South Africa had eleven official languages and that wasn’t one of them. However, if you asked almost any Indian who lived there, they would agree that that was English. Her tutors had always taught her to speak like a lady—well, as close to a lady as she could be—so Jasmintha had never really learned the slang, but she knew enough to decipher what he’d said. No, my friend. Wait for a few minutes. When my girlfriend gets here, we’ll go to Marlon’s house.
There. That was easy enough. And people said she couldn’t fit in.
“Can’t you knock?” Prenisha snapped at him. “We’re on a video chat with Mini.”
They’d given Jasmintha the nickname Mini, not only because it was sort of the middle of her name, but also because she was tiny. She liked it, because the nickname made her feel like she was part of the crew.
Jitesh leaned over between both his sisters and smiled at her. “What kind, stekkie?”
She was pretty sure that meant: What’s up…girl. But it may be open to interpretation.
“How’s it going over there?”
“Fine, good,” she replied.
“Any ous hassling you? ’Cause you know I’ll fly over there and fuck dem up.”
Jasmintha laughed at the ridiculousness of the question. She’d never had a boyfriend and Jitesh’s overprotectiveness was probably twenty percent of the reason why. The other eighty percent was because she simply wasn’t dating material.
She still chose to play along, though. “Pffft! Guzzi, I’ve got boys lining up around the corner for me here. The ous can’t get enough of me.” The slang felt uncomfortable on her tongue, but she loved the way his face scrunched up every time she tried to use it.
“I’ve got one word for you. Playa!” He gave her one last smile and then turned back to his sister. “Lend me the cab.”
Prenisha rolled her eyes as she reached into her purse to grab her car keys. “And don’t drive like a maniac.”
“Shot,” was the last thing he said before he left the room.
“Your brother is so cute,” Rachel commented once he closed the door.
“Eww! Rachel, you have no taste in men,” Prenisha responded with a look of total disgust.
“So how cold is it there?” Pratiksha asked, resuming their previous conversation, because she too did not want to indulge Rachel’s revolting attraction to their brother.
Jasmintha checked her phone. “My app’s saying it’s thirty-nine point two degrees.”
“That’s hot,” Rachel said.
“It’s Fahrenheit, Rach,” Jasmintha clarified. “Convert it to Celsius. Subtract thirty-two and divide by one point eight.” She took a second and did the math in her head. “That’s four degrees.”
“Shit, that’s cold.”
“Exactly. And I’m not gonna sit around and freeze to death until Christmas Eve.”
A very worried Prenisha leaned forward until her face was covering most of the screen. “What are you planning on doing?”
“I’m going to Atlanta.”
There was a roar of protests from all three of them. She was expecting that. She hadn’t done one thing on her own in her entire life and now she was planning on going across a country she didn’t know to meet a woman she’d never met. Her mother.
It was a complicated story. Her father had lived in America for years. He’d made a success of himself by starting a business called South Star. The company owned multiple hotels and resorts across the States, one of which she was staying at right now. Though, because of the location, this one could be described as a glorified guesthouse. He’d started from nothing and slowly built himself up, but she sort of messed up all his plans. She was only four-years old when he packed up all their belongings and moved to Johannesburg. His business still demanded his attention, so there were weeks, even months, when he’d been away from home, leaving her to be raised by a string of nannies. It wasn’t too bad when she was a little girl, but as she grew so did the distance between them.
It was a lonely childhood. He’d kept her safely tucked away from the world. She’d been home-schooled. She never had any friends. It was only after months of begging that she’d convinced him to send her to a normal school and even then, he’d insisted she attend the same school as her cousins so they could keep an eye on her. It lasted two years, grade nine and ten, and then he pulled her out again.
At least in that time she’d made a lot of friends…
A few friends…
Just Rachel.
