Читать книгу Zephany - Joanne Jowell - Страница 5

With the particular dramatic irony due to true-life stories, my first interview with Miché Solomon kicks off with a child’s cry. ‘Mommy, Mommy, Mommyyyyyyyyy,’ bawls her two-year-old daughter Sofia as she is carried off in the opposite direction from the subject of her attachment. Her crying reverberates in the near-empty corridors of the mid-week shopping mall, just outside the Blue Route Mugg & Bean where Miché and I have arranged to meet.

Miché tosses her head and keeps walking towards the restaurant entrance. ‘It’s okay,’ she says, more to herself than to me. ‘She’s with my daddy. She’ll be okay.’

‘Do you want to go and settle her?’ I ask, happy to wait though the cries are definitely subsiding.

‘No, if she’s with my daddy, it’s fine. As long as it’s him. She’ll be happy soon.’

I hadn’t had much time to greet her father – just a quick handshake over Miché’s brief introduction to ‘my daddy, Michael’. He gave me a soft smile and a gentle nod before taking over the helm of Sofia’s pram and steering her away, leaving me and Miché to talk in the relative privacy of the restaurant’s only couch.

Miché lowers herself slowly into a leather cushion beaten with age and overuse. It sinks deeper than expected and she giggles as she tries to stop herself from wallowing. I’ve only just discovered that she is pregnant again, and quite far along, so her mobility isn’t quite what you’d expect of a 21 year old.

Not that I know what to expect. This is only the second time that I am meeting Miché, the first being an official introduction by our publisher, which was more about Miché vetting me as her biographer than about me gauging her as my subject. I’m as virginal to this territory as the rest of us, having known of her only as Zephany Nurse, the kidnapped baby now found, and living a stone’s throw from her biological family. But you can’t interview a figment. I’m here today to interview Miché Solomon, the real McCoy.

Miché orders a hot chocolate, which comes piled with whipped cream. She eats the top of the white spirals with a long spoon and stirs in the rest. She excuses herself for not being as made up as usual – ‘pregnancy and being a mom isn’t great for my weight or my looks’ – but it’s easy to see how a blow-wave to her honeyed mane, a slick of ruby to her delicate lips, and a pair of glossy stilettos to offset her curvaceous figure would earn her the J.Lo comparisons which she laughingly indulges.

Frankly, I’m happier to see a Miché without a façade. We’re finally getting to hear the other side of the Zephany Nurse story. We want bare-faced rather than airbrushed, in-the-flesh rather than in-the-news.

MICHÉ:

I look like my father’s family, like Michael’s family. They are all tall and some are quite fair-skinned, so I’ve grown up with the idea that I look like his side of the family.

As a little girl, I had a very strong bond with my daddy. I still do. I was more adventurous with him; we’d go to the beach, or jogging, or for drives, because my mom would be home in the kitchen or doing household stuff. I could speak to him honestly, and more to him than anyone else about certain things.

I see him now with my daughter and it’s just like it was for me. He’ll take her to the beach, or if I am busy with something, he takes her for a drive or an ice-cream. If I reprimand her and tell her, ‘Don’t do that stuff, that’s being a naughty girl,’ then he is the one to comfort her – all the time, as if it’s his own baby. She’ll probably end up calling him Daddy.

I really was a daddy’s girl. I still am. It frightens me if my dad should die or if he can’t help himself anymore – who am I going to depend on emotioinally? I’m grateful to have him as a father, really I am.

My dad is an apprentice electrician, and he was working that day when Lavona said she gave birth to me at Retreat Hospital. It was a normal birth, so she didn’t have to stay long in hospital. I once asked my mom why there aren’t any hospital pictures of me in my baby album. She said, ‘Nobody was there to take pictures.’ I know my dad was working but I did find it strange that nobody even went with her when she went into labour. You’d want support at a time like that. I felt sad for her.

So my dad came home from work and there I was.

