one had seen him. It was an easy country for a young black criminal to get lost in. In a land where crime had become a career opportunity, one house breaking gone wrong wouldn’t even make the news.

An overworked, underpaid police force would not spend too many hours trying to find criminals determined to stay hidden. The ones that got caught were brazen, foolhardy.

Criminal. It was the first time he had described himself that way. It was the first time he had acknowledged that what they were doing might be wrong, or dangerous. He held the thought as he scrubbed the butter soft leather clean of Skunks blood. They got twelve thousand rand for 37

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the BMW at a chop shop in the township. Four thousand rand each. Enough to see him through while he figured out what to do. Again.

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CHAPTER 4 GREED

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He would have to eat a big chunk of humble pie!

He knew if he appealed to Lucky’s good nature he would stand a reasonable chance of getting his job back. Right now, getting lost in the noise of the tavern seemed like a mighty nice idea. To retreat back into the safety under Lucky’s wing. But life had another surprise in store for him. When Jason approached Lucky, all fake humility and false remorse, he saw the once compassionate eyes turn to stone. On Friday and Saturday nights, when Jason and the crew had partied up a storm at the tavern, he had momentarily felt Lucky’s disapproval from across the room. He had dismissed the admonishment then, holding onto the belief that Lucky was a stupid sheep, content to munch on the dry fringes of scrub grass, when he, Jason, had a whole field of lush Lucerne to devour at will.

Jason could not hold Lucky’s sardonic gaze, could not face the disappointment Lucky felt in him. A part of Jason’s mind opened under the onslaught of that relentless indignation. Lucky had helped him, Jason had been thankless, Lucky had protected him, Jason had left him in the lurch, Lucky had provided for him, Jason had been a traitor, Lucky had honoured him, Jason had ridiculed him in return, Lucky had spent time on him, Jason 39

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had turned his back. There was no shelter under Lucky’s wing for Jason. There would be no forgiveness from this hard working man. Jason had failed to notice that another boy had taken his place while he was busy making big mistakes. A boy that looked to Lucky as a hero. A boy who had once begged outside on the pavement and was only too happy to have what Jason had taken for granted and cherish it.

Jason felt ashamed. A very different shame than the shame he had felt leaving the Banks home.

This was a shame he had brought on himself. This time he had let himself down, he had used a human being who had been good to him, he was no longer the victim, he was the perpetrator. The image of his mother swam before him as he blindly left the tavern. The pain he could imagine in her eyes had she known her boys actions! It was the drugs! He theorized. The crew! Their influence!

He consoled himself. His mind dredged up excuse after excuse to wipe out the image of his mother and Lucky’s faithless gazes from his head.

He marched down the road, shame burned his ears.

“Whatever!” He defied them. He would still show them!

He went up to his room to lick his wounds, to think. To find another path to his ultimate goal.

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With a grade ten and no experience, honest job opportunities were few and far between. He could drive. He thanked Lucky mentally for all those lessons, felt a deep pang of remorse. But he had no license. To go through the system to get a license would take over a year – no-one had the patience for a crooked traffic department. Better to buy a license. Desire, the prostitute in the room next door had a ‘boyfriend’ who could organize one for a price. If you had a license, a lot more jobs were available to a person. The world opened up a little bit, there was a thin glimmer of hope shining again on his dream.

One thousand five hundred rand would guarantee him a test in a months time, just to get through till then, lay low and get through this period. Then start looking for honest work. Criminal did not sit well with him, no matter how he tried to justify what he was doing. His mothers lessons of right and wrong had plagued his sober moments.

It had taken more and more drink and drugs to drown out her voice. That amoral state of being was expensive to achieve and hard to maintain.

He could also not get the smell and feel of Skunks blood out of his mind. He had thought Skunk to be invincible, had listened to Skunks philosophy like an apostle.

In his own room, in his own mind, with his own thoughts, his moral compass struggled to find 41

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direction again. His body ached. Since he had stopped the cocaine he was sore all over, jittery.

And tired. He took to sleeping all day. Doing whatever he had to do at night, the darkness became his shield in the absence of the steel armour of the drug. He felt sure he was about to get caught at any moment, paranoia was his constant companion. He hadn’t seen or heard from Stix or Sipho since that night. Not that he wanted to, he wanted to wipe the entire incident from his mind, Sponge Bob his brain.

His room began to feel like a cage, he made it into a prison. Punished himself for his crime.

He ventured out only to get food. People looked strange to him, alien. Happiness, sadness, anger, the whole gamut of human emotions that he saw crossing over peoples faces, and he just felt numb, immune to it all. The only time he felt alive was when he was exercising. He had seen the movies, T.V. American prisoners all exercised. He made his room into a makeshift gym and sweated the drugs out of his system, pumped the bad thoughts from his mind.

For the next month he slept and worked out, worked out and slept. He only felt good when his muscles were aching, when his arms couldn’t lift themselves never mind the two 20kg chunks of carbon steel that he used for weights. His appetite for junk food was dead. He never had quite 42

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developed a taste for it. Homemade traditional would always taste like the only real food to him.

Now he just craved fruit. That was always available. In every black community there would always be a street vendor or ten who had fresh, seasonal fruit. His body was trying to repair itself as he tried to repair his mind.

It was six weeks before he took his drivers test. A clear, cool winter’s day the air still acrid from night-time fires. He was emotionless and passed with flying colours. Maybe because he didn’t really care. The crooked instructor offered him a public driver’s permit for an extra three hundred.

He took it without knowing why. Emotion continued to evade him. No guilt, no shame but no elation, no conviction either. All he wanted was to get back to his room and hide. He forgot that he was only supposed to be waiting for his license. The very thing that he now had in his possession. He forgot that his incarceration was voluntary. Forgot that his dream waited for him. Forgot that he was supposed to be looking for work. Life seemed to be happening all around him, not to him.

He was in his own isolated void, somewhere between living and dying. Even his thoughts had become suspended. Reality was the ache of his muscles, the rhythm of his breath filling his lungs, expelling, the roar of the blood in his ears as he worked up a sweat. Life held no pleasure, 43

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no pain, he merely existed. People he had called his friends tried to talk to him, he ignored them.

People he did not know were friendly to him, they did not exist. The prostitutes on the same floor, next door, the tavern downstairs, the weekend merry making all seemed removed, like life happening behind a glass screen, slightly out of focus.

Until one morning – a banging on his door. Lucky standing there with a thunder cloud over his head.

“This is enough now laiety!” Lucky’s voice penetrated the cotton wool effect in his head. Jason shook his head in confusion, focused.

“Come now! All this self pity! Get a job!” And Lucky slammed his own door in his face.

It did the trick though. Jason felt sensation start to trickle back into him, felt the drive to survive start to take hold of him once more. He got dressed and went downstairs to the tavern. If anyone could give him proper direction, it was Lucky. As it happened a friend of a friend owned a private taxi service and needed a driver. Did he have a license, a public drivers permit? Yes. It became clear to Jason that destiny was once again directing him. He hadn’t known at the time what a public drivers permit was, like a robot he had just accepted.

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Now he knew why.

Taxi driver. That was a job he could do and do well. He met with his new boss in the tavern, received his keys and went out to meet his new car.

Nothing special, a 1994 Toyota Conquest, but he loved her on sight. Lucky gave him space in the warehouse behind the tavern to park her in. He was employed again. Honestly employed again.

His station for casual pick-ups was outside the court buildings in town. The fraternity of taxi drivers was a society unto itself with its own rules and regulations. Here competition was healthy, price fixing essential, camaraderie the order of the day.

The wars between the mini-bus taxi’s didn’t filter down to these brothers. The loss of one fare was an opportunity for another. If he couldn’t get to a pick-up, there was always someone ready to speed off. Jason felt part of a team, not so alone.

The darkness in his soul during his isolation started to lift. He caught himself smiling. Often. For no particular reason.

The slices of life he caught a glimpse of from his invisible position up front and to the right!

Every day bits and pieces of information were filtered through to him. His station, being outside the courthouse, allowed him a telescopic view 45

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into peoples lives at their most basic level. Every strategy, complaint, sorrow, rage, shattered illusion was spent on the back seat of his taxi. Jason had taken to almost ritualistic cleansing of his baby, not for the sake of his fares, but to try to eradicate the bitterness they left behind. Or the arrogance, or the crafty underhandedness or the downright legally illegal. Such wholly unwholesome undercurrents!

People he had once walked past, facsimiles of people he had seen on T.V. and envied. Beautiful people, people with hope and money, reasonable expectations of success, all pointing their weapons at each other, all ready to kill or be killed over nothing. He listened to the winners gloat, the losers bitter tears and vitriol. He watched the shifty eyes of lawyers, desperate to the last one, to continue to engage their hapless clients in futile, meaningless battles that brought no resolutions, ever.

Jason learned a lot looking backwards. His rearview mirror became his T.V. screen, reality his program. One “gentleman� in particular captured his attention. A well dressed, well lawyered up man of means, in the middle of what could only be a messy divorce. On a monthly basis he would call Jason into service to pick him up for court. To be collected from his up-market, with his stable of luxury cars, to leave with a kiss goodbye from his 46

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fine mistress in residence, to arrive at the courthouse steps to meet with his expensive lawyer. To enter those sacrosanct hallways, to stand before one or another of those learned men and plead abject poverty and hand in excuse after excuse as to why his children did not deserve education or food or clothing or shelter from him.

Jason was shocked at first. In his knowledge, in his background, in his culture a man was deemed a man by the very manner in which he kept his wife and children. Any refusal as to the well-being of those under a mans’ care would anger the ancestors greatly, surely would bring nothing but misery to the perpetrator of this horrible crime.

But day after day he heard the strategies of lawyer and client on how to back out of contracts, how not to honour words said in honour, how to lie and get away with it. How to win in a myriad of situations. Only the outcome meant anything.

Only victory was acceptable. Whatever the human cost. Court did not seem to be a place where humanity as he understood it existed.

At first fascinated, intrigued, Jason soon became jaded. He didn’t just drive the winners , liars, all round scoundrels, more often than not he was charged with the duty of ferrying home the losers. The uninitiated, unknowing believers in justice, the ones not prepared to sink below certain levels to get what they wanted. His perceptions of 47

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right and wrong were being tested to the limits.

Everything his mother had taught him seemed to be out of place in this system called justice. Plots and schemes to win court battles never seemed to have any basis in truth and honesty. Delay tactics were employed, money spoke louder than every language, manipulation and buddy systems overrode laws in every way, shape and form.

Jason recalled a few months ago when his mind and soul were tortured over his criminal exploits.

There was no such conscience here.

Every crime was accepted, every ploy to get away with that crime was employed by the perpetrators and their defenders. The lessons learned on the back step of his family hut while his mother cooked, seemed as far away as the moon in the sky. Jason was tempted to revert back to the easy way of making money.

Being a taxi driver was honest, but the money wasn’t exactly rolling in. The hours were long and backbreaking, the rewards barely sufficient to keep his roof over his head, food in his belly, and a subdued night at the tavern once a week.

Dangers were inherent in the job. You never really knew who was getting into your taxi on a late night call. Every Tom, Dick and Harry had access to the little company fliers that were handed out by the hundreds to the local community.

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Tempted. Tempting. These crafty little lawyers could explain away every action, could justify every crime with a sad tale and a good imagination. Murder had so many definitions, theft could be explained in a thousand different ways, every crime could be litigated until it didn’t even sound like a crime anymore. But his mothers’ voice rang strong and true in his head.

He couldn’t shut her up, shut off his own inner voice, ignore the conclusions he had come to in the darkness of his own moral dilemma.

Jason watched and listened and drove and watched. His own eyes in the rear-view mirror looked weary, he was going to be nineteen this year and his eyes looked ninety. But he clung fast to the tiny spark of hope, the minute speck that was his dream. The good life had to be just around the corner, the movie in his mind where he was the star, the hero, the dude with the looks and the muscles and the car and the woman. There just had to be a way. He drove people from all walks of life around all day, maybe one of them, just one, would see that special light in him, that thing that set him apart. For six months he had been ferrying people around! As much as he loved his car, this was getting tedious, and the money sucked, barely enough to live on!

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Jason was contemplating his current predicament, Lucky Dube on the radio accompanying his maudlin thoughts. He had just dropped off Mr. Money with the fine honey and stable of beautiful rides.

He saw success all around him, why did it seem so hard for him to attain it? A loud crack split the air a moment before the pandemonium. People were scattering everywhere! There was always a hive of activity in and around the court, especially on maintenance days, which today was one of them.

Jason got out the car and tried to peer through the hectic movements of the panic stricken to the cause of the ruckus.

He could just make out the figure of a man sprawled dramatically over the courthouse steps.

A middle aged aunty with dishevelled brown hair, eye-glasses askew was docilely submitting to being handcuffed by a burly court security guard. A wail of sirens a couple of blocks away increased the drama of the proceedings and called everyone within hearing range to come and witness a tragedy in real life. Jason got onto the roof of his car, any excitement on any day was a welcome relief to the tedium that was setting in. Holy crap! If it wasn’t Mr. Money lying in a pool of his own blood!

From the look of the state of Mr. Money’s head, Jason did not think an ambulance would do any good in this situation. What the hell!?! Mr. Money had had all bases covered, how on earth could he end like this?

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Jason had a story to tell at the tavern that night.

He had watched the body loaded and carted away, had watched the people gathering and yakking, had gathered and yakked himself with his fellow taxi drivers. The residual energy after the incident seemed to enliven people, their eyes were open wider, they spoke faster, the atmosphere was excited, not shocked, not appalled. People seemed glad of the respite from the boredom of living. At the tavern the retelling made Jason the centre of attention for the duration of the recital.

The papers the next day reported that Mr. Money (not his real name) had been shot and killed on the courthouse steps by ex-Mrs. Money (not her real name), the reason being — money! That thing that was supposed to purchase food and education for his children was being used to support an expensive lady and an even more expensive lifestyle and no-one wanted to listen to ex-Mrs. Money. So she had taken matters into her own hands. Had finally cracked under the pressure of a bad ex-husband and a corrupt system of justice that favoured men and their weaknesses. Jason didn’t quite know what to feel. He had envied Mr. Money all the things he had at his disposal, had coveted all that he had seen when he had collected Mr. Money from his home on the very day of his death. But denying a future to his children could not bring anything good in any-ones eyes.

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Forgetting one path, one set of obligations, for the sake of another came with a price. Mr. Money had now paid that price! Jason wanted his dream to manifest, to become tangible, but not like that, not at the cost of someone else.

The day after, at the taxi rank, there was still a buzz of excitement over the previous day’s events, but life went on as usual. Up and down, stop and go, left and right Jason drove, on autopilot. He could feel the frustration growing in him, filling his chest with pressure, filling his head with negative thoughts. It had come to a point again where life seemed endlessly long and boring and bleak.

The rewards seemed meagre.

To try make extra he had taken to accepting any call, any time, from any one. Anything for an extra fare. He had come to know the streets like the back of his hand, could zip through those streets as if he had designed their layout. At just after 2am one hot, close summers morning, he got a call for a pick-up in a dodgy part of town, well known for drugs and guns and pretty much anything else illegal and tantalizing. The instant his fare got in the car, Jason knew he was making a mistake.

The young guy Jason saw in the rear-view mirror was a reflection of his own self six short months ago. High as a kite, edgy in the extreme, des52

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peration contorting his countenance into a predators mask. Jason drove, calming himself with lies, soothing his fear with falsehoods. When he felt the cold barrel of the gun come into contact with the back of his neck it felt inevitable. He was flooded with a superb calm, an inordinate focus on the young tso-tsi in the back who held his life in his shaking, drugged up hands.

“Stop! Stop the fucking car!” Tso-tsi shouted, gun shaking and trembling, eyes darting all over, a wild tone in his voice.

“Ok, just calm down. I’m stopping mfweto.” Jason’s voice was like ice, barely. It had an immediate effect on tso-tsi in the back. He had expected resistance, had prepared for a fight, had called adrenaline to his system. He was obviously a novice criminal, a desperado trying to fulfil whatever need. Jason pulled quietly over to the curb.

“Give me your money — all of it!” Tso-tsi screamed, unable to allow his mind to believe that this was going to happen without a violent end.

Jason reached slowly into his pocket, took out all of R230 and handed it back to the youngster.

“I said all of it!” Tso-tsi howled, looking down in disbelief.

“That’s it.” Jason said shrugging his shoulders “A whole day’s work.”

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“Fuck! You guys work for nothing!” Tso-tsi shook his head, not quite comprehending “Serious?”

“Serious.” Jason sighed. The level of aggression had dropped considerably. They could have been brothers after all.

“Just get out of the car!” Tso-tsi had a note of exasperation in his voice.

Jason understood totally! As he watched his baby drive away, he said a silent prayer that that was no longer a life he chose to live, was no longer an attitude he had to live with. The derision in tso-tsi’s voice for his paltry taking for the day had stung for an instant, sent a bitter little arrow through that prideful area in his heart. But the sting was only for an instant. In the hour and a half that it took him to walk home, he thought a lot on that subject of temptation. No matter how a crafty lawyer could navigate the oceans of the law, nothing could ever take away the actions required to perpetrate a crime. The time that Jason had spent in the car with the tso-tsi with the gun pointed at his brain was unique to the two of them. Jason this time as victim, at the wrong end of the gun, muscle-bound, strong and powerless. Youth, potential, dreams all could have been wiped out in one second because of one misread move, a bump in the road, a random noise.

Jason’s blood ran icy through his veins the more he thought of it. He found himself — young, strong, 54

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capable man – unable to face getting up the next morning. He had reported the car stolen to his supervisor the night before, had to give a formal statement at the police station this morning, but found himself experiencing wave after wave of fear. His mortality had suddenly become a very real thing, the thread of life all of a sudden so tenuous and becoming more so every second he spent in his head. The trip to the police station, the cacophony of sound, smell of despair, air of hopelessness all resonated with his internal fear.

He couldn’t show it, couldn’t express it, had to hold his pose of strong young man, show no emotion, just one of those things, no big deal!

But he didn’t go back to work, couldn’t go back.

Even when his boss called round and tried to entice him with a brand new baby, smelling clean and fresh. He couldn’t think of going back down that road, looking those drugs in the eye. A murder and almost another one in a 24 hour period! This was a bit too much for Jason’s sensibilities. Different perpetrators, different victims, same motivation. Different needs, different demographics, same driving force. It seemed petty and small to him, definitely not worth putting his life on the line for, no matter how much he had loved his baby, no matter how much he would inevitably love the new one. He had to walk away again.

Jason holed up again. Not with any sense of guilt, 55

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not to punish himself, to protect himself. To nurture the burgeoning spark of self preservation that had ignited the instant he had felt that cold steel against his warm skin. He had thought he had been willing to do anything to fulfil the dream in his head, had imagined the pay-off worth any intervening price he had to pay. But it wasn’t turning out to be that simple. He had discovered there were things he was not prepared to do. This confused him somewhat, seemed to set his dream at an impossible distance. Maybe he should just be content to earn a relatively safe living?

A large contingent of his prostitute neighbours’ clientele were waiters. That seemed a safer way to make money, and they always had cash, always had money to throw around. Just to get into a restaurant, befriend a friend and get in a door. He had never felt good enough or polished enough or confident enough to work in a restaurant, felt like a rural twit next to his worldly wise town brothers. But in the interests of self preservation he would have to leave his comfort zone. It couldn’t be harder than looking down the barrel of a gun.

Waitering jobs were always opening up and his chosen guide into this world, Clinton, was ready, willing and able to get him placed and trained at the up-market restaurant where he was employed. Jam Sessions. Just the name of the place gave him goose flesh. It felt like the right direction, like fate was intervening on his behalf again.

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This was a whole other world! And another pseudo-family with its own set of rules and regulations.

The rich and the poor were constantly exposed to each other in a restaurant, although not constantly aware of it. Jason’s training lasted a week.

In that week he tried to cram recipes, wines, table settings, etiquette into a brain that swirled and heaved and tried to grasp all the information Clinton threw at it. The pace of the restaurant was schizophrenic going from quiet, almost comatose lulls to frenetic periods of controlled madness.