But now it was time for her to break free, spread her wings, discover the world. She would be starting her new job in January next year and there was plenty of time to reinvent herself before then. Her father hadn’t been keen on her accepting this job. It required her to move to the States, the very place he’d been trying to keep her away from, but it was an offer that could not be refused.
So now she was here with nothing but a few thousand miles between her and the woman she’d been dying to meet her whole life. She wanted to know if they looked the same, if they liked the same things. Did she hum while she cooked? What were her hobbies? Now was the time to find out.
“Cuz, if your dad finds about this, he’ll kill you,” Pratiksha said.
“How’s he gonna know?” Jasmintha fired back. “He’s never around. I was with him in Chicago for months and I barely saw him. Then he sends me here and tells me he’s gonna fly over in two weeks. He said we were gonna tour the town and roast marshmallows by the fire…and now he’s not coming.” She felt her throat clog up, but that was merely because some pointless emotion was causing a chemical reaction in her brain. It was quickly rectified. She knew how to deal with unwanted emotions. “I’ve been waiting for him for two weeks…six months…three years. It depends when you start counting.”
Prenisha stepped in and attempted to sway her with logic. “There’s a reason why your father doesn’t want you to meet her. She could be a drug-addict, or some kind of criminal, or a—”
“I don’t care. She’s my mother, Nish.”
“You don’t even know if she still lives in Atlanta. You’re basing this on an inactive Facebook account which hasn’t been updated in over a year. You’re just going to hop on a plane and hope for the best? It’s crazy! What if you get there and she’s moved? What if you get there and she’s on vacation somewhere?”
That was definitely a risk. Hell, there was a risk that she may have tracked down the wrong woman. Her search was based on the only information she knew of her mother—a name and date of birth. Statistically, the odds of two people having the same name and date of birth were low, so it was a risk she was willing to take. The limited details on her Facebook account were all Jasmintha had. There were no pictures, no status updates, nothing. It only had a name, birthday, hometown, and company of employment. That wasn’t a lot of information, but it was enough to pique her curiosity. It could end up being a wild goose chase, but she had to know. If there was a chance, any chance at all, of meeting her biological mother, she had to take it. Besides, she had nothing better to do until Christmas Eve.
Feeling a little edgy, Jasmintha stood up again and shrugged her shoulders. “I’ll take my chances. And I’ve decided to fly back, but…I’m gonna drive there. I already rented a car and plotted out the entire trip and everything.”
This time the protests were so loud, she had to cover her ears to drown out the sound.
“What if you get a flat tire? Do you even know how to change a flat tire?”
“What if you get hijacked, or kidnapped by some lunatic?”
“What if you get lost? No one will know where to find you.”
They were all throwing these what-ifs at her at the same time. It was impossible to determine who said what. She could understand their concern. She’d never left the house without an escort before, had not done one thing by herself. That needed to change. She could easily book a flight to Georgia, but there were many purposes for the road trip.
Firstly, she had planned it to take rough
ly three to four weeks. That way she could buy some time and psych herself up before she actually met her mother. She also wanted to learn everything she could about this place, a country she would at some point have to consider home. And finally, she just wanted to…live, live her own life without anyone dictating where to go or what to eat or where to stay. No nannies. No escorts.
She wanted to see the world and make new friends. She was on a roll. She already had six friends on Facebook. Six! It didn’t matter that three of them were the three ladies on the screen in front of her and that one woman had only sent her a friend request because she was trying to sell her skin products, the other two were totally legit. And she was just going to keep adding to it. With every mile, with every state, she was going to meet new people and learn new things and she was going to have fun doing it.
“What if you get caught in a blizzard?” Rachel asked worriedly. “Isn’t it winter there?”
“I think it’s autumn…or fall, whatever they call it, but it feels like winter. So I’ve done some research and they said that most of the states I’m driving through don’t get snow every winter.”
Pratiskha’s eyebrows furrowed together. “Who’s they?”
“Um…Google and…Yahoo Answers.”
