Читать книгу After Tears - Niq Mhlongo - Страница 11

At eight forty-five the following morning I was already inside a minibus taxi on my way to town. Mama had given me R30 for the journey, but I had specifically waited for Zero’s taxi as I didn’t want to pay the taxi fare to the city.

“You’re dressed very smart, Advo,” said Zero, as I sat in the front seat next to him.

“Thanks, man,” I replied, smiling at his compliment. I was wearing an expensive white Polo T-shirt, a black leather jacket, black suede Carvela shoes and a pair of grey, five-pocketed corduroy pants.

Zero himself was wearing a black T-shirt with Tupac’s head printed on it, but the smell that came from his left armpit was an unusually cruel punishment. It was like a rat had decomposed somewhere under his arm and I’m sure I would have suffocated if it were not for the open window on my left. No wonder Mama had nicknamed him magez’epompini.

“Are you going to work this late, Advo?” Zero asked. “PP would kill me if I arrived later than half past five in the morning.”

“Yeah, I’ve got a meeting with a judge in town,” I lied.

Just after the Chiawelo clinic, near Senaone, along the Old Potchefstroom Road, I saw a lovely lady pointing her finger to the sky. Her pink T-shirt clearly defined her upper body and she was wearing a pair of white jeans so tight that I don’t think she could have bent over to pick something off the ground without them tearing.

Zero stopped the taxi for her to get in and as soon as she opened the door I smelled her strong perfume. It was as if she wore it to get rid of all the bad township smells. As she walked down the almost nonexistent aisle of the taxi with her head bent down to avoid banging it against the roof, her orange G-string was clearly visible.

“Hello, Bunjubunju, my Venus, my goddess of sexual beauty and love,” said Zero with a voice that was spiked with desire.

“Hi, Zero,” shouted the lady as she sat in the back seat, her face glistening with a smile.

“Mmmmmm! I smelled you even before you left your house. Ohhhh! That perfume, baby, you drive me crazy!” he said, widening his hairy nostrils. “Ahhhh! It smells so gooooood! I feel like eating you like an apple.”

Bunju smiled broadly, like a child who had just received an unexpected gift. She seemed to be pleased with Zero’s charm, although the sweat ran down his unwashed face like soft porridge boiling over the edge of my uncle’s blackened pot.

“Thanks, but you’re so scarce these days,” she said. “You no longer phone or visit me.”

“Ahhhhh, my Bunjubunju! You know that I still love you more than payday, but it’s this job. It doesn’t give me time to come and see you. I work from Monday to Sunday. There’s no holiday if you work for rich people like PP.”

The conversation with Bunju stopped as Zero saw some potential commuters. Zero’s hand was immediately on the horn as he tried to attract more passengers. He pointed his finger skywards, signalling that he was going to the city, but no one was interested.

“She’s the deliciousest of the deliciousest. Did you see her arse, Advo? She’s gifted with the reverse, isn’t she?” he said as soon as he was sure no one was interested in his taxi.

“Who are you talking about?” I asked, resisting the urge to look at Bunju.

Zero’s eyes darted from me to the rear-view mirror and back to the road. “Come on, man!” he said. “I’m talking about my Bunju. I saw you staring at her arse.” He smiled and looked into the rear-view mirror again. “They say you can look, but never touch!”

“Yeah, it’s true. She can sue you for sexual harassment if you’re not careful nowadays,” I said to Zero.

“But you see, Advo, these ladies nowadays have a way of challenging us men. You’ll be surprised at what we taxi drivers see in our taxis every day. Some of them don’t even bother to wear panties at all. Some of them wear revealing miniskirts just to challenge you, man. That’s why Avalon Cemetery is full, it’s because these ladies are living advertisements for Aids. I tell you, Advo.”

Mama had warned me that Zero and PP had one thing in common and that I should keep away from them as much as possible. She told me that they were notorious for undressing every member of the female species that they saw with their eyes. According to her, they lived in the over-sexualised township world. In Zero and PP’s universe, Mama once told me, a man was a man according to the number of ladies he was dating.

“You know what, Advo?” Zero whispered. “Bunju was once my meat and I used to chew her every day.”

“And what happened between you two?”

“No, I’m no longer interested in her and I don’t care what she does with her pussy now,” he said, looking at me.

“But I think she’s perfect for you, man.”

“Yeah, you’re right, she’s a perfect pain in the arse,” he responded uninterestedly.

“What happened?”

“She thinks that I’m her walking ATM. It’s as if I have to pay to have sex with her and, since I left her, she behaves like those motor mechanics that you see in the Midway scrapyards. Yeah, she’s always lying on her back for men to screw her for money. She’s a puff and pass, man. You can have her if you’re curious to know about what’s hiding under those panties, but I’m telling you now that those nice curves of hers are dangerous. She’s a social worker. Uyagayana. She gives. Don’t tell me that you don’t know about that?”

“Of course I don’t know. I only came back to the township recently. I don’t know many people here.”

“I think we should spend some time together at The White House this Saturday. You always have your nose buried in a book, Advo, it’s not healthy, my bra. You’ll go mad. I can hook you up with a nice mntwana.”

“I didn’t know that it was that simple.”

“Siriyasi, I’m telling you, Advo, there’s a minimum of five chicks for every dick in Soweto,” emphasised Zero.

“Is that so?”

“Siriyasi, Baba. Sure. I already have a new release, man. I got this new chick during a funeral some months back. When I saw her by the graveside that day, I knew she was going to be mine,” he said, touching his left breast tenderly to show his love.

“Are you serious? But how did you get her by the graveside, man?” I found myself unable to resist asking him.