People had to be seated, orders taken, kept happy and watered, food had to go out on time and to the right tables to the right people, drinks the same thing. The kitchen was a country on its own, the front of shop a bordering country. Both countries were at war with each other. The owners were at war with the managers, the managers were at war with the waiters, the waiters were at war with each other. The diners dined in complete oblivion of the intricate, ferocious battles taking place around them. Jason loved it!

Jason started looking forward to every day. He enjoyed working with people his own age, he soaked up the idle chatter and battering like the desert 57

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receives the rain. His workplace was his entertainment, his dysfunctional family, his invitation into a world heretofore beyond his comprehension and out of his reach. His first day as a fully fledged waiter he felt blessed, he had washed and pressed his uniform the night before and then lain and stared at it in the half light for hours before finally drifting off to sleep. On that first day he had walked in proud, chest swelled to bursting.

Just in his lunch time shift, he made more money than he had in a week driving taxi. Granted, he’d gotten lucky and scored a table of four women who had liked the look of him, but the chips had fallen the right way. This could work, this could really work!

Every night the place buzzed, had a pulse all of its own. When the bands were rocking, the booze flowing, the food steaming, money just seemed to flow. Jason saw people spend more on one meal out than he spent on food in a month. It was a totally different reality. Between the waiters there was fierce competition for choice tables.

As a newcomer he had to pick up the smaller, less choice patrons. Still, he made his money, still he was satisfied. The competition he found stimulating, the hectic pace exhilarating, the people he was meeting beyond interesting!

His mind was being opened to all kinds of worlds.

The names and cultivars of wines was a new and 58

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exotic language, food wasn’t just food it was art on a plate. He heard languages being spoken from all around the world; saw so many varieties of beautiful women that Jessica paled in comparison. He smelled so much perfume, so many aromatic cigars all mingled with spicy aromas from their traditional South African kitchen that sometimes he thought that aroma would be caught in his nostrils forever. And he got his initiation into the world of Jazz.

Music had spoken to him before. Hip hop moved his loins, Kwaito stirred his heart, rap stirred his mind but Jazz, Jazz reached in and stirred his very soul. Those riffs played his emotions up and down, high and low, happy to sad, wherever the collective musicians wished to lead their captive audience. The popular American pioneers were emulated, but their African cousins kicked some serious musical butt! Jonas, Gwangwa, Moses Molelekwa, Sipho Gumeda, Zim Nqwana, Ringo a few of the masters who had their way with his soul! The fact that he was in an environment that he loved and still made money enthralled him.

Until now, earning a living and living were two separate things. Making money was the hard road to be travelled to reach the destination of his dream at the end of it. It dawned on him that it wasn’t necessarily that way. He started paying attention to his tables in a new way, to their con59

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versations, trying to figure this new anomaly out.

At some point at every table, the subject of work came up. More often than not large tables were there solely because of work, celebrating deals, brainstorming, schmoozing customers, office affairs, interview processes he had never even contemplated existed. Their work made it possible to afford this place, their work bought them a ticket to be entertained this way, their work made them able to smile self satisfied smiles, to relax in a way Jason had never relaxed, to walk on this earth with a solid, sure tread.

In this world the credit card ruled. It was so discreet, the little silver tray with the mobile credit card machine, the magic little plastic rectangle that could satisfy every desire. The waiters had it down to a fine art, all the regular customers were categorized by the colour of their plastic rectangle and treated accordingly. Jason learned the art of covert observation and shameless manipulation.

The cars that clients arrived in were the first indication of how much a good waiter could squeeze out of a table. The more luxurious the car, the better dressed the patron, the harder the waiter tried to impress, the more dedicated he became to good service. Pushing a bill to the upper limits was the main focus of every waiter on every day.

Jason learned the art of more subtly manipulating 60

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people into taking what they didn’t want or need, learned the skill of appealing to a persons greed in all its varieties. Men were easy, especially when trying to impress a table, more especially when trying to impress a lady. A man after three drinks became putty in Jason’s capable hands. Jason smiled, cajoled, charmed, joked his way around his tables. The atmosphere helped, Jazz loosened people up, people who liked Jazz were already his kind of people, already in the mind-set to let go. And Jason learned how to position himself accordingly when they did.

It wasn’t uncommon for the waiters to leave on a Friday night with the equivalent of a whole weeks earnings lining their pockets. No wonder they could afford the companionship of Jason’s neighbours.

Waiters, as a group, spent their money just as easily as they made it. After the shop was cleared and cleaned and set up for the next day, after their patrons night was over, Jason and his fellow workers, soldiers on opposite sides of the border during work hours, would begin their night. In a different style, in less sumptuous surroundings, but try they would to emulate in a fashion, what they had seen others do all night.

Therein lay a huge conundrum for Jason. The first couple of weeks that he woke up on his day off with just enough money for taxi to get to work, he nearly shat himself. The night before he had 61

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had enough money to get him through the whole week food, taxi and rent! It had seemed to go nowhere! A lady, drinks, take-away’s and the money was gone! But his shift rolled around again, money rolled in again and he was back on track. Till the next Friday night. And the next. And the next.

And the next.

His cycle from rich to poor and back again was fast. As hectic as the pace in the restaurant. He felt out of control, swept away, again filling a need.

A need he had not even known that he had. Spoiling himself. That’s what he was doing. But every day, all day he watched people doing it, loving it, coming back for more. Self gratification. And they afforded it again and again. Maybe this was the way to do it. To stop being so scared of losing what he had. He was by nature reticent to spend too much, by his mothers lessons he was positively mean. He thought to himself that he had a poor mans mentality towards money, treated himself cheaply, worried about every cent. Maybe he should just relax and go with the flow. Guys that had been working much longer than him at the restaurant swore by their need to live large at least once a week. If rent was a bit short, what the hell, cash would roll in again the next day.

Jason’s nineteenth birthday was a blow-out. Gone were the weary eyes he had seen in the rear-view mirror of his taxi. Christmas time was lucrative, 62

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summer was in full swing, Jason was feeling super fine. He even had a thing going with the bar waitress, a feisty little Portuguese chick who was teaching him all sorts of things that he hadn’t allowed the prostitutes to get around to. Tasha was her name, Jessica she was not, but she had an edge to her, the spirit of a wild-cat embodied in a tiny little frame. They celebrated his birthday in style, in a hopelessly loud, anything goes club in the heart of Jozi.

For just one night Jason thought he would relax his no drug rule. Thinking back, it was probably the company and the activities the last time that messed him up so badly. Not the drugs. This scene was different he rationalized, these friends were different. He was different, more sophisticated.

Anyway, half the people he served day in and day out were high on one thing or another and managed to get away with it. Not just get away with it – to totally succeed AND get away with it. He had just done the wrong drugs with the wrong people!

The afternoon after his birthday, he felt it! He woke up with just over an hour to spare before his next shift. Tasha was still out of it, deliciously naked and spread-eagled over his single bed. Last night had been a heady, mind-blowing, rush. The cocaine high quality, the booze un-watered, e’s to put them in a loving frame of mind, the music pulsed clear and loud, wave after wave through 63

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him. After they had finally come home he had used and abused Tasha in every way he could think of and she had still begged for more. Oh Happy Birthday!! He had shouted to himself. But today he felt like a bus had hit him. An hour to come right, an hour to find energy from somewhere, an hour before show-time. Amphetamines, that’s what he needed, a pick-me-up. Just for tonight.

And so, Jason got on another roller-coaster. A fast, long track full of twists and turns and bellyflipping loops. The pace at which he found himself living his life was dizzying. Sometimes he felt that he had just got to sleep, when it was time to wake up and put on his game face. Time alone, time for himself was non-existent, time to think was even more scarce. He convincingly convinced himself that taking drugs was essential to his performance. He took to ingesting anything that promised an energy boost. Amphetamines, coffee, cola’s, cocaine, energy bars, energy drinks, energy, energy, energy!!!!!

An up-beat personality, an energetic step, a quick wit, a fast turn-around on tables all pulled big tips, made happy managers. He had to keep up the pace. He had to stay in this place. The atmosphere, the money, the music, the aroma had become essential to him. He truly felt he was making it, anytime he wanted to he could start putting 64

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the money he earned away instead of blowing it.

Just a couple more months of living it up. Just a while longer making up for all the good times he had never had.

His mothers kitchen, his dusty little home town seemed a universe away. The natural reticence of his mother to waste anything, the quiet subdued life of restriction was so mind-numbingly mundane in comparison to the smorgas board of sensual pleasure he was witness to on a daily basis.

This place made him free. Free from the voice of his mother in his head, free from Lucky’s negative attitude, free from the curse of having to slog away at a meagre living. He was finding his way onto the bottom rung of the ladder. He could see and touch and smell success every day and it was a heady perfume, an intoxicating ambrosia. So play the game he would! Whatever it took! All he had to do was watch and learn, do what everyone else did, behave like everyone else.

Tasha was his best teacher, an encyclopaedia of alcohol. She taught him all the best wines, most expensive single malts, how to pour the perfect beer. He had thought of alcohol as a method to get drunk, she taught him there was a difference.

A difference as distinct as night is from day. In her chip-chop, lightning fast manner she punched information into his racing brain. Recipes for exotic sounding cocktails, whiskey’s and brandies and 65

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liqueur’s and aperitif’s. At quiet times in the restaurant she took him behind the bar and dazzled him with her ability to mix beautiful, complicated alcoholic art. Jason latched on and soaked up what she taught him. Every bit of knowledge he could add to his repertoire would come in handy one day. That he knew intrinsically. That his life was guided he knew absolutely.

Even though he thought himself free from his mother’s discipline, the thought recurred that his thirst to learn new things had ultimately originated from her. Her absolute fixation that he was to become educated, become something more than his father. His father had been an itinerant worker whose spirit had been broken long before the ancestors called him to their side. All four of his siblings had been treated to her stubborn mindset with regard to education, had fallen victim to her razor-sharp tongue when producing a failure.

But teach her lesson she did. Make her point? Absolutely! He started to see the sense of that lesson, started to acknowledge its application in the world he currently found himself in.

But that didn’t mean she was right about everything damn-it! His mind rebelled. There were things that he was required to do that she, in her isolated little world, had no concept of. Such as taking whatever chemicals necessary to stay on top of his game. Such as going out with his col66

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leagues. It was important! It was team building!

It was essential! To work together they had to play together! The only way to make big tips was to keep customers happy and on big tables team work was an absolute necessity!

Sometimes Jason wondered if their customers had any idea of the amount of smooth manoeuvring that had to go on to keep them so blissfully content. Between loading a table and clearing it seamlessly, effortlessly replacing empty drinks, clearing glasses, cutlery, ashtrays, crockery without allowing a patron to feel imposed upon. That was an art form. An art form he was beginning to excel at. He had been at this gig going on four months and boredom was yet to set in, every day was as interesting as the day before.

Talk about interesting days! On a beautiful summer’s night in a fresh new year, entertainment, Oh so safe, in Bra Hugh Masekela’s talented hands, a vision appeared. Every male waiter was tripping over their feet to somehow be blessed enough to wait on the superbly gorgeous Jade. Celebrities were often ensconced in the many hidey holes of this trendy eatery, but Jade was a supermodel! A racehorse, a pedigree, an icon, a wet dream for any testosterone laden young man. Jason turned at precisely the right instant and was honoured to receive a smile that fairly lit the amber hue of the interior.

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“Party of four, Hoity Toity Modelling.” He heard a gruff voice pronounce.

“Follow me please Sir.” Janet at front desk swiftly fell into her role as hostess. She pressed four menus at Jason as they passed and whispered “Your table.”

Jason had to take a moment to tame the wild horses in his chest and head, to gain a modicum of self control. He could feel Tasha giving him a scathing look from across the room. He ignored her totally! No chance was he going to pass up the opportunity of being close to the legend that was Jade.

With the party of four seated, Jason felt all nervous tension dissipate. He was in control; this was his game, his playing field, his own personal stage where he could shine. He felt his features arrange themselves into his game face, turned the full force of his sparkling eyes and dimpled grin towards the head of this little soiree, a peroxided, pierced little man, overdressed to kill. He was overtly homosexual and Jason sighed a deep mental sigh. The price of serving Jade was going to be that he would have to put up with this little prick’s advances all night. From the first eye-contact he could sense the totally brazen innuendo.

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“Hi, I’m Jason. I’ll be your waiter for the evening.

Whatever you need.” He pronounced, a new energy to his customary introduction.

“Oooh. Hi Jason – Mr. G. – whatever we need hey!” Mr. G. batted his eyes and offered a limp, lily white hand. It felt like a dead fish in Jason’s firm grip.

Mr. G’s feigned blush and girlish giggle at his brash flirtation raised no interest from the other three at the table. Jason mentally thanked the gods, when these guy’s got attention they were impossible!

Jade was further accompanied by what could only be two other models. A male, almost femininely beautiful with dark hair and blue- green eyes set off by vampirically pale skin and an androgynous female with sharp, angular planes to her features, softened by the hugest, crystal clear, blue eyes Jason had ever seen. Yet even with all the good looks (and the totally bizarre) surrounding her, Jade commanded all his (and most everyone else within range of visibility) attention.

Jade was a true African princess, an ebony goddess. In her eyes, her bearing, her natural physical supremacy over surrounding mortals, Jason saw and for the first time embraced his African heritage. His blonde haired, blue eyed white dream was obliterated the instant he looked into the bot69

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tomless depths of Jades blacker than black eyes.

She exuded the mystery of Africa, his Africa. The wide open plains, equatorial jungles, wild coastlines. In a split second he had crowned her queen of every region, had enthroned her and knelt at her feet. Statuesque, chiselled, lithe, powerful, flawless, perfect, perfect, perfect! In that split second she had deposed his dream and taken up residence in the kingdom of his mind as queen.

Beyond awesome!

In his altered state, in his dopamine induced high, Jason took the order for their table from Mr. G. who was flirting even more outrageously, desperately after he sensed Jason’s total lack of interest. Still he lingered, not wanting to leave, knowing that the only reason he had even come close to this magnificent creature was because he was supposed to wait on her, hand and foot. The trip to the bar was one he made with clouds underfoot. Dom Perignon! They were drinking champagne! Always a cause for celebration amongst that opportunistic pack of wolves commonly referred to as waiters. The champagne set always tipped well. But Jason didn’t care for once about the tip, he would have paid THEM just to drown in those fathomless eyes for one more second.

Friday night, the place was jamming, Jonas Gwangwa was up on the mike for his set, Jade’s table was soaking up the bubbly. The three beau70

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tiful people were making frequent trips to the bathroom. Those brighter than bright eyes and the hyper vibe in the group was less due to oral intoxication as nasal, Jason was all to familiar with the signs. Obviously Mr. G. was the allocated babysitter to three very expensive, highly strung charges. The platter of savoury delicacies ordered for the table, was avoided like the plague except

by Mr. G. who was visibly losing ground in the battle to keep his charges lucid enough to walk out under their own steam. After 2 hours, five more bottles, regular trips to the ‘powder’ room, Jason was feeling slightly sorry for the over-thetop lackey who was, by now, looking piqued. The situation seemed to be getting away from Mr. G..

Jades perfection remained un-marred, her appreciation of the band was, of course, overly enthusiastic, her cat-walk stalk to the bathroom wobbly, nothing that would dampen Jason’s infatuation though. In fact he had cause to come into contact with her, touch the seemingly carved and burnished flesh as she stumbled and he caught her.

Her eyes touched his directly once again. Jason knew in that instant that he would always catch her when she fell.

By closing time Tasha had utilized her full armoury of optical daggers, knives and hollow point bullets at every given opportunity. The tongue lashing Jason got went largely unnoticed though. A 71

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couple of drinks later at their usual after-hours club and she was over it. As quick as Tasha was to get angry, she was just as quick to move right along. Besides, between all the good natured elbowing, winks and lurid jokes was the unstated certainty that a lowly waiter could never capture the legendary Jades fickle attentions. Jason was certain that, an hour into the evening, Jade could not have differentiated one human being from another. He had to assist the un-enviable Mr. G. to get his three totally wasted super-cargo into the stretch limo with great difficulty.

Their party was most likely still continuing from the looks of the champagne on ice in their supercool ride.

As Jason and his crowd played in their way, he wondered what it must be like, just for one day, to be IN that life. To be able to have the highest quality drugs delivered to you, to have your name open any door, to be able to behave anyway you chose to and still be golden. To have ‘people’.

People to dress you and people to babysit you and people to befriend you and people to bow and scrape to you and people to cook for you and people to drive you, people, people, people to do almost anything for you. One gene this way and another that way and you future was pure golden.

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of good days.

Jason looked over his group. Not one of them bad-looking, in fact a pre-requisite of working for Jam Sessions was that you be ‘presentable’. Politically correct speak for no ugly people. An attractive group, yes, but Jade and her pals were super-humans. Genetically superior. Structurally perfect. Another round of shooters.

Jason needed this one. He was starting to feel decidedly inferior. Two rounds of shooters and their own trip to the ‘powder’ room, and Jason started to feel a bit better about his exterior. Even Tasha started to look beautiful when he brought his gaze down to her eye level. He found he had been looking over her head for the longest time. She wasn’t even getting pissed off with him anymore.

In fact, she was cosying up to Eric, an almost perfect looking Nigerian who had just joined the staff.

At some point Jason decided he was getting jealous. Maybe Tasha couldn’t dream of competing with Jade, but she was HIS roll in the hay. He would not give in that easily. Jason puffed himself up and exhibited all the time-honoured physical signs of the territorial male humanoid. Eric got the message immediately, Tasha drew it out for a little longer, punishment for what she had had to endure the whole night while he drooled 73

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over Jade. Eventually she allowed Eric to back off, hands held up in silent acquiescence. It wasn’t a big victory, but Jason felt like the rooster in the hen-house. He tucked Tasha under his arm and escorted her triumphantly home where he promptly screwed her in 100 different ways whilst imagining Jades ever so long limbs writhing and wrapping and jerking beneath him, over him, around him. It was hollow. A hollow victory.

He hadn’t given a second thought to Tasha all that night at work, apart from wanting to dodge her optical admonishments. But then he’d put on a display of jealousy over her later? Purely possessive, that’s what it was! Whenever she left to go home after visiting, he never gave her a second thought. He had hoped that she would be as casual about their relationship as he was, but he knew she thought more of him than just a sport. Tasha had taken to giving him corny little gifts regularly and one very nice one. His first cellphone! She’d spent an entire week-end’s tips on that little electronic masterpiece. He loved his ‘phone! It made him feel important, ‘connected’ as the adverts said.

The ‘phone was also a big deal to Tasha. When she wasn’t with him it was her constant link to his physical presence. Jason hadn’t grown up with this kind of communication, villages relied on complex networks of gossip to keep informed, but he was 74

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learning fast. Her little gift was one that kept on giving. Nude and lewd photo’s of herself were her particular favourite. Jason’s knowledge of females was romantic at best, unreal scenarios of deep love and passion that had nothing to do with what he had witnessed personally, in real life. Flashes of scenes he had seen, his favourite movie clips, a woman conjured into life in his mind from all the scraps of information his brain had received in what amounted to years of images passing through the miasma of his mind. But try as he might, he just couldn’t fix the image of Tasha into the romantic lead in the movie in his head.

Some of the things Tasha got up to, some of the things she allowed Jason to get up to! If his mother could conceive of behaviour such as Tasha’s, it would shock her! It shocked him! Yet still he did not feel that connection to her. She was cute and fiery and feisty and pale white, she taught him and learned from him, she ordered him around and allowed him to lead, she was putty in his hands. He still could not say he loved her. She gave herself physically, mentally, emotionally to him against her family’s wishes. Still no go.

Jason’s fantasy girl was still to clear in his mind.

Tasha was only a tiny part of the way there – she was a white chick. But she wasn’t that California blonde white chick. If the dream was going to come true all the elements had to be in place.

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Tasha was interesting, a learning experience. Sort of like a practice chick. Someone to hone his skills on while he was waiting for his dream to materialize. So far only Jade had interfered with the reception of his dream in his brain, only she had temporarily distorted his mental reception. But the odds of her deigning to entertain the notion of him was zero to nothing.

Jason was a little shocked upon discovering that all the male waiters had a very similar dream.

