“Huh? What’s that in your hand?”
“Not my dress.” I was squealing now, pitiful, a field mouse trapped in the jaws of a lion. “This is a miniature person’s dress, Ilana. A dress for a fairy, or one of those skinny girls they shoot out of cannons.”
Ilana turns around and checks the supermodel-sized dress in my hands. It belongs on the runway at Fashion Week, not among my things. “There’s no cannon chick here searching for her dress. So where the hell is your dress?”
“Beats me.” My misery and panic rising, I hold up the tiny school tunic in front of me. It is clear to me that I have two choices; slither back into the sweaty wetness of my gym kit, or squeeze myself into Ariana Grande’s slip of a dress.
The bell rings as I’m weighing up my options and the few girls still titivating in front of the mirror grab their brushes and towels. They rush through the door.
“Move it!” Ilana urges as she flings her tog bag over her shoulder.
I grab the minuscule excuse for a school dress and pull it over my head. My shoulders are the first anatomical points of resistance. I am suddenly drowning in a blue polyester ocean with my arms waving above my head. Ilana tugs for all she’s worth, and I wriggle around tightly until the dress is over my shoulders. Then comes the second challenge: my Van Zyl boobs.
I need to explain here: my namesake grandmother, Cornelia van Zyl, and all three of her daughters buy their underwear at a very special place. I’m not quite that big, but there’s no telling what my bra size will be once I’ve stopped growing.
The dress barely covers my butt. The zipper snags under my left arm and certainly isn’t going to close. It grins at me with two rows of tiny bronze teeth.
“Wardrobe malfunction,” Ilana declares, dry as a pathologist pronouncing the cause of death.
Fortunately, my school jersey will conceal the open zipper. It’s just a shame I can’t stretch the jersey over my backside and down to my knees. I gather my bits and pieces and run after Ilana to our next class. The air feels cold on my bare thighs and a breeze lifts the short hem of the dress. I can’t help thinking about Tannie Leina’s little company car. Her Kia is wrapped in the yucky yellow logo of the real-estate agency she works for. CASA MIA PROPERTIES! it shouts. Dream homes at dream prices! The school dress I’m wearing today fits as tightly as the vinyl wrapping on Tannie Leina’s little car. There is one difference though: Tannie Leina’s buggy has a cute behind. I don’t.
I let my backpack hang low over my butt as I enter English class. Maybe it will help force my skirt a few inches down. Is it my imagination, or is there a rustle among the kids in the back row? I’m sure I hear a muffled giggle bubbling up from those chairs. Mr Crawford is not at his desk yet. I have to sit down extra carefully to ensure all my bits are covered and remain that way. Finally, I settle down and pull Romeo and Juliet out of my school bag with my back straight as a ruler. Then a deep, lazy girl-voice emanates from the back of the class:
“Don’t you think Dolores misses her dress, Sharapova?” The whole English class bursts out laughing. I look around. The owner of the too-sexy-for-a-schoolgirl voice is Charmaine. A tall, snarky girl with rhythmically moving jaws. Her mouth bears a hint of a smile, but her stare, fixed ruthlessly on me, is icy cold. I realise it’s the look Hannibal Lecter gave Clarice through the bars in Silence of the Lambs, and feel a shiver run down my impossibly upright spine. It’s the one movie with a serious age restriction that I really shouldn’t have watched.
“Dolores?” I ask, trying hard to act like I don’t care. She must be the idiot who accidentally took my dress in the dressing room. “In which class is she?”
Then the entire class cracks up.
“In the gym class, you nana!” Magriet Roos screams with delight. Magriet and Charmaine are besties and I always see them with Edwin Daniels, a quiet guy with a strong body and a jaw like Buzz Lightyear. I am aware of other boys – I don’t yet know everyone’s names – who are laughing at my expense. Someone points at the hem of my mini school dress, which has now shot up even higher since I am seated. I know Dewald Fourie is also somewhere here in the English class, part of the hostile force that is giving my reputation a few final blows. But I don’t want to see what his face looks like now. The door knob turns and Mr Crawford walks in.