At the time, we were living in Sea Winds. We stayed there until I was about three or four and then we moved to Hillview. We moved because my mom had a miscarriage. She was pregnant after having me. I remember coming home from crèche one day and she was just on the bed, crying and crying. I questioned my dad when I was a bit older: ‘Daddy, why was Mommy crying that day?’ He told me that she had lost her baby.

My mom said she needed a new environment, and that’s when we moved to Hillview.

I remember going to school for the first time. It’s actually one of my saddest memories. When it came time for my mommy to let me go by the door, I didn’t want her to leave. I was crying so loud, like, ‘I don’t know these people, I don’t know these children – you need to sit with me in class.’ I remember I cried the whole entire day that she had to fetch me early.

Back in those days, my daddy used to drink. But when I was thirteen years old, I got very sick with meningitis. I was in hospital, having a lumbar puncture, and that was the turning point for my dad. He couldn’t handle seeing me like that and he made a religious vow: if God would make me better, my dad would stop his drinking and stop going around with his friends. And he did. He hasn’t had a drink since – and I’m now 21 years old.

Growing up, we often had family gatherings and they would always be at our house because that’s just how my mom was: she would always bring everyone together. She is the eldest and she felt strongly that family must be together, stick together, spend time together.

I grew up very selfish. My aunty and them would always say that nobody was ever allowed to push me around or speak badly to me because my mom would always back me up. I grew up with the selfishness of an only child, even though my brother Gerald was there.

Gerald is actually my cousin, but I call him my brother because he grew up in our home. He’s my mom’s sister’s son and my mother raised him – he’s 31 years old now. He was with my mom before she and Michael even met. So my mom took him in when he was about a year or two because his mom couldn’t afford to raise him, and I think the dad wanted to give him up for adoption. When the social worker came to see them, my mom said: ‘Give him here, I’ll raise him, and I’ll support him.’ When she met my dad, he just came to know that this is Lavona’s son. So Gerald would call my mom ‘Mommy’ and he would call his own mom by her name.

Although my brother lived with us and was always there, he is ten years older than me so we didn’t really have a friendship. I know he used to take me places and he will always tell people, ‘Don’t mess with my sister,’ but it was never a bonding relationship. Gerald had his own room, he had girlfriends. He was extremely close with my mom.

So I always felt like an only child because I was basically treated as one.

My earliest memory is of going camping – I have a picture of me and my dad sitting on a rock at Soetwaters camp site. We used to go every year until a certain age, I can’t remember what age. It was my immediate family and my cousins, my brother’s friends – we’d all go in summer time. It was so nice. My dad and his friends would make potjie. I loved to swim and stay for hours in the water. My older cousin had to swim with me and she would literally be shivering, but I would always tell her: ‘You’re not getting out, you’re going to stay in with me till I get tired.’ She’d be shaking from cold, but she would never leave me alone in the water.

I don’t mind the cold. My dad and I used to go to St James beach and we’d swim even when it was raining. It was so much fun. I could spend hours in the sea. I always wondered what was out there, past the horizon. I’m a very curious person. I used to like a good mystery … that was until my life turned out to be a whole mystery of its own, strange and full of secrets.

Gerald moved out of home when he was about 23, at the same time that we moved to another house, in Gladiola Road. I was thirteen and I went to high school that time. I had always had my cousins around – obviously not knowing that they’re not my cousins – and that’s who I’d go out with. When I got to high school, I started making new friends who were older and even in Matric. I didn’t hang out with the cousins as much anymore because it was all about friends at school. I started wearing short dresses and heels. My mom is a seamstress and she’d make me dresses. Sewing is where she got her income, like she would do children’s tracksuits for school and sport. She sewed at home – we had a section where her working area was – and she made all sorts of things: pyjamas, onesies for the children, dresses. Here – I think I have a picture of one of the dresses she sewed for me when I was about sixteen or seventeen.

* * *

Miché turns her phone to show me a picture which could just as well have fallen from a modelling catalogue. Admittedly, it’s more about the bod than the dress, though the dress looks catalogue worthy too. The only fitting response is a wolf-whistle, but since I’ve never mastered that, I settle for an emphatic, ‘Yowzers!’

