Pink Cocoa

INTRODUCTION

Hey! I hope you are well.

I'd first like to thank you for giving my story a shot, I hope not to disappoint.

I have tried writing stories on Wattpad before but had them unpublished of several reasons, one being that I lost connection with them. When Pink Cocoa came to mind, I was not certain about going through with it because I did not want to have to unpublish it as well because of the same reason but as I thought deeper about it and how I wanted it to go, I knew it was a story I needed to write, a narrative I needed to share.

Pink Cocoa is a story set in Lesotho, the African country I originate from. I feel that the setting gives me more familiarity to my story and that the authenticity of my narrative is more maintained in that manner.

Most of the places here are fictional and may not be relative to any real life location. The characters, names and events are also entirely products of my imagination therefore any relation of any of those to real-life ones is purely coincidental.

Everything about this story is something I brought up from scratch. Any similarity to any other person's work is not intentional and shall be redeemed if I am made aware of such.

Most names are Sesotho names to complement the setting and to avoid the story losing originality.

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The names of the main characters and their English equivalence or meaning :

Lehakoe: is the Sesotho word for the quartz rock. The name means precious stone or jewel.

Bohlokoa: is a word used interchangeably for 'important' and 'importance' as well as other synonyms relating to those two words.

Motaung: is a clan name, also used as a surname. Tau is a lion. Motaung was originally used as a term for he/she whose totem is a lion.

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I shall add more name definitions for Sesotho names at the beginning of each chapter where a  new character is introduced.

The story is written in second person mainly though first person may also be common. This is something I have never properly-exercised on long stories before but I am hoping to get right.

Please refrain from any form of plagiarism of the content in this book. Do not copy any content here without proper permission from me as the writer or carry out any other form of plagiarism as this book is protected by copyright and so any form of plagiarism is punishable by law.

I won't be posting any cast or pictures of outfits and all so feel free to imagine the character in any way you'd like. I also won't be posting theme songs for each chapter so any song that feels right for you as a reader is okay. It may happen that I post theme songs for the entire book at the end but it is not guaranteed.

Please bear with me in cases of slow updates and typing and grammatical errors as well(this story will only undergo full editing once it is complete).

DESCRIPTION

Pink Cocoa is a story about two teenage girls with different but very similar lives. It demonstrates a struggle with accepting oneself due to skin conditions, battles with mental health and finding love and falling into a same-gender relationship in a community which stigmatises mental health and the LBTQI+ group.

Lehakoe. The quartz which ignited fire in me, the fire which started off as my warmth but ended up to scald me.

You told me coffee truly was nice unsweetened and black but maybe it was better with some pink cream added to it. You called me your Pink Cocoa. I guess the reason you gave up on yourself and succumbed to your darkest deepest emotions was because you realised that coffee and pink cream was not a good combination after all.

You got tired of the bitter unsweetened flavour beneath the sweetness of the cream.

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I do hope you enjoy reading this story as much as I am to enjoy writing it.

Please do keep the feedback coming. Vote! Comment! Share!

Love
Mpho