How could he lie to her? If he wasn’t going to school in the mornings, where did he go to? These questions ran through her head. Noticing that she was not alright, her principal asked her to take time off and go home.

Zweli was not there when she got home. She sat on the sofa and dialled the teacher who asked about Zweli. She explained to her that all along she thought Zweli was in school.

Later that day, there was an unpleasant knock on Zweli’s home door. When his mother opened the door, four young men pushed in holding Zweli by the collar of his blood-stained white shirt. Blood was coming through his nose and mouth.

“Are you this boy’s mother?” one of the man asked.

“Yes, what happened?” Zweli’s mother asked going for Zweli’s arm.

“I was still in bed this morning when I heard some movement in the house. When I switched on the lights your boy dropped and broke my TV. He attempted to run with his friends but these three men caught him.”

“Zweli! Zweli! Are you trying to kill me? Why are you doing this to me my son? Were you not supposed to be at school?” Zweli’s mother cried.

“Listen here woman, I don’t want to hurt your son, I just want you to pay for my TV,” the man warned.

Zweli’s mother asked the man to come back in a few days for his money. Zweli became addicted to drugs. He used almost all kinds of illegal substances. He would steal from people and have his mother pay. She pleaded with him to stop what he was doing but those pleas fell on deaf ears.

“Where is my cut, gents?” Zweli asked his friends a day after one of their night-jobs. He found them drinking at a local shebeen.

“Relax, have a drink!” Gift said. They drank until Sira passed out.

“Get us some cigarettes, Gift boy,” said Zweli, drunk.

“We drank all the money we had. Now help me take Sira back to the shack,” said the equally drunk Gift.

“What do you mean we drank all the money? Give me my cut boy!” Zweli demanded.

“Whose money did you think you were drinking? Don’t play games here boy masivaye.” Gift laughed as he stood up.

Zweli finished what was left of the Castle Lager bottle. He threw it at Gift, hitting his forehead. Gift staggered backwards, people in the shebeen screamed as Zweli took out his pocket knife. Gift tried to run but it was too late, Zweli tripped him and stabbed him repeatedly on the chest. Realising what he had done, Zweli ran home. It wasn’t long before the police came to arrest him.

He spent few years in the juvenile prison. Sira mended his ways after the incident that happened at the shebeen. He went to live in the Eastern Cape with his aunt. Zweli came back from prison and started from where he left off. Zweli would lay his hands on his mother if she refused to give him the money he had asked her for.

Nobanzi washed her hands; she threw him out of her house. The people of Makukhanye were afraid of Zweli. He began recruiting young boys into his gang. Attempts on his life were made by his gang rivals but he always survived. People began to believe he was using a powerful muti.

On one rainy Saturday morning, Zweli woke up to a forceful knock on the door of his shack.

“Open the door!” someone shouted.

People were banging the corrugated zinc of his shack. He was frightened. He pushed his bed against the door and kept quiet. He looked through a tiny hole in the zinc to see who was outside. He saw a crowd had surrounded his shack. The door was kicked open. The bed couldn’t prevent the mob from coming inside.

“We are tired of being scared to walk on our streets. This ends today,” a man said while hitting him with a sjambok.

“To whom did you sell my cell phone to?”

“Where is my DVD Zweli?”

These questions went on but Zweli wasn’t given a chance to answer.

Soon everyone was having a piece of him. He attempted to flee but he was caught and subdued to the mud. He had his boxer short only. They tied his hands to his back with a barbed wire.

He cried until he made no sounds but that didn’t stop people from assaulting him. When he saw his mother he hoped she would save him as she normally did. Zweli’s hopes faded when he saw his mother leave. He succumbed to his wounds after hours of beating.

***

Tell us: Do you think parents blame themselves for the bad behaviour of their kids?