He had thought he was unique in his quest, only to find he was part of a group, a group that was getting increasingly larger. A group of displaced young men come to the city and the lights to find that pot of gold that was sure to be there. As a group they had figured that the Jades were out of reach. Those kind of chicks cost serious money, needed serious attention, very high maintenance.

But there were other types of hot chicks, ones that WOULD look at him, them.

All the T.V. shows had normal guys, even ugly guys, with super-hot ladies. Normal girls, like the ones they worked with, danced with, drank with were well and good for sex in the meantime, but every guy had to have that babe of his dreams to finally give his heart to. Anything less was a waste. His fathers generation had had to settle for ordinary females, work their fingers to the bone till the day they died, but this was a new world full 76

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of possibilities, options that his father had never even considered. He, they, could wait. Nothing wrong with having some fun in the meantime though. Tasha would just have to get it that she was temporary.

Jam Sessions was the current hot-spot for the celebrity ‘in’ crowd, which meant that Jade et entourage were strategically placed and entertained most Friday nights. After Jason’s initial helpful service, Mr. G. made a point of requesting his services whenever they patronized the establishment.

It suited Jason immensely, he was guaranteed a 20% tip and this party never watched the bill. All tabs were picked up by the agency. Hell, everything flowed at their table! He had never actually seen Jade eat a thing but boy! Did she consume!

Her trips to the bathroom were frequent, top-ups on her glass were double that of anyone else at the table. It amazed him, her ability to maintain her outward appearance on her current diet of cocaine and champagne. He had a hard time hiding the effects of his own indulgence. Tasha looked like shit on the morning after a night of play.

But Jade was always gorgeous. Out of it, wasted, all over the show, over the top, flippant, rude, spoiled but totally breath-taking all the time. He had witnessed more than a few self-indulgent tirades in subsequent weeks and in every altercation Jade ruled supreme. She had a lightning 77

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quick temper, a razor sharp tongue, coupled with the haughty beauty of an African princess. The combination was deadly. No lowly mortal stood a chance. In his eyes her temper, her superior attitude, increased her beauty. Jade didn’t take shit from anyone! Jade knew and got what she wanted! Jason had become content to just looking forward to waiting on her, watching her, feeding her desires.

The shit that he had to put up with from Tasha was worth it. She still got most of his attention anyway, he didn’t know what she was complaining about. If he appreciated a beautiful woman then so what? All the other guys got to make dirty jokes. Just because Tasha thought they were exclusive didn’t mean she owned his heart or mind.

Besides, she had to see that when Jade walked in the restaurant, every other female paled in comparison. That was just a fact! He had over-heard Eric, on more than one occasion, telling Tasha that she was beautiful in her own right, more beautiful in his eyes. Bullshit! Jason thought. The guy was still trying to move in on his turf!

Eric and Tasha had become very close in the three months since Eric had started working at the restaurant. Increasingly, their days off, once dedicated to drugs, sex and alcohol, were now dedicated to excursions. Excursions that Eric was always included in. It seemed to Jason that the 78

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handsome Nigerian was always around them, her.

Eric seemed to have such a different outlook on life, a calmness to his spirit that irritated Jason.

Where he had managed to irritate and annoy Tasha’s parents on the two occasions they had met, Eric got himself invited over regularly, black skin and all. Where he seemed to constantly get on the fiery side of Tasha, Eric came in and invoked calmness in her. It was starting to piss Jason off.

He couldn’t understand why Tasha wouldn’t just stay in the position he had put her in, in his life.

Everything had been so un-complicated! He had been so satisfied! The job, the money, sex on the side with benefits, Jade to look at and dream about. His life had seemed just right!

Fate, that fickle demon, stirred the coffee of his life again one Friday night. Jade was already high and in a fighting mood when her party blew in. Jason and Mr. G. had to use all their powers of persuasion to get her to sit down, never mind calm down. Everything seemed to be wrong, the air around her was charged with crackling electricity.

Her eyes blazed, the corners of her mouth turned down, her nostrils flared.

“Lost a big contract today!” Mr. G. whispered behind his hand, looking positively terrified. “The coke’s affecting her work.”

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and then stalked off to the bathroom.

She left a palpable silence in her wake, even the music seemed more subdued as everyone stared after her retreating back. Jason cleared up the champagne off the table that she had spilled and headed to the bar for a fresh glass.

It sounded like a cat was being killed in the passageway leading to the bathroom. Both Jason and Eric ran towards the ruckus. The sight that met them was both awful and hilarious at the same time. Jade had Tasha by the throat, up against the wall. Tasha’s were clear off the ground and she was pin-wheeling all four short little limbs.

Her face above the ebony claw was red, becoming purple.

“You fucking little bitch! Get out of my way!” Jade was caterwauling.

Tasha just tried to gasp for air.

Jason stood transfixed.

Eric moved like lightning, grabbed Tasha by the waist and disengaged Jades talons from her neck in one swift, imperceptible motion.

Jason still stood with his mouth agape.

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“Get Jade to her table!” Eric shouted.

Jason, finally galvanizing his limbs into action, grabbed Jade by the shoulders and propelled her back to her table, where he deposited her with a horrified Mr. G. Tonight both he and Mr. G. were going to earn their money. Jade was out of control, out of line, out of her mind! All Jason could think about was how he was going to calm her down, how he was going to restore her dignity to her. All Jade wanted was more champagne and for Jason to get the fuck out of her face!

When he got to the bar, he thought to check on Tasha and see if she was alright. It had been a good 20 minutes since the incident, she should be alright by now!? But Tasha was nowhere in sight.

Neither was Eric come to think of it.

“Where’s Tasha?” He asked Clinton behind the bar.

“I’m filling in for her. Eric took her home.” Clinton answered in a rush. Friday at the bar was hectic.

“What’s your order!” Clinton rushed him impatiently.

“Dom Perignon.” Jason answered distractedly.

For an instant it felt like there was a vacuum in his head, a pressure that popped his ear-drums.

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A sense that something very important had happened and he had somehow missed it. Even so, he sensed the loss, suddenly felt very idiotic, very lonely making his trip back to Jades table with the sweating ice-bucket and over-priced beverage.

The rest of the night was hectic and disjointed and one mess-up after another. It seemed that everything that could go wrong, did go wrong. From the wrong food to cold food to uppity patrons and un-generous tips. Jade had been impossible all night and Jason was happy to help her drunken form into the stretch limo and see her glide away down the street.

At the end of the night, after duties and cashup, Jason just wanted to go home and snuggle up to Tasha. She was sure to be there, surely that’s where Eric had taken her to? She was pretty much permanently in-residence at the weekends. When he opened the door to his little room that he called home, he could feel the emptiness.

He still called for her. He checked his phone. No messages, no missed calls. Eric hadn’t been there at cash-up, Eric hadn’t come back at all, Jason realized. He started phoning frantically.

“The number you have dialled is not available at present, please try again later.” The cold-hearted bitch on the airwaves pronounced, over and over again. He called Eric’s number. Same rude cow.

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Eventually Jason lay looking into the darkness, marking time till the morning, wishing it was already time for his next shift, imagining a million different scenarios, knowing the one true answer.

That moment, that vacuum ha had felt, that shift in energy that had told him with absolute certainty that something had left his life. He was pissed off with himself! Eric had made him look like an idiot tonight. Eric had swooped down like a big, muscle-bound hero and had stolen his girl. Eric wasn’t a friend! Eric was an idiot! Eric was a thief!

Eric was! Eric was! Eric was! Eric was not the one alone tonight.

The next day Tasha and Eric were both positively glowing! They told him together, in gentle words, Eric with his hand extended to shake at the end, told him that they were ‘in love’. That they had been ‘in love’ for some time, had ‘feelings’ for each other for a while.

Told him that Jason didn’t really love Tasha anyway, that Jason should have protected Tasha last night but hadn’t. That they were sorry. That they were still friends, right? Jason wanted to punch Eric in his perfectly structured face! Jason wanted to grab Tasha by her scrawny neck like Jade had done! Jason shook hands with Eric, Jason gave Tasha a hug, Jason wished them good luck. Jason went to the men’s room and punched the wall, hurt his hand and had to tenderly work with the 83

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For further punishment, he had to watch Tasha and Eric all night being all cute and shy with each other. It made his blood boil! Eric’s attentiveness and gentleness towards her made him sick!

It seemed like Eric was checking on the invisible neck injury every five minutes! Secret little touches and giggles all bloody night long! It was ridiculous! He couldn’t bear the thought of having to sit and watch them after work, so they even messed up his jol time! He had to indulge in his indulgences alone in his room. He didn’t even indulge all that much. It wasn’t really fun without Tasha. It struck him that he actually missed her now that she wasn’t available.

Fuck them! He thought. He still had his dream girl, still had the secondary fantasy of Jade to cling onto! Maybe now that Tasha was out of the way, maybe his dream had more chance to come true.

Maybe Tasha was blocking the way. Life would be better without her. At least he didn’t have to hang out with Eric anymore. He didn’t have to put up with that calm, boring spirit! He didn’t have to be tied to Tasha’s possessive spirit either! He didn’t have to listen to her tell him to save money, do a course, get straight! In fact she had started to sound very much like his mother! His dream woman would never tell him what to do, would never treat him like a child would never argue with him 84

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like Tasha had done!

He was a man! He looked after himself! He had made his way to the big city on a wish and a prayer! It had taken seven taxis, all in terrible states of disrepair, a full day and half a night to deposit him in this city of gold, of dreams! He had traversed many dangers on the streets to be able to be in this position! He did not need Tasha! Tasha with her ‘wise’ words and boring advice! He was a man! He didn’t need Eric sitting beside him, making him look bad! Making him feel bad! They were welcome to each other! They could cling to each other and be boring for the rest of their lives for all he cared! Eric wasn’t a man anyway if he settled for Tasha, she was so ordinary! Jason knew many other men that would agree! He knew most guys didn’t think Tasha was a girl that dreams are made of! He had heard what they said about her and he agreed! Normal and ordinary and boring.

That wasn’t HIS destiny!

Now that Jason was truly free with, a constant source of ready cash, the world was his oyster, or so he thought. What used to be a once or twice a week night out was becoming a regular, nightly, top-off to his work day. Since Tasha and Eric had become a couple (sick!), they had been pretty scarce. Just the boys then, free to tear their little piece of the town apart! Free to live the dream they saw on the screen! Without Tasha holding 85

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him down, Jason got to meet, speak to, screw a whole variety of females. All with their different smells and words and essence. He still did not form a connection to any one. Variety, the spice of life, was the general consensus. Use and be used. Drink, drugs and a rocking good time!

When he cared to notice, he saw that Tasha and Eric were quietly getting closer and closer. He had predicted that Eric would get just as bored with Tasha’s nagging as he had, it just seemed to be taking a while. Three months since the night of Jade’s tantrum and the two of them were inviting everyone to a house-warming! They were actually going to live together! Tasha had tried daily to push him into getting a place with her and he had shuddered at the thought. Here was Eric, making a bloody nest with her after three months! He had to go! Just to see what delusion they were living in! They probably had some rundown little hovel that they wanted to call home! Not that he was one to talk! He was still living above Lucky’s , with prostitutes as his neighbours. But he was a man working on his dream!

He dressed with extra care that night. He had to look good, make Tasha see what she was missing! He had arranged for a gorgeous college girl to be his date for the night. Granted, she was a coke-head party girl, but if they didn’t stay too late, she would hold up. The directions took them 86

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to a renovated inner-city office building which had been converted into living areas. Jason was surprised. It was actually piss-cool! The apartment was one huge living area made into recognizable spaces by furniture and screens. They seemed to be so jacked, Eric and Tasha! How the hell had they accomplished this!

Jason went back in his mind to all those annoying lessons about saving. Upon reflection, he realized that Tasha had always been conservative with her money in their time together. Apart from the gifts to him, she seemed to waste very little money.

He had thought of her as miserly. Come to think of it, Eric was just the same! Squirreling away money like nuts in a log! When they had spent time together as a threesome, the two of them had always wanted to take in free or cheap entertainment. Jason had thought them small-minded like he had once been, small-thinking. Unwilling to experience the full joy of life. The full impact of their mutual state of mind hit him. That’s how they had achieved this super-cool residence so quickly! They must have pooled their resources, the result of years of saving, and made all this happen!

Dressed to the nines, cool chick on his arm and Jason stood in the middle of the awesome space and felt like an idiot! Tasha and Eric fit into their home like a hand in a glove. Tasha looked beau87

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tiful. Eric looked proud. They parted and entertained and came back together in an exotic, subconscious dance, moved in sync with each other to a beat only they could hear. Jason felt like a fool!

He had been gawking, jealously coveting what he had had and lost, so intensely that he misplaced his girl. He had to search for her, finally found her on the balcony locked in an embrace with Clinton, powder still lining her delicately upturned nose!

He slipped out the front door alone, stood one flight down in the stairwell and listened to the sounds of merriment spilling down on him. What on earth had happened! Was Eric so much better than him? How had Clinton moved in on his date so fast? What the fuck was going on!? Why was he standing alone listening to other people having fun? Why did he feel so messed up about Eric and Tasha? How was everything so right one day and such a mess the next? He couldn’t figure it out, couldn’t make sense of the strange twists and turns his life took, up one day down the next. The picture of Eric and Tasha together in their space made him flush with anger, no, jealousy! He was envious of what they had!

By the time he got home he had resolved to start saving, to finally start taking some of Tasha’s advice, even though it was way too late to be with her. There was still his dream life after all. No-one could take that away from him! Monday he would 88

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start, would open a bank account, would start paying some attention to his future. He had been waitering at Jam Sessions for nearly a year. Shoo.

A year almost! It had seemed to fly by! Jason lay in the dark, on his own, sober for what seemed like the first time in that year, and took stock of his life in the silence of his room, his tomb, his womb.

Jason thought back to the lessons he had learned, all the knowledge he had gained. He became determined to put it to some use, to try to find direction, to try take a step closer to the goal he had nurtured for so long. The common denominator to all the success he had seen was money, try to save some of that! He mentally tried to add up all that he had earned and subsequently spent since he had been at Jam Sessions. He felt an acute sense of loss when he estimated the amount he had spent so willingly, so extravagantly! Oh well!

He thought. No more! He thought. He would create a dam for his money! And there was still Jade to brighten his week.

He found himself looking forward to Friday night more than ever. Found himself watching the door, eagerly anticipating Jade’s arrival. When the limo pulled up, the gleam of the neon lights on that ocean of white set his heart thundering in his chest. He positioned himself at the door, wanting to capture every second of her. He saw Mr. 89

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G. get out the Hoity Toity limo, saw one then another exceptional looking waif exit in style, saw a gorgeous male disgorged from the depths of the steel masterpiece, saw the driver close the door with a solid thunk. No Jade! She had been coming here most week-ends for six months and now, no Jade! After seating the party, making them comfortable, fetching and pouring their drinks, Jason found an opportune moment to ask Mr. G. her whereabouts.

“Oh Jade! Didn’t you see the mag’s? Got picked up by an international agency! Flew to New York last week. Be a honey and get us a platter of nibbles won’t you.” Mr. G. gushed. Back to the flirting, back to impressing a new batch of charges.

Jason was horrified! Jade was gone?!? He stumbled his way to place their food order, looked over at the bar. Tasha’s eyes were waiting for him, her look knowing and far away. What a total fucking idiot! He felt. How could she just leave? How could she depose his dream one minute and be gone the next, without warning? He watched Eric and Tasha smile lovingly at each other while she loaded Eric’s tray with drinks. Fool! Jason thought, mentally giving himself a hefty kick in the butt! Of course Jade would leave one day! If not the country, then definitely the restaurant. As ‘in’ spots go, Jam Sessions was holding their own, but tastes change, especially Jades set.

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Jade was gone!?! He lay on his narrow bed that night and felt ever so alone! No one-night stand, drug or drink would make him feel better tonight.

He recognized this feeling from before, from when he had incarcerated himself. He lay looking into space, listening to the sounds of the people living around him and for the first time in a year realized that he was essentially alone. That people flowed into and back out of his life like a river. People and money had flowed to him and past him like water.

Resolve. That’s what he needed. To be determined! He set a goal to have a bank account and 10% of his tips saved by his birthday. Little steps, a little step towards his dream. No more going out every night spending everything he earned on a good time. No living like tomorrow would never come. He imagined his mother smiling knowingly at him, something similar to the look Tasha had given him tonight. He felt anger well up in him that she had been right. How did she know anything living there in her dusty little village? But she had, did. Somehow his mother had known this part of his journey through life would come, and she had tried to prepare him for it.

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hands would reach sky-wards, her face radiating a gentle beauty so unlike the sharp, angular beauty of Jade. But he did remember her beautiful nonetheless. It was the first time he had allowed himself to think of her as anything but his strict mom.

The concept of his mother as a woman was a new one. The thought that she might have been young at one time and harboured her own dreams was an uncomfortable idea. He was having a hard time keeping people in their place in the shifting sands of his mind.

Despite his wayward brain, his new resolve followed him to work that Monday. Everyone was still yakking on and on about Eric and Tasha’s new spot, not allowing him to forget to put money away towards his own dream, to remember to apply his mother’s philosophy, to remember his own true nature, go back to his own internal knowledge that waste was never a good thing! The news of Jades going to New York held everyone’s attention for about ten minutes and then the day went on. What was such a big thing in Jason’s life and mind was nothing to everyone around him. Eric and Tasha were looking at second hand cars at lunchtime, everyone was helping them. Jason felt out of it. Like he had somehow been left behind.

He went through the couple of months running up to his birthday subdued and slightly moody. It wasn’t easy, leaving the drugs and drink behind.

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Not that he left it totally alone. He still partied at the week-end after shift. But he had noticed that finding people to party with was getting harder and harder. Everyone seemed to be pairing up and going straight! It was like a communicable disease! He supposed AIDS had something to do with it. The messaging about condoms and getting tested and being responsible were just everywhere! No-one could ignore that silent, deadly threat. Such a two-faced world! On the one hand every music video, movie, TV programme, advert sold wholesale sex and on the other was the fact that if you listened you could die from it! What a fuck-up! Jason’s thoughts had become just as morose as his mood. Even escape into the screen was becoming unpleasant, had become un-enjoyable once he started recognizing the lies.

What did make him happy, was on the day of his birthday, to wake up and realize that he had kept to his goal! Twenty years old today! And fully ten percent of his earnings safely in a bank account.

He felt like he had achieved something significant.

The celebration that night in his honour was a subdued affair at Eric and Tasha’s apartment. No matter how angry he had been at first, he couldn’t deny that they made an excellent couple. In fact, his party was all couples, he seemed to be the only one un-attached. That would show him for investing emotions in someone totally un-attainable! He chided himself. Still, he did not feel quite 93

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so bad as the last time he was at their home. He had stuck to his goal!

The silly season of Christmas and New Year passed.

Jason managed to keep even more rigidly to his rule of saving, rather than allowing himself to let go. It was incredible, the amount he managed to save! The festive season was really good to workers in the hospitality industry! He had even discovered that all the energy boosting substances that he had thought he couldn’t do without, were disposable to his life. His New Years resolution was to continue what he had started in the preceding couple of months. To keep his head down and really try to earn a living. He pretty much had no choice, no-one seemed to want to play hard anymore anyway.

When he paid attention it seemed like everyone he knew was studying something, going somewhere, doing something, finding direction. Jason finally conceded that maybe he should too. He looked through a whole bunch of distance courses and finally settled on book-keeping. It raised a couple of laughs that choice, but to his mind, he wanted to learn how to look after the money he earned. What better way than to learn how to look after other people’s money and then apply that knowledge to his own self? He stuck with his choice, paid for his course in full and felt another, very strange feeling, when all his study material 94

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arrived in a hefty package in the post some weeks later!

Was that blessed mother of his right again? He opened that package with the same excitement that he used to feel just before snorting his first line for the evening! Only this feeling was better!

Who knew? No-one up to now had been able to explain the joy of learning to him. Sure, he had sucked up what Tasha had to teach about the bar and it’s workings, had held onto every scrap of information Clinton threw his way in his training.

But he had wanted to know that stuff, needed to know that stuff. It dawned on him that book-keeping, anything he chose to study, was precisely the same. Learning was something he could want to do, not necessarily something that he had to do.

