No Turning Back (7 page)

F
rom the back of Mr. Danny’s car, Sipho thought he saw Jabu. But he couldn’t be sure. They were driving past Checkers in the gray light that gets pulled over everything as the sun goes down. He had hoped the traffic lights would turn red to give him a chance to look properly. But they were green, and the car swept past the corner with only time for a quick glance at some figures crouched around a small fire on the other side of the road. One had a hood. That could have been Jabu.

Sipho recognized the place where he and the others “asked money” from motorists. A small boy, younger than him, was standing on the traffic island in the middle of the road as they drove past. Sipho could see him shivering a little. How odd it was to be in one of the cars, feeling warm air blowing from underneath the seat, and looking out at someone who was cold and alone.

Soon they had left the busy road with its moving streams of red and yellow lights and were
traveling down streets with a mixture of houses and apartment buildings. Slowing down in front of a building with steps leading up from the pavement, Mr. Danny pressed his horn lightly. From behind the curtains of a second-floor window, Sipho saw a face appear and disappear.

“My friend Portia lives here,” said Judy, turning around to Sipho. “She’s coming over for the night.”

“I can’t understand how you girls find so much to talk about!” Mr. Danny joked. “I would have thought you saw enough of each other in school all week!”

“You’re just antisocial, Dad!” retorted Judy, as a black girl in a pink track suit came running down the steps and waved up at the window above. Someone was holding a baby and waving the baby’s hand. Judy leaned over to the back and opened the car door.

“Hi, Portia! Your little brother is so cute,” she said, waving up at the baby.

Portia climbed into the backseat next to Sipho.

“Hello, Mr. Lewis! Thanks for collecting me,” she said, smiling. “You know, Judy, my little brother isn’t quite so cute when he cries at night!”

“Well, he’s certainly cuter than my brother David!” replied Judy.

“That’s hardly fair, Jude,” reprimanded Mr. Danny.

Changing the conversation, Judy now introduced her friend to Sipho. The beads at the ends of Portia’s braids clicked as she turned to greet him.

“Hi!” she said in a bright, chatty voice.

“Hi!” he replied softly.

Listening to the girls talking about homework, Sipho kept his gaze fixed outside. It was already quite dark, but these streets were well lit. Pulling up at some red lights, Mr. Danny pointed ahead of him. Scrawled on a white wall were the words VIVA MANDELA! VIVA ANC!

“They’re not even in government yet, but see how they’re already messing things up.”

“Come off it, Dad! Nelson Mandela hardly went and wrote that himself! You’re so prejudiced!”

Judy turned around to Portia in the backseat, making a face by casting her eyes upward. She looked embarrassed. Portia lifted her eyebrows but remained silent. There was something strange about Mr. Danny, thought Sipho. He could never imagine the white farmer sending his son, Kobus, to a school with black students. Or letting him bring home a black friend to sleep in his house. But Mr. Danny was doing that. So why didn’t he like Nelson Mandela?

They had left all the apartments behind, and there were only houses on each side of the road now. Suddenly Mr. Danny swung the car in front of some iron gates. As if by magic, lights sprang up inside around a long, low house, partly hidden by bushes. Opening his window, Mr. Danny spoke into a small metal box on a pole and, as if by magic again, the gates slowly opened.

“I’m starving!” Judy declared as they drove in. “Ada doesn’t know you’re coming yet, Sipho, but she always makes more than enough. She knows Portia and I eat like horses!”

“Speak for yourself!” giggled Portia.

Before they had reached the front doorstep, Sipho heard chains jangling, barking, and the door being unlocked. A medium-sized dog with long, floppy ears bounded out, jumping, sniffing and licking.

“Get down, Copper!” ordered Judy.

Sipho put out his hand to stroke the dog, but, looking up at the woman who opened the door, he felt a sudden panic. She was small, like Ma, but looked older. Beneath her creased brown forehead, her eyes were like those of Gogo and the woman in the taxi. Deep, dark eyes that looked straight into you and knew if you were telling the truth. He had let these people think he was an orphan…Perhaps he should run
right away. This whole place was strange to him. Lowering his eyes, he glanced quickly behind him—just in time to see the gate gliding back by itself, locking them in.

“This young man here is Sipho,” Mr. Danny announced.

