The Truth

Carly

That weekend I met the people who would come to matter to me. In a psychiatric hospital there are different wards for the many different conditions. It's not like the movie-versions where regular depressants are placed with psychotic schizophrenics. Potentially dangerous patients and those who are high suicide risks are the only ones put in lock up. Patients suffering from depression and bipolar are grouped together. Anorexia and bulimia nervosa in yet another ward. That's how it is in South Africa, at least. I stayed with people who were fucked up but not crazy.

Carly was a prototype. At twenty-four her life was going nowhere and she had turned to drugs. Synthesised khat specifically. I knew nothing then about khat and I know little more now, except that it gives one a short burst of euphoria and confidence, and is used by some as a poor-man's cocaine.

Carly's main addiction wasn't drugs. It was her attachment to despair - something we all had in common. An excuse for the fear of responsibility many of us depressives nurture. Her whole facade suggested a desire for death; her slow, stoner-like manner implied that she was useless and couldn't be counted on. That was exactly what she was going for.

This trait made her approachable and easy to talk to. It also gave her the courage to converse with remarkable honesty. She considered herself shy but I could never see it in her. I've always been the shy one.

"So what are you in here for?" she asked.

"Oh, the normal. Depression, alcoholism, shitty relationships."

"Ah nice. Me too." She scratched at her limp auburn hair. "So did you have to wait long to get in here?"

"I don't really know. I was kept in hospital for an indefinite time."

"Cool! Private?"

"I wish. An eternity in the gen'. A shitty bed and nurses who didn't give a fuck. I'd rather they just let me die next time."

"Oh. Well, you know, that's what we're all aiming towards." I laughed with her and it was a relief finally to find humour in this bleak, hopeless period of my life. "So. What do you do?"

"Nothing," I said.

"I know that." She said it ironically but it contained a sad truth. "But, like, do you live with your parents? How do you support yourself."

I'm not usually open with strangers, but I managed to attain a cool detachment and accede the responsibility to my mouth.

"No. I'm kind of homeless at the moment. I haven't spoken to my mom in five years and my dad is an asshole."

"What does he do?"

"He's trying to be a businessman but he's lost all his money and spends what he gleans together on his new wife..."

Shel interrupted us. "What's up, guys?" She would always be available to break down the potential for sincerity. I turned my mind from the company.

My thoughts raged against my father. All the more so because even the happy and comfortable years of my upbringing had led me to this situation. My parents had been academics and had done well for themselves. They had good jobs at Wits University and were well-respected. Their settled ease had allowed them to give me attention without the common parental resentment. I had never wanted, neither in terms of basic needs, nor in love.

They made their first mistake in assuming that by aimlessly providing they were giving me an upbringing. So caught up in their flawless lives, they omitted to teach me an African language. My English is impeccable, but that counts for nothing for a black girl who can't communicate with her own people. Un-Anglicised black people assume that I think I'm better than them. White people assume that I won't respect them unless they can prove that they're better than me. My tenth grade English teacher called me pretentious because I used words he didn't understand.

The greater mistake was that they believed it would last forever. A relationship upheld by boundless beneficence entirely dissipates when there's nothing left to give. A year into university I found this out. I'd chosen to study drama in my privileged naivety. And then, at the end of the year, the university discovered that my mother had been embezzling research money. She fled, leaving my father - the remaining beneficiary of her pernicious gifts - to pay back what she'd taken. Not only did this deplete all his assets, it left him in huge debt. In addition, Wits considered him guilty by association and released him from his job. He could've fought his unfair dismissal if he'd had the resources to go to court.

I was unceremoniously dumped out of my course, which the university funded as part of my parents' employment package. I returned home from the residence to the indignity of my father telling me he couldn't afford to house me. We both knew that he could have found a way. He had friends from whom he could borrow. But his limited love did not have room for sacrifice, and in the end found my regard easy to surrender.

With my meagre savings from the year's pocket money, I rented a room in the gritty suburb of Yeoville. My inability to communicate, being the only resident who could speak neither Zulu nor Sotho, forced me into hermithood. When I went out into the crowded streets, even the friendly people treated me with a deep suspicion. I felt like an aristocrat who, through unforeseen circumstances, had ended up living with the people who had previously served her. Wait, that's exactly what I was. Like any white family, we'd had a domestic worker, a gardener, someone to clean the pool. They all came from a township or area like this one, and couldn't afford a good enough education to find white-people jobs. They didn't accept me as one of them. Neither did I. This had to be a temporary situation after all.

But weeks turned into months and my money was running out. I wouldn't be evicted - that's not the way there - but my stay would become increasingly uncomfortable.

My landlady referred me to a white family who needed a maid. It was below my dignity but I did not want to seem ungrateful. I thought she'd probably kick me out if it didn't look like I was trying. It took me two hours to reach the house via taxi, just for my interview. Within two minutes of meeting my potential madam, I knew she wouldn't have me. Again, my superb command of English ruined an opportunity. No one wants their domestic worker to be an equal. In retrospect, I should have swallowed my pride and spoken in pidgin (or whatever the African equivalent is called), but my parents did not raise me to be adaptable.

I arrived back in Yeoville late at night. It was a dangerous place at the best of times and I had been naive not to find somewhere else to sleep. I turned a corner straight into a group of drunken men - young, around my own age at the time. They recognised me and taunted me, calling me a 'coconut' and saying I was too good for them 'kaffers'. One of them grabbed me by the shoulder and shoved me into the arms of another who pushed me towards a third and used me for a game of hot potato. Then I fell before one of them could catch me and once I was on the ground they really started to hurt me. The alcohol on their breath was so strong in my nostrils. Their rough hands held me down. I thought I they would rape me. They did not. Not that time.