He went into work each day with a new purpose, worked his tables with a new natural energy, studied until the early hours with a passion. A passion.

That’s what he discovered in himself, deep inside himself. He walked with a purpose to his step, got his life working in a rhythm. He found himself day-dreaming less often. The rules of figures, the rows of figures, frog marched that blonde mirage out of his head whenever she intruded for too long. Patrons of the restaurant always engaged in personal conversations with their waiters. Every waiter had been asked by almost every table what they were working towards. At least Jason had a 95

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viable answer now. It gave him a great sense of pride in himself. Was addictive.

Once he had started on this road he didn’t allow anything to intrude. Nights out were few and far between, the company of a one-night-stand just too empty and frankly too dangerous. Condoms always broke, no matter what the promised quality on the outside of the box. The farther he got away from those nights, the more he realized that he had not enjoyed himself as much as he had told himself he did. Tasha and Eric and their palpable love for each other was a constant reminder to him what could be achieved with diligence, hard work and a stubborn mind. He was naturally blessed with the capacity for all three of those ingredients especially the last!

Stubbornness had played a major role in his life since he was a small boy. His mother had nicknamed him esele when he was very young and it was still her pet name for him. He would use tat stubbornness for his own good this time! Was using it for his own good. His course was six months long with two examination days, apart from the work he had to send in. He allowed himself to fail on no point, miss no task. Resolve. It wasn’t just a word, it was an action, a feeling, a mind set, a thought process and he had it. That thing called resolve.

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What he once would have considered a boring life, he now found he was enjoying. Not something that anyone would make a movie about, no explosions, adrenaline rushes or love scenes, but it was deeply satisfying to him to unlock his door and see his books strewn about. He seriously considered getting himself a pair of glasses so that he could look on the outside the way he felt on the inside. All studious and learned. He even brought study material to work in the hopes that Tasha would see that her nagging hadn’t fallen on deaf ears after all. But Tasha and Eric were so wrapped up in each other, nothing and no-one else existed.

The six months of his course flew by. Like the previous year, only this time he could remember every moment, could account for every cent. The day of his final exams he had taken the day off work, deigning to go in for the night shift in case it went horribly wrong and he had to console himself. He wanted some time to collect himself if the wheels fell off. His exam was on another winter’s day. All the very important days seemed to come for him in winter, he thought, as he stood chewing his nails, waiting to go into the examination room. He wished he had taken some chemical or another to calm his nerves, was starting to panic, when the examiner arrived and a whole crowd of equally nervous learners all spilled into the exam room. Jason eyed his question paper with narrow eyed suspicion for a good minute, gathering 97

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up courage, before he began to read through the questions with utter trepidation.

He read that question paper through twice in utter disbelief! Everything on the paper was familiar territory! He had the knowledge stored in his brain! Not one question flummoxed him. Afterwards he wouldn’t say that he had 100%, everything correct, but it was darn close! All the nervousness had drained out of him as he put pen to paper. Not an intrusive thought had filled his mind the entire time it took for him to righteously, fully empty the knowledge from his head onto the pristine answer sheet before him. This was another kind of high. A sense of power.

Three weeks later when he got his results and certificate, he paraded around the restaurant like a conquering army returning from war! Distinction it said! Distinction! For the first time since arriving in the city he felt like, should, had to phone his mother! The first call, placed to the local spaza shop. Put down and wait half an hour while the laaitie at the shop went to fetch his mother from their hut and bring her up the road. Call again.

That voice! That voice that was constantly in his head, now filling his ear. Questions like machine gun fire, a longing for his return strong enough to make its way through many kilometres of telephone cable and reach in and touch his heart.

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Where are you? Boo Hoo! You’re alive! When are you coming home? Boo Hoo! The family had contacted Khumbul E Khaya! We thought you were dead! Boo Hoo! I’ll kill you when I see you! Boo Hoo! How are you? Are you eating? Where are you living? Boo Hoo! Boo Hoo! It took a full half hour and a pocketful of five rand’s before she calmed down enough for him to say hello, never mind impart his news to her.

When he finally did, he could just imagine that ample bosom swelling with pride. She shrieked her jubilation down the line with no care for his loss of hearing. She was busy telling everyone who would listen on her end of the world, everything he chose to relate to her, while he was still on the line. It was frustrating him, trying to get through to her that he couldn’t stay on the phone forever. Eventually, after many promises, a thousand apologies, a million assurances, he got her to ring off.

He would HAVE to buy that woman a phone! He thought. The impact of his leaving home, leaving her, leaving their family had not seemed real until right now. The ramifications of his middle-ofthe-night, without-a-word departure on the ones he had left behind, had not occurred to him until now. He was a man in the world trying to find his dream, life was for living forward, leave the past behind. In the very instant that he heard his 99

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mothers great love for him in her voice, he knew there were some things in life that you could never leave behind, some things you found a way of carrying forward with you wherever you went!

He absolutely MUST get that woman a phone!

He imagined the spur-of-the-moment, joyous celebration that would take place in the village tonight! On his mother’s behalf, a lost son found, news of success not tragedy from a city, a world where tragedy was an ugly, every-minute occurrence. A city where thousands of boys, the same age that he had been when he left, disappeared never to be seen or heard from again. What had started out as a phone call to, somewhat arrogantly, impart his good news had turned into a life lesson for him again. For the first time he saw from her point of view, felt the absolute terror she must have felt, day after day, month after month, birthday after birthday, not hearing from him.

He found a reasonably quiet patch against the trunk of a rare, bare tree and slid to the ground, held his head in his hands. The implications of the last three years on his mother hit him with a physical force! His selfishness, his self-absorption, his obsession with a dream in his head had caused his mother such great pain! The wondrous thing was that he knew that she had already forgiven him, was willing to forgive him anything just so 100

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long as he remained on this earth. The disconnection he had felt since arriving in the city was replaced by a body and mind filling sense of being loved, being connected, being missed, being worried over, being thought of.

He just HAD to get that woman a phone!

He arrived back at work changed, and it was only in small part now, due to the fact that he had aced his course. He felt a tiny bit of that calmness that had irritated him so much in Eric, begin to steal over him. The knowledge that he was loved filled his being. Somehow, when he thought about the celebration taking place in his village, it did not seem quite so dusty or so little anymore. Somehow, his memory of his mother was one of her singing to the heavens while peeling vegetables, not of her admonishing him.

He absolutely would HAVE TO, MUST, HAD TO get that woman a cellphone!!!

The very next day he spent a sizeable chunk of his savings on just that. A cellphone for his mother!

The first real gift he ever bought a woman and it was for his mother! He packaged it, wrapped it, wrote a letter and posted it off and immediately couldn’t wait until it got there. He could imagine, would love to see, the look on her face as she opened the parcel. He found himself wishing 101

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he was there! Longing for home? Another strange revelation.

Three days later, the agony of his impatient patience was over.

“Jason, hello.” He answered, without checking his caller ID. “Dumela, can I speak to Nkosi?” she asked in Sotho. Jason took a while to understand, took a while to recognise her voice.

It took him a while to get her to believe that it was him on the phone, took an even longer while for him to try and explain the circumstances surrounding him taking a new name.

Eventually, he manoeuvred the conversation around to topics he felt more comfortable with.

He calmed her down with stories of the exotic people he was meeting, soothed her with tales of the successful life he was now leading. He borrowed liberally from the successes of the people he came into contact with and wove them into a tapestry of fantasy for her.

After that phone call, Jason felt at peace, then angry. Mixed emotions. He was so happy with his choice to get her that phone, so happy at her reaction, so pleased at her pleasure. Her displeas102

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ure at him taking on a new name irked him. He argued with her in his head, chastised her like she had chastised him as a child. He had called hadn’t he? He had made contact! Wasn’t that good enough? He was studying! Wasn’t that what she had always wanted? It was just a name after all. Jason wilfully decided to ignore the one sour note in their conversation and keep all the rest.

From experience he knew that brooding on the negative would get him nowhere.

The next few months of his life, he lived off the residual high of his educational achievement and the knowledge that a family, his family, existed, not just in his head, but in flesh and blood, nestled in the hills. Life had taken on a regular, safe rhythm. Work, sleep, washing at the Laundromat, weekly phone call from mom (thanks that airtime was so expensive), weekly night out (thanks that no-one wanted to party anymore), work, sleep.

Save, save, save. Safe and regular, regular and safe. Humdrum. Boring. Bored.

Jade was back? Jade was back! Jade was back?

He nearly fell over his feet when he first glimpsed her through the melee of the weekend throng.

He about broke his neck and a tray of glasses to get to her first and seat her. Up close, she was as gorgeous as ever. She was accompanied by a scrappy, pierced, tattooed, bed-headed scruff of a male. Could be artistic expression though? Ja103

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son thought to himself. Until he seated them and caught a whiff of ripe, stale body odour wafting off him! He looked for Mr. G.. Not with her. Looked for her usual entourage of strange beauties. Nothing.

Just this smelly ruffian.

They were both obviously, totally out of it. Not even Jade’s usual tempestuous out of it, but an end-of-a-three-day-binge out of it. Jason doubted whether Jade really knew where she was. His overexcitement at seeing her, turned to concern when he caught her slumped over in the booth a while later. She had slipped him her credit card when he seated them, another anomaly. Jade never paid her own bill! The holey, un-washed scrap with her was taking full advantage of her stoned generosity, ordering JW Blue, oysters, you name it on his free ticket. Jason felt decidedly uncomfortable, asked Janet, his manager, for advice.

“Her credit card, her rules.” She flipped him off.

After Jade’s attack on Tasha, you would be hardpressed to find anyone in the restaurant with even an ounce of sympathy for the tyrannical superbitch (as they referred to her).

Halfway through the evening, it seemed his dilemma was solved. When he checked on Jade’s table, he saw that they had absconded. At least he had the credit card, they couldn’t skip on the bill and 104

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leave him with the headache of having to pay it.

Shit! That Jade had sunk so low! He had thought of her every now and again in her big New York career. A super-life for a super-model! He felt sad at seeing her dethroned and just a little bit glad also! The night ended as nights always do come to an end. He was the last to cash up, allowing all the couples to go off and start their coupling.

He had nothing special to run home to after all.

They were switching off the lights, almost out the door, when they heard a faint groaning, moaning coming from the direction of the bathrooms.

It was coming from the ladies room, that eerie sound. Jason felt fear in his belly, a fore-warning that what lay behind that door wasn’t going to be pleasant. He took a deep breath and pushed the door inward, entered, searched, found. Jade, his super-Jade, propped between the tile wall and the toilet in the last stall, covered in a putrid vomit, looking decidedly like a junked-up street-whore!

Jason remembered back to that instant when he had corrected her stumble on the first night he had ‘met’ her.

This was no good, absolutely no good! Apart from the bad publicity for the restaurant, he knew that Jade couldn’t get and withstand any more bad press. What to do? What to do? He was panicking slightly, Janet wanted to call the ambulance, the police.

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“She’s overdosed Jason, look at her!” There was a note of hysteria in Janet’s voice.

“Shut up! Let me think!” Jason commanded, the same tone that had stilled his criminal allies in the back of that BMW so long ago.

Jades cellphone! It was clutched in her hand in a death-grip! Jason pried it from her hand, scrolled down, trying to find inspiration, direction. He pushed the last number dialled. Either she had been wanting to go to heaven or hell. Jason took a chance. ‘Daddy’ said the luminous window. A sleepy male baritone answered.

“What now Jade!” It growled, guttural, strong, annoyed.

“My name is Jason, I have Jade’s phone. She needs help!” The nervousness was evident in Jason’s voice.

“What the hell has she done now!” The voice boomed.

“She’s overdosed Sir, I think she’s very ill!” Jason implored, anything to lift the weight of responsibility from his shoulders.

“I’ll be there now. Where are you? Where is she?

What has she taken?” The man was used to tak106

ing control, it was evident.

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“Coke, definitely, drink. I don’t know what else.

Please hurry!” Jason begged.

That forty-five minute wait seemed like a year.

They had moved Jade to the front of the shop, had her laid out on the floor. At times she looked for all the world to be dead, her breathing was shallow and erratic. Jason had to continuously check that she was still breathing at all. Eventually, a black stretch limo pulled up silently. Two men got out, approached the front door, entered, got to work. From the moment Jason saw them, he could tell without a doubt who Jades father was.

The superbly structured creature that was Jade was so obviously sired by this incredibly handsome male. But more than looks set this gentleman apart. The instant Janet opened the door, an aura of absolute, unquestionable power entered ahead of the physical form of the man.

“Jason?” The voice from the telephone, hand outstretched. “Jabulani.”

Jason struggled to meet the mans direct gaze, all of a sudden he felt as a boy again.

“Thank you for averting a media frenzy. My doctor will take care of her.” The voice was smooth and rich.

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Mr. Sir Jabulani had taken complete control of the situation. Jade was already being loaded into the limo by the driver and the doctor. Jason saw a wad of cash being handed to Janet, felt his shoulders encircled by an immense force, felt himself propelled towards the inky blackness of the limo. “Come, we need to talk.� There was no question that Jason would comply. That specific energy surrounded him again, that sense that his life was about to change.

The inside of the limo was as plush and luxurious as Jason had always imagined. The experience was somewhat marred by the fact that Jade was laid, unconscious, over the black leather seat. But it seemed like the doctor had everything under control. No-one seemed overly concerned. The ride was smooth, the uneven surface of the road barely felt, absorbed by the superlative suspension. Jason had no clue where they were going, what the purpose of his presence in this dream car was. Mr. Sir Jabulani was not saying anything.

No-one was saying anything in this deliciously decadent motor vehicle.

The silent journey ended at a huge pair of black pillared gates somewhere on a hill. Jason was trying to surreptitiously observe every detail of his surroundings. The wrought iron gates swung gra108

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ciously inwards and the limo drove through, up, along an elegant tree lined driveway which ended with the crunch of gravel encircling a bronze water feature, easily three times his height. They were deposited on the vast marble steps of a columned entrance vast enough to swallow a truck. Jade was carried in, promptly swallowed by the cavernous entrance doors of what Jason described to himself as a mansion.

“This way.” Mr. Sir Jabulani threw over his shoulder as he led Jason over the marbled foyer in the direction of a beautifully carved Rosewood door.

Jason knew Rosewood, his father had worked on the mines, in the mines, down in the shafts for a living, but the man’s passion was wood. Jason’s father, in what little time they had together, once a year at Christmas, had instilled, drilled into his only son, an abiding love and appreciation for wood. They entered what Jason knew to be a ‘study’ from the movies he had watched. A book lined, leather and wood furnished, masterpiece of a room. This was opulence! An understated, never-a-care-about-the-bill reflection of the taste and position of the superbly dressed man who commanded this room, this house, those people, that limo.

“Your instinct for discretion is impressive.” The smooth growl broke Jason out of his awestruck state, a cut-glass tumbler was pressed into his 109

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hand.

“I, um, thank you Sir, Mr.” Jason stuttered.

“Sit, sit.” Mr. Sir Jabulani directed him to the leather chesterfield in front of the fireplace. It struck Jason that it was winter, his personal magic season. Jason sat awkwardly, unsure what to say, what to do. He decided to keep busy, try to look as if this was an every day occurrence, so took a sip, a gulp, drained his glass. The liquid lit a fire in his mouth, blazed a trail all the way down to his gullet, brought tears to his eyes.

“Another one?” Jason saw, through his tears, an amused grin play at the corners of Mr. Sir Jabulani’s mouth. That uncontrollable spark of male pride extended his arm, and by virtue his glass, for a refill to his shock, his horror! He didn’t think his insides could take another blast of that heat.

“Ah! A strong man.” Jason could sense the barely withheld laughter in Mr. Sir Jabulani’s voice, could see it in his eyes. But that masculine trait to always do the brave, stupid, prideful thing forced him to tilt that glass of poison down his throat again!

The second jolt was not so bad, the first fire bolt seemed to have cauterized his insides. The liquid fire had seemed to pleasantly have melted all of Jason’s muscle structure, so that he found himself slumping against the corner of the deep, fragrant 110

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leather of the couch. The effect was worth the initial shock to his heretofore un-educated system.

“I want to thank you for what you did tonight.

You saved my family an embarrassment.” Mr. Sir Jabulani’s voice came to him as though through a buffer of cotton wool. “’S nothing.” Jason answered, almost slurred. He was getting sleepy. The adrenaline leaving his system, the effect of the alcohol, the late hour all combining to make his brain soft and fuzzy.

“So what I was thinking, maybe I could help you out, find a place for you within my corporation, corporation’s. What can you do, what have you done besides waitering?” Mr. Sir Jabulani was serious, Jason was flummoxed. He rather incoherently rattled off what he had done since arriving in the city, leaving out his brief encounter as a criminal, editing out his personal methods of relaxation.

“You said you drive? Have driven in a professional capacity? Do you think you could manage that limo of mine?” Jason picked up, through his haze, the sharpness of the man, the agility of that brain.

Jason’s head cleared a bit, he put in a great effort to sit up straighter, something was about to happen.

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“Yes, yes I was a driver. I have my PDP and everything! Wow! I would love to drive that limo! I’m sure I can handle her!” Jason was tripping over his words, the excitement of imagining himself behind the wheel of that machine bringing a fresh flood of adrenaline to his system.

“Good, good. My driver – you met him tonight – has to leave unexpectedly. Would you be interested in the job? Why I ask is that the position would require – how should I put it – discretion.

You have already exhibited that particular character trait admirably tonight.” Mr. Sir Jabulani intimated.

“Yeah! Yes! Sure!” Jason’s head was spinning, he felt that electrical charge shoot straight through him, clearing his mind.

“The job comes with a more than adequate salary, you’ll be well looked after. Oh, and you stay on the estate. I work odd hours – will need you on call – so it’s better if you’re close at hand.” Mr. Sir Jabulani got up, just like that. Business done, deal closed, dismissed.

“The housekeeper will show you to your room for the night. You can collect your belongings and get settled in, in the morning. Goodnight.” Mr. Sir Jabulani’s voice was almost harsh in it’s dispatch of him, now that he had concluded the final clear112

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ance of the mess of this night. Jason had been so taken aback that he had not even noticed the housekeeper standing discreetly in the corner. He certainly had not noticed her entering the room.

He followed the black and white uniformed form in a slight daze. She led him up a vast marble staircase, turned left down a plushly carpeted hallway, passed many doors till, what seemed like a kilometer later, she opened a door and stood aside so that he could gain access to his quarters for the evening. She followed him in, turned down the covers on the bed, pointed out the bathroom, laid out a fresh new pair of pyjamas for him, and quietly left. Jason slowly turned around, surveying the splendour that he found himself in, wondered just how, just what exactly had happened? His cloudy mind was struggling to catch up with the events of the past few hours. Such a totally different direction, such a different ending to what had started as an ordinary work night. What a strange turn of events.

All those years wondering, imagining what it must be like to be in this life and here he was! Standing knee almost knee deep on a carpet, in the middle of a room, in a house, in a suburb, in a world few ever got to personally experience. He crept to the bathroom, expecting this dream, mirage to disappear the moment he reached out to touch something, anything. Waited for the rainbow hued 113

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bubble to burst. He closed his eyes, opened them again. It was all still there. The marble fixtures, golden taps, snowy towels. He turned. The plush carpet, Rhodesian teak bed, silk linen was no illusion.

Jason slept for what little was left of the night, fell asleep, rested like he had never experienced in his life before. It was as if he was on a cloud.

He vowed to himself that the first thing he would purchase when he caught the tail of his own star, was this bed. This very same bed. Waitering was murderous on his feet, legs, lower back. During the night that wondrous piece of furniture had massaged all his pain away. He loved that bed.

He wanted to live in that bed.

The view from his bedroom window was of a sparkling blue rectangle surrounded by lush tropical vegetation. As his eyes travelled, the vegetation grew more wild, more African as it climbed the sun drenched slopes of the hill behind the house.

As he stood at the window, taking in the scenery, it hit him! He had a new job! He hadn’t even been looking for one, wasn’t sure that he wanted one, wasn’t actually unhappy with the life that he was leading. He turned around and took in his surroundings. This was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity! What magic had placed him right here, right now, in the same house as Jade surrounded by such incredible opulence? Literally within 114

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arms reach of everything he had ever dreamed of, seen, imagined. He felt pulled by forces beyond his control.