“Oh, my Gawd!” She rubbed both her temples as if the response had caused an instant headache. “You’re going to be driving thousands of kilometers based on advice you received from Yahoo Answers?!”
Prenisha was always the more level-headed one in the group and again she tried to bring calm to the situation. “Cuz, we worry about you. This is a long trip that you’re going on all by yourself. You wouldn’t know danger until it literally hit you in the face and…and also…you…you don’t know…how to be…around other people.” She shrugged almost pitifully. “They won’t understand you, Mini.”
If she were normal, that statement would have made her cry, but as her cousin was very carefully trying to point out, she wasn’t normal. She’d learned how to not cry years ago. Yet it was a fact she needed to accept. Society wouldn’t see her as normal. How could they? She’d never been introduced to society. She could count on both hands the number of people she knew.
But…whatever. Screw it! She had six friends on Facebook. The world was her oyster. There was no better way to become socially acceptable than actually socializing. She was scared. No. She was terrified, but fear of the unknown was half the fun.
“Guys, you know I love all of you and, trust me, I understand your concerns, but this is something I need to do. I start a new job in a few short weeks and I don’t want to be this weird, awkward mess of a person. I need to learn how to fit in…And I want to meet my mother. I’m starting a whole new chapter of my life and I want her to be part of it. Maybe she abandoned me. But what if she didn’t? I have to find out. I’ve only heard one side of the story and it’s not even the full story. What my dad did was selfish. He just took me away and if he never gave me a proper explanation, then I’m sure he didn’t say anything to her either. She probably tried to contact me…or look for me, but we were gone and she didn’t even know where to find us.”
They all seemed a lot calmer after that speech. Over the years, she’d confided in them, told them about every hopeful dream she had of the day when she would finally get to meet her mother. They understood what this meant to her.
“We love you, too, Mini Mouse,” Pratiksha said. “But please call us every opportunity you get and tell us absolutely everything.”
“I will. Virtual hug.”
They wrapped their arms around each other in a group hug, but because she was alone, as always, she just spread her arms and pretended like she was there too.
Rachel leaned forward and blew a kiss. “When are you leaving?”
“As soon as we end this chat.”
After they gave her a teary-eyed goodbye, she shut down her laptop and packed it away. She slung the bag over her shoulder and rolled the other two through the lobby to the rental car outside the resort. She’d decided on a blue Prius, because it was fuel efficient and environmentally friendly. It was a small car, but the rental agent had told her it would be sufficient for the long trip.
“Oh, hey. Let me help you with that,” Dalton said from behind her.
He was an assistant at the glorified guesthouse and also one of her legit friends on Facebook. They’d been getting to know each other in the two weeks she’d been staying there, and he was such a nice guy. Friendly and sweet. He was cute in a scruffy kind of way, skinny with curly ginger locks. Even dressed in the ugly navy-blue golf shirt with the South Star logo on the breast pocket, he still had a subtle appeal. He carried her bags the rest of the way and loaded them neatly into the car.
“So…you’re going somewhere?” he asked.
“Just a little trip. I should be back in a few weeks.”
He shifted nervously on the balls of his feet. “Did you think about what I asked you?”
“Oh…um…I thought you were joking.”
“I could get fired for asking one of the guests out to dinner, so…no. It wasn’t a joke.”
This was strange. This situation was new to her and she didn’t know how to handle it. Dalton was already nervous and she thought it would be better if she didn’t reveal that her dad actually owned the resort. He would withdraw the offer immediately. Asking out the boss’s daughter would definitely get him fired and she was tired of being dictated to by her dad, whether directly or indirectly. She wanted to make her own decisions for a change.
“Dalton, you’re sweet and kinda cute. I’m just not sure if I like you…in that way. It’s not something I’m opposed to, though. I mean, that’s the whole point of a date, to see if two people can like each other like that. We don’t really know each other that well, and I don’t know if we have anything in common, but I guess—”
“You’re doing it again,” he cut in awkwardly. “That thing you do when you think out loud. It’s one of those questions where a yes or no would suffice.”
