by Raven, R. D.
Why? That was the question Jaz had in her mind. Why would Miguel do that for Sandile? What did he owe him? But she chose not to pry. She had enough questions in her mind not to want to add to the confusion with yet another one.
"Oh, and Jaz, one more thing," he said as she turned to walk away. "If Thandie asks, just tell her you were my date and that Miguel was out with some other girl."
"God. Boys. I can't tell her I was your date!"
"Why not?"
Jaz shook her head and smiled. Were all guys this dense? "Because you guys dated!"
Sandile pondered this. "I see. Do girls have some unspoken rule about that sort of thing?"
Jazz chuckled and shook her head in utter dismay.
And so they began working on the lie they would tell Thandie, and it was there that Jaz began to feel the unease and discomfort of one lie forming on top of another, a waste-dump of untruth above untruth, each rotting away and infecting the ones below it. She felt herself being assimilated into their story, much like some of the local words had been assimilated into her own language, as if the two would never again be separated.
After each of their concocted stories had failed, Jaz finally said, "Look, I'll just tell her I was alone with Miguel. She's away this weekend so she'll never know you came with us."
And just like that, she was going to tell her first lie to her new best friend.
SIX
The road around the International House was eerily empty the next morning when Jaz came down to be picked up by Sandile.
She found him talking to a guy dressed all in black, a red bandana on his head like Tupac (or Justin Bieber, depending on the point of view—or the era), and his underwear showing from above his pants (which desperately needed a belt). Sandile was leaning on his car—that ugly light-sky-blue thing he'd told her about the day before—and shaking his head. When he saw Jaz he tried to squeeze away from the monster (he was indeed a monster in size, towering over Sandile like Shaq) but baggy-clothes-dude put a massive palm on Sandile's shoulder and stopped him from moving away, gently, easily, as if Sandile knew his place and this guy knew that he was in control—no force necessary.
However, the guy also then turned to face Jaz. And then she saw it: the piece—sticking out from under his basketball shirt, tucked into the seam of his pants; just enough showing for it not to be obvious at first glance. His gaze pierced into her chest and sent a tremble down her arms and out her fingernails. A frenzied look in his eyes dominated his grimy face, as if he hadn't slept or bathed in days. He smiled at her, sending chills down her legs.
She swallowed, and waited for them to finish.
They spoke in an African language (who knows which one; all she knew is that it wasn't "Afrikaans," that having about the only distinct characteristics she could pick up on—namely, a particular sound which seemed like the person was clearing up some mucous from their throat and getting ready to spit). Sandile gave the man one of those resigned nods, like you're agreeing to something but only so the person will leave. The big guy turned around, nodded with a lewd smile at her (revealing a gold tooth) and swayed away like he was from friggin South Central or in some goddamn gangsta music video.
She walked up to Sandile and greeted him. His mind was clearly elsewhere. And so was hers now. She almost got into the wrong side of the car but forgave herself because she still hadn't yet gotten used to the whole driving on the wrong side of the road thing.
For a while, they drove in silence. Then, when they got on the highway and she looked down on the sprawling city below—almost as if its towering buildings had been stifling her voice when they were in amongst them—she finally spoke out.
"Who was that guy earlier?"
A fraction of hesitation before Sandile answered: "Ach," (that was one of those throat-clearing sounds from the Afrikaans language). "It was no one. Just some Johnny-come-lately who thinks he knows me. His name is Tsepho. Just forget him." Then he changed the subject. "Look, you didn't tell Thandie anything about Elize, did you?"
Jaz was slightly—but only slightly—offended.
"Of course not. And hey, you're the one who opened up to some total stranger about this thing, not me."
"You're right. I'm sorry. It's just that ... well, no one can know. Not now. Not ... for a while. Not even your best friend."
"I know that. You told me yesterday."
"Yes, I'm sorry." Sandile was on edge, as if something had triggered a circuit of worry within him. "However, I'm also excited about you meeting Elize. She is a special person. You will be the first of my friends she will get to know outside of Miguel."
