Swirl

4. Running Mascara.

A/N:

This story is being written in the third person, but I feel like I've focused too much on Achim's point of view with the occasional sprinkle of Lerato's.

Soooooo, this chapter is all about her.

Definitions:
Sawubona: hi in zulu.
Phephisa: I'm sorry in zulu.

BTW, mostly, I'll be using English in this book. In the prologue, I had used some German, which I probably will use at some later point in the future.

As the rest of the chapters go, expect some Afrikaans, Zulu and German.

Thank goodness for Google Translate, because damn. :/

*Kourtney Kardashian voice* Honestly, truly, I'm excited about this chapter.

Happy reading! And don't forget to vote and comment. :|

She ran.

She left Achim in the middle of the street in white-washed suburbia and ran because she didn't need this right now. She was still in the process of accepting that not all white people were the same.

She had extended an olive branch to Achim because he was whom she had cut off first, all those years ago, when she decided that white people weren't worth her time and energy. But this, - this was too much, too soon.

Her gut had told her something would go wrong the minute the car had parked in front of James' house but she went against it and listened to Achim.

Something she normally didn't do was listen to people who thought they knew what was best for her.

Only she knew what was best for herself, because aside from her mother, she was all she had.

Something just wasn't working within her; - she honestly thought Achim had her best interests at heart, so she decided to trust him and shared with him thoughts and emotions that she had managed to keep buried within the bowels of her heart for so long.

Thinking about it now, she realized that she needed the release that that brief moment with Achim in the car provided for her.

She never cried at her father's funeral because it all seemed too surreal. She never saw his coffin, nor his corpse. She only heard that he was dead, so a part of her never brought herself to believe it,- to accept it. It wasn't something she voiced out to anyone, not even her own mother, because they would have tried to convince her that he really was dead.

Tonight she accepted it.

Airing her story out to Achim made it sink into her mind that he was dead; and in that split moment, she finally felt free.

Daddy, your little girl's all grown up, she remembered thinking during that culmination of truth.

The shackles that had chained her mind surrounding the circumstances of Mr. Paki's death had been dropped. She thought that because it happened whilst she was in Achim's arms, the shackles that surrounded her thoughts around white people could be dropped, too. Maybe she could try to build a bridge with those who would be willing.

She almost believed that he could be the beginning of the difference in her life regarding the matter. That is until she found herself running in the summer air, barefoot like a bandit because of Achim and his friends.

Maybe it's just because of his friends. He didn't really do anything wrong to me, she thought.

That thought was quickly pushed aside when the pessimistic side of her mind took over and convinced her that it was his fault, too.

He brought her there.

Those are his friends, and as the saying goes, birds of the same feather, flock together.