I remained seated on the chair, with the phone now on my hands, sweaty, hands. My heart was racing. Whatever I would find will finally help me and finally put a stop to the bad dreams I have been having for the past two weeks of my father looking at me disappointed. After several tries of the pin, I finally unlocked the phone and went to the phone records and one number kept on popping up a lot, it was written Mr. S. I wanted to meet, but I needed to. I couldn’t do it alone. I needed help and Detective Tom quickly came into my mind. He is the relentless investigator who seemed determined to uncover the truth at any cost. A dog with a bone. He questioned me relentlessly, probing for weaknesses, searching for cracks in my carefully constructed facade. He needs to know what I have found, or maybe I can tell him after I’ve known for sure who is behind my father’s death. He might discourage me while I’m close to finding the truth. I was more than happy that finally I’m close to the truth, the light at the end of the tunnel was finally showing. After deleting the message several times, I managed to write, “meet me at the Tugela foot bridge after an hour make sure you choose a discreet place. “I don’t know who I will meet, will he give me the answers to solve this murder mystery. I ended up telling the detective about the findings. He was livid that I withheld information from him, but he managed to come.

“This is it; I’ve seen it through the end dad. I am finally catching the person behind your murder; the worst part is that mother seems to be the master behind it all. She orchestrated all this. My name will be cleared, hopefully my life isn’t entirely ruined.”

The plan was to catch the person, corner him pretending that mother sold him to us, maybe he’ll squirm. We were hoping that he won’t see through us that we were still fishing. We were now seated in the car, both of us gazing into space as people went by until it was quiet. We waited in anticipation, looking around and hoping that we would finally see him or her. Just after an hour, a tall figure, wearing a hoodie stood by the walking bridge, looking around, moving from one side to the other. The detective called it in, well it was a surprise to me too that he had police officers on standby. On both sides he was surrounded, I ran with detective Tom running after me. He had instructed me to stay in the car and let “police officers “handle it as if it had helped anyone to let them take matters. Taking off the hoodie that covered his face, he had a grin on his face, he looked familiar but the grin on his face was wiped by a hot slap that landed him.

“The grin plastered on his face while my life lies in ruins, felt like needles , my insides were in knots , it felt like they were leaving me. Breath became shallow and shallow, people sounded like they were on the far end of a hallway.”

I’m woken up, apparently, I fainted and I’m in a hospital bed. I had a panic attack. The doctor was kind enough to call the detective who was sitting just out of my room. As soon as he got in, it felt like he read my mind and he started singing like a bird.

“He confessed to helping your mother and your dad’s lawyer into killing your dad. Vusi, that’s his name, was supposed to kill him on the day of the party, but there were changes in the plan. He was let know by the lawyer that the deal is off.”

I couldn’t understand how the deal was cancelled and yet my dad remained dead and me in the hot soup.

“Who killed my father and for what?”

“Your mother had an affair with the lawyer that your dad found out was about to fire the lawyer and cut off your mother. Leaving her penniless, when she found out she was no longer the part of the will and that everything was to be split amongst you”, he said. Keeping quiet for me to digest all he told me.

“But, but… but she said he gave all his things to my brother.”

“That was the plan all along to get you to fall, they needed a way to make it stick to you, it’s what we call a motive for the killing. She was being blackmailed by Vusi and the lawyer. She has been paying them lump sums of money. She didn’t know her lover was in with the hitman they hired”, he said.

“Who killed my father?”, I said. All of this was too much to take, and I wasn’t ready to hear that my mother herself pulled the trigger and killed her husband, but I needed to know.

And yet, try as I might, I could not shake the feeling that he was holding something back – some piece of the puzzle that remained tantalizingly out of reach. It gnawed at me, this sense of unease, eating away at my sanity like a cancerous growth.

And as he presented it to me, his eyes alight with newfound purpose, I felt a surge of hope swell within me. For I knew that this was our chance – our chance to finally break free from the chains that bound us, to cast off the shadows of our past and emerge into the light of a new day.

“The lawyer did, he had made your father sign half of his assists to him. Thanks to your clever father, his last will and testimonial was a recorded video, whatever he said there was evident that he would never give anyone else his business other than his children. When he suspected his wife’s affair, he approached another lawyer and decided to split things between you too, “he said.

I got discharged and it was late at night, the detective had to do his duties of arresting my father and I hated that I was the one to be the bearing of bad news. We found my family gathered in the lounge and the culprit was nowhere to be found. I honestly didn’t know whether to let the detective tell them or I should, but I wanted to ask my mother questions as to why she didn’t leave him if she wasn’t happy. As I was approaching her bedroom door, I had a gunshot. I froze, I knew what had just happened, but I couldn’t believe my ears. The detective came running with a gun in his hand and went past me, opened the door, I peeked and there she was lying on the bed, lifeless. My knees were shaking, giving in. Daniel stood with his hand on his mouth, tears running down his face. A note on the side of the bed was found written, “I’m sorry”. In a space of weeks, we became orphans. Our lives drastically changed forever.