"Ah, you assume we're friends!"
She swore she saw him blush.
"I—guess," he said with a weak shrug.
"Well, that depends on how it goes with your friend, Miguel. By the way, I did tell you I am in no ways interested in him, right?"
"Not in so many words, really. But you should give him a chance." (Jaz had never been less interested in a guy). "Now, as to that 'friends' question: Thandie likes you—a lot—so, yes, I consider you a friend. There is no question about that. I hope that I—we—can become friends to you."
That sounded good to her. She could be friends with this Miguel guy—maybe. As for Sandile, she already considered him one.
"Cool," she said.
"Cool? You are so American."
Jaz was taken aback by how much sheer space there was when driving to Northriding (the suburb in which Northgate Mall was). On their way there she saw a paint ball place on her left and shouted, "We have to go there!"
Sandile merely nodded and told her that if she liked veld school then she'd get enough of that kind of stuff at the camp they were going to.
"Veld school?"
"Oh, God, you don't know what veld school is? You have not lived!"
He explained what it was. Veld school (which she later discovered was spelled with a V and ended in a D, even though it was pronounced with an F and a T sound—like what guys always tried to do to Rae at a party) was sort of like a "survival camp" that all South African kids had the fortune (or misfortune) of attending in both seventh grade (the final year of their "primary school" which is sort of like Elementary School) and then again in tenth grade. Sandile wasn't sure what they learned there, but they sure ran around in a lot of mud, climbed a lot of ropes and ... well, that's when he and Thandie had hooked up.
"So, ja, we'll be doing a lot of that stuff this coming week at the camp, I believe, from what I've heard from previous students," he said.
She had to confess, it sounded fun.
"Why did you decide to do the IHRE program?" she asked him.
Sandile went quiet. "Um—just some stuff in my past, I guess. Look, something I should've told you"—Jaz's stomach sank—"but don't ask Miguel about his family. Beyond that, it's all smooth sailing with him."
"I see," she looked out her window at the expanding fields of grass, sparsely speckled by houses in the distance. And then her curiosity won: "Why? What's up with his family?"
Sandile cleared his throat. "It's just—his mom and sister passed away a few years back. It's best to leave it as an untouched subject."
Jaz sensed Sandile's own discomfort clearly, and decided to drop the questions.
"Well, I have an ulterior motive for coming today," she said. "I want to find what makes you guys so close. I think you're both secretly gay," she said.
Sandile laughed through his nose. "Good one," he said, slapping the steering wheel. "Definitely tell him that. He'll like it."
Even though she'd chosen a flowery sundress because of the surprisingly warm weather, Jaz felt suddenly overdressed when she saw Miguel in nothing but faded Levis and a gray T-shirt. That, and the strange sensation she felt in her chest when she saw the blonde that he was sitting with, made her feel a little self-conscious. It was ridiculous of her to feel this way around him. Sandile had made it clear—and said that he'd made it clear to Miguel—that there was no pressure.
That he was a boy and she a girl did not mean they had to call this thing a date. It wasn't a date. That had been the deal. They would just be two friends out for coffee. Jaz would be doing Sandile a favor—had those not been his words?
Standing there now, purse clutched in front of her, looking at Miguel's own curls as he and the blonde (that must be Elize) laughed as they sat at their wooden table, it struck her that two single heterosexuals, alone, out for a cup of coffee, had never been (and never would be!) anything but a date.
Damn it. She was such an idiot.
She felt the strap of her leather purse moisten in her hands as she gripped it. The rest of her body seemed also to have broken out in a sweat, a cool breeze from somewhere hitting the nape of her neck and sending a chill down her spine, finally making her entire body shiver.
Why had she spent so long ensuring her eyeshadow looked just right today, or wondering if the dress she'd chosen made her look fat?