As the Capulet and Montague staff take each other on in the streets of Verona, my phone vibrates in my pocket. It’s Ilana. The message reads:
FYI ...
Dolores is the school mascot.
The shop doll in the storeroom. You’ve got her dress on, and my guess is she’s wearing yours. I think I know who did it.
At break, Ilana, Dineo and I head to the gym class to find my dress. Dineo is not in our English class and can’t stop laughing at what I look like.
“We’re going to have to CUT that thing off of you,” she says, grabbing her belly with laughter. Then she does a spontaneous little dance to the beat of her own giggles. I swear it’s like Dineo hears music in her head all the time. She will start tapping her fingers without warning or move her head left-right, left-right to the beat of a song that only she can hear.
“I need a chocolate,” I say like a surgeon asking his scrub nurse for the right instrument. “Explain to me again why this stupid school doesn’t have a tuck shop?”
On Day One I had made a gruesome discovery: my new school doesn’t have a tuck shop. So, my favourite part of school – the refreshments – does not exist here. How am I going to cope without the emotional safety net of sugar?
“There’s no place for a chocolate in that little dress, Ari,” Ilana declares, trying to get a pinch of Dolores’s dress between her thumb and forefinger. I’m surprised and delighted to find out that I have earned a nickname so soon. And beyond relieved that it is not Arnelian or Alien or anything like that.
In gym class, we discover that Dolores the mannequin is indeed wearing my brand-new school dress. She is a typical fifties’ shop dummy with curled-up hair of the same hard plastic as her body, a dull look in her eyes and a broken nose.
“She looks like she’s on tik!” says Dineo. Dolores does look rather forlorn in my big blue dress. She’s definitely a woman who’s been through tough times. Her broken nose testifies to some bad choices she’s made along the way. For a moment, I feel sorry for her. Then I remember that she’s wearing my dress.
“Mascot my ass,” I mutter and start unzipping her.
Dead meat
I’m lying flat on my back on my bed with my legs up against my bedroom wall. Oily marks from the previous tenants’ Prestik-held posters dot the walls throughout the flat. It makes the place look lived-in and a little grungy. My poster from That ’70s Show is the only one in my collection that survived our trek from Cape Town relatively unscathed. I’ve used my own fresh pieces of Prestik to stick it to the wall above my bed. I wonder what my favourite character from the show, Fez, would do in my situation.
My life has morphed into a sitcom, I realise with shock. Complete with an appreciative audience that roars with laughter right on cue. I bet the kids at school can’t wait for the next episode. By now it must be evident to all that I am neither mysterious nor important. The new draft of my life’s script is a giant flop.
I roll over onto my tummy and survey my little kingdom. A whitewashed wooden desk, at which I never actually do my homework. It stands under my window beside an old wicker chair and my childhood toy box. The reading lamp on the desk has become my hat stand. With my three beanies stretched over the lampshade, it looks like Eminem on a freezing day. I nod at the metal-necked rapper. “Respect,” I say.
An empty espresso tin stands next to Eminem, filled with my pens, pencils and other stationery. Stuck to it is a neon-pink sticky note. Mom pastes a new one of these on the tin every week, on which she writes an interesting word she feels should be part of my vocabulary. This week’s word is DECLUTTER. She’s jotted the
meaning beneath the word: To reduce, sort and simplify.
Mom’s intention with the ‘Word of the Week’ is that I should use the word at least a couple of times in my everyday conversations, for practice. Preferably when talking to her, so that she can monitor it. Monitor was last week’s word. MONITOR: to control or keep an eye on.
My wardrobe door is slightly ajar. Several pieces of clothing are doing their best to escape the tight space. The carpet is strewn with my sneakers, socks, pyjamas, a magazine and an empty cereal bowl. It is a small room and my gaze soon returns to my bed, where my faithful old toy panda bear, Miss Cuddles, lies between two scatter cushions.
Miss Cuddles and I exchange looks. I’ve read somewhere that there’s a direct link between the number of stuffed toys on a girl’s bed and her level of intelligence. The more teddies and bunnies and Mickeys and Barneys, the fewer brain cells. That was last year when there was still a fully stocked Toys R Us exhibit on my bed. So, I mounted a sort of toy genocide, and asked Mom to take the lot to the hospice shop. Only Miss Cuddles survived this radical decluttering. We’ve simply been through too much together, bitter and sweet.