The deal had been closed last night anyway, he couldn’t, wouldn’t, shouldn’t turn tail now! What an idiot, fool he would be if this chance presented itself to him and he turned it down? How he would regret not taking this opportunity one day, when he was an old man? A discreet knock at the door made him start, broke his chain of thought, stunted the growth of that seed of doubt in his belly.

He gave himself over to the forces that guided him, once again, trusted that he would fall on his feet, come what may. He broke away from the turmoil in his head, quelled the burgeoning knot of fear in his belly, turned and walked toward the door, toward his new life.

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Jason didn’t stop to think, didn’t start to doubt.

A dreamlike quality shrouded all the hectic activity. Like a movie. His life was being played out like on a movie reel in front of him. He went with Paul, the current driver, to collect his belongings.

He sat up front, absorbed all that Paul imparted to him with regards to the running, maintenance, manoeuvring, pampering that the beautiful machine would require. He was itching to get behind the wheel, dying to have control in his hands. But he would have to wait. Paul had a weeks grace in which to show him the ropes, show him the etiquette, skills required to drive the ???m long stretched Mercedes.

The reaction the vehicle got, parked as it was outside Lucky’s, more than made up for the disappointment of not driving. The instant they parked, people started gathering. By the time he came down with his first load, the crowd was three deep around the black beauty. He had to elbow his way through, nonchalantly deposit his load, elbow his way back out. Inwardly, he was bursting! A thousand questions were hurled at him from those who knew him, had known him. He ignored everyone, continued his mission. This is what it must feel like to be a Hollywood star on the red carpet! He 116

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thought to himself. He allowed himself to imagine it, allowed his head to swell, allowed himself to bask in the residual glory created by the presence of the car.

On his last trip upstairs, Thandi caught him. She was a prostitute he had passed time with, shared drugs with, laid down with when he was that way inclined.

“Leaving us are you?” She asked, dying to know.

Jason looked up, he was three steps short of the landing, she was directly above him, leaning on the balustrade. She was staring straight at him, through him. Strung out again! Jason thought.

She had frustrated him ever since he had lived here! Always looking to get high, always needing!

Money, drugs, sex, booze. Anything. Everything.

“Yip!” He answered tersely, “Got my ticket out of here!”

“Don’t forget about us.” Thandi tried to drawl suggestively. It came out plaintive, under the sarcasm the plea was undeniable. “How about a gram for old-times sake?” No hidden plea here!

Jason thought for a second, reached into his jacket pocket, gave her all the cash he had on him. At least she could take the night off if she wanted to.

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His parting gift, his good deed done for the day.

Shit! He couldn’t wait to get out of here! What had seemed adequate and safe yesterday now looked, was, seedy, cheap, desperate, classless!

How had he endured these surroundings, these people, this atmosphere for so long without seeing, really seeing, it for what it was? No doubt!

He had to get away from this shit, was definitely making the right move, doing the right thing. After last night, waking up this morning where he had, there was absolutely no way that he could ever feel satisfied being alive in this place any longer! He had seen, tasted, felt the other side. It was ambrosia to him!

“Thanks.” Jason started. Thandi wasn’t even looking at him. She was staring down at the money he had thrust at her, already calculating how high she could get, for how long. Jason, all of a sudden, became very sick of this place. A sickness deep inside himself for all the lives in various states of despair. He rushed through collecting the last of his worldly goods, couldn’t get back down the stairs fast enough, wanted to get away as quickly as humanly possible from the ugly reality he had been living.

Once inside the air-conditioned luxury of the limo, the knot of tension in his belly started to lessen, the tightness at the top of his skull to evaporate.

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beckoning them through the tinted windscreen.

Driving off into the sun. Jason liked the image.

Leaving the darkness behind. Taking the sundrenched highway, leaving the dirty piss and shit of the alleyways behind. He took one last glance backwards. The men from the tavern were still congregated on the pavement, watching the icon purr away. He could still hear the gabble of their awe in his head, knew that the rest of the day, probably the rest of the week would be peppered with suppositions, superstitions, verbal flights of fancy as to his, Jason’s, ascension. For a second he longed to be back among that melee of downto-earth men. But only for a second. Paul was trying to get his attention, trying to further indoctrinate the etiquette of his new job into him. He turned his attention back to his future.

Jason was installed in a flat above the garages on the sumptuous estate. Although not nearly as luxurious as his accommodations of the first night, the area he was to live in was still better than anything he could ever have afforded. And he was on the estate, still had superb views of greenery and luxury, was still on the same property as Jade.

He was provided with three full uniforms, had the services of a maid, had full laundry service and three square meals prepared for him in the vast central kitchen. Life was good. The ominous look he had received from Tasha when he had gone in to Jam Sessions to resign, became a distant nig119

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gle once he had settled into his new abode. He had yet to tell his mother about his new situation.

The conversation would be arduous!

Even to himself it sounded to quick, such a vast difference in such a short period of time. He was still trying to get her to comprehend his last circumstances. This phone call was going to be painful. Till then he was going to enjoy this new life of his. He had not seen Mr Sir Jabulani in the week since he had been installed above the garage.

Paul, he had seen constantly. On the third day he had been allowed to take control of the wheel, finally! What a rush! He found that he had to think, consider this vehicle constantly when driving her.

Parking, overtaking, backing up, speeding up, turning, reversing all required optimum presence of mind, allowed no room for error. He loved it!

In the same way that waitering had appealed to his sense of excitement, driving this beauty made him focus, made him pay attention in fine detail to the world around him.

So far he hadn’t been called on to take a passenger anywhere, neither had Paul for that matter. They had been left, Paul to hand over, Jason to take over, completely uninterrupted all week.

When Jason finally did work up the courage to ask as to Mr. Sir Jabulani’s whereabouts, he was surprised to learn that Jade and Mr. Sir Jabulani had left the country at the beginning of the week.

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Jason had been waiting in vain, hoping futilely for a personal expression of gratitude from Jade for saving her life. He supposed she had gone somewhere to get herself straightened out. She was already forgiven. He would make her excuses for her. Of course she would have to go somewhere to get well! Until then he would learn his job. He would stuff his head full of the knowledge he required to make a suitable impression next time he did see her.

On his ninth day in Paradise, Jason got to drive his first passenger! It was only to take Paul to the airport, but to Jason it was a monumental day. He off-loaded the ex driver at International departures at OR Thambo, got back into his own private cockpit and took off for his first solo. Without the constant chatter from Paul in his ear, he all of a sudden found himself to be nervous, overcautious. The car felt monstrously huge all of a sudden and the roads impossibly narrow. By the time he pulled into the driveway of the estate, his nerves were shot! He parked the gleaming chunk of steel and holed up in his abode above her to contemplate how he was going to overcome this new anomaly. Nerves. Nervousness. He did not want to mess this job up, absolutely did not want to ruin this chance he’d been given!

The harsh buzz of the intercom at his bedside jolted him awake. He had fallen asleep, fully clothed, 121

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“The master needs you to pick him up at the airport, he’ll be landing in an hour, flight 143 from Bangkok.” The sleepy voice announced.

Jason jumped up, wide awake, “Ok, on my way.”

No time to think, no time for anxiety, he would not lose this damn job! He splashed water on his face, grabbed his key, headed off to do his first completely solo ride. The airport was another labyrinth to be mapped, charted and discovered. To a Sotho boy from a little village in the foothills, this cosmopolitan melting pot was a confusing maze. Paul’s instructions, lanes, parking, timing were spot on. As Jason pulled alongside the curb outside the gleaming steel and glass building, he felt his heart skip a beat at the awesome beauty of the structure.

Jason held the door as Mr. Sir Jabulani climbed in followed by a short, rotund, obviously Oriental man with slicked back, shiny black hair. Jason climbed back in, under the assumption that they would be going back to the estate, considering the hour.

But the cool bass of Mr. Sir Jabulani issued forth an uptown club as their destination. Thank God for GPRS. It was a place Jason had never been to, heard of. At least the GPRS would save him from getting lost, would save him from losing face. He 122

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wanted this first journey with his new boss to be perfect, wanted approval from this man of power.

The limo responded perfectly as always, the traffic at this time of the morning was almost nonexistent, their destination achieved without incident. The outside of the ‘club’ was nothing more than a solid face-brick façade with what appeared to be a solid steel door. After opening the door for his passengers to exit, Jason was left with the instruction to wait. An indefinite time period, an undefined instruction. He watched their backs as they were instantly admitted, all that he saw between them, beyond the steel, was a pitch black maw into which they were swallowed.

Jason had hours to contemplate that blank brick wall, that impenetrable steel door. He had hours to wonder what on earth was happening in those cavernous depths. A sharp rap at the window startled him awake. The sky was full of the hazy shimmer of pre-dawn. He jolted upright, rubbed his eyes, wished he had something to kick start him. The half-glimpsed bouncer, ‘doorman’, seen hours ago, was peering in the window through cupped hands.

“Your parties on it’s way out, rise and shine.” He announced sharply.

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man and two strange, skinny white guys all made towards the limo. Jason was confused! He opened door, made sure everyone was safely inside, took his post behind the wheel.

“Where to Sir?” Jason asked, watching Mr. Sir Jabulani in the rear-view mirror.

“The estate Jason. Oh, and close the window.” He was dismissed.

Jason could see one of the two skinny white boys cutting lines on the glass top of the bar as the tinted privacy window silently slid into place.

The last thing he heard was the muted pop of a champagne cork. Boys?!? He would have thought girls, women. Those two gentlemen could afford anything their hearts desired, anyone their minds took a fancy to. Money could buy anything, anyone, anytime. But boys?!? Above Lucky’s tavern, in the company of whores, Jason had learned a lot about the needs of men. Thandi’s stories started to come back to him, once just background chatter. He replayed those stories over again in his head on the drive home. Nothing she had told him prepared him for this scenario!

Jason deposited them at the massive entrance, watched the strange combination of men head across the marble expanse towards the giant door.

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looking into the darkness, wondering just what the fuck was going on. Mr. Sir Jabulani, that icon of power, that superb human being who had sired Jade, that man who had become an enigmatic legend in his mind, was inside that vast mansion somewhere partying with a skinny white boy? Jason’s imagination was running wild, an unbridled horse heading straight for a canyon. There was no way he could get to sleep. He decided to clean up his limo, usually a task done as soon as he parked her. But tonight he had not wanted to look in the back, could not get the image of his passengers from his mind.

He slipped downstairs, being quiet and cautious for absolutely no reason whatsoever, approached the limo as if it were a coiled snake. The champagne bottle listed in the sweating ice-bucket, still half full, the bar was dusted white. Drug use, when money was no object, was obviously not done with the fanatic care of the financially challenged user. Jason stood and pondered the scene before him. He knew there was no way that he was going to resist those leftovers! What was left on the bar counter was enough for three decent lines of A grade shit, the champagne was champagne, not sparkling wine. He was going to have his own party. Who on earth would ever know?

The coke blew his mind wide open! In all his experience in his dream city with drugs, he had never, 125

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could never, would never be able to get his hands on this grade, this quality. With a Dom Perignon chaser? Never! Their leftovers gave him a buzz he had never felt before. So this is what it felt like to really roll. Sitting in the back of a limo, A grade drugs, quality booze, the smell of leather and luxury. OK, so he was parked in the garage and he was still in his driver’s uniform, but a boy could dream all the same couldn’t he? He was touching it, that movie life, that film that played in his head was becoming real, was tangible. He had the car sound pumping, undulating waves coursed through his body with the rhythm of the music. Mr. Sir Jabulani and his strange company and even stranger tastes did not seem so odd after a while. Just alternate???

The bug of his buzz bit him! His task was to clean the limo, and clean her he did! Spick and span, with a drug induced obsession, a fanatic intensity borne of chemicals. Job done, mission accomplished, he bounced back to his room, supercharged, and paced around manically, wondering what to do with himself. Music. That’s what he needed. To move. He wished he could go out, was dying to feel the pulsing rhythm of a club around him on this high. But he didn’t know what Mr. Sir Jabulani’s were, he was on 24 hour call, couldn’t follow his own desires, was there only to serve the whims and wishes of his erstwhile master. Jason felt like he was caged in behind invisible bars!

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He would have to reign in that horse that was his mind, bring everything back under control, calm the fuck down! It was a monumental effort to fight against that chemical in his bloodstream, but lose his position, his job? Never!

Just as the property started to hum with the regular morning activities, Mr. Sir Jabulani summoned him. Instructions were to enter the house, follow lefts and rights, escort the two skinny boys out, take them where they wanted to go. Jason duly followed his orders, found his cargo behind the solid wood door in a state of disarray, had to assist with waking, clothing, supporting his human freight out the house and into the limo. There had been no sign of Mr. Sir Jabulani or the Oriental man in the wreckage of the beautiful room. Just the human leftovers of their personal enjoyment.

It turned Jason’s stomach. Even though he still had a slight buzz on, the sight of that room, what had obviously transpired behind that particular closed door, couldn’t be accepted by his brains personal frame of reference. This was one leftover he would never help himself to, ever!

As he trundled them into the limo, the blonde rasped a downtown address. He watched them in the rear view mirror, slumped on the seat, barely coherent. The sudden fog-horn blast of a semi startled them both awake. A second later they were cutting lines on the bar counter. Ja127

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son’s nose itched to partake, hoped they would be as sloppy this morning as they had been in the pre-dawn. Two lines generous lines each and they were instantly animated, popping another bottle, going through every nook and cranny of the back of the limousine, now that they were alone. Their chatter was animated, so happy with their score.

Turned out they’d each been paid R2000, still had 3 grams of excellent coke and they were busy raiding the bar of a couple of good bottles. Easy money. Male whores. Who would’ve thought?

Not Jason. In his mind women were the whores.

Women serviced men’s needs. Women were those tragic, hopeless members of society that fell from grace. Not men! Not white boys with all the world at their feet. He could hardly concentrate on the road, he was so fascinated watching them in the rear view mirror, not unlike his days as a taxi driver.

Much more plush interior, way different situation, but very similar. Watching life being played out on the back seat. Watching the two male hookers go from comatose to party time in ten minutes flat.

Watching them pick over the pickings in the back of the limo like the poorest picked through the garbage at a landfill.

Jason offloaded them at a seedy dump. A drug addicts haven. A heartless hovel. They bounded out, oblivious to their surroundings, careless of the degradation that surrounded them. Money 128

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burning a hole in their pockets, cocaine chasing it’s inexorable way around their brains, 20 year old Scotch burning a fiery path down to their gullets. Jason pulled away from the curb, still looking back, still puzzled. Where were their rich families, their cars, their girls, their houses, their LIVES! Their TV lives where every white boy has a girl and a car and a house and a good job? That TV life where money never seemed to be a problem, fridges were always full, all the good things in life just flowed like a river? Why were they doing this?

They had been just as sloppy as before, poor boys acting like high rollers. At the first convenient spot, Jason pulled over and ‘cleaned’ the back of the limo. Perfect. Perfect weird start to a very weird day. 2 lines. Just enough to allow him to drive home in his own mind, just enough not to have to think of Mr. Sir Jabulani and his desires.

He arrived back home in a ‘top of the world’ frame of mind. He wouldn’t let anything get him down!

He recalled that his discretion was the reason he had gotten this job in the first place. R2000 for a night of work? The thought had been intrusive all along the road. Free booze, drugs and 2 grand for a nights work? In his state of mind, the details of the ‘job’ that they had done was mercifully hazy, devoid of detail. When he had woken them up, he had been repulsed, but in the car they had both seemed to bounce back, show no signs of trauma, too be totally unaffected.

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His buzzer brought him sharply out of his thoughts.

He was needed at 2 o’clock to take Mr. Sir Jabulani to XYZ for blah blah blah. He had wondered if he would be needed today. At 5 minutes to the hour, he brought the car around to the entrance, sat and waited in trepidation. The Louis Vuitton travel bags on the front steps he recognized as the Oriental man’s. He loaded them in the ample trunk, checked the air conditioner was running, double checked the cleanliness of the limo, stood in preparation, a knot in his wired belly, still in an alternate frame of mind.

Mr. Jabulani appeared first, stepped aside for the smaller man, followed him out, over the steps toward the waiting car, made direct eye contact with Jason for the first time since the first night he had met him. Jason cringed inwardly. His icon had taken a tumble off the top rung of the ladder in his mind.

“Good afternoon Mr. Jabulani.” He managed to push out while holding the door.

“Afternoon Jason, hope everything is in order? Big day ahead for us Eh Mr. Chung?” He chuckled as he slapped the little man on the back.

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fit. Those good genes made him a formidable party man, as strong as an ox.

“Off we go then Jason.” Mr. Jabulani winked.

Jason felt extremely uncomfortable, rushed around to his side, closed the privacy window without bidding and concentrated on his destination, a well known conference centre where wheels spun and deals were clinched.

Just drive! Jason thought to himself. Look forward and drive! Nothing that Mr. Jabulani did was any of his business anyway. He had hours to sit and collect his thoughts, hours to convince himself that his job, his life was perfect. Yet somehow he felt that niggle creeping in again. That niggle of doubt. Only one thing would, could make him feel better. Call his mother. Bite the bullet, utilize his time productively, just phone the woman! Get it over with!

As he had thought, she sagely put his mind at rest. Granted, he only told her the good parts, the parts to inspire envy, pride. He edited out the things he shouldn’t have seen, left out explaining that particular feeling of unease in his belly. Her questioning him about studying was the only low point. Not that she nagged him, but the inquiry reminded him how he had forgotten his previous determination to utilize his money, his time, his 131

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mind in positive endeavours. She was still proud of her boy, still thought she had to shout down the line to be heard, still brought to him the peace of his upbringing, still made him feel part of something larger than himself. The longer he stayed away from home, the more often he found himself longing to be back. At such an odd time. At a time when he was comfortable, at a time when he had a measure of success, at a time when he felt he was touching his dream, the thread of home still pulled at him.

After speaking to his mother, the thought of that easy two grand, all of a sudden, thudded into perspective. For a second he had contemplated the ease, his accountant brain had computed the speed, with which he could reach grand totals of money. But at what cost? Already, telling his mother of his new life, his new job, his new circumstances, he had felt the difficulty, the lack of flow to the conversation when he had to edit parts out. What on earth would he tell her if he ever did something like that for a living? What could he buy that would salve the wounds created by what he’d had to do to earn that money? He got an inkling of how those boys, this morning, had felt.

They had HAD to take drugs, had to drink, had to blow that money. They had had to get rid of the spoils of their own ruination.

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well under the influence, a small part of Jason’s mind had hardened to them, men of power or not.

He felt as though he were peering down at them from a great distance. Maybe the drugs, maybe the sleepless night, maybe a distancing from their wickedness? But a powerful feeling it was. Reverence was turning to irreverence, respect to disrespect. As he closed the door, the solid thunk sounded the end. The vague notion of ever attempting to earn money that way fled his brain.

“Airport Jason.” Mr. Jabulani ordered with no further ado.

Both men seemed overtly pleased with themselves. There was lots of back-slapping, more liquor, wide toothy smiles. A 3 point blah blah million rand contract, ha ha, clink clink, slurp slurp, slap slap! A couple of hours of drinking and talking and these men had made more money than villages, villagers would see the benefit of in a lifetime. These two men of questionable morals, no self-control, no obvious redeemable qualities. And they held the keys to kingdoms in their hands, held peoples lives, livelihoods, futures, dreams captive? Jason wondered at the sense it.

Wondered at the fairness of it. Wondered just how few were going to actually benefit from the huge housing deal that had just gone through.

Mr. Chung was deposited at, escorted through OR 133

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Thambo, seen through his boarding gate amidst further backslapping and many empty promises.

Jason had walked behind the two men, toting the designer luggage, watching them in fine detail, every false move, false smile, false gesture carefully registered and stored. His mind seemed strangely clear, minutely receptive to input. Something was shifting in him, his young-boy mindset was being altered ever so slightly. The romantic haze that usually accompanied his dreams, his ultimate dream, had an icy edge to it, a frosting of cold reality.