“Hello, Sipho.
Sawubona!”

The voice of the woman at the door was firm. If she was surprised she did not show it.

“Sawubona,
Mama!” he replied, keeping his eyes fixed on the pattern in the carpet as he stepped into the house. He was wearing his army jacket and the broken shoes, which were still damp, while carrying his other clothes bundled under his arm. Copper came leaping inside with them, trying now to sniff the clothes. The dog’s long, wavy hair glowed with a reddish tint under the electric light.

“Copper, stop it! We’re starving, Ada! Can we eat right away? We need to make one extra place.”

Judy signaled to Sipho to follow her and Portia into a room with a long table covered with a white tablecloth. One end was set out with plates, knives and forks and shining glasses.

Apart from a narrow table at the side, there was no other furniture in the room, but on every wall there were pictures. Some large, some small, some with figures in them and some with just colors. There had been lots of pictures in Ma’s
shack too. She had papered the walls with pages cut from magazines. Lying on his mattress on the floor, he used to look up at film stars, or people smiling at him and telling him to buy something. These pictures were very different.

Sipho was still looking around when a boy entered the room who was about a head taller than him. In the car Judy had said her brother was three years younger than her, only eleven.

“This is my brother, David,” said Judy.

The boy stared as Judy introduced him. His hair was darker than his sister’s. It was like the brown tassels at the end of ripe
mealies,
and hung over his forehead down to his eyes. Flicking back some strands, he gave a very slight nod and sat down. Sipho was placed facing him. The boy’s thin lips were set downward, and there was something in him that made Sipho feel not just awkward, but uncomfortable.

The smell of chicken, however, soon took over. Everyone’s eyes, including Copper’s, followed Mama Ada as she carried a large silver plate into the room. The roasted bird surrounded by crisply roasted potatoes was placed in front of Mr. Danny. Sipho’s stomach was churning. He could hardly wait to feel the juices in his mouth!

“You can start with that,” said Mr. Danny, giving Sipho a plate with a large leg of chicken
and two potatoes. “Help yourself to vegetables and gravy.”

Following the silence of the first mouthfuls, Judy and Portia began to chat, Mr. Danny joining in at times. Sipho was just wishing he didn’t have to struggle with the knife and fork when Mr. Danny said he should use his fingers on the bone. Glancing up, Sipho caught Judy’s brother looking straight at him. It wasn’t a friendly look. He hardly spoke, even when his father asked him about the rugby match.

“Aw, Dad, I don’t want to talk about it.”

“I bet that means you lost!” Judy grinned.

Her brother glowered at her but remained silent. He didn’t even smile when Mama Ada brought in a large chocolate pudding and ice cream. The only nice thing Sipho saw him do was pass Copper a piece of chicken under the table.

After dinner Judy took Sipho down a long corridor with rooms on either side. There were two sitting rooms.

“We watch television in that one, and this one’s the lounge,” said Judy. The comfortablelooking sofas were covered in material that looked like a garden of flowers. Dark green curtains hung from the ceiling to the floor along one wall. In one corner stood a piano, and, once again, there were paintings everywhere.

Farther down the corridor, it seemed that everyone in the family had rooms to themselves. Pointing out her father’s bedroom, Judy led the way into her own.

“Excuse the mess! Ada’s always going on at me!

Portia was lying on one of two beds with a magazine propped against her knees. She smiled and returned to her reading. Opposite the beds was a stereo system. Tapes, books, and magazines were spread over the floor.

“That’s David’s room, but he’ll shout if we go in. This is where you’ll sleep, in here, Sipho.”

They had come to a room at the very end of the corridor. Inside, everything was very tidy. Next to the bed was a desk with nothing on it. A single picture hung above the bed. A scene of some trees with flaming red flowers and blue mountains in the distance.

“I bet you’ll want to wash off all that horrible lake water,” said Judy. “Hold on a minute. I’ll be back.”

He had seen two bathrooms, one right opposite his room. Judy returned with a large fluffy towel, some pajamas and a pair of smart white
takkies.

“David has grown out of these pajamas, and I don’t use these shoes for tennis anymore. You can have them if they fit.”

“I think they will fit. Thank you,” said Sipho. The shoes looked almost new.