And he? Miguel looked like he was about to roll in the mud with some pigs. He looked like he'd put as much attention into looking good as he'd put into—I don't know—throwing a basketball at someone's head!
"Hi," said Miguel, standing from his chair and putting his hand out to shake Jaz's.
Well, that was at least more chivalrous than yesterday.
The blonde literally glowed when she saw Sandile. He put his arms around her and they kissed. Jaz shook Miguel's hand, hoping he wouldn't notice how moist hers was. They stood around for a bit, hoping Elize and Sandile would soon finish, but then Miguel pulled a chair out for her when that seemed unlikely.
"You look nice," he said, an air of calmness now on his face, completely unlike the angry stiff she'd met the day before.
"Thank you." She wiped her hands on her dress under the table. She was sitting unbelievably close to him. And he was wearing quite an aftershave (or cologne). As its aroma wafted into her mind, she felt briefly lightheaded.
They sat in silence awhile, Elize and Sandile still standing and kissing. Miguel cleared his throat very obviously, and they chuckled. Elize (whose cheeks had gone very pink by now) smiled as Sandile pulled away from her, never letting his gaze leave her face, and then Sandile finally introduced her.
Jaz could've sworn she'd seen the man's dusky skin go slightly red (the second time today).
Elize's skin, however, was unmistakably red.
"I've been dying to meet you!" said Elize. "Miguel was telling me all about you."
He was? And what did he say? How long did he talk about me? Did he introduce me as Sandile's friend or … as something else?
Jaz looked at Miguel and his expression betrayed nothing. "I told her you were from America," he said as he played with the straw of whatever clear-colored sparkling drink he was having. He looked so casual, so relaxed, nothing at all compared to the person she'd met yesterday.
Jaz noticed that he'd cut himself just slightly below his right ear while shaving that morning, and saw as well that, if he was to let it grow, he'd have quite a thick black beard. She hoped silently that he wouldn't let it grow. Beards prickle. Her dad had a beard once. Every time he'd kissed her on the cheek it had made her skin itch, and her mom had always complained about it as well. So then he shaved it off.
"Jaz?" Elize's voice. It sounded like someone saying something to her from above a pool while she lay beneath it. And just as Elize had spoken, Jaz heard the sudden rumble of people's voices talking at the same time at the coffee shop, and the sounds of glasses hitting against each other, as if she'd just been suddenly yanked from that quiet pool by a fisherman's rod.
"Oh, yes, yes—I'm from ... America." She'd long since noted that everyone here called it "America" so she just went along with the flow, the word blending into her language just as so many others already had, merging into one language as if neither had ever been different from the other.
Elize's beauty struck her. But it was a different kind of beauty—a simple, caring beauty. She had marine-blue eyes and curls of golden hair. Her cheeks, she saw now, had an almost permanent red hue on them—not from makeup; it was natural. She was not overweight, but carried a tiny amount of baby fat. In a way, it suited her, making her even more elegant and soft and uniquely feminine. She wore a simple green sweater with a loose collar over a plain dress—nothing conspicuous at all—which contrasted with her pearl necklace and the long, silver earrings that swayed above her smooth shoulders.
Like when she'd met Sandile, Jaz just knew that she would like Elize, and needed no explanation as to why.
They ordered drinks and, seeing as the legal drinking age in South Africa was eighteen and that Jaz was at least two months older than that now, she ordered a small beer. Elize was genuinely interested in where Jaz was from and so Jaz told them about Seattle and The Needle and even about Northgate Mall (which they all laughed at).
"Ah, but does your Northgate Mall have an in-house ice rink?" retorted Sandile.
Miguel stayed mostly quiet, just listening as they all spoke, sitting back in his chair, his gaze every now and then wandering toward things at other tables, but not with an air of boredom. It's as if he was simply basking in the comfort of companionship and the alleviation of friendly voices. He'd smile as they made jokes, and ran his index finger over the top of his glass occasionally. Part of him seemed to be permanently elsewhere.