The journey home was a silent one. Jason was unexplainably on guard, alert, keeping a constant eye on the powerhouse in the back. That sleeping lion that was his boss. It was dusk when they traversed that section of highway that circumnavigated Alexandria Township. The smoke from thousands of meagre fires hung in a low pall over the shacks in the crisp winter air.

“Look at that filth!” Mr. Jabulani hissed.

Jason’s nerves jumped! He had thought his boss to be asleep in the leather cocoon at the back.

“What? The smoke sir? They have to keep warm sir.” Jason stuttered.

“All that.” Mr. Jabulani made a sweeping gesture.

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“Look at all that filth! Living like dogs, like pigs!”

Mr. Jabulani spat out.

Jason’s senses heightened, he watched his boss closely as he asked his next question.

“Where do you come from sir?” He asked quietly.

The head came up, bloodshot eyes slid forward, shoulders instinctively set in a self-defensive stance.

“From here! But I got out, I didn’t give up!” Mr. Jabulani pronounced too loudly, too proudly.

“Did you make it to where you are on your own --------- sir?” Jason inquired pointedly. A natural arrogance rising in him, an instinct to get to the jugular surfacing rampantly in him.

Mr. Jabulani sputtered, took a big gulp of scotch, narrowed his eyes at the back of Jason’s head.

The hesitation was all that Jason needed. He had struck a blow, shot a true arrow at his target.

“No Jason. I had help. Good marks at school, ambition, various people, various bursaries ........?”

He trailed off, obviously going on a mental journey down that path. He took another big gulp.

Remembering his roots was not a thing he liked doing, a pastime not often indulged in.

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Jason watched him. Just why he had become so brave, brazen to ask such impudent questions, he did not know, but the need to do so had all of a sudden welled up in him like a volcano. Jason had felt the cold, the hunger, the discomfort of all of those millions of souls inside of him. He had not been able to allow them to be insulted for something as uncontrollable as the meagre living conditions they were forced to endure day in and day out, year after year. And by one of their own? A township boy made good who never looked back?

It was unconscionable to him! Mr. Jabulani’s lifestyle was one of total waste, total self-indulgence, total hedonism. A kind thought, for his own people, was not too much to ask was it?

Jason could feel Mr. Jabulani’s eyes boring into the back of his skull. Where it would have made him nervous before, he now felt calm. He met his boss’s red-eyed gaze in the mirror. The challenge was unspoken. Jason won, would not look away even to check the road. It was Mr. Jabulani who yelled ‘watch out!’ when the approached too close to the backend of an eighteen wheeler. The rest of the journeywas made in an almost palpable silence. The over-jubilation of Mr. Jabulani’s celebration had been tempered by the sight of, the existence, the stark reality of the poverty of the township. The contrast was sharp and clear. The sheer jubilation of one, against the tired misery 136

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of so many.

“I won’t need you tomorrow Jason.” Mr. Jabulani’s voice was ice down his spine.

“Make sure the BM’s ready for me.” He added.

Back at home, back in control, master over servant, trying desperately to overcome that moment when he had allowed his armour to slip, had allowed a cheeky young man beyond his defences.

Jason felt duly berated as he returned the limo to its spot, started checking the beautiful silver BMW for preparedness. He had to come down, had to sleep, had to reset his mind. What on earth was happening to him? It was none of his business what Mr. Jabulani did, thought! It shouldn’t make any difference! 24 hours ago, all he had yearned for was Mr. Sir Jabulani’s approval, why did he now feel hatred for the man?

Jason went up to his room and crashed! He didn’t fall asleep, he fell into a virtual coma! When he woke’ it was 15 hours later and he was ravenous.

After a shower he was fresh, with distance he was happy with his life again. He sat in a patch of weak winter sun and wolfed down his breakfast and lunch tray. No need to get worked up about Mr. Jabulani! His life was good, it didn’t touch him, he was not responsible, it was none of his concern.

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soul still clean. It wouldn’t, couldn’t touch him, the nefarious deeds of other people.

At eight o’clock that evening, a knock at the door.

One of the many house servants bearing an ornate silver tray, on it a bottle of Glenfiddich, two Cuban cigars, a small off-white envelope of heavy paper. Jason thanked the young maid, closed the door and sat down to inspect the tray of bounty.

He opened the envelope and took out the heavy white card. Bank notes and something smaller, heavier drifted, plopped to the floor.

‘Thank you for your discretion.’

The card read.

‘A small token of my appreciation. J.’ Jason gathered what had fallen. R500 and what?

A small Ziploc, a snow-white gram! He sat back dumb-founded, all Mr. Sir Jabulani’s transgressions instantly forgiven. He was gonna party like a rock star tonight! He sat on the floor surrounded by his unexpected loot, poured himself a double shot, coughed and sputtered lighting up a two inch thick Havanna, cut himself a generous line of A-grade shit. He sniffed, ingested, inhaled, fell back against the bed and let the various chemicals flow to his brain. Mr. Sir Jabulani could do no wrong! He was redeemed! There was good in the 138

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man after all! Jason partied on his own, in his private quarters, in private. Mr. Sir Jabulani left him alone, had no need of his services for the next three days. Three days to enjoy the estate, three days to finish his bottle, three days to regenerate, relax, fit in, merge with his surroundings.

The next time he saw Mr. Sir Jabulani, to take him to the Government buildings in Pretoria, there was no awkwardness, no reprimand, no recrimination. Back to business. Business as usual. The phrase, all of a sudden, struck him as funny. In fact, he felt full of an inexplicable joy. This day was the start of a new routine. A different pace, a different phase, but easy to chart once he got used to the odd hours, the intoxicating locations, the prime destinations. Jason started to get an inkling that even this level of existence could become hum-drum.

What appeared so heady on the screen, so unimaginably exciting, enticing was not so extraordinary in reality. Without the sound track, the camera angles, various entourages, timely cuts in the scene, the exploits, extravagances, excursions of the wealthy seemed in large part to be just as tedious, monotonous as the routines of the poor.

Lunch here, tailor there, dinner, meeting, drink, eat, play, shop, fuck, get high, sleep, wake up.

Filling the void of each and every day with meaningless activities. The difference was in the qual139

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ity of the choices, the lack of restriction, but the correlations were there. All human, after all. All pursuing the same pursuits. All trying to grab for that unreachable brass ring.

Weeks turned to months. Jason had become accustomed to Mr. Sir Jabulani’s regular partying.

He became equally accustomed to the intake of leftover, lost, mislaid narcotics. His personality allowed him to manage the pace easily, his body managed what he threw at it, into it without too much ramification. He had money in his bank account, he was comfortable, well fed, well dressed, well employed. The lifestyle of his boss was no concern of his, all he had to do was raise the privacy window in the limo and in his mind. Just turn a blind eye to the various boys, girls, company that Mr. Jabulani chose to entertain himself with on any given day. His confusion, shock at his boss’s lifestyle had turned to an uneasy acceptance. As long as he was looked after, as long as it didn’t touch him.

A beautiful spring day heralded another change in the Ngcobo household. He was instructed to collect Jade and her mother from the airport at 2pm that afternoon. It was more than a year since he had last seen her, more than a year that he had hold on to a wispy vision of her in his mind. The entire house buzzed, from early in the morning, making preparations for the return of the ladies of 140

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the household. The atmosphere was light and excitable and mirrored the stirrings in his own heart at the anticipation of seeing Jade again. He felt more grown up, more accomplished, more worldly than he had been the last time he had seen her.

Surely she would notice him now, now that he was going to be in such close confines with her?

Surely she would see him?

The hour approached to leave. A peek through the kitchen door into the main lobby of the house revealed fresh cut flowers everywhere, the house seemed to be alive for the first time since Jason had arrived here. He left with a spring in his step, a traditional gospel song that the cooks were singing, in his heart. Along with the sheer joy of seeing Jade again, was the anticipation of seeing her mother for the first time. From gossip amongst the staff, he had surmised that she was a great beauty, if an aging one, a Nigerian princess, which would explain Jades’ unique beauty and presence.

He waited, at International Arrivals, for the flight from New York in a hyped-up state. Every delay, and there were three such announcements, made his heart plummet! But, eventually, the darn ‘plane landed. When the passengers finally started appearing through the gate, Jason saw them instantly. Mother and daughter. Jade could stop traffic, but the two of them, head and shoulders 141

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above the crowd, gliding gracefully toward him almost stopped his heart! What a lucky man Mr. Sir Jabulani was! The thought crossed his mind.

For one, hot instant he was furious with the man!

To have such blessings to call your own and not honour them!

He saw them first, caught the ladies’ attention, waited for, loaded their luggage, escorted them to the limo, all in a heady daze. He felt so honoured to be accompanying them, to be surrounded by their perfume, their regal aura, their untouchable perfection. Their clothing was straight out of the pages of high-end fashion magazines. Hair, makeup, shoes, accessories – sheer perfection! Oh to be able to lay claim to such feminine perfection!

The fact that Jade had not recognised him stung, but only slightly. He had time to win her over!

She looked like a totally different woman to the last image he had of her. Rehab had done her the world of good. The super-model was back!

In the limo, he had the chance to study them minutely, to drink in their sheer magnificence.

The conversation was of a world and people and things that he could not comprehend. The air of mystique intensified the physical prowess a thousand fold! Jade ruled supreme on the throne in Jason’s mind! She seemed strong and capable and in control. Her and her mother sipped champagne slowly and delicately whilst chatting ani142

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matedly about their various travels, experiences, acquaintances’. Dolce. He caught Mrs Ngcobo’s name and it sounded as exotic as it should sound.

When he left them at the entrance to their palatable home, he physically felt the void left in their wake. He deposited the luggage inside the foyer where a manservant hurried to ferry it off to parts of the mansion unknown and unseen. He put the car away, hung around in the bustling kitchen, hoped for a glimpse of Jade in her environment.

The kitchen staff were joyously preparing for a day of celebration on the morrow. Gogo, the dominatrix of this domain, was issuing forth orders left, right and centre to a staff of eight. As pots and pans and crockery were busy being filled with culinary delights, the women sang. Those songs that accompany every group effort, those soulful ululations that appear to be an essential ingredient in every dish. From the ultra-modern, highclass, new-world chic of the ladies’ of the house to the heart-warming, soul-stirring tradition of the ladies’ in the kitchen struck Jason as such a contrast.

He wandered back to the garages, busied himself cleaning the limo, noticed for the first time that the silver BMW was not there. Come to think of it, Mr. Jabulani had not been there to greet his wife and daughter. Oh well! He probably had a meeting, a lunch, a function. He went up to his 143

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quarters, found himself looking out for Mr. Jabulani’s return. Day turned to evening, evening to night, night to the wee hours and still Mr. Jabulani failed to appear. It would have to be something extremely important to keep him away till this time! Jason thought. At 3:25 am, Jason was wakened by the electronic garage motor, only a quiet hum, but he had been waiting, was only dozing.

He crept to the top of his landing, stood in the shadows to watch his boss arrive.

Jason had hoped something important had prevented Mr. Jabulani from being home to welcome his wife and daughter back. From the state of the man that exited the BMW, he could tell that it had been nothing more pressing that had kept him from home than another night out on the town.

To Jason’s mind, this was totally irrational! In the past year, He had come to realise that these nights out were a dime a dozen. Maybe to the revellers, a whole lot of ‘fun’ and ‘excitement’, but to the watcher, just more of the same. Eat, drink, get drunk, get high, get fucked, go home, go to sleep, wake up, hung over. Same thing over and over again.

Welcoming your beautiful wife home after more than a year apart, was a different matter. How often did a man get to do that? To not be there to welcome home such beauty? To not be there to receive your daughter after the obvious trial she 144

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had been through? After all, the last time Mr. Jabulani had seen her, she had nearly been dead! He watched as Mr. Jabulani steadied himself against the car, focused, stumbled out of the garage. Jason resisted the impulse to go down and help him to the house. The seed of dislike for the man was germinating in his heart again. He could not, for the life of him, understand his boss!

The next morning dawned bright and breezy with the fresh scent of spring to enliven and rejuvenate. Jason had to take the ladies to the spa, shopping, luncheon. It was going to be heaven for him! To ferry Jade and Missus Dolce around to their appointments. Jade honoured him a slight upturning of the corners of her full lips. Missus Dolce gave him a dazzling smile, every perfect tooth visible against her perfect jet-black visage.

Before she shielded her gaze from him with the Gucci shades, he did catch the look in her eyes.

A wounded, tired look that spoke volumes louder than the smile she used to try to mask her pain.

The day with those ladies’ was all that Jason had imagined it would be and more. At lunchtime they sent him a platter of delicacies from the restaurant, didn’t just forget about him like Mr. Jabulani did. Jason wished that every day could be like this, following the gentle path, enveloped in delicious perfume, surrounded by beauty. Mother and daughter chattered, chatted in between destina145

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tions, like long lost friends. They looked like contemporaries. The party tonight was an event to look forward to, a celebration of note.

At around 5pm, they were finally ready to be escorted home to do their final preparations for the upcoming joviality. Jason toted boxes and bags up to the main entrance while the ladies clip-clopped ahead. The rest of his day was to be spent doing various errands for the household, and later three pick-up’s from vastly divergent locations. He was caught up in the mayhem! The entire estate was buzzing and humming and bustling! The smells emanating from the kitchen took him back home in his mind. Those aromas, co-mingled, signified joy and togetherness. Professional caterers were traipsing in and out with laden platters of more exotic, European fare but the traditional was what enticed Jason’s olfactory sense into action. Gogo sneaked him a plate, a preview, with a twinkle in her eye. She had sensed the longing in his heart for home, fulfilled that longing the best way she knew how. Through his stomach. Jason wolfed down the plate of food with gusto, held the memory of those flavours close while he performed his duties.

By the time Jason had deposited his second load of well-heeled passengers at the main entrance, the party was in full swing. The extensive parking area was a bumper-to-bumper showroom of ve146

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hicular perfection. He would have to ogle that lot when he came back from his last run! He thought excitedly. His pick-up was in Pretoria North, a politically hirsute couple, an influential couple as were most of the guests at the estate in one way or another. When he returned, he got his desired eye-full of chrome and pressed metal, satisfied his boyish heart with super-buffed paintwork and rims. As he was drooling over an icon, a well preserved vintage Bentley, he was startled by a voice behind him.

“She’s a beauty. Old, but still a classic.” The voice drawled in a strange combination of an American twang with a Zulu inflection.

He turned around, laid eyes on the owner of the voice, knew on sight that this had to be a close, younger relation of Mr. Sir Jabulani. The similar characteristics were impossible to miss.

“I like the classics.” Jason pronounced softly.

“Sure, sure. Hi, I’m Thabo.” The handsome young man introduced himself.

Jason was unsure how to proceed, decided to go with the truth.

“I’m Jason, chauffeur for Mr. Jabulani.” He stated, eyes downcast.

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“Ah, that would explain it! Sorry. Thabo. Son of -----Mr. Jabulani.” He said sarcastically.

Obviously there was no love lost there! Thought Jason. Strange, African men usually clung to their sons, their namesakes. The young man turned, loped away, powerful shoulders, athletes build propelling him forward, on his own planet of energy. Jason watched him leave, puzzled. Mr. Jabulani had not even mentioned a son in more than a year. He had certainly never spoken to or seen him, to Jason’s knowledge.

The thud, thud, thud of the party finally broke into his reverie. He could hear the intermittent shrieks of laughter, care-free joviality. He would have to make his way up to the entrance, take up his post, do his job for the evening. Valet! A tedious job for most, an absolute pleasure for him! To actually get to sit his butt in these vehicular masterpieces, if only for a minute, was a dream come true for him. At this particular time though, no-one was about to leave. The celebrations were just starting, the festivities just beginning. He could hear the deep bass of Mr. Sir Jabulani’s voice, amplified electronically, welcoming his wife, his daughter, home. The injection of warmth and love into his voice was in stark contrast to their actual reception home. He wished Mr. Sir Jabulani could be like this every day. He wondered in that instant if 148

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Jade and Missus Dolce felt the same way.

Mr. Sir Jabulani made a joke, his crowd responded warmly. The chocolaty smoothness of his voice belied great love, great pride in his ladies, in the fact of their return to his side. Even the light seemed to have a warm glow, as if the force that was Mr. Sir Jabulani could affect the hue, could alter the very ambience. Maybe this was the real Mr. Sir Jabulani, maybe the other man that he had come to know was just a man reacting to loneliness, behaving out of reaction to his single status? He could see how this persona was so successful. He could feel, even from a distance, the awesome magnetism, magnificence of this man.

At the end of the soliloquy, the crowd erupted in a spontaneous bout of applause. Jason, from his vantage point, could see both Missus Dolce and Jade beaming, glowing that special warm glow particular to ladies who are loved. Mr. Sir Jabulani jumped from the elevated dance floor, took his wife in his arms, swept her round the dance floor to Lionel Ritchie’s ‘Three times a Lady’. Everyone was mesmerised, including Jason. The man and woman were made for each other, were dazzling in their finery, regal in their height, superb in their physical prowess! The evening had taken on a magical edge, an animated movie beauty. The dance floor filled up with other couples, but Mr. And Missus were still head and shoulders above 149

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the melee, still held most peoples attention. The tone for the evening was set.

People were eating and drinking and milling and chatting without cessation. Jade was dazzling in pure white sequined David Tlala creation. There was no shortage of suitors vying for her attention, no lack of dance partners, no lull in the onslaught of attempts to capture the magnificent creatures’ imagination. Jason felt his heart contract with jealousy every time he watched a new introduction, saw a new game in play. One day! One day he would have the opportunity to show Jade his interest, reveal his heart to her! Until then he would have to just watch. Observe. It occurred to him that he spent most of his life occupied in that way.

In observation of life, other peoples lives being played out before him. Like a living T.V. screen.

High def, 3 dimensional, surround sound, living colour. He could even reach out and touch it if he really wanted to, if he wasn’t constricted by that invisible barrier of fear and uncertainty.

Things really started livening up at about 11pm.

Inhibitions were eroded by alcohol. The wellheeled congregation started their journey to a higher high, a more elated elation. Drugs were being ingested openly. All generations were partaking freely, without the caution and paranoia of the illicit drug addict. It was as if, somehow, wealth decriminalised the action, as though po150

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sition in the social structure transformed their usage into an acceptable pastime. Jade, freshly back from rehab and a good clean adventure, withstood the temptation for several hours before the allure of the white powder won. Jason instinctively wanted to protect her from herself yet knew that it wasn’t his place. He couldn’t get the sight of her, slumped in a heap on the toilet floor, out of his mind. Her father was there, her mother was there, her brother was there. She was loved, they would protect her!?!

She was still maintaining her standard, was not getting out of hand. Maybe she had it under control? Maybe she could use and not abuse? Maybe an elephant could fly! As it got later, as the crowd became more unruly, he could see her speeding up, losing count, losing control. As people started trickling out, so Jason was kept busy collecting their machines for them.

The pleasure he had anticipated to derive from this activity was severely impacted by his concern for the wayward beauty. He had not seen Mr. Sir Jabulani or Missus Dolce anywhere near their daughter. The art of socialisation kept them very busy, mingling was a full time occupation, impressing was an arduous task inviting no distractions.

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Jason tried to check on her as often as possible.

It was after a particularly large party departed that he lost sight of her, she had vanished from the main body of the party and Jason felt a sudden knot of terror. Mr. Sir Jabulani was holding court with a group of equally well-fed gentlemen, Missus Dolce was shining in amongst a group of her peers, Thabo had attracted a group of beautiful hangers-on, but Jade was nowhere to be seen.

Eventually, he could stand it no longer! He slipped through, eased through the crowd with the practised grace only accomplished by the professional waiter, bent to Mr. Sir Jabulani, “May I have a word sir.” He intoned softly.

Mr. Sir Jabulani looked up, slightly drunkenly deposited his cut glass tumbler of whisky.

“Excuse me gentlemen.” He mumbled.

“What is it Jason.” He asked in annoyance as they breached a gap in the crowd.

“Please sir. Jade isn’t in the party. She disappeared a while ago. I’m worried, sir.” Jason stumbled over his words.

Mr. Sir Jabulani looked at him sceptically. Jason knew he was revealing a piece of himself but he had to! His concern was mounting by the second.

