THE AFTERMATH

CHAPTER EIGHT

ALINA

Sounding ice cold as only she can be, Michael's mum answers my phone on the first ring like she was anticipating for me to call. I wonder if she knows anything.

Her: I never thought I would live to see this day. Look who is calling me! Wonders shall never end

She lets out an annoying laughing sound. I choose to be the bigger person now, so let me be very polite.

Me: Hello Mama. How are you?

Her: I am not your mother young lady. Your mum lies so cold in that bushy graveyard, I will be so damned she is probably tossing and turning as we speak right now. I am told trees will be outgrowing her grave soon enough. When was the last time you visited her? Haaa?

I figure if I don't stop her now, she will keep throwing those insults at me before I even accomplish the mission why I called her. But wait! That really hurt. She has no right to speak ill of my mum. Who doesn't have respect for the dead really? Anyways, let me just breath this one in and let it go.

Me: With all due respect Mrs Pasi, that is not why I called you

Her: Then what do you want Ntombazana (Young lady)?

Me: Have you heard from Michael recently?

Her: What is really going on with you two people?

Me: What do you mean by that?

Her: That stupid boy called me about two weeks ago telling me a lot of nonsense. He said he was sorry for what he did and he wanted to come home for a while.

I let go a sigh of relief as I hold on to dear hope that he is there with her

Me: May I please speak with him. I can't go through his phone

Her: Are you crazy Mampofu (Calls me by totem)? Do you think I will ever let him set his foot in my house? He killed my husband before his time and I will never forgive him. I told him to shove his apology up his cursed ass

I don't hear what she keeps rumbling on about or maybe I just choose to stop listening to her endless insults because I literally start to shiver with cold as sweat breaks through my forehead and shaking palms.

Michael is in danger!

He was going to seek shelter at his mum's place because he thought it was a lesser evil than whatever he is running away from.

But why didn't he call me?

Why didn't he come home at least?

He knows I wouldn't have pushed him away. In my line of work, I have come to realize how desperation can push people to the edge. I am worried that Michael has probably suffered his worst which I am not sure what it is at this point.

It can't be about his sexuality because in literal sense he hasn't come out to the whole world. Well with the exception of me, his mum and two sisters only. We all agreed never to say anything to anyone until he was ready to come out himself. His mother vowed to skin alive anyone who would say anything to the community because she was embarrassed.

In her own words she said to him, "You have stripped me naked my son!"

As sad as it might sound, I haven't been home the past twenty two years. What Mrs Pasi just said actually has some sense to it despite the meanness coating it. I know nobody has been tending to my mum's grave ever since I left home.

I had a lot of unfinished business with my family so I just made sure I skipped any trips to my maternal home whenever it was possible. This was as far as me not attending my lobola negotiations because we deliberately picked a date when I also had to attend to a conference in Thailand.

My mum passed away when I was about eight years old. My father married another wife barely a year later after we mourned my mother. She came with her own daughter who was two years younger than me.

I hadn't really comprehended what the death of my mother meant to me when she was buried but I definitely felt her absence when I suffered in the hands of my step mother. To say she was just mean would be an understatement, the woman was abusive to me.

From sleeping without food to self-nursing wounds from her intended 'disciplinary actions', when I was twelve years old, my endurance spirit bailed out on me and I attempted suicide.

Succumbing to despair, growing self-hate and losing the will to live are not things I learnt in Psychology University. They are personal experiences I conquered which inspired me to enroll into the program and made me a dedicated psychologist. Committing suicide is something I never wish on anyone at all. No matter how bad the situation might seem to be.

It is well!

That is what the fourteen year old Michael told me when he saw me draining in my own pool of blood which was gushing out from my right wrist as I patiently endured pain waiting for the angel of death to come for me.

'Hang on!!' He shouted and his voice sounded from afar yet he was so near.

'It is well!' He kept saying and after a while I figured he was also telling himself. After too many failed attempts to lift me from the ground, Michael left me helpless as my consciousness slipped out of my brains. He ran to get help. He saved my life when I should have lost it at twelve.

When I woke up the next day at the hospital, the nurses told me that there was little boy who wouldn't want to leave. Had it not been his mum who threatened him with his life, he wouldn't have gone home. That was the beginning of my friendship with Michael.

And now my friend is missing. I am losing my mind but I also vow to do everything I can to find him wherever he could be.

I should go to the police.

The drive to the police is only ten minutes away. I step on the brakes as I slow down to watch Michael's vehicle being towed in to the police car junk yard. Oh my word. Please don't be dead Michael! Don't you dare die on me!

If it weren't for the number plate, I wouldn't have recognized it. The scrap of metal is so distorted clearly showing that he probably hit something from the front. All the airbags seem to be out and the front wheels are both disengaged.

It is by miracle that I manage to safely park my own car. My feet feel heavy as I stroll down the pavement going towards the scrap yard. I am losing my breath. Then my phone rings.

I don't even check who it is as I am choking in my own tears. My voice obviously comes out shaken betraying me to the caller.

"Is everything ok Alina?" Kaem sounds so calm but his voice also stresses genuine concern

I scramble for words but they seem to be sprinting away from me so I just breath.

Poor man tries again, "Where are you Sunshine?"

"At the police station" that at least manages to come out together with the directions and he tells me to hang on as he grabs a cab to the station.

In the meanwhile, a police officer has finally escorted me to the report desk and I give my statement and add on that it is his car I saw being towed earlier. They don't really give me much information but in the least of it, I learn that Michael's car was seen ditched on a cliff 20km out of town heading north. Nothing has been found there except his cellphone, wallet with a few bill notes and some glasses. No-one was in the car and there are no witnesses yet to testify how it all happened.

There is got to be something I can do!

But for now, I have to figure out a way to explain all this to Kaem when he gets here without sounding cheesy or stupid.