C H A P T E R O N E

☆☆☆

ROBERT HEARTH

1998

☆☆☆

I assumed other people knew when they're going to meet the love of their life, I reckoned that they woke up one day and the atmosphere was a little different. I think that they had perhaps rolled out of bed and cleaned up well and got out there and when they meet the love of their life, fireworks exploded in the sky and flock of birds flew in a heart shape above their heads and the whole world knew that they'd found the one. That's how the chick flicks my little sister used to be obsessed with would portray that, but the day I met the love of my life was a day ripped out of the book of commonplace.

As a twenty-four year-old guy who had grown up in a remote farming town in Free State, I had been born to be outside: to run through the endless mealie fields on my parent's farm and out into the veld beyond. to Climb the trees of the high veld during the day when it was hot so the leaves could protect me from the glare of the sun. To hunt birds with my friends during the holidays and swim in the Orange River and camp near its vicinity.

I had always imagined myself having a career in tennis since I was a little boy - to play and practice to my heart's content: travelling all over the world to participate in world tournaments and acquiring new skills and achieving the goals I had set for myself.

An unfortunate knee injury had made a pursuit in tennis impossible, so I'd had to settle for the next best thing. As much as I enjoyed Architecture and its components, the glamour of being an architect on paper wasn't as enticing in real life.

With an Honours degree and a position as a Junior Architect in Cotzee's Architectural Firm in South Africa's best city, I had made my parents very proud and they had something to boast about to their friends back at home - but the monotony of my day-to-day life made me miserable.

On that particular day, I had been on my lunch break with the intent to catch a break from the stifling confines of the office, but the heat, congestion and noise of the Pretoria CBD during rush hour made it impossible to find any semblance of peace and it only made me further agitated.

I supposed I shouldn't have gone into a Nandos of all places, but it had been my favourite fast food outlet ever since I was a little boy.

Our town had only had a KFC so I had only been able to enjoy Nandos whenever I my father would take trips into the next town for supplies for the farm.

Nandos had been a place of good memories for me and in the six months I had worked at Cotzee's, I had never left the office for my lunch break, so I figured I should have settled for something I was familiar with.

When I'd made it into the restaurant, I had managed to snatch the last table that was adjacent to the windows that looked out into the street. The place was abuzz with the voices of many patrons and it had gotten so busy that the cashier had to shout orders to be heard over the din.

I had half a mind to leave, but I'd already settled down: my blazer was draped over my chair and the day's newspaper was already opened to the crossword puzzle.

I waited for fifteen minutes to be served by a pudgy, disarrayed waitress. She had asked me to repeat my order so many times, I feared she hadn't gotten it right. She had toddled away and another half hour passed without any sign of my food arriving. I passed the time by solving the crossword.

The acute grumble in my stomach reminded me of the fact that only fifteen minutes of my break remained and I still hadn't eaten a thing.

"Hello sir, may I please have your order?"

The voice that spoke was different to that of the waitress from half an hour ago, so I assumed that she was talking to the people at the table in front of me.

"Excuse me sir, may I please have your order," the voice said again. It was closer this time and I snapped my eyes up to look up at the woman who owned it.

She was gorgeous. I'd never been one to throw adjectives around, but this woman was one of the most attractive women I had ever seen, but my short temper wasn't concerned with the affairs of my lust. I was hungry and frustrated.

"I've already ordered," I replied.

"My colleague was unable to process your order. I was sent here to take it for you, what would you like to order?"

"You have got to be kidding me!"

"I know it's inconvenient-"

"It's more than inconvenient - I have been sitting here for forty-five minutes and my order wasn't even processed? In what world do you think that it's okay to treat a customer like this? I have less than five minutes to get back to work and I have not been served."

On a good day I would never raise my voice at a woman, but I had been pushed too far.

"Listen here, Boeta, you will not speak to me in that tone," the waitress replied, her face twisted into a frown.