“Don’t you look at me like that,” I snap at Miss Cuddles. “I met a scary doll today who can teach you a trick or two, little sister.” I immediately feel sorry about my threat and hug the worn little bear, drawing my arms and legs up so that I am curled into a human croissant.
“Coming to town with me, sweetheart?”
Before I can react, Mom gingerly opens my door and enters. The enormous old hippie bag slung over her shoulder bulges with old plastic shopping bags. Lente van Zyl, Bag Lady. The line flashes in my mind like a caption to the scene in front of me. My mother’s commitment to recycling has been elevated to a religion in our home.
“Erm ... not today, Ma.”
About the only thing that gives me a sense of blissful freedom is when I am able to hang out alone at home. That’s when I can turn up the volume of my music and play air guitar in front of the mirror. It also allows me the opportunity to rifle through the contents of our fridge without Mom’s watchful eye lurking over my shoulder. Whenever I’m lucky enough to find a ripe banana or avocado, I make a face mask and soak in the bath, pretending to be a movie star.
“Oh, come on, Noldy! How will you ever get to know this place if you only go to school and back home? It’s Saturday – come out with me for a change. We could get an ice cream at The Dairy Devil?”
My mother has drawn her big guns; she knows I can’t resist ice cream. Well played, Lente van Zyl. Well played. Weekends in Potchefstroom aren’t much different to weekdays, especially for newcomers like us.
“Think we’ll ever crack an invite to someone’s home in this joint, Ma?” I ask as I wrestle the Honda’s safety belt into its slot with a complicated series of tugs. The clip hasn’t functioned properly in ages.
“Oh, Arnelia, why use such slang?”
This is my mother’s response to my deep question about social acceptance in a strange town.
Inside Checkers, Mom begins her customary ritual of scrutinising product labels to check for forbidden ingredients like tartrazine and modified starches. Packaging is turned over with great care as she intently studies the small print through her Clicks-bought reading glasses. We have dozens of pairs of these cheap spectacles lying around the house, because Mom is always misplacing them.
There are only battery hens’ eggs and my mother wants to speak to the manager. I drag my feet behind her, praying that the beanie I’ve pulled low over my forehead hides my features and makes me unrecognisable.
That’s when I see him.
Dewald Fourie is standing behind the transparent plastic curtain of the supermarket’s butchery section. He is busy ladling mince from a huge container into individual Styrofoam punnets and covering each with cling wrap from a giant shrink-wrapping machine. My heart does an odd thing; it feels as if my inner computer is doing a reboot.
“I’ll wait here for you, Ma!” I call out after her. She gives me a dismissive wave and sails determinedly ahead towards the manager’s office.
I position myself behind a pyramid of baked beans on special offer. It gives me an excellent view of Dewald. Like all the other workers in the butchery, he wears a strange gauze cap thingy on his head.
Unbelievable, I think. Not even a ridiculous hat can make him look bad.
Occasionally one of his co-workers says something that amuses him and his lopsided smile appears.
I roll a few ice-breakers around in my head.
“Hey, what are you doing here?”
I ditch that. It’s obvious that he is packaging mince.
“Where can I get a hat like yours?”
Boring.
“Fancy MEATING you here!”
Arnelia, you’ll commit social suicide, just shut up! I tell myself.
I decide to pretend to be choosing meat for our evening braai. I can then ‘accidently’ spot him and throw him a shy wave. Yes, this feels natural. My heart beats like a wild rabbit trapped in my ribcage as I approach the meat counter. I’m not quite at the counter when a girl appears next to me. She waves her arms wildly above her head and yells an ecstatic “Dewaaaaaald!”
Behind the curtain all the workers look up as one. I follow the girl’s gaze. For a split second I’m uncertain, but then realise that she is indeed trying to catch Dewald’s attention.
Stupid girl.
Dewald has seen her and is enthusiastically pulling off his plastic gloves. He glances up at the clock on the wall and flashes a grin at the pretty girl next to me.
