Back to Villa Park

by Jenny Robson

  I was smiling at this video going on inside my head. Back at Port Alfred, the English teacher used to say, “Use your imagination, Strydom. Lord above, don’t you have any imagination?”

  Well, right now I had plenty!

  But Mrs Mogwera was worrying. “What is it, Dirkie? Aren’t the chips nice? Did I cook them too long?”

  And I realised I was still sitting there with one cold chip halfway between my plate and my mouth.

  I told her, “No, no. These are the best ever.” I started eating quite fast, just to prove it. Because that was treating her fairly, right, after she cooked me such nice food? I said, “I was just thinking about what you said. You know, about the power to treat people fairly.”

  I even found I was thinking about Bethany and that I wasn’t being fair to her. I didn’t want to be her boyfriend. She was too hard and loud and bossy. I really didn’t want to be kissing her and stuff. Or talking about blowing places up. So then I had to stop going to her house and using her shower and eating her Woolworths food.

  Yes, that was the fair way to behave.

  Mrs Mogwera said, “When you are thinking, you look even more handsome. And very grown up, like you’re a man who understands things, not a teenage boy who can’t be bothered. Even while you’re chewing.”

  And that was what my dad had said, wasn’t it? Just before my twelfth birthday. “Being a man is about understanding things.”

  I smiled at her through the petals.

  *

  And then there was the sound of knocking.

  Mrs Mogwera said, “Dirkie, I think there is somebody at your door outside.”

  She was right. Because next came the sound of a voice calling my name.

  Aggies! It was Aggies right there in the yard. Come to get his revenge, to tell me exactly what he thought of me. Probably to show me as well. Okay. So I had to get up and walk to the kitchen door because I had to face Aggies, even if I felt ashamed. But I had to be a man, not a coward.

  And I was already thinking: If he wants to hit me, that’s fine. If he wants to smash my face into a bloody mess all over the yard, I won’t fight back. No, I will not give in to my IEA, no matter what he does. My security guard in his red uniform will be at the gate, even if I’m still working out his logo. He’ll be saying, “Careful, Mr Dirk Strydom, sir. Keep your fists down at your sides. Don’t let your anger get out. Your friend Aggies has every right to beat you up – it’s what you deserve. And you know you want things to be fair, right?”

  I took hold of the handle to open the door. I heard the small squeak as I pulled it downwards. Just the way it must have squeaked for my dad on that drizzly day in October. On his way to the maid’s room. To Koos’s box.

  12

  Mr Dirk Karel Strydom

  What happened actually, there in my house that drizzly day in October? Before I got home from school early because cricket got cancelled?

  It has always bothered me. I have tried so hard, so often, to imagine it.

  How did things go after that New Zealand letter arrived in our postbox? Or maybe Dad was already there at the gate, waiting, and the postman put it right into his hand.

  I suppose he ran inside, shouting to my ma, “Leila! It’s here! Hey, our dreams are about to start for real. NZ, here we come! Finally! Hell yes!”

  But was he already ripping the envelope open? As he ran inside, was he already reading the words? So then maybe he ran straight through the house, through the kitchen door and into the maid’s room. To Koos’s box.

  Or, no. Maybe they sat down together at the kitchen table to enjoy opening the letter together. And then Ma saw the words written there and her eyes started going blank again. And she said, “Pieter, I can’t go on. Pieter, make this stop!”

  And they both knew she was talking about Koos’s gun. And Dad walked to the kitchen door and opened it slowly.

  Did they at least think of me?

  Maybe not Ma, but Dad?

  Maybe he said, “It will be alright. Dirkie is at cricket practice. The police will sort everything out before he gets here.” Or maybe he said, “Dirk is a big boy now. Nearly a man. He’ll understand.”

  But I didn’t. I still don’t. Not even with all the cotton wool lifted off my brain. All I understand is that I will never understand.

  And it will always hurt.

  *

  So I opened the kitchen door and there was Aggies, standing at the bottom of the two steps. He looked old and hopeless without his hat on. And with his hands behind his back like a prisoner. I knew at once he wouldn’t hit me.

  It made me feel terrible. I said, “Aggies, I’m sorry.”