Miché laughs. ‘That’s when I still had a body! Hopefully I’ll get it back some day.’

MICHÉ:

You can see that the dresses were all short, hey? She didn’t mind making them like that, she just wanted me to be responsible. My daddy and my brother would say, ‘Why are you wearing that?! Where are you going? It’s cold outside, put on a jean or something!’ but my mom would let me wear what I wanted, just always telling me to be responsible.

My mom isn’t the angry type. Like if I was late for stuff, or lazy, she’d never shout and say, ‘Get up, get moving.’ But at the same time, she didn’t let me get away with it and she would know how to make me feel guilty. She’d be more like: ‘Do you want to stay at home forever? Do you want to go work at Checkers? You can go work at Checkers if you see yourself there. You can live here for the rest of your life and travel with a bus to Checkers. It’s your choice.’

I always used to be smart about how I did things because I didn’t need to go behind my parents’ back. They were upfront and made sure I understood the consequences; then they’d leave the choices to me.

That’s still the type of relationship I have with my dad. He’ll say, ‘You know what’s right and wrong, you need to do what’s best for you,’ not like, ‘You keep making stupid mistakes, and you’re silly for doing this.’ I appreciate it because that’s how I’ve learned to grow up. I don’t feel I have to hide things because my daddy’s going to skel. I don’t feel pressured because of fear of what my mommy’s going to do. Just afraid of disappointment.

I was a cheeky child, but I never wanted to disappoint her.

Even in high school she used to tell me and my brother, ‘You don’t ever let me come and embarrass myself at school because of your behaviour.’ She was very straightforward about things and you don’t disrespect her.

I was never so naughty that I caused her disrespect in school. Like drugs and things like that. I had a bit of weed twice, but I never had a drug issue. Weed wasn’t for me – I got scared of myself, and I never did it again. I don’t like that feeling, not knowing myself or being worried about my own behaviour. That’s why I’m not a drinker or a smoker. I would go out, yes, but you can’t get wasted and then come home to parents you respect. And of course once I had a child myself, there was no way. I know if I get into trouble, my daddy would be there for me. He’s not the type to turn his back and he’ll always help me. But I won’t ever take advantage of his goodness, especially because I know the hurt that he’s been through with my mommy.

My parents hardly ever argued in front of me. The way I know they’ve had an argument is when they’re quiet with each other. Maybe we’d get into the car and my mom would say, ‘Ask your daddy what he wants to eat.’ Or my dad would say, ‘Ask your mommy if you have to go now.’ Then I’d know that they were arguing. But the next day, you’d see them talking again.

In our family we were always open about any issues that we had. Like financial things. If they should tell me we can’t afford to buy something this month, we can buy it next month, I could never ask why because I knew, I could see their money was going empty. They always had that openness with me and my brother. That’s still how I learn. People call me cheeky or rude because I’m very straightforward. But my parents raised me to speak my mind, and they were always to the point with me, always straightforward, when I needed it.

My parents are everyone’s parents. They’ve always been the ones to help my cousins with food, clothes and school things – even up to this day. When I was sixteen and didn’t want to go out with my cousins anymore, my parents would still take my cousins out. Other family members call them ‘Mama’ and ‘Papa’. They’re everybody’s mom and everybody’s dad. Even in prison, people call my mother ‘Mommy’ when they come to greet her. It’s good to know that she has that motherly instinct, even in there …

I went to Steenberg Primary School and then, when we moved to Gladiola, I went to Zwaanswyk High – a school in Tokai with a very good reputation. My mom always wanted me to go to an excellent school, she never wanted me to go to school in the area.

Zwaanswyk was a 25-minute drive from my house, so it wasn’t too far. My aunty used to drive me to school and then pick me up, but once I started dating Sofia’s dad, he used to lift me because he came with a car to school, which was very nice.

I liked school and was happy. I always had lots of friends, until … you know … everything happened. After that, I didn’t know who I could trust because my friends were talking about me to the journalists. They must have, because the journalists found out things that only my friends knew. But until that time, my friends were a big part of my life.