Before he could answer, Zero beamed broadly and nodded his head. My question seemed to have excited him and he was smiling as if I had just caught him fondling Miss Universe’s breasts in his zozo.

“That’s a good question, Advo. A good question indeed,” he repeated. “I always do my homework on the beautiful things that appeal to my heart. Even PP knows that he can’t compete with me when it comes to beautiful chicks.” He slapped his chest with his left hand. “PP knows that I’m the number one here in Msawawa and he comes second. I’m the real makoya charm. I have great taste in abomabhebeza and I always win them with ease. PP has poor taste when it comes to women. All of his chicks that I know of are shapeless like a two-litre bottle of cooldrink.”

“Is that for sure?”

“Siriyasi, man, I’m not lying to you, Advo.”

I was tired of talking, but I had to keep going because of the free ride. Luckily I saw Zero’s face light up as he stopped the taxi at the red robots by Vista University’s Soweto campus. In the other lane was a green Jeep Cherokee and a beautiful young lady with an Afro was driving it. From the open sunroof and windows of the Jeep I could hear the jazz of Moses Molelekwa. Zero immediately wound down his window. He took his 5110 Nokia cellphone from the dashboard and whistled at the lady in the Jeep.

“Hello, Ms Thing,” he said to her, smiling.

The lady lowered the volume of her CD player and smiled back at Zero. She waved her hand at him lazily, but Zero had already misinterpreted the lady’s innocent smile as a sexual invitation and he smiled again, his mouth spreading from one big ear to the other.

“Oh, my God, you’re so fucking hot,” he said, running his tongue over his lips, “did you bath in full-cream milk today?”

The lady smiled at the compliment, but she still didn’t say anything. Instead she took a drag on the cigarette that she was smoking. Zero pointed at his cellphone as the lady looked at him.

“Can we exchange numbers, mabhebeza? I promise I’ll call you tonight.”

“Sorry, it’s a wrong number,” the lady said, trying to lighten her refusal with a smile. “Try next door.”

“Why shouldn’t I try you, sweetheart? You’re the one that I want.”

“Because I don’t think you have the equipment that I need.”

“You’re missing out big time, mabhebeza. Don’t deprive yourself of the pleasure that I’ll give you.”

The robots went green and, as the lady sped off, I glimpsed her personalised numberplate that read: KARABO GP.

Zero tried to match the speed of the Jeep, but his taxi couldn’t keep up. Unfortunately for the lady in the Jeep, the robots were red again at the T-junction leading to Orlando power station. She was looking to her right, at a piece of ground where some shacks had been built, when Zero called to her. It was obvious that he was on the lady’s list of no, no, nos, the way she took her time to respond, but Zero wasn’t going to give up.

“What’s your name, mabhebeza?”

“Syphilis.”

“Wow, that’s a very nice name. So where do you live, Phyllis?”

I nearly laughed out loud when I realised that Zero hadn’t heard the lady correctly.

“I live in Aids View.”

“Ace View? Is that a new suburb I don’t know?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“Where about is that?”

“Between Gonorrhoea Park and Masturbation,” she answered, relaxing against the headrest.

“Me and you have a lot in common, mabhebeza,” said Zero, grabbing his crotch, “we must get together soon.”

“Go jack off,” said the lady and took another deep drag on her cigarette.

The robots went green and the lady sped off again.

By half past nine I was at the Housing Department’s offices in New-gate Centre. As I entered, I saw that the corridor was already full of people. The majority had come to register for the low-cost RDP houses that the government was building. There was no way I was going to stand in that queue, so I went straight to the door on which was written Transfer & Conveyances. I knocked loudly at the door, just once.

“Come in,” said the voice of a woman inside.

I opened the door gently and stepped into the office where two women were busy chatting. The moment I entered the office, the lady sitting behind the table started laughing at a joke her friend had made and I saw that her front tooth was slightly crossed over the one beside it. Her friend, who had slender, long-fingered hands, was holding a white mug of coffee.

“Dumelang,” I greeted them in Sotho, as I had heard them speaking the language.

“Dumela, abuti. How can we help you?” said the one with the crooked tooth.

“I was wondering if you could help me by checking if a certain house in Chiawelo, Extension Two, in Soweto, belongs to one Mr Kuzwayo.”

The long-fingered lady shook her head and lifted her coffee mug to her lips. She sipped her coffee as she eyed me sharply with the superiority that government office workers show to anybody who’s not from parliament.

“What does the title deed say?” she asked, her voice betraying her lack of interest.

“Well, it says it belongs to Mr Sbusiso Kuzwayo.”

“Then what’s the problem?” asked the one with the crooked tooth.

“I wanted to verify the details because my mother wants to sell it.”

The woman with the crooked tooth rubbed the back of her one hand across her eyes.

“Actually, we no longer deal with the transfers of deeds in this office. That stuff must be done privately by the lawyers,” her eyes implored me to understand, “so I suggest that you go to your lawyers.”

The two ladies immediately returned their attention to their conversation as I walked out of the office. I don’t think they even heard me when I thanked them.

As Zero had already returned to Soweto with another load of passengers, I decided to kill time by going to listen to a case at the Johannesburg Magistrate’s Court in West Street.

I tiptoed into the back row of Court 5A. The magistrate was reading the indictment in which a lady, Maru Kgama, aged twenty-seven, was accused of having shoplifted some Lil-lets and perfume at one of the Clicks stores in the city centre. Next to the accused was her lawyer who was wearing a black gown and a bib on top of his white shirt. I listened with great curiosity and envy as Mr Charismatic Lawyer convinced the court with ease that it was in the interests of justice that his client did not remain in jail until the date of the trial.

When I left the court about an hour later, my mind was occupied with the depressing thought that I had let my chance to become an advocate slip away.