  But what a small, stupid word that is! Sorry? It didn’t feel like it could change anything. No, for sure he was here to tell me I must never go sit with him and Rosie at the play park again. Or beg with him at Pick n Pay. Or the intersection. Probably he had already torn up my sign, thrown it in some rubbish bin. Maybe he was there to say he wanted the mink blanket back.

  Aggies looked at me for a long time.

  Then he suddenly smiled so his four teeth showed. He stop­ped looking old and hopeless. He said, “Happy Birthday, Dirkie.”

  He brought his hands out in front of him and I couldn’t believe what he was holding! A bright-yellow packet. With MTN written on it!

  “A man needs a cellphone,” he said. “A man must have a cellphone.” Even though he doesn’t have one himself.

  A cellphone! And how could it be? I’d treated him so terribly, and he’d given me a present. And not just any present, but a cellphone – the thing I wanted most in the world! A Nokia, lying there inside its own special box with a little book and wires all neatly tied up.

  I tell you, I hugged him so hard that I had to stop myself in case I hurt him again. I kept saying thank you over and over. But those are more small, stupid words that don’t even start to explain what you feel inside.

  Imagine! Next time I applied for a job, I could write my number there in the letter. Even if I couldn’t say I had any papers, at least I had a cellphone number! Well, first I needed to learn my number, off by heart. With no mistakes. No matter how long it took. And then the manager could phone me. And I could answer my cellphone, “Good morning, this is Mr Dirk Karel Strydom here …”

  And the manager could tell me I must come for an inter­view. A proper interview with only him and me sitting on chairs by a big desk.

  I asked Aggies, “Did you steal this from an MTN shop?”

  Aggies laughed. He laughed so much he was bending over, holding his pants waistband where the string loops through it. He said, “Hawu wena! I bought it with proper money. I am not a thief! Why are you saying I am a thief?”

  And then he told me all about buying it. The story took him quite a long time. And by then, Mrs Mogwera was standing at the door too. With her mink-soft hand on my arm while she listened.

  *

  So this is the story of how my cellphone happened, right. Aggies was lying there on the island with his back hurting and his head hurting and his safari hat squashed and broken. And some people got out of their car, even though all the traffic behind them hooted and some drivers were even swearing out their windows. But these two people were worried that Aggies’ back might be broken.

  They bent over him and they kept saying, over and over, “Please, Rra. Are you okay, Rra?”

  They gave him money to show they were good people. They wanted to drive him to the hospital too. Or else to their own private doctor. But Aggies asked them rather to drive him to the MTN shop. So he could buy this cellphone. For a thug like me!

  It was like his story finished a circle in my mind: a circle that started with my IEA, but then looped through the kindness of those people, through Aggies’ generous heart to kind Mrs Mogwera and all the way back to me.

  When I could speak again, I said, “Well, I hope you kept some money for Rosie’s KFC.”

  Aggies was still smiling. “No, the MTN people, they took it all. But we
will eat tomorrow. No problem.”

  No problem? How could I sit eating that huge steak when Aggies and Rosie had nothing?

  Mrs Mogwera understood right away, like she often does.

  She said, “It’s your steak, Dirkie. You can do what you like with it. Truly.” I was so glad she said that. Otherwise I would have start worrying that I was treating her unfairly.

  I got stuck into that rump steak, let me tell you! Worse than Fatter Koos! I used Mrs Mogwera’s nice sharp knife and I was cutting it up into small pieces because of Aggies only having four teeth that didn’t match. And Rosie not having any teeth at all.

  There was so much meat, enough for me and Aggies and Rosie to all feel full. And Mrs Mogwera wrapped up their part of the steak in foil and put it in a packet. With tiny packets of salt and tomato sauce for them. And then she put in some bananas. Plus some biscuits. Plus two tins of Coke. That would be a change for Rosie!

  And then Mrs Mogwera did the loveliest thing ever. She put her hands on my cheeks. She said, “Dirk, you are a good, decent man.” Yes, she called me “Dirk”. Like I was too grown-up to be called “Dirkie” any more. And then she kissed me, like she was a mother and I was an adult son.

  And then she wrote out my cellphone number on a piece of paper.

  *

  Okay, so then I walked with Aggies down the driveway. He carried his food packet and I carried the cellphone box tight against my chest. I was saying my number over and over: “083 282 …” and I could feel the digits slotting safely inside my brain. All in the right order. Like they would be waiting in line, bright and clear, whenever I needed them. Like I wasn’t a dom-ass any more.