"Excuse me? You are the ones in the wrong here-"

"Yes, but there's no need to speak to me in that tone. My colleague just collapsed in the storage pantry twenty minutes ago and she's pregnant. You can imagine the last thing on her agenda right now is serving you. I was sent here in her place. Now, will you order something or will you just fuck off?"

"Ntombi!" one of the other waitresses that had been serving at a nearby table cried.

"I am tired of abelungu thinking that because they're white that the whole world has to bow at their feet!" she replied to her colleague, "listen here, Boeta, apartheid is over and you will not speak to black people whichever way you want. Learn some respect gaa!" she then turned on her heels and stalked away.

The entire restaurant had come to a standstill after the altercation between the waitress and I. There were so many different emotions running through me, the most prominent one was absolute shame. I was ashamed that I had spoken so poorly to someone - a woman no less, who was just trying to do her job.

I was also ashamed that an entire restaurant had witnessed the ordeal. My break was well and truly over now, so I gathered my things and walked out of there as fast as I could and ordered a ham and cheese sandwich at the Shell petrol station.

I hadn't been able to focus at work for the rest of the day and when 17:00 finally rolled around, I was more than ready to go home with a bottle of wine and forget about that day. The knock-off hour traffic was the stuff nightmares were made of and I'd made the mistake of stopping at a liquor stop in the CBD as soon as I'd knocked off and that had added an extra fifteen minutes into my journey.

As I was driving down Walker street, I noticed the woman from Nandos a few hours back. I wouldn't have recognized her had my headlights been off. She walked alone, with her hands stuffed deep into her pocket. I slowed the car down and lowered the passenger window.

"Hi," I said.

She turned her head to the side and when she saw that it was me, she quickened her pace.

"I'm sorry for what happened earlier, can I make it up to you?"

"If I never have to see your face ever again, it will be enough of an apology."

"Let me drop you off at home,"

At that she actually stopped and turned her body to face the window.

"Do I look like I need a lift home?"

"It's getting late and it's not safe here," I replied.

She scoffed, "Where do you live meneer?"

I wouldn't admit it to anyone, but the way in which she used the terms boeta and meneer to refer to me were said in the most condescending of tones and for the first time in my life, I felt ashamed of my whiteness.

"Waterkloof," I replied.

She cackled, but there was no humour in in the sound, "Your idea of safe and my idea of safe are two totally different things."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means that your idea of unsafe is a tsotsi from Mamelodi - who is probably my neighbour whom I've known for years - and where I come from, the only unsafe thing is a white boeta in a police uniform. Have a good night meneer," she replied, before she took a sharp turn into a an alley and disappeared into the night.

I knocked off an hour earlier the next day and I waited outside Nandos for her to knock off, with a bouquet of flowers in my hand.

As soon as she saw me leaned against my car, she made a sound of discontent and walked off without paying me a second glance.

I chased after her and dodged the oncoming influx of people who were all walking in in the opposite direction.

I caught up to her and matched her walk stride for stride.

"I think we started of on the wrong foot."

"No one told you to be a rude asshole."

"I agree and I'm sorry I-"

"I thought I told you that never seeing your face ever again was enough of an apology, so why are you here?"

"Because, I want to get to know you," I said as I came to stand in front of her. I knew I was creating more traffic by making people walk around me, but I didn't care, not when I had other pressing matters at hand.

"I got these for you," I said and pushed the flowers to her direction.

She grabbed the bouquet with and before I could say anything and began to rip the petals off of the bud.

"What am I supposed to do with these leaves? What do they fix? Do you think I'm just a vapid flower pot that will accept your nonsensical gifts?" she said as she continued to rip the petals. I could hear my heart stutter at her rejection, but all I could do was just watch in a horrified silence.

Half of the bouquet was already ruined when she threw the rest of it on the floor and stomped on it with one foot.

"I don't ever want to see you again! Leave me alone!" she turned on her heels and crossed the street while I stood there, dazed. I hadn't had the heart to pick up the pitiful-looking bunch.

It took her a month to finally talk to me again. Every time that I would wait for her after her shifts; she'd walk right past me, spewing insults until my ears would burn with shame.

