Dumisani could tell the moment he got in the house that things were horrible. Both Thembeka and Melokuhle were glaring at him. He saw himself as a brute, his son did not want him near him and his wife and daughter abhorred him.

If only he could change the past. He had managed to change his future but the past was what he couldn’t change, no matter how much he wished. He needed a plan fast. His agony seemed like it was there to last. He came slowly and he took a seat looking like he could break down and cry at any moment.

Change is hard to bare. Dumisani believed that he had changed. But he was still spiteful because of the mistakes he had done in the past.

“How could you do this to us? Did you think what this will do to me, to us, our family?” Thembeka grumbled.

“I was young, Thembeka, stupid, naive and immature. I was not ready to be a father. At that time I had nothing, I struggled to support my own self, how was I going to support a child? Please believe me I’m being sincere.”

Thembeka and Melokuhle seemed to be lethargic to Dumisani’s story.

“I can’t even look at you dad, I’m sorry.” Melokuhle said and ran to her bedroom. Dumisani eyed Melokuhle until passages and walls of the house swallowed her.

***Else Where ***

“Baby, why are you being so difficult?” Ayammah was very wise. Sihle knew that very well. Ayammah was the reason Sihle was where he was in life.

Ayammah and Sihle had just started dating five years ago. Ayammah was very vigorous while Sihle was self-effacing. There is no Casanova without a weakness. Sihle did not see any weakness outside of Ayammah so he expected it to be inside.

Ayammah was even more beautiful inside in a way that when Sihle realised it he wanted to put it down in words, just something about how amazing Ayammah was and that was when he realised he was a poet, from then he had never looked back. Ayammah had been holding his hand ever since.

“I don’t need him in my life baby.”

“Holding grudges of the past won’t help you. He denied himself a chance to be a father to you when you needed a father, now don’t deny him a chance to be a grandfather to your son. Baby if you can’t forgive, how do you expect to be forgiven? You are a good guy, yes, but you are not perfect, at some stage you will also need forgiveness. Give him another chance. Prove that you are not like him, not like how he was. Prove that you are a good guy.”

Sihle stared at Ayammah like she had a point but still the pain of an absent father had bedrooms in Sihle’s heart.

***

Tell us what you think:Does Dumisani deserve another chance? Will Melokuhle forgive her father, Will she stop loving Sihle and take him as a brother?