At Least We Have Good Weather: A Life of Love and Loss

Chapter 49

"Why don't you just talk to her? Girls love confidence. What's the worst that could happen...?"

That was Sasha's advice to me when she first saw me talking about Hot Train Girl #2.

Now to be fair, she didn't have a clue what was really going on in my life at that point, but also if she had just followed through on her promise of September 2012, both of our lives could have been very, very different...

A few months prior, during July of 2012, I found myself browsing the Internet in search of some sort of motivation to help me write again, and as luck would have it, I stumbled across Sasha's blog. I was immediately attracted to her open and honest style of writing, something I could relate to, as we seemingly both saw the world the same. If finding her blog was luck, it was fate that she was in fact based in Johannesburg too, and I began my efforts to try and contact her.

It took a while, but what started as trading blog comments eventually became emails to each other and then phone calls.

It seemed like we had a lot in common as we were both carrying around heavy burdens in life and had aching hearts searching for love and affection. She, however, was currently in an on-again-off- again relationship with an Afrikaans guy, who from what she revealed to me, treated her so badly, both mentally and physically, but said that she was finally done with him, and was making plans to move out from their shared accommodation.

We'd been talking for months about meeting up, but it seemed like we just couldn't get the timing right, and with my lack of reliable transport, I was frustrated that I couldn't make a concerted effort to make it happen. At long last, we finally arranged a meeting but she cancelled last minute. I was more than used to being cancelled on, and knew that things in her personal life were complicated so was a little more understanding about this one.

I decided to up my game, and in an effort to lift her spirits, I sent flowers to her work, I didn't hear from her the day they arrived though, and when I casually asked her if she got anything, she told me she hadn't been to work. Curious as to why, I asked. She answered.

She said her guy had smacked her around and her face was so blue she couldn't go into work. My heart broke out of anger, and my now infamous white knight complex was about to kick in.

I promised to show her a better way, and she needed to get away from this guy. She did return to her work and was blown away by the romantic gesture of the flowers, and the card attached was to remind her that romance did still exist in the world.

We chatted every day, all day, until it was time for me to head down to Cape Town for the first time that year (the same trip I would meet Manuela).

While I was down there, Sasha told me she couldn't wait for me to come back to Joburg so she could show me what an amazing man I was. That was my first night down there, and I was eager for my trip to end so I could go back and meet up with her. The next night, I messaged her to chat, and she didn't reply.

Over the next few days, she ignored my messages completely, and by the time I returned to Joburg, she had stopped all communication with me. With my unexpected encounter with Manuela playing itself out, my first instinct was out of concern, what if something more serious had happened with her ex...or current...or whatever he was to her now.

But all my attempts at communication went unanswered.

Fearing the worst, or maybe realizing the expected, I carried on with my life. Then, a few months later in early 2013...she resurfaced with a new blog post. I'll never know if it was my concern, curiosity, or my ever-increasing loneliness, but I again tried to contact her, and we began talking again.