I didn't let it derail my plan and I still waited outside Nandos for her every day after her shift, leaned against my car. There was only a one hour gap between our respective knock off times so the wait was not long, but I would've waited long for her if I needed to.

I needed her to acknowledge my presence. She didn't need to talk to me. I just needed her to see me and for her to know that I was there for her and only her, until she would give me another chance.

I realised very soon after the flower incident that this woman was one who wanted to do things on her terms, so I waited every day for her to make her move.

Some days, she'd see me and roll her eyes before she stalked off in the other direction; other days she and a friend would see me and laugh and on the rare days, she'd see me and make eye contact for a moment, before she went on her way.

One day, she walked out of the Nandos and instead of walking in the other direction she walked right up towards me, crossed her arms across her chest and said, "What will it take to make you go away?"

"Go on a date with me and I'll leave you alone," I replied.

"You promise?" she had asked and I nodded.

"Okay," she replied and walked off.

The next day after her shift, she had given me a piece of paper to an address in Mamelodi West with the short instruction, "Sunday, two o'clock."

"Yes ma'am," I replied.

"Ntombi," she said.

"Excuse me?"

"My name is Ntombi."

I repeated the name over and over again and decided that I quite liked the way that it sounded.

I took Ntombi out to the Ster Kinekor in Brooklyn. She had insisted on watching The Parent Trap and afterwards we'd gotten ice-cream and had walked all over the city until it began to get dark.

I drove her home straight afterwards and I let her pick the radio station of her choice. She hummed softly along to a song I didn't know and when I parked the car right at her gate, she turned to me with a smile that melted all of my insides,

"I had fun... thank you,"

"You're welcome," I replied, "do I still need to leave you alone?"

Ntombi shrugged her shoulders and reached into the little brown satchel she had brought with her and placed another piece of paper in my hands. I felt my heart rate speed up when I realised what the ten-digit number staring back at me was.

"If you call between eight and nine o'clock you might get lucky and I might pick up," she said with a soft, teasing smirk before she got out of the car and went into her house while I sat in my seat, dumbfounded.

I stopped going to Nandos after her shift and focused on calling her at her desired hours. True to her word, Ntombi only picked up the phone occasionally, but whenever she did, our conversations were nice and I made her laugh until she couldn't breathe while I revelled in the sound.

It took me another three months to convince her to go on another date with me.

This time, I had taken her on a drive to Jozi and we had eaten at a nice restaurant and afterwards, I had pressed her against the exterior of the car as I kissed her. She had given into me without much of a fight : soft curves melting into the hard crevices of my body. Her arms had looped around my neck. It was the first time i I had ever been that close to her and her scent embedded itself onto my clothes.

Her mouth was urgent, yet gentle, and if heaven had a taste, I reckoned it would've been her lips.

I had told Ntombi that I loved her a month after our second date.

I loved her when I introduced her to my parents two months later.

I loved her even as my family doubted her commitment to me, because we had no business being together.

I loved her when we had moved in together and I loved her when she became pregnant with our first child.

I loved her when I proposed to her and I loved her when we moved into a small townhouse to accommodate our growing family.

I loved her when she gave birth to our daughter, Paiten and I loved her for every night I came home to her after a long day at work.

I loved her even as I came home one day and found the house empty and our neighbour had handed Paiten over to me, explaining that Ntombi had left our daughter with her while she ran errands.

I loved her when I found the note - written for me in her neat print - with words I had never hoped to see. Somehow the words "I'm leaving, don't look for me. I'm sorry and I love you, Rob," didn't sound natural.

Ntombi was a woman who played by her own rules, she just needed time.

I loved her as my daughter celebrated her second birthday without her mother.

And I loved her even when she never returned.

A U T H O R N O T E

Glossary:

Boeta - colloquial term used to refer to men

Meneer - [Afrikaans] sir

Abelungu [Zulu] white people

Gaa! --[ Xhosa] colloquial term used by black people to express displeasure at someone's behaviour .

Ster Kinekor - name of a South African based cinema

Tsotsi - colloquial term for theif