I busy myself with an intense examination of the halaal sosaties in the fridge in front of me. From the corner of my eye, I see Dewald saying goodbye to his colleagues and emerging from the gap in the plastic curtains.
When he reaches the girl he sweeps her up in a bear hug. “Man, I’ve missed you!” he exclaims. He holds her at arm’s length and looks her over for a moment. “You look fantastic.” Another tender embrace follows.
Dewald is so focused on the raven-haired stunner that he doesn’t even notice me. The wild rabbit in my ribcage is nothing like the Duracell Bunny. Its batteries drain rapidly and now I just feel sick. Like someone who can’t help but stare at the blood and gore at the scene of an accident, I watch the departing backs of Dewald and his girlfriend with a mixture of shock and horror. They are chatting and laughing as if they’ve known each other forever. Clearly, they are soulmates.
“Ha!” I jump with fright when my mother appears next to me with a triumphant little shriek. “From next week we’re guaranteed free-range eggs here,” she says.
Romeo and Idiot
“Ag, puh-leez!” Dineo snorts with contempt. “You have noooo idea what it feels like to be invisible, Ari. Take it from me.”
We are sitting on the grass in the school’s quad, discussing our weekend. I’d just told Dineo and Ilana about Dewald and his girlfriend not noticing me in Checkers. How I had almost made a complete fool of myself. I should have known that a guy like him would have a girl.
“Invisible? You?” Ilana laughs at Dineo. “You’re larger than life, Neo. Nobody would dare to ignore you. You’re practically a celeb! A Motswana sista who won the Afrikaans public-speaking competition hands down? That’s never happened before.” Ilana is clearly one of Dineo’s biggest fans. Dineo thinks about this for a while. She smiles as if to say, You have a point.
“That is only the start. Watch this space. This year your Motswana sista is going to be in the school’s musical theatre production. And we’re talking lead role,” she proclaims.
I look at my two new friends in wonder, mixed with just a dash of envy. They know each other so well. The constant roaming around with my mom has never allowed me to make memories with special friends. Nobody knows my backstory. I have nobody with whom to recall good times.
Ilana is one
of those people who appears quiet and reserved, but who is actually completely the opposite. I think her heavy black spectacle frames are misleading – that and her hair scraped into that severe bun, of course. Plus, she always has her nose buried in a book. Only recently have I discovered that the books she reads compulsively are all graphic novels and comics. Marvel, DC ... She speaks of Harley Quinn, Wolverine and Jessica Jones as if they’re her housemates. And, boy, can she draw. She’s always sketching in the margins during lessons, regardless of which class we’re in.
Dineo is so beautiful. How I wish I loved my curves the way she loves hers. I try to shrink myself at every opportunity, to be smaller and thinner. But Dineo walks straight and proud.
She interrupts my thoughts. “Oh, good. You’re wearing your own dress today.”
“Yeah, yeah.” My response is listless. The Dolores debacle will probably shadow me for life. “What’s the story with the stupid shop dummy anyway? How come the school has such a nasty-looking mascot?” I ask.
“The Grump believes in tra-diiiiition.” Dineo mimics the headmaster’s voice, stretching the last word out like bubble gum. It’s clear that he isn’t exactly popular. “Legend has it that the boys of the matric class of 1956 stole Dolores from a shop in town on a dare. They had planned to use the dummy to teach that year’s intake of Standard 6 guys to kiss by practising on Dolores as part of their initiation. You know, like those rubber dolls lifesavers practise mouth-to-mouth resuscitation on?”
“Gross!” I shudder.
“Yeah. Gross. That night, when they broke into the fanciest boutique in Potchefstroom, somebody split on them. The police nabbed them as they walked the dummy down the main street back to the hostel. The boys tried to pretend Dolores was a girl who’d had a bit too much to drink. Potchefstroom’s blue uniforms would have none of it and promptly loaded all the boys in their van and carted them off to be locked in jail.”
“Seriously? Shame man.” Ilana and I are hanging on to Dineo’s every word.
Confessions of a Ginger Pudding Page 2