Almost in the middle of one of Elize's sentences—unprompted by anything other than the sudden urge to know more about him—Jaz blurted out to Miguel in an incomprehensibly unthinking moment, "And? Tell us about you!" On top of it, along with her spontaneous question (much like her spontaneous hand the day before), her other unthinking hand (the left one this time) had also now found its way (all of its own accord) onto Miguel's leg ... but only briefly.
Miguel choked as they all shared a fractional moment of silence which seemed so much longer than it actually was. And Jaz could've sworn that Elize broke a smile, and that Sandile looked at her with a knowing smirk on his face as well.
But it was too late to go back now, Jaz had to make out like she'd planned the whole thing (except for the hand part). "Yeah, tell us," she said.
Miguel hesitated, and for a moment she felt awkward, thinking that maybe Miguel had a problem being around people and that's why he had been so quiet and now here she had gone and put him on the spot, forcing him to say something about himself when he was clearly shy.
But he proved her wrong. "I'm this fucking bastard's keeper. That's my story," he said, gesturing with his long-eyelashed-eyes at Sandile who quickly stood up and shouted, "Hai, you!" And then they were at each other's necks, wrestling over the table like they were in a UFC match, almost knocking their drinks over.
Elize laughed. She laughed and laughed and laughed and so did Jaz, some of her beer even coming out of her nose (Jaz had stopped counting the number of embarrassing moments she'd had around either of these two guys). Soon the table was shaking and they were swearing at each other so loudly that a man finally came over to break them up, thinking they'd been having an actual fight.
The boys explained that they were only joking and the manager (or whoever the overweight buzz-cut guy was) looked at them funny, telling them to "just keep it down, okes" (she made a note to ask what that word meant). "This is a family place," the man finished, and when he was gone, the four of them looked at each other silently for a moment and then cracked up once again at the absurdity of the man's statement.
"This is a family place," said Miguel quietly, exaggerating the statement with grotesque facial expressions. The four of them suppressed some more laughs like they were talking badly about a high school teacher in class.
But Miguel went serious again, and looked over at the manager, then looked away quickly—as if not wanting to pick a fight.
Jaz's attention went to Miguel, her laughter slowly subsiding as well.
This is a family place. What had he meant by that?
SEVEN
There was something unique about this Jaz
, Miguel pondered to himself as they sat there making jokes about the manager, and just generally being loud and obnoxious. There was this unusual sense of comfort he felt around her, like they could just sit in silence and say nothing for hours and all would be OK.
It wasn't the first time Sandile had tried to set him up with someone. The poor guy had been trying (and failing) for close on a year now. It was the first time, however, that he'd set someone up with him while he and Elize were there—a double-date.
That had been a bold move on his part (and had taken more than a bit of convincing to have Miguel go along with it. You'd be doing me a favor! That had been Sandile's final argument—a low blow if Miguel had ever seen one!) But this American chick seemed safe enough. I mean, these Americans, they had that Martin Luther King guy and all those marches and speeches and stuff.
The snide comment from the manager had not bothered Miguel. As he was sure it hadn't (not even in the slightest) bothered Sandile. Because a snide comment here and there from some dumb-fuck was not what they really had to worry about. That, there would always be. And, so what? Sticks and stones.
No, they had more to worry about than some hairy fart-head who smelled of beer and maybe had forgotten to take a shower that morning, telling them about "a family place."
Where Elize lived, sticks and stones were the call of the day—that, and guns.
Guns aimed at black people.
Really, it had been bad timing, that's all—the news that had come the week just before she and Sandile had met, putting the entire country into a panic. On the few occasions when Miguel had gone to Elize's house for dinner on the guise of being her boyfriend, it was true that the men of the family had sent out the K-word a few times, but it was also true that Miguel had noted her mother's discomfort at them using the word. Whereas she'd let it slide the first two or three times, she then came out and told them that times have changed and that we are not like the people they wrote about a few weeks ago in our neighborhood. Absolutely not!