Watching the steam rising from the water as it ran into the bath, Sipho wondered how much he should take. When you had to carry water a long way from a tap, you only took what you needed. Would anyone be listening to see how long he left the taps on? He didn’t think so. But still he didn’t like to waste water. When the bath was a quarter full he turned the taps off.

As he stretched out in the hot water, his mind flooded with pictures. Gogo bathing him in a small tub in the yard when he was little. Being rubbed and hugged afterward. Jabu grinning and splashing his head with water under the railway tap. Ducking his own head under and seeing his
malunde
friends through a cascade of icy-cold water. His body hitting the freezing lake, feeling like it was splintering.

Later, lying under the covers in bed, he imagined the places where his friends might be sleeping. Had Lucas found another hideout under a staircase, in an alleyway or another empty plot? The faint sound of music, beating from Judy’s stereo down the corridor, reminded him of a song he had heard coming a few times from clubs and cafes in Hillbrow. It would be cold out there. Mr. Danny and Judy had been very kind to him. But he could tell that David
wasn’t happy about him. And Mama Ada…once she started asking him questions, she was bound to find out the truth. That he wasn’t really an orphan. What if they found out he had a mother and stepfather? What then?

Sipho turned in the bed and buried his face in the pillow. The other day Jabu had told him about ostriches and how they buried their heads in the sand.

“Hey, they’re stupid, man! They must leave their brains in the sand!” Sipho had joked.

But now he wished he could do the same. If only he could forget all the disturbing thoughts that jostled in his head.

W
hen he woke, the wall opposite the window was slashed with a strip of bright sunlight. Not sure what to do, Sipho lay in bed, enjoying its softness and listening to the sounds of the house. It was very quiet. Quiet enough to hear birds calling and answering each other outside. Every now and again a dog barked somewhere in the distance. There was no sound, even of motor cars. Perhaps because it was Sunday. Sunday mornings in the township were usually quieter too than weekdays. But even then, when he lay waking on the mattress on the floor of the shack, before long there would always be sounds of someone doing something. A baby crying, a voice calling, a dog barking or whining, someone shouting at it to shut up, a rooster squawking…

He had closed his eyes again, trying to make out how many kinds of birds there were outside from their different calls, when he heard a shuffling sound at his door. At first he was puzzled,
half expecting the door to open, until he realized who it was. Copper! Slipping out of bed, he went to let him in. In the beam of sunlight, Copper’s silky hair seemed even more reddish golden than the night before.

“Sawubona,
Copper!” whispered Sipho. “You’re a good dog.”

Copper’s large eyes looked up as if they understood, while Sipho stroked him and scratched behind his ears. Sitting on the edge of the bed, with Copper relaxing beside him, Sipho began to feel he had a friend he could trust. When Judy put her head around the door a little later to ask if he would like some breakfast, she smiled.

“Copper must really like you! He doesn’t usually take to strangers that easily.”

But while Copper’s eyes made him feel safe, Mama Ada’s made him feel nervous, and it wasn’t long before she had the opportunity to question him. He had brought his empty porridge bowl to her at the sink, when she said to him, “Tell me about yourself, Sipho. How do you come to be on the streets?”

“I was with my grandmother, Mama. She worked for the white farmer. Then she died.”

“So who took care of you?”

As he looked downward at the zigzag tiles on the floor, his mind raced crazily. He didn’t want to lie, but what could he do?

“My mother…she brought me here. But then she got very sick, Mama.” His voice had gone down to almost a whisper, and he paused. No, he couldn’t bring himself to say the actual words that his mother had died. That would be very bad. Instead he wiped his eyes with his hand.

“There was no one to look after me…and there was too much fighting and killing in that place. That’s why I came to town.”

“Where did your mother live?” Mama Ada asked.

Again Sipho panicked. He had to name a different place.

“It was Phola Park, Mama.”

Mama Ada was silent. Phola Park was well known. Thousands of people without homes had made shacks for themselves there.

“That place is not good for a child…even if a child has his mother,” she said, shaking her head and turning back to the sink to continue washing. Pointing to a towel, she asked Sipho to help dry the dishes.

It wasn’t clear whether Mama Ada believed him or not. He wondered what she would say to Mr. Danny. But Mr. Danny had already left the house. Judy said that he played golf every Sunday. A little later Mama Ada also left the house. She had prepared some food for them and
announced that she would see them in the morning.