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“O.K. I’ll look for her.” Mr. Sir Jabulani relented in a sudden show of parental concern. “Get Victor to take over for you, it’ll be quicker if we both look.”

Jason rushed off, relieved to be in action, to be doing something! The knot in his stomach told him something was very wrong. By the time he returned, Mr. Sir Jabulani was already in the gargantuan house. Jason followed, climbed the stairs, took a left aimless, directionless but occupied with a mission nonetheless. He rushed, absolutely soundlessly, through the lushly carpeted hallways, looking in door after closed door. After what seemed like an age or a timeless void, he heard raised voices, a harsh tone. As he reached for the door handle, the unmistakeable sound of flesh striking flesh! He pushed the door open, for this moment with no thought of consequence.

Jade was standing in the centre of the room, her hand to her cheek, her eyes wide with fright. Mr. Sir Jabulani was towering above her, the wrath of an electric storm contained in his features, one big paw still poised to strike again. Behind Jade, on the massive bed, was the paraphernalia that accompanies much harder core drugs than those on offer down stairs. Three young men, who had obviously been trapped in the room, until Jason’s fortuitous advent, made an opportune escape behind him. Mr. Jabulani turned to him, took a mo153

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ment to realise who he was, such was the level of temper still in him.

“Thanks Jason, the little bitch was up to her old tricks again!” He turned his attention back to his daughter again. “You’re a bloody disgrace to this family!” He literally spat out. Jason could see the flecks of spittle dotting Jades perfect cheek.

“You’re the worst one Daddy.” She half shrieked, half sobbed, sounding for the all the world like a ten year old child.

Jason could see the enormous effort it took for Mr. Jabulani not to strike her again. The look he gave his daughter could have withered a stone statue to dust. Mr. Jabulani said nothing, turned on his heel with an air of absolute finality and left.

“Get back to work.” He directed Jason over his shoulder as he lumbered down the silent hallway.

A second later he was back, a huge shadow in the doorway.

“And you, get out!” He directed his newly arrived home, newly rehabilitated, newly sullied daughter.

Jason looked after him in shock as Mr. Jabulani retraced his steps. He was momentarily paralyzed, fixed to the spot as if by divine forces. He looked 154

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to Jade, wanting to make this all alright again.

How had everything gone so skew, so contrary to what should have taken place? Jade was glaring at him with a withering hatred, a look that could cut through tempered steel.

“Thanks asshole!” She spat at him.

He could discern the discolouration where Mr. Jabulani’s hand had struck, saw the where the immaculate hairdo had been displaced by that giant paw. The bottom of his world was falling out, his intestines felt as though they were in free-fall, and all he could do was stand dumbly rooted to the spot. He sure as hell was finally getting her attention! The ludicrous side of his mind thought.

Insanely, he felt like giggling. As vindictive as she was at this point, at least he got to be alone with her!

“Fucking asshole! Is that all you can do? Stand there looking like a retard?” She hissed at him as she stormed past, her cheeks soaked with tears.

Jason was at a total loss, of words and possible actions. Eventually, he got his muscles to mobilise, made his way back through the cotton-wool maze of corridors. Jade was not in attendance when he slipped back through the crowd. As he made his way back to his post, he scanned the groupings for her, but she was absent. Nothing for it but 155

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to get back to his job, follow orders. Surely Jade would pull herself together after that lambasting from her father?

He knew he wouldn’t dare to openly defy his mother whilst within physical reach! He became more and more certain that Jade and Mr. Jabulani would make up their differences in the morning.

She had gotten away with so much before, there was no way Mr. Jabulani would really put her out!?

He got back into the rhythm of his task, comfortable in the knowledge that Mr. Sir Jabulani was onto Jade, wouldn’t let her farther out of control.

He and Victor were having a fine time, making fun of the revellers, as they left in their various states of disrepair. Alcohol, narcotics did an excellent job of eroding civilised veneers to reveal the inane, insane or just downright stupid. As the hour grew later, the state of people leaving grew more hectic, Jason thanked God that he didn’t have to be driving on the roads at the same time as this lot.

All three of his pick-ups earlier were to stay over as house guests. But still, the humorous side was there, one older lady even mistaking the potted palms for the bathroom. He and Victor couldn’t contain that laughter.

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of a sudden, Jason’s blood ran like ice through his veins. In the pit of his belly, he knew that something was about to rip at the seams of his world.

Again. He left his post, followed the trail of that sound through the scattered crowds, still partying, oblivious. The air was split again, a plaintive wail, coming from the pool house. Jason sprinted in that direction, afraid of what he would find, yet desperate to see, to confirm his dread. He pushed his way through the small crowd, broke through.

Jade was sprawled on the pure white flokati rug.

Missus Dolce knelt next to her. She was the source of that scream, that haunting wail. She was rocking back and forth on her heels, clutching her belly, big tears streaked down her cheeks and splashed onto the supine figure of her daughter. There was no life in that beautiful creature, laid prone on the floor. A ruckus behind him. Mr. Jabulani parted the crowd like the Red Sea before the staff of Moses, his entourage efficiently pushing back the onlookers, securing the scene, taking charge of Missus Dolce, trying to breathe life back into that perfect mannequin.

“Jason!” Mr. Jabulani shouted.

Jason was unsure how long he’d been standing, watching all the drama unfold, unsure how long Mr. Jabulani had been trying to get his attention.

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“Jason!” He heard again, more emphatically this time. “Get these people off the property, calmly! But just get them out of here!” Mr. Jabulani barked.

Jason blinked, focused, his mind registered his boss’s face, the ashen caste to the skin, the sour smell of the alcohol on his breath. Jason turned, ran, back the way he had come, shouted for Victor.

“These people need to leave, in a hurry!”

The urgency in Jason’s voice allowed Victor no questions. They both took that sense of urgency and started operating, basically hustled, the now recalcitrant crowd into departing. Human nature, being what it is, the knowledge that a human drama was playing out in their very environs, brought out the Vampire in the throng, revealed the dormant heathen. But Jason and Victor were adamant, took full advantage of the skein of social grace. They brought the over-priced steel and deposited expensively-clad arses on butter-soft leather without missing a beat, listening to a protest or acknowledging an argument. Just get the fuck out of here! The sentence became Jason’s mantra, overcoming, deafening him to all other sound, blinding him to all other sights but what was directly in front of him.

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All except that one intrusive vision, that one snapshot that his mind had taken that he knew would never, ever be eradicated from his mind. Fuck, fuck, fuck!!! Jade’s half-lidded eyes, reflecting no light, no life, no vitality. Gone. He had known instantly that she was gone when his mind, his vision had zoomed in on those immensely dark pools, devoid of any spark. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!!!!!! He slammed the dashboard of the current hunk of metal. He took a deep swallow, quelled the rage that he felt rising in him from some immensely hot place in the centre of his being. He kept that rage at bay, kept that vision at bay, refused to acknowledge that certain knowledge. He focused entirely on evacuating the rest of the drunk and drugged, clearing a path to Jade, clearing away the obstacles that lay between him and his dormant Icon.

The better part of an hour later, the last of the outsiders were despatched beyond the great steel barricades of the main entrance gate. Only then did Jason hear approaching sirens. That fact, that one tiny detail, confirmed what he already knew.

Had known the instant his eyes had lighted upon Jades shuttered lenses. She was definitely, unequivocally, certainly dead! No paramedic, no doctor, no medical miracle, no heavenly miracle, no Hollywood miracle could bring the life back into that statuesque mirage. Statuesque. Statue. Now an ebony cast, a mahogany frieze of what was 159

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once alive and vital and animated.

Jason felt a vice-like grip on his arm, turned, caught Mr. Jabulani’s ashen visage out the corner of his eye.

“A word Jason!” Mr. Jabulani said through gritted teeth, as though the very act of speech was painful.

He steered Jason to the pool area, into the deep shadows of the surrounding palm foliage, turned him face to face.

“No need to mention what happened earlier, eh Jason?” He whispered emphatically, administering another vice-like squeeze to Jason’s bicep.

“No, no, not at all Mr, Sir.” Jason stammered, pinned as he was by that awesome glare.

“OK. Just so long as we’ve got that straight! The police should be here any second.” Mr. Jabulani uttered, walking out of the shadows toward the pool house.

Jason stared after him, stunned, followed trancelike. He had yet to fulfil his need, had to see Jade, had to make absolutely sure, had to try and understand that the Queen of his dreams was dead.

Dead. What a strange word to use to describe 160

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someone just starting up the ladder of life. His footfalls on the paving felt strange to him, his ears were ringing, making his head feel full, his heart wanted to thump its way out of his chest. He looked through the glass doors, suddenly needing the smoky haze as a barrier between him and the inevitable truth. The big muscle-Mary, who had helped clear the crowd, breached that barrier suddenly. Shockingly.

Jade lay in the middle of the white rug, in her white dress, in her haughty beauty for all the world like a sleeping fairy-tale princess just waiting for a kiss from her prince, her errant knight. Someone had blessedly closed those fathomless doorways to the pits of oblivion. It made no difference though, they were emblazoned on his mind. His Queen was one of ice. Her inimitable, haughty, haunted spirit no longer resided in her body. Never again would he be able to hold the dream of a favourable glance, a touch. Never again would he catch a whiff of her unmatchable fragrance.

The screeching of sirens shattered the stupendous silence. Again there was commotion and movement and energy. As if rushing around, now, could do any good! As if manic activity, now, could make up for the total lack of energetic response earlier in the evening! As Jason stood back and watched, he felt that volcano, that hot lava of anger spill over, felt it suffuse his entire being! Mr. Jabula161

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ni was to blame! It wasn’t a niggling thought. It wasn’t a conjecture reached by a long stretch of the imagination. It was a certainty! Had he behaved with even a modicum of emotion earlier, a hint of fatherly love, an ounce of human compassion Jade would not be lying on the floor in all her splendour, waiting for her funeral! By whatever means the doctors came up with for the fact of her death, Jason was absolute in his conviction that she had died by the hands of her father! He suddenly struggled to breathe, had to get away from the aimless calamity, the futile activity.

Jason walked, then ran to his quarters, sat in the dark listening to the filtered hub-bub, glad of the bricks and mortar and space separating him from the obscene scene. His rage made him feel impotent, past the point of seeking physical relief, past the point of seeking verbal relief. His hands shook uncontrollably, his cheeks burned, his muscles were tensed rock-solid. He took in breath, tried to relax his lungs, exhaled a sob. A guttural, animal sound rasping out of his throat, a precursor to a torrent of fluid from his eyes. Tears! He was crying damn it! Unacceptable! His fury at Mr. Jabulani was growing by the second!

All of a sudden, the inactivity was killing him, he had to do something! He paced his room flat, came back to the bed, sat with a thud, desperate to quell his sense of desperation. His heel thudded 162

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into the frame of the bed, into something more giving shoved under the bed. His bag! Maybe he had a forgotten stash in there, anything to take the edge off his temper! He hauled it out between his feet, started frantically hauling at the crap he’d not bothered to unpack, bending his finger back painfully on the solid edge of something thrust on the bottom. He dug further to root out the offending object, planning to kill it with a vengeance, plotting to wreak havoc on its offensive existence.

He grabbed and scrabbled blindly, triumphantly dragged out the hapless object, gave it a menacing glare.

His vision focused, blurred, cleared, refocused on the well-worn leather, dulled bronze cross of his Bible. The comfort he felt, at the sight of that long-forgotten friend, was extreme. The rage of a moment ago was gone, replaced by a deep emptiness, a bottomless pit needing to be filled, illumined. He gently rubbed the leather like he had done millions of times since he was nine and had received this very same book, in mint condition, from his Gogo. His thumb traced the indentation of the branded cross, knew the smooth edges, followed the trail with certain knowledge of every imperfection. He reached over and turned on the bedside light, his fingers of their own volition seeking the page, the place, the chapter, the verse that would bring him the solace he so desperately craved. It had been so many years since 163

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he had thought to turn here for guidance. It was since he had come to this city of lies, since he had started chasing his celluloid dream, his misty fantasy. He felt as though he had found something precious, once lost.

When he became cognizant of his surroundings again, he found himself in an ominously silent environment. The sun was peeking through the gaps in the curtains, letting him know that at least a couple of hours had passed while he drank in the words that his soul craved. He felt right again, straight, aligned. His arrow on his moral compass pointed, sure and steady, north again. Strangely enough, he felt high, as if he had just had a couple of lines if the icest coke. A natural, no side-effect high! Jade was still dead, Mr. Jabulani was still to blame, but Jason had shed the emotional load.

The burden of her death was on Mr. Jabulani’s shoulders, not his! He had tried to warn him, had tried to save Jade, had followed his instincts. He would carry the sorrow for the fact of her death forever, nothing more than that.

He showered, dressed, saw the evidence of his grief in the puffiness of his face, the redness of his eyes. His grief would be nothing to that of her family though, he reminded himself. Got to go and face the day, got to see if he could be of any assistance. The words he had read were a salve around his heart, would be an armour in 164

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the next difficult period. There was bound to be countless tasks in preparation for the burial. Funeral. He felt the prick of tears behind his eyes, swallowed hard on the lump in his throat. Grow up! He admonished himself. There was certain relief in movement. Just keep moving! Down the stairs, through the garage, to the kitchen. Make yourself useful! He ran smack, bang into the solid form of Mr. Jabulani.

“Sorry sir,” he blurted out “I’m very sorry sir!” He repeated, trying to convey the full import of his emotion, the full scope of his meaning.

“All right, all right!” Mr. Jabulani snapped, pinning him with bloodshot eyes “Be on hand and awake today Jason! We have a lot to do!” Mr. Jabulani barked.

Jason watched his retreating back as Mr. Jabulani made his way to the garages, keys to the BMW jingling rhythmically into his palm and back.

“Where’s he going?” He inquired of Gogo as he entered the kitchen.

She was hunched over the counter, pretending to make tea. He saw the plump shoulders raise in an ‘I don’t know’ gesture, watched as they fell back to their silent quaking. As he came around to her side he saw the early morning sun glint on 165

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a fat tear as it coursed its way down her chubby cheek. He had to offer her comfort! Had to reach out to this fellow sufferer! He awkwardly patted her arm, withdrew his hand. Hell, Gogo had practically raised Jade, had spent more time with her than either of her parents. Gogo certainly showed more emotion than the father who had just left the scene so hurriedly!

“Where’s Missus Dolce?” he asked.

“U-u-u-p stairs.” Gogo sobbed into her handkerchief, blew noisily, tucked the fringed linen into her bosom.

Upstairs. Upstairs? And Mr. Jabulani was going out? He couldn’t get this man! Every time Jason imagined a course of action Mr. Jabulani would, should take he did exactly the opposite of what would be expected! Missus Dolce, upstairs, presumably alone at a time like this? These people seemed stranger and stranger by the minute. It wasn’t the money, the wealth. Jason had thought that that was it at first. On this particular morning, at this particular time, in these particular circumstances the anomaly became clear to him. It was the lack of human emotion. The disconnection between what should have been a strong, united family. They certainly were a blessed family in terms of material wealth. But that very wealth seemed to have robbed them of their humanity.

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Jason patted the quaking shoulder again, reaching out to Gogo made him feel better. They stood in silence for the better part of ten minutes, each lost in thought of the human no longer with them.

“Ai, ai, ai!” Gogo eventually stirred, started, “I must make Missus Dolce’s tea.” She almost sobbed her words.

Jason came back forcibly, involuntarily, at her words. He remembered he should be performing duties, should stay in motion.

“Where is she? Jade?” he asked tentatively. He hadn’t stuck around to see her taken off earlier in the morning.

“The ambulance took her. They want to see what killed her.” Gogo dissolved again, her cheeks were soaked with spent tears. “They want to have the funeral on Wednesday.” This last was barely audible through her sobs.

The intercom buzzer jangled Jason’s nerves, brought Gogo back to attention. Missus Dolce was summoning. Best to be strong for her, her pain would be greater, deeper. Jason drew on that absolute sense of comfort he had felt a while ago reading from that book that seemed to know every pain.

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“I’ll take Missus Dolce’s tea. You go wash your face.” He took charge, a quiet certainty made his actions sure and gentle, “Go, I’ll be fine.” he urged her.

Gogo left to go to her room, the relief at Jason’s kindness and strength evident in her whole body.

For once he was not mimicking any character he had seen on screen. For this day he had remembered who he really was, the spark of his true personality was alight. Not a conflagration, but a tiny bright spark nonetheless, of his own self was present. Brought to life at the advent of someone else’s death. He took the tray Gogo had prepared, moved quietly through the silent house, navigating his way to Missus Dolce’s sanctum.

He knocked softly at her door, expertly balancing the tray with a practised hand. Missus Dolce opened the door. She was fully dressed and madeup, not a hair out of place. The only evidence of the cataclysmic event, a slight puffiness around the eyes, a vacant expression in the eyes.

“Thank you – Jason is it?” She said softly, “Have you seen my husband yet this morning?”

“I – yes Ma’am, he just left, about 15 minutes ago.”

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“Then I’ll need you to be available in – let’s say – half-an-hour?” She raised one eyebrow, tilted her head, waiting for his affirmation. He nodded by way of reply. “Good.” She said, taking the tray from him, kicking the door closed shut with her heel.

Jason stood staring at the mute plank of wood in front of him, struggling to comprehend. He eventually roused himself, made his way back to the kitchen, gave Gogo a hug, made his way to the garages to get the limo ready. When he pulled around to the front of the house, Missus Dolce was already waiting for him on the front steps, picture perfect. He opened the door for her, wanted to, restrained himself from, reaching out, offering a measure of comfort. She was unapproachable, hidden behind her shades, her shield of ice. She gave him an address, directions, in an impersonal tone, closed herself behind the privacy window, inaccessible.

He followed the direction of that other impersonal lady in the car, the one that came from his GPRS, to the blackened glass facade of a funeral home. It struck him, like a ton of bricks, that this was absolutely real! Missus Dolce swept into that dark, cold cavern in a swirl of Chanel No5, alone, to arrange her daughters final soirée. Jason sat in 169

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the car feeling totally, utterly, absolutely isolated.

An overwhelming need to reach out to another human being swept over him again. He pressed ‘connect’ to his mothers’ number. Whatever the irritation of the first couple of minutes, it would be worth it.

“Hola!” she answered.

What the hell! She was bright and sparkly and bubbly. Hola? Did she think she was twenty? He felt the corners of his mouth turn up in an involuntary grin. This was good!

“Dumela Mme.” “Haaai!” he heard the screech of joy, revelled in it, gloried in the bond that stretched over hundreds of kilometres, powerful enough to envelope him in a love that the Ngcobo family could not feel an arms length away from each other. The contrast was extreme!

“Mme, ssh. Hola.” He smiled down the line.

“I was just thinking about you, right now!” she said emphatically.

“Right now?” he questioned.

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son.�

Jason could feel the depth of emotion behind the words, could feel the love. It was as if she had known exactly what he had needed at that precise moment. He felt a sob build up, swallowed hard once, twice, pulled himself together. He couldn’t show his pain, reveal the truth, she would demand that he come home. He told all the things that he knew would soothe her, lied through his teeth the entire conversation, to set her mind at rest. He let her chatter on at length about the mundane concerns and events of rural life. It made him feel comforted, soothed in a way that no chemical, no amount of money, could. He listened until he saw Missus Dolce appear in the vacuum of the funeral home facade, and even, then didn’t want to disconnect.

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The day of Jade’s funeral dawned in perfection.

It was as if every shrub, every tree decided on this particular morning to go into full blossom. In the early morning sparkles of sunlight, the dew beamed like thousands of rainbows on every living thing. Jason took a long walk through the grounds before he made his way to the kitchen, before he faced the family on this day of sadness.

Gogo was already in the kitchen, bustling around, an apron covering her best outfit, ready to say goodbye to the girl she had raised.

“The funeral is at 10 o’clock. Mr. Jabulani said you must be ready on time wena!” she put on a fake cross-face, masking her sadness. Jason had not failed in his duties since he had been here! Jason patted her shoulder, cringing inwardly at the coldness in the house, the utter silence, the absolute loneliness that typified Jade’s passing.

“You are going to work hard today Gogo!”