“Oh…that was me saying yes. Yes, I would like that…but not now…when I get back.”
“Cool,” Dalton said as she hopped into the car. “See you when you get back.”
She smiled her farewell and waited for him to walk back in before she closed the door. She was a dork. No question about it. A complete and utter dork. Dalton would be considered about two steps above socially awkward and she made him seem like a smooth talker.
This was going to be difficult. Starting a life where she would be in constant contact with different people was going to be the biggest challenge she’d faced to date. Learning how to interact with different personalities, facing the world on her own—those were skills she still needed to develop. She was scared and nervous, but she reminded herself that this was the reason for the road trip, to meet new people, experience new things, and she was more than ready for that.
For nineteen years, she’d been escorted everywhere. Her father hadn’t even allowed her to go to the mall unless Prenisha or Pratiksha accompanied her. But now was the time to change all that. It was an impulsive decision. She hadn’t put much thought into it, but after living her entire life with rules and schedules, some spontaneity was refreshing.
She set the coordinates on her GPS and let out a slow, nervous breath. “World…here I come.”
Well, this wasn’t exactly the adventure she’d been hoping for. She’d left the resort with the GPS telling her that she would be on the I-90 highway in fifteen minutes and here she was three and half hours later with no satellite reception, no highway and no clue as to where the hell she was. Montana was beautiful. She’d been staring at the landscape for long enough to know that with certainty. Rolling hills and open fields, but no highway, and after a while everything started to look the same. She couldn’t tell if she had seen that tree before. How many times had she driven down the same road?
It was almost one in the afternoon on the first day of her trip and she was already in the predicam
ent her cousins had feared. An hour ago, she was still relatively calm, but as the minutes ticked by, she was becoming more panicked. There was no cell reception and even if there was, who would she call?
“It’s okay,” she told herself. “You’re gonna find something or someone eventually. This is what life is all about. When it’s all over, you’re gonna be laughing about this. It’s not funny now. It’s really not funny now. It’s amazing how unfunny it is. But it will be. It will be very funny…someday.”
Sunshine came streaming through the windows making it difficult to see some of the faded road signs. Actually, it wasn’t sunshine. It was light raining from the heavens above. Sunshine implied warmth thus this was some kind of imposter trying to fulfill the duties of the sun and failing hopelessly.
Despite the fact that the heat was set on maximum in her tiny rental car, she was still cold. She was completely unprepared for this type of weather. Even in the heart of a South African winter, a sweater and a thick jacket were sufficient and now four layers of clothing were just not cutting it.
She blew hot air on one hand and then the other, slowing the car down so she could take note of every road sign. She eventually spotted a sign for a gas station three miles down a road. What a Godsend! A gas station meant people. People meant she could ask someone for directions. Three miles. 1 mile = 1.6093 kilometers. Doing the math in her head, that was roughly 4.83 kilometers. She’d be there in no time. She followed the sign and turned left, letting out a breath of relief that she was finally back on track.
* * * * *
The shushing of the truck’s brakes jolted Kevin from his state of semi-consciousness. He must have dozed off. He opened his eyes just in time to see Brady, the very friendly truck driver, pulling into a Cenex Quik Trip. A day and a half had passed since he left home and he had only put about four hours of road behind him. He was in Lockwood now, not even out of Montana yet.
He’d walked for over two hours yesterday before a family of four stopped and offered him a ride. They drove him to the outskirts of town and he walked for another hour before he decided to book into a motel for the night. After a light dinner, which he rationed so he could eat the rest for breakfast this morning, he’d done some research. He checked out different bus routes to get to Florida. He needed a back-up plan because this hitchhiking thing wasn’t as easy as he thought it would be. He’d also searched for tips for hitchhikers and made a mental list of the ones that seemed likely to work:
Journey to the Unknown Page 3