I was an excellent student in primary school, I used to be in the top ten. In high school, I wasn’t up there though; it’s when I started having fun, going out late, getting a boyfriend and things like that. I did fine in my studies, but not excellent. I think I was a normal teenager – I liked to party occasionally! But I’d never sleep out of the house because that was the rule.

Sofia’s dad was my first boyfriend. I started seeing him casually when I was fifteen, in Grade 9, and he was in Matric. By the time I was in Grade 11, he had matriculated and was out of school, and we were serious.

You know what it’s like – you’re seventeen, you want to experience things and have fun. But my mom always warned me about him. She would say: ‘He’s too talkative – that’s not a good thing. And a good-looking man is everyone’s man.’

I laughed and said, ‘So must I pick an ugly one?’

‘No, but he’s too talkative and you know what talkative does – to anyone and everyone.’

‘Mommy, you’re being silly – I’m not going to get married to this guy.’

I think we had a normal household and I was a normal teenager. I mean, I was always verbal, and I could be rude. My mommy never over-reacted, but she would always tell me straight if she thought I was being cheeky.

I was definitely very moody in my teens. I often didn’t feel like talking. Every night my daddy would ask, ‘How was school?’ and I’d be like, ‘You keep asking me how was school. Can’t you see I don’t feel like talking?’ He got used to it, though. He even explained to other people: ‘Everyone in the family is used to Miché sometimes just being quiet; sometimes she’s just in her own world.’

My mommy didn’t just accept that behaviour. If I told her I didn’t feel like talking and just leave me alone please, then she’d say, ‘What happened? Is it that guy again? That guy who talks so much?’

‘No, you don’t know him, he’s not like that.’ I always defended him.

Maybe because of the boyfriend, I did start to lose focus in Grade 11. My teachers asked me if I had a boyfriend and I was like, ‘No, why?’

‘Because you look distracted – like you will just pass.’

I liked the softer subjects, like Life Orientation and English, not maths and science. I was very fascinated with life issues, cultures and religion. I used to love drawing and art … I still do; sometimes I lay in Sofia’s room, draw pictures and decorate.

My plan for my life was to go and study social work or psychology. It still is. I always wanted to know how the human mind works, what causes certain reactions, why people do certain things. Like Lavona – there are things that triggered her to do what she did – was it a mental issue? Did a wire come loose? I’m fascinated with those things, now more than ever.

For myself, I mostly know where my issues come from. Of course there is the main issue I have with trusting people, but that’s more recent and obviously because of everything that has happened. But I have some older fears too. Like dogs, and driving …

I have a driver’s licence but I’m too afraid to drive very far. I’ve been in a few scary situations on the road and there are all these shootings and things. I may drive to Pick n Pay for shopping but I won’t drive to Worcester for the prison, or even to Muizenberg for the beach. I always get a lift – with my dad, or my brother, or a cousin.

And dogs, well I’m scared because I was bitten. We actually had five dogs growing up. We only have one now, a Boerboel, but she’s getting old and we need a new dog. But when I was young and we were living in Sea Winds, me and my three other cousins were teasing this black and white dog that belonged to a man we called Pa Martin. My cousins were scared, but not Miché. No, Miché was very bok and brave … until the dog chomped my leg. I remember I was crying and Pa Martin still picked me up and took me home. My mom took me to the doctor and everything. Since that day I have a fear for dogs. I don’t fear my own dog but if I see other dogs, I would literally squeeze you or hide behind you. I fear dogs with my life.

My daughter Sofia is not scared of anything. I know that my aunty and them warn their grandkids about all sorts of scary things but I don’t allow them to do that to her because they’ll ruin her bravery with fear and I don’t want her to grow up afraid. Sofia will walk alone in the dark house not afraid of anything; I will also. My cousins are scared of the dark – they won’t even fetch a phone charger down the passage if the light isn’t on. Not me. That’s something that doesn’t scare me. I’m simply not afraid of the dark.