Jason teased, trying to lighten the sombre mood, referring to the preparation of typical funeral cuisine.

“No, no, no.” Gogo muttered. Jason could sense 172

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the displeasure in her tone, “Missus Dolce arranged for the caterers.� Gogo slapped her washcloth onto the granite top.

Jason was taken aback, again, in this household devoid of tradition. For the passing of a child of such an important man and there would be no cow slaughtered, no community of ladies chopping and slicing and boiling and singing over pots? He left for the garages, the atmosphere in the house had become too cloying, like a vacuum devoid of any living thing. He polished and brushed the limo to gleaming perfection, gave the BMW and the Merc the same treatment. Even his admiration for the cars had lost that blind-love glow of several months ago. So much seemed to have transpired, in the back of that limo, to cut his dream-world to shreds. He was running out of places to hide away from reality. He retreated to his room, sought out peace in his bible.

The hearse arrived at 9:30 am. Jason watched from his bedroom window as the snow white automobile crunched gracefully across the gravel drive. He hurried down the stairs, brought the limo around sedately to park behind Jade’s last ride. The half-an-hour that he sat and waited behind that white metal and tinted glass exterior, his mind took many flights of nightmarish fancy.

Just the knowledge that Jades body lay a couple of meters away, gave him goose bumps. His 173

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love of horror movies now counted against him as one horrific scene after another chased its’ way around his brain.

He felt sheer relief when cars started arriving, people appearing on the vast marble stairs. He was glad of the sudden activity, the call to duty.

He swore blind that that corpse was about to leap from the back of the hearse! He opened the door for Mr. Jabulani and Missus Dolce. This would be the first time that he would see them together in the back of the limo. It was sad that it was for an occasion such as this. The procession to the church was sombre, Jade was carried out by the pall-bearers in a gleaming white coffin adorned with yellow and white roses. Forever more, Jason would associate the colour white with the beautiful Jade.

The church service was stilted and formal and before Jason realised it, over. A prayer, a word, a hymn. Done. Everybody traipsed to the cars again, another procession, Jade in splendid white, the star of the show. Maybe at the graveside they would observe tradition? Jason thought. But she was laid to rest, in her hole in the ground, under a spreading oak tree with just as little consideration. No-one speaking as to her achievements, no-one remembering her fondly, no-one speaking as to who she had once been on this earth.

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Yet the turnout was huge. A veritable who’s who of Jozi society, politics and money. It finally clicked in Jason’s brain as they moved off from the graveside that this was a show for the living not a farewell to the dead. He had to try hard to avoid the clusters of attendees who were actually standing and posing with their masks of fake tragedy well set. He drove back to the estate with a gnawing ache in his belly. His expectations had again been dashed, the search for familiarity, humanity in this family, in this society was a futile one.

His understanding of that tragic girl lying in the ground was absolute, she had had nowhere else to go but out.

The procession reached the estate and Jason and Victor, again, performed valet services. He realised that this is what people had actually come for. The snippets of gossip that he picked up, just in between parking cars, was a ceaseless fest of conjecture. When he ventured to peep into the vast reception room, he would have been hard pressed to guess that someone had just departed this earth. This party needed no encouragement to get underway. No-one seemed to mind that it wasn’t even 12pm yet and the booze was already flowing like rampant floodwaters. Someone had turned on the stereo and he could hear the oonce oonce of dance music pouring out the house. No Rebeca Molope to soothe aching hearts with uplifting gospel notes, no Danny O, no Koleka, no 175

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Deborah to remind the mourners of Jades reunion with, her ascension to join the Ancestors. These savage people wanted to dance!

And gossip! Forget about not speaking ill of the dead! The circumstances of Jades death, which he himself knew intimately, had been so distorted that he started doubting his own knowledge. The stories ranged from overdose to 9mm to shotgun blasts to slit wrists and rivers of blood. More than anything, this sickened Jason. He knew in the deepest part of his being that that slap from the father that she loved, that rejection from the man she adored, that banishment by the only person she wanted to impress, that is what had been the cause of her death. The autopsy had confirmed heart failure due to an overdose of cocaine. But Jason knew. These fools with rampant mouths and careless tongues were systematically destroying Jade without a care and he had to stand by and hold his tongue? When all he wanted to do was shout the truth from the rooftops. That hot lava of rage was again eating at his insides to be released in an explosive torrent!

The afternoon dragged slowly on. The funeral of Jade, Queen of his dreams, had turned into a common, garden-variety revelry with the drunkenness and debauchery that accompany such occasions. Jason saw Mr. Jabulani and another man wandering down the marble steps, drinks in 176

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hand. He slipped after them, hoping to offer condolences, wishing for a comrade to join him in his mourning.

“A bit sad.” He heard the fat, white mogul offer.

“Ah shit, she was bound to get it right some time or another!” Jabulani spat “She was weak, since she was a baby! Now my son! That’s were I look to for my line to continue! A good strong boy! A strong mind!”

Both men laughed and raised their glasses sloppily in a salute to all things masculine. Jason wanted to shove his fist right down Jabulani’s arrogant throat!

“Jabulani!” he shouted, remaing rooted to the spot.

Jabulani turned, frowning in annoyance at the interruption.

“Jabulani!” he reiterated “I’m leaving!”. Jason reached into his pocket, lighted on the familiar shape of the limo key, tossed them in the general direction of his erstwhile ex-boss. The look of arrogant indignation had skewed Jabulani’s bloated features. Jason wondered how he had ever held this pompous fool in such high regard. The timeworn features of his own father swam into view 177

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in his minds eye. The lips perpetually curled in amusement, the merry twinkle in the eye no matter how tired, the overall impression of a gentle strength. This ‘great’ man was ugly! Jason turned on his heel, stalked off blindly.

“It’s Mr. To you!” he heard Jabulani shout at his retreating back. Mr.! Mr.? Go get fucked! No Mr., no Sir, this man didn’t even deserve the respect of a dog!

Jason packed with the haphazard energy borne of fury. Until the very instant the words had breached his lips, he had not known that this is what he would do. But once uttered, once the course of action taken, he felt an enormous relief at the decision. Had he agonised over the idea, he would never have blown the opportunities that this job afforded him, would never have walked away from the money and the estate and the car and the luxury of his surroundings. Once done, once said however, he started to think that this had been what he had to do ever since the night he had met the craven man. Say no and walk away!

That’s what he should have done! He had allowed himself to be bought over by trappings and comfort, he had ignored his instinct, had suborned his own morals, had forgotten where he came from, what he knew to be true and right.

He grabbed up his stuff, gave the room one last 178

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look and headed out, through the garages, down the long driveway in the gathering spring dusk.

Halfway down, with the huge gate in sight, he heard and felt the scrunch of gravel under the wheels of a carelessly driven car. He moved off to the side, waited for the silver Ferrari to pass, to leave him to complete his own little walk to freedom. The car did not go past, but skidded to a halt alongside him. The window flanking him slid down silently to reveal the handsome visage of Thabo, who was leaning awkwardly across the passenger seat.

“Come! Get in!” he ordered, sounding none too sober.

Jason thought for an instant, acted an instant later than that. What the hell! He might as well drive out of here in style, not like a dog who had just been kicked!

“Where ya goin’?” The fake American accent was thick and annoying.

Jason tried to think, caught sight of Thabo out the corner of his eye, realised he wasn’t even waiting for a reply. The car was already out the gate and heading towards town, no matter what Jason would have replied.

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drawled, “That party was just drink and talk.”

Oooh! This was a mistake! The voice in Jason’s Head bellowed. This bozo brother of Jades’ was so out of touch he considered her funeral a party!

But he really could do with a couple of lines right now. He directed Thabo to Jabulani’s up-market supplier. He had been a thousand times before, there shouldn’t be a problem scoring with Thabo. They got four grams, a bit excessive Jason thought, but what the hell! It was Thabo’s money, he could do what he wanted to with it.

As night fell, they took their first line, saluted with a slug of Glenlivet, straight out of the bottle. Thabo howled at the newly-risen moon and the party was on! For the first time Jason felt like he was inside the bubble, not just poking at the periphery.

It was exciting, thrilling to be with someone his own age. The car was bling, the money flowed, they were young and free and unstoppable!

Thabo took them from one nightspot to the other until, finally, Jason didn’t actually know where he was. The mixture of adrenaline, good quality booze and even better quality coke had its effect on him, no matter how good he had previously thought his tolerance levels to be. When he became aware again, he was sitting in a plush, half-moon booth in the company of Thabo and four gorgeous girls, ranging in hue from platinum 180

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blonde ivory to full afro ebony. He appeared to be doing ok, he was really cosy with two of the girls, had a dopey grin on his face and a half-full tumbler of whiskey in front of him. He tried to straighten up, all of a sudden needed to escape.

He needed to get to the bathroom, anywhere private to take stock, to try to remember the past couple of hours.

Jason excused himself, hauled himself out of the booth, caught himself stumbling three steps sideways to the mirth of the party watching his departure. In the bathrooms, he splashed water on his face, tried to focus on the face that stared back at him. He heard the door crashing open, saw Thabo stumbling in.

“Come on dude! A bullet will make you feel better! Girls are waiting!” he sing-songed, giving a lascivious wink as he held out the little silver container. Jason complied. Two bullets for each nostril, splashed more water on his face and started feeling the control flood back into him.

“Better?” Thabo grinned “Come, let’s blow thisjoint!” he drawled.

Jason agreed vehemently! Fresh air seemed a million kilometres away, yet the very thing he needed. Thabo wobbled back to the booth, threw a wad of money on the table in a flourish, thanked the 181

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girls for their time. Jason was puzzled he had assumed the ladies would be coming with. His need to get out of the cloying environment superseded the need for company for clarity. Thabo read his expression perfectly as they headed for the exit.

“No space in the car, remember?” he teased.

Jason forgot that they weren’t in that cantankerous tank of a stretch limo. The Ferrari was built for two. There was no room for four more bodies.

“Besides there’s ALWAYS more girls!” Thabo whooped like an out-of-control schoolboy. Jason sank into the car, feeling measurably better, glad that he was out of the loud, smoky interior of the club. Thabo pulled away from the curb with screeching tyres and a screaming engine, pushing the envelope of adrenaline all the way. They roared through the deserted city streets, skipping robots, ignoring lanes, turning at the last second on a whim! Jason held on for dear life, suddenly sober, awake and afraid. They rounded a corner, on what felt to Jason, like two wheels. Thabo floored the accelerator the instant the rubber found traction. In the next second all Jason could see was a pair of eyes rounded hugely in pure fright.

When the dipped nose of the bonnet caught the old hobo just below the knees, Jason knew his life was going to be irrevocably changed. In that 182

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strange distortion of action, time, thought the old bag-man seemed to traverse the bonnet, the windshield, the roof in slow motion. For a split second, he caught the look of sheer terror in the old mans eyes a pane of glass away, heard the sickening crunch over the sound of the engine, could still see the blood and mucus and heaven knows what else on the windshield in front of him. They were already hurtling along, fully three blocks and two corners away from what could only be a lifeless corpse.

Jason sat, frozen, staring dead ahead. Thabo hadn’t even tried to avoid the man, hadn’t even tried to brake! Thabo whooped mightily out the window, like a conquering hero. The whole of Jason’s world went dead quiet, dead calm.

“Stop!” he commanded. His tone immediately caught Thabo’s attention, even though his volume had barely risen.

“It was just an old hobo!” Thabo insisted, trying to pat his arm “How about another bullet, feel that rush properly!”

“I said stop!” Jason bellowed.

Thabo screeched the car to a standstill amidst a cloud of smoke from expensive rubber. Jason didn’t hesitate, he grabbed his belongings and 183

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bolted into the night.

“It was just a fucking hobo!” he heard Thabo screaming into the vacant void of night that he left in his wake.

He tried to put as much distance between himself and the spoiled maniac as possible. He walked blindly through one derelict alleyway after another, trying to process those insane events, trying to make sense where all reason had fled. He kicked out at a bundle of rags in the urine-soaked alleyway needing, desperately, to vent his pent up anger and frustration and disgust at himself. He punched the unforgiving brick of the wall, kicked out again.

The bundle of rags moaned! Oh shit! There was someone in there! He couldn’t do a hit and run, make that a kick and run, twice in one night! He bent down, peeled back the layers of filthy blanket until he saw the general shape of a head, heard a soft moan. He lit his Zippo, was taken aback as he saw the face revealed in that filthy pile. He knew that face! Much more hollowed out, eyes sunken, cheek bones prominent bet still unmistakable. The cleft in the chin, the dimples that he knew would appear when she smiled. Thandi!!!

What the fuck was she doing, lying in an alleyway in Jozi? She had a room above the tavern to the North, how had she ended up here?

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He couldn’t get a response out of her, absolutely couldn’t leave her lying there. He picked her up, tossed her over his shoulder, filthy blankets and all. He was a man with a mission all of a sudden.

Get a room, get her off the streets, find a place where he could think what to do next. He booked them into the first Seedy, rat infested ‘hotel’ he came across. He thanked God that he had been able to save substantially while in the employ of Jabulani. The money would be enough to keep them safe for a good long while.

Once in the room, the smell emanating from the blankets became unbearable, he had to get rid of them! He unrolled Thandi and unceremoniously tossed them out the window into the alleyway below. He turned back to inspect Thandi, who had rolled out onto the squeaky bed. She was in a state! Not coke, not drink. That hadn’t turned her into this wreck so relatively quickly.

She was purely flesh and bone, huge sores dotted all the flesh he could see, and presumably what he could not see. He turned one stick-thin arm over in trepidation. No tracks? What the fuck? He would have to wait for her to wake up to find out just what poison she was self-administering to have gotten her in this state! Jason covered Thandi with the threadbare bedspread and fell, exhausted, into the rickety chair by her bedside.

He fell asleep like that, watching her chest rising 185

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and falling erratically.

A pale shaft of filtered sunlight momentarily blinded him as he came awake. Thandi lay exactly as he had left her. He doubted she had felt a bed under her body in quite a while. Nor a bath! After spending the night surrounded by her fetid stench, Jason could stand it no more. He found an old pot in the closet, made his way down the dilapidated hall to the bathroom at the end. It was too much to hope for hot water in this dump, cold would have to do, would be better than nothing. When he got back to the room he gently undressed her.

He didn’t exactly want to invade her privacy, but the stench was awful. Besides, he reasoned, he had seen absolutely all of her on numerous occasions!

Jason washed her down with the care of a mother to a child. All the pent up emotion of the past week, all the horror of last night expressed itself in gentleness. All the desire to care, to heal, yet never released had found a outlet in the personage of Thandi, laid supine, unconscious, unresisting before him. The tenderness with which he dealt with her cleansing was in direct contrast to the utter rage that had been seething in him. The act of caring for Thandi soothed Jason in an inexplicable way. He had looked down on this woman, had perceived her to be a cheap drug-addicted whore not so long ago. Yet, for some reason, he 186

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knew with certainty that he wanted to heal her, to fix her, to make her well, to help expunge her demons.

He slipped out while she slept, exploring the nearby shops, buying essentials, hunting, gathering, toting his haul back to the little cave on the second floor. Thandi was stirring, murmuring, tossing in the creaky little bed. He set down his parcels, took up watch beside her, determined that nothing bad should befall this human being.

“What the fuck!?!” Her hoarse voice brought him out of his doze.

She was sitting up in the bed, clutching the blanket to her chest, eyes huge and full of fear. The room was hazy in the semi-dark of late afternoon.

Jason leaned over and switched on the little bedside lamp.

“Holy shit! Jason?” she looked at him questioningly. “ How did we end up here? Where are we?

Did we fuck?” She shot the questions at him, trying to find a way out of the confusing maze in her head.

“Ssh, ssh, calm down.” He spoke softly, trying to instil, in her, the calm that had engulfed him. “Get dressed, there’s clothes in here,” he said, tossing her one of the bags “hope they fit.”

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Thandi looked sceptically from the bag to him, back again to the bag, trying to comprehend.

Eventually, the girl in her won, excitement at the prospect of new clothes. Jason took great pleasure in watching her frantically paw through the garments he had selected. She uhm and ah’d and shot him a look that told him he was stupid, but her delight transfused her features, transformed the junkie whore into a shining beauty in that moment. She dressed under the blanket in a sudden awkward attempt at modesty. For some reason it was as if they had never met before. Perhaps they hadn’t, not as the characters that they were in this moment.

“Hungry?” he asked. Jason had waited until she woke up, before he would relent and eat anything. The smell of fried chicken, all of a sudden, became like a living entity in the room once mentioned. They ate ravenously, not speaking, until they were both sated. Warm and safe and full.

They were content to just sit back and be for the time being. To fill in the blanks, answer the questions, make the decisions in a little while. To just enjoy being alive and together for this instant.

When they finally did start talking, they couldn’t stop. This was a new experience for Jason. Truly getting to know another human being. Thandi’s downfall was rocks, a drug he had never tried be188

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fore nor ever wanted to, after he saw Thandi’s condition. After she was fed, after she started to feel better, after she realised that Jason had money, she turned to every trick in her extensive book to convince him to provide her with her poison.

Jason resisted, sustained them in their little room for two weeks. It took every ounce of his will and strength to keep Thandi from the streets that he knew would kill her.

In the early morning hours of the third week, after an horrendous battle of wills, Jason decided that he had to get his new-found dream, away from the thing that she craved, away from the poison that would take her away from him. Under the pretext of getting supplies, he arranged passage for them the next morning, hurriedly purchased food and hot-footed it back to the room. He was deathly afraid of leaving her for too long. Even a locked door wouldn’t keep her in, given enough time.

The destination he had chosen surprised him, but the clarity with which he saw the solution to this problem was crystal. He packed their belongings, promised an adventure, gave no hints. His decision was unilateral. That miasma of his childish dream was inconsequential now that he had found a greater purpose. Thandi would not, could not make a correct choice right now, while her brain was fixated on that deathly chemical. She 189

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would just have to trust him. He would prove that he was worth that trust.

At the crowded bus station, he panicked. He could lose her so easily, here in the jostling melee. He grabbed a hold of her arm, refusing to let them be parted for even a second. He only felt safe when they were wedged into their seats and the wheels were rolling rhythmically beneath them.

Only then did he feel his lungs ease and his heart begin to thump regularly.

“So, can I ask now where we are going?” she asked him belligerently, a feisty spark igniting her beauty.

“Home” said Jason softly “we’re going home!” he said more decisively.

The trip was a long and arduous one, but with every kilometre, Jason became more certain that his decision was the perfect one. In that fantastical dream of his, he had pictured himself roaring triumphantly back home in some gleaming metal monster, dressed to kill, blinged to the hilt, blonde by his side, just like the movies. He grinned quietly to himself at the disparity between the reality and the fantasy. Yet he surprisingly felt no shame at his return home such as it was. Rickety bus, jostling crowd, a squawking chicken or two. He was part of this, a single unit in a big, beautiful, 190

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powerful whole. His dream was smoke and mirrors compared to the reality of Thandi’s presence pressing against his own. He was coming home the wealthiest man in all the world.

“How long till we get there Jason?” Thandi asked him sleepily, contentedly.

Jason took that adorable chin gently between thumb and forefinger, tilted her face to his, locked her eyes to his, determined to import the importance of his next words.

“My name is Nkosi!”

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Nkosi walked the path he walked every day. His arms were laden, a basket of fresh fruit and vegetables from the farm in one hand, a plump chicken in the other. It was two years since his return home. Work as the accountant for the commercial farm was fulfilling. The services he provided as the village accountant were exciting. In his naivety, he had not realised that his home was self sustaining. He had been to blinded by the lights to see that all he had ever wanted or needed was right there in front of him all the time.

Everything, except Thandi of course. That sojourn in the city had not been a waste, he thought to himself as he sure-footedly made his way into the valley that resembled his vision of paradise. He couldn’t help grinning to himself, caught sight of the subject of his thoughts.

Thandi was bathed in the golden red glow of the summer sunset, perfectly posed in the field of summer wildflowers. She looked in his direction, as if his gaze had physically lighted on her. A radiant smile lit her from within when she did catch sight of him. She had rounded out, her belly was swollen with their first child, her eyes glowed back at him with the soft light of love.

Nkosi was truly the wealthiest man in the world!

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