Umfelokazi

Chapter 37

Chapter 37

BONGANI ZONDI

I have always been one to be different from my family especially when it came to everyone else. I was to be much fare in skin colour and my hair would be much softer and most probably looking like a plump short smurf in the process expect being blue. Even my name. It was meant to be for a boy. Well I was expected to be one but when my mother gave birth to me I came out this yellow big eyed girl with the darkest lips they have ever seen.  Well you would assume that I smoke when I have never smoked ever in my whole entire life. 
Growing up I behaved more masculine than feminine hence why I had a fare number of guy friends. 
I got along with everyone, I wasn't much out and about but people just loved knowing me and I didn't mind at all.  I even got along with the Mzimela sisters and that is how I got to know about their brother's more especially Qophelo and Hlubi as I was more close to them. Well I would say I was closer to Qophelo and we squabbled alot with Hlubi, at some point I thought we didn't like each other but stayed being friends too. 
Qophelo is a nice person once you get to know him. The bratty him is gone and you get to know him well. He liked me once, should I say but I never liked him in that way. We sorted out our difference and we stayed true friends. We have never been in a relationship nor tried anything romantic nothing at all we were just good friends and up until I left and so did he to pursue his dream of being a business man like his father ways of which he did like his father did.
I left this place at a very young age. Around 18 if I am not mistaken and that time I was going to be part of another family. No one knew that I was getting married. So did I until the negotiations came. It was a manditory and traditional thing that happened in our family that arrange marriages were a thing in our family. Little did I know when I got married that I was already pregnant. My husband and I knew that Sqalo was not his child but he put himself in a position where he father's him and claim to be his father and it didn't turn out the way I thought it would be. That is why I am here. Back home with my son. 
It breaks my heart to see him the way he is at times and I would say it took me a while to get out of that toxic marriage.
I have dished up the food that I cooked for my son and also my parents. My father was the most unhappy one about our return and my mother chose to not speak about it and just keep to herself and not say anything to me. I have not been home in years but surely they benefited from me being away for all these years. I mean I got married to my mother's ex boss's son who thought that if their son married a rural woman then he would have someone to control which was true. It turned out to be that. If I didn't get out of that marriage I do not think I would've survived any longer staying there.
My mother makes her way inside the kitchen and she looks at me.
“Your child has been making noise since morning”,She says like he is some new born.
“I know mah he just needs time”
“This is not a rehabilitation centre Bonga I do not understand why did you leave your husband to be here?!”
“Mah I was abused emotionally everyday and when it started getting physical I had to get out of there. Sqalo is too young to loose me”
“Young?he is 15 years old and you like babying him that is why he will never grow up!”,She throws her hands in the air and I look at her.
“Go back to that man already he had accepted your bustard child!”,She says with anger laced in her voice and I flinch at the word “Bustard”.
I swallow as I look at my mother feeling my eyes getting glossy.
“Mama Sqalo is not a bustard child”, I say softly feeling the pain of my mother saying that about my child.
”That is not Zondi's child and he doesn't look like him. What were you hoping for these years?”,she asks.
I was hoping that this never comes out and Sqalo looks like me the most but he turned out to look like his father the most.
He was just a one night mistake that I didn't think I would be left with. A result of me falling into temptation with his biological father. He doesn't know, he never knew that after that night before he left for university he left something in me that grew to a 15 year old version of him. 
We hear noises that are coming from my bedroom.
“Nx”,She says and moves away from me. 
That is the longest conversation we have held since I came back here over 2 months ago. 
I rush to my bedroom and I get inside and I find him looking at me as he is laid on the bed. Tied to it as possibly can so that he cannot escape. I have had my fare share of days where I wanted to let him go from this hold but also I thought of saving him from being a statisic from drug use. 
I get get to one of the bed side and he turns his head to look at me.
“Mah please let me go”,His voice breaks my heart. His plea is not as agressive as it was when he was hooked into these drugs. 
I can't afford to take him to rehab, I always depended on My husband for years. I didn't even get the chance to sore and go to university. He hated that idea and reminded me that I had to take care of Sqalo of which I have been. 
“How are you feeling today?”,I ask.
“I am not feeling itchy today”,He says and I nod.
“I will let one of your hands free”,I say and I do so.  Seeing the red marks on his pale(ish) skin breaks my heart.  I quickly remove the other hand from its chain and let him go from the rest of his body. 
I take his food and he offers to feed himself. His hands are shaking as he takes the plate from my hands.
“I am doing all of this because I love you Sqalo”,I say.
“I know Bonga”,He says and I nod. 
He tries to feed himself but with the way his hands are shaking he seems to be failing.
“Let me feed you”,I take the plate and take a spoon full of for him and sigh before I try to feed him.
He obliges and does not even give me a hard time in doing it.  He hasn't asked for a fix in the past two weeks of which I think is progress.
My ex husband is the one who got him hooked on drugs purposely mainly because Sqalo was starting to fight for me and “Filling ideas” of me leaving him of which he didn't want me to do but I ended up doing it.  I might have thrown my life away but I do not want my child to do that and I had to put him first. 
He chews on the tiny rice and beef that I have cooked and I smile looking at him. I run my fingers on his grown hair and I giggle.
“You look all grown now. You should cut your hair”,I say.
“I will”,I nod my head.
“Gogo has been saying some things when she comes in here”,my heart skips a beat.
What has my mother been saying to him?
“Let's finish this food”,I stare back that the plate trying to get some food for me to feed him.
“Bonga is Dad my dad?”,My heart comes to an honest stand still for a moment. I feel tears prickling my eyes but I look up to push them back before I stare at him.
“No, I am sorry”,I say softly. 
I cannot lie to him. 
Silence prevails the room.  I put the plate next to him.
“I will go and make some juice for you”,I lightly smile before I make my way out of the room.