  It was an amazing feeling.

  And then I had this idea. Suddenly. Out of nowhere! Right there on the concrete driveway! Hey, if I wasn’t a dom-ass any more, then maybe I could try learning again? So I could get proper papers for a proper job? Maybe I could go to an FET college too, like my friend Rex Zwelethu Jili? And get a bursary too because I was poor and with no parents and unemployed! Mrs Mogwera would help me find out, for sure.

  By the time we had reached the gate, I was really excited about my idea.

  Just then Jimmy Big Deal Cameron drove past with his girlfriend and his logo and his overalls inside the dark shadows of his car. I waved at him, but I don’t think he knew who I was. I waved because even if he has such good stuff in his life, well so do I. Oh yes!

  Just then, on Groenewald Road, the street lights went on. How about that? I tell you what, that moment it felt like my birthday candles were being lit.

  *

  So. So I came back to the kitchen to finish my part of the steak. Then we had a cup of coffee and Mrs Mogwera got even more excited than me, talking about FET colleges.

  “I think there’s one close to where Mr Mogwera works. Maybe we can go there together and talk to them, Dirk? We can see what courses they offer. They will have pamphlets for sure. We can study them together so you can choose.”

  And that is how my eighteenth birthday ended. It’s been about the best birthday I’ve ever had.

  When I got back to my room, I plugged my cellphone charger into the socket behind the dressing table. The Nokia book says I must charge it for eight hours. Then I said my number to my reflection there in the cracked mirror. And I remembered it all. First time. In the right order.

  In the mirror, my eyes looked grown up. Like there was quite a lot of understanding in them already. And I got into bed under my blanket with the turquoise ship sailing to its turquoise island.

  Other titles by the same author

  Mellow Yellow

  Don’t Panic, Mechanic

  Dark Waters

  One Magic Moment

  The Denials of Kow-Ten

  Because Pula Means Rain

  Savannah 2116 AD

  The Ugliest Animal in All the World/

  Die lelikste dier in die hele wêreld

  Praise Song

  Balaclava Boy

  It was Mrs Mogwera who found the newspaper advert about the Kagiso Holdings interviews for Dirk.

  Earn while you learn. No matric required. As part of our commitment to social upliftment amongst the youth of South Africa, we offer a Youth Training Scheme …

  So that’s where he was, on the morning of 13 September, his eighteenth birthday. Except it was no ordinary interview. The conference room was full of other applicants all sitting at rows and rows of desks. Like school all over again! He just stood there in his clean shirt that Mrs Mogwera had ironed for him, with his new blue tie around his neck. Wasn’t your eighteenth birthday supposed to be the mark that you’ve become a man? That you can drive and go to a bar and vote and earn a proper living? He should have realised. Hope was hanging around his neck like a blue noose.

  Jenny Robson was born in Cape Town. After studying Primary School Teaching in Mowbray and obtaining a degree in Philosophy through the University of South Africa, she worked as a teacher in Simonstown before going to Botswana, where she worked as a music teacher in Orapa for many years. She currently teaches at an International School in the town of Maun, on the banks of the Okavango. She did not start writing until the age of 38. To date she has published more than thirty books for children and young adults, as well as a novel for adults and numerous short stories. Her texts depict South African teenagers with their dreams, their fears, their hopes and their problems, resembling those experienced by young people outside of the African continent.

  Tafelberg,

  an imprint of NB Publishers,

  a division of Media24 Boeke (Pty) Ltd,

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  PO Box 6525, Roggebaai, 8012, South Africa

  www.tafelberg.com

  Copyright © 2013 J. M. Robson

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this electronic book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including photocopying and recording, or by any other information storage or retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher.

  Cover image by David Larsen, Africa Media Online, with a photo by Antonio Jiménez Alonso

  Cover design by Michiel Botha

  E-book design by Trace Digital Services

  Available in print:

  First edition, first impression 2013

  ISBN: 978-0-624-05879-3

  Epub edition:

  First edition 2013

  ISBN: 978-0-624-05880-9 (epub)

  Mobi edition:

  First edition 2013

  ISBN: 978-0-624-06453-4 (mobi)