‘Ada’s going to see her children. They’re all grown up, so she usually only goes home at weekends,” Judy explained to Sipho after Mama Ada had said good-bye.

“Where do they live?” asked Sipho.

“Oh, somewhere in Soweto.”

He was relieved. Mama Ada didn’t come from his township, then.

“Ada’s been with us since I was a baby. She’s amazing and so wise. She helped bring me and David up as well as all her own five kids, singlehanded. You should ask her how she got rid of her drunken husband! She’s really proud about it!”

Sipho didn’t know what to say. He was interested in what Judy was saying, but he wasn’t used to this way of talking. The way she called Mama Ada by her first name didn’t seem respectful. It reminded him of Kobus calling Gogo—who was old enough to be Kobus’s grandmother—”Sarah.” But at the same time Judy really seemed to like Mama Ada. If Mama Ada was also so wise, like Judy said, he would have to be very careful not to give her any clues that would show up his lies.

Sipho spent most of the day watching television, listening to music and playing cards with the two girls. Judy’s brother seemed to be keeping away
from them, staying in his room. When a friend of his came over, instead of inviting the boy in they heard David suggest they go out to visit another friend. Sipho saw how Portia raised her eyebrows and Judy shrugged in return. They didn’t say anything. Did David’s behavior have something to do with him? Sipho caught sight of the two boys as they walked out of the driveway. The friend was white, and both boys’ heads were bent in close conversation. Were they talking about him?

In the late afternoon, just before setting off with her father to take Portia home, Judy brought Sipho a handful of old comics. Absorbed in the adventures of Batman, he hardly noticed that David had come into the sitting room until the television came on with a blast. Copper, who had been sleeping on the floor next to Sipho, jumped up with a bark and padded across to David, his tail wagging. Without saying anything, David threw himself onto the sofa in front of the screen, scratching Copper behind the ears in the same place Sipho had done.

That evening, however, at the table, David suddenly accused Judy of stealing his comics from the bookcase outside his room.

“Come off it, Dave! It’s not stealing just to take a few old comics to read!” Judy laughed.

Sipho felt the heat rising to his face.

“Stop it, you two!” said Mr. Danny, raising his voice. “What’s this all about?”

“Dave is getting paranoid because I borrowed some of his old comics for Sipho.”

“You didn’t ask me,” David blurted out.

“You weren’t here to ask! What’s your problem? Sipho’s only reading them. He’s not
eating
them!” retorted Judy.

“Well, I’m not going to have any arguments at the dinner table, least of all on a Sunday, the one day I have to rest,” Mr. Danny stated severely.

Judy and David glared at each other but kept quiet. Sipho sat embarrassed. Judy was right. He hadn’t eaten the comics! They were safe in the next room. Her brother must be angry about something else. Whatever it was, it was probably something to do with him.

“You will need to be ready by quarter to seven tomorrow morning, Sipho.” Mr. Danny’s voice interrupted his thoughts. “That’s the time we leave for the shop, all right?”

“Yes, sir,” he replied. “I’ll be ready.”

He wanted to ask whether Mr. Danny would bring him back to his home again the next evening, but it didn’t seem to be the right time.

“I trust you two have done all your homework for tomorrow,” Mr. Danny said, getting up from the table. His eyes were on his son.

“Yes, Dad,” David replied in a bored voice, as if words had to be dragged from his mouth.

Like the night before, Sipho didn’t fall asleep immediately. Once again, too many thoughts were whirling through his head. Among them was Mr. Danny talking about homework. For a whole week he had hardly thought about his own school. Who had missed him there? With nearly seventy children in the class, he might have hoped to escape unnoticed by the teacher. But not with his teacher. She took a roll call every day and was very strict. By the end of the week she would surely have asked why he wasn’t there. Would Gordon have said anything? Or had Ma been up to the school?

In this soft, warm bed it felt like he was a world away from Gordon, Ma, and his life in the township. Yet it was only a taxi ride away. Even nearer were Jabu and the rest of the gang…somewhere out there in the cold of Hillbrow. But from this bed here in Mr. Danny’s house, it felt like he was a world away from them too.