The Fight To Find Home

Welcome to South Africa

IN SOUTH AFRICA

"Argh, my cloth is soiled." As she looks down at her cloth soiled with a brown, hot chocolate stain, Alexis shouts hysterically "Tina, come here now.", Instead of her old, kind personal house help, a young lady with full long black wavy hair walks into the room, smiling, the girl says, "she was sent on an errand; what do you need? I'll help." Her voice sounding sweet annoys Alexis even more and she throws a ceramic pot at her, she dodges it without breaking her smile. Hearing the noise and commotion, a fairly aged couple run up the stairs and into the room, the elder woman moves her gaze from the broken pot to Alexis, who had switched positions with the girl and was now standing facing the pieces of broken glass with a look of shock and anger clouding her face and the girl opposite her standing with the smile still on her face. The man speaks first "Tami, what is going on here, you are meant to be preparing for school tomorrow with Alexis and instead I find you I here with Alexis but not preparing for school but breaking ceramic pots", none responds, the woman, gentler asks directing her question at Tamilore "darling girl, what happened?" Politely she responds "ma I heard Alexis calling for ...." She couldn't complete her response when a slap lands on her cheek and for the first time the smile fades, she turns to Alexis and starts walking towards her, when she reaches her she smiles slowly and returns the slap gingerly. Shocked, Alexis staggers back and pulls a shaking hand to her cheek and bursts out screaming, annoyed and tired, the older man walks out the woman shakes and follows suit, after they had gone out, Alexis walks towards Tami and slaps her, removes her shirt and tosses it to her "take it to the dry-cleaner, that's why I called" she turns around and walks into a large closet and when she returns she sees the white shirt she tossed lying carelessly on the floor where she had dropped it with a note, she stooped to pick the letter and read "you tossed it, you take it to the cleaner yourself, I'm  not your slave"groaning she picked the shirt.

   Tami wakes when her maid pulls the curtains in her room, good naturedly she greets her and walks to the bathroom for her bath. She is done in a few minutes and meets her uniform on her bed, she dresses quickly and pulls a container from under her bed, puts it in her bag and walks to the dining table on meeting her parents there, she greeted politely and went to get her meal from the kitchen. She gets there and a mischievous smile graces her face, the cook sees it snd shakes his head pulling the foul-smelling nylon from her bag she drops it on the counter and brings out Alexis' special  diet cereal and options the container, wrinkling her nose, she opens the bag and dumps it's content into the container. She closes and returns the container to its spot, she washes her hand, takes her food and returns to the table " her dad sights her returning and asks "what took you so long?", she replies as though her mind is drifting and was foggy "I myself have no idea father" he smiles fondly and says jokingly "you always did have a weird way about yourself didn't you?, I think I've grown too fond of you", he pats her hand. Alexis enters the siding table chatting away happily and she throws her bag on the table dramatically, attracting attention, pulls a chair beside her mother and sits, without even a glance of greeting at her parents she continues talking when her father turns to face her and asks "where have you been?, you are ~ he glances at his simple but exquisite wristwatch, then returns his gaze to her ~ at least 35 minutes late" Alexis glances at him, not bothering to hide her annoyance then ignores him as she cut the call. Then she speaks "dad how mean can you be, you saw I was on a call and you're quoting your holy rules ~ she mimicks him ~  where have you been?, you are at least 35 minutes late. Do you know how embarrassed I had been, Octavia laughed at me and asked if I was still being controlled by my dad. I tell you don't you ever ....." A swift slap lands across her cheek, her mom had slapped her and her face had gone back to it's usual calmness as if nothing had happened, without responding to the slap she looks at her younger sister and is annoyed at her height of beauty, again without reacting she called for the butler to bring her diet cereal and a cup of condensed milk. He hesitates and at her persuasion he goes into the kitchen and brings out what she had asked for on a silver tray, with a mischievous gleam in her eyes Tami says quietly to herself "yeah serve her demise on  silver platter" the stench of the diet cereal fills the dinning area as the butler walks in, Alexis cringes at the smell and speaks to her father "please do tell Mr. Aaron to take a bath next time he is to attend to me" another slap from her mother, she ignores it as Mr. Aaron drops the tray. As she opens the container a scream escapes her mouth.