Nomonde
The visiting hours slipped away faster than I expected. I said goodbye to Ndalwenhle and left him lying there in that hospital bed. He looked numb, hollow. I couldn't tell whether it was the pain in his body or the cancer eating him from the inside. What stunned me most was that he hadn't shed a single tear. Not one. Yet every word of his story carried a weight I could feel in my bones.
Driving home, I let his voice linger in my head. The road is quiet, no traffic this afternoon. Yesterday, the highway was chaos...a car crash near the CBD. I still see it in flashes when I close my eyes: twisted metal, bloodied faces, people crying. Today I shake it off. I don't want to relive it.
I tap my car's hands-free. "Call Cindy."
It rings twice before she picks up. "Hello?"
"Hi Cindy, love. Check my schedule for the rest of the week. And if there's anything, clear it."
"Hold on…" I hear her flipping through the diary. "Mmh. Only one client, Mr. N. S Khumalo."
My grip tightens on the steering wheel. "When was the rest of my week cleared?"
"Yesterday."
"Okay. Thanks, babes."
"What story are you working on?" she asks, nosy as always.
"Just a tragedy. No corruption this time."
"Eish. Sounds boring."
"It isn't, Cindy."
"Whatever, Mrs. Good-Bye." She hangs up, leaving me sighing into the silence of the car.
By the time I reach La Lucia, the gates slide open with a click of the remote. My husband's car is already parked in his garage. I pull into mine, close the gate, and feel the familiar comfort of security. This neighborhood is safe, yes, but in South Africa you learn never to be careless.
"How was work?" Sphiwe asks when we meet in the passage.
"It was draining. Not office draining...hospital draining. That kind of atmosphere gets under your skin."
"You were in the hospital?" His brow furrows as he sets down his bag.
"Yes. A particular man needed me to listen. His story…" I shake my head, trailing off. "It's raw. Painful. Beyond what I expected."
"As long as you're fine." He kisses my cheek and disappears into the kitchen.
I drop my bag on the bed and glance at him with a small smile. Five months married, three years of dating. He'd saved me once...from a mugging, nothing heroic, just the right man at the right moment. But one cup of coffee turned into a habit, and a habit into a love story. Now, here we are.
I've met almost all of his family. Mother's side. Father's side. Cousins scattered everywhere. All except one. The eldest brother. Nkanyezi.
Sphiwe speaks of him with reverence, as if he's more legend than man. Skhumbuzo and Ayanda are names I know well, but Nkanyezi—he is the ghost. The secret. "Don't tell the family I've met him," my husband once told me. "It's his wish." So, he and Skhumbuzo guard that silence.
All I know is a name. Nkanyezi. A mystery that gnaws at me. Why would a son be erased from a family's history? Why would a father pretend he doesn't exist? And why does my mother-in-law, a woman who only cares that her children are well taken care of, never speak of him?
I smile faintly to myself. My job just keeps getting better and better.