Maje then told me that he wasn’t trying to depress me, he was trying to show me us human beings have no idea what love really is. I agreed with him, some of us don’t know what peace and humility is. If I had to ask people to define who they really were, most of them wouldn’t be able to give me an honest or straight answer.

“I feel like a beast when I pray,” he continued. I listened to him talk as we walked. He was talking about how we as societies define other people’s worth by what we assume they are. That we say we love each other, but we don’t act that way. And that God is the only one who is and has been an example of unconditional love. I smiled as I listened to him preach, as he expressed himself. When I’m with my friends I’m the one who usually talks a lot, it felt good being with someone I had a lot to talk to about. “You get me, don’t you?” He asked, pulling me back to the now.

“You know I do, but I’d like to know you better than I do now.” I said.

“We’ll get there,” he said.

We continued walking in silence, listening to music playing from a tavern nearby, to fierce conversations between a group of men who were hunched in a circle and a group of boys who talking about soccer games and money. The sound of our hearts beating at different rhythms was all I wanted to hear. I wanted to enjoy the feeling of his arm rubbing against mine. I wanted him to continue speaking because I enjoyed listening to him. By God was I blessed! In my head I heard God say, “Yes he was made for you,” and I knew I deserved the best.

As I drifted in and out of my own thoughts, he started squeezed my hand and said my name, his eyebrows creased.

“What?” I asked in confusion.

“I want to know what you were thinking about because you heard nothing I said.” He said.

Then I realised that we had stopped walking.

“Are we here?” I asked.

Yup, I was wondering when you were going to notice.” He replied.
Ahead of us, stood a tiny, turquoise-coloured RDP house. It had a black door, a gold coloured curtain in the front window, brown tiles on the steps and the famous Soweto house accessory laid calmly on the left side of the house – a black, shiny stoep.

“Welcome,” he said indicating for me to walk towards the door. I knocked on the door.

“Come in”! Someone said.

We entered through the kitchen, and made our way to the dining room, where I waited for Maje to join me.

“Hey mom, we have a guest,” he said.

“Really?” She asked in a friendly voice.

I immediately felt at ease. Maje then grabbed my hand and led me towards the dining room. His mother sat on the edge of her vintage brown couch, her hair perfectly maintained, wearing a blue dress which hugged her waist and flowed down to her legs, like a negative parabola.

“You look very beautiful Miss,” I said by way of greeting.

She laughed and said, “So do you my dear.” She stood up to hug me and signalled for me to sit down next to her. She then told Maje to make some tea while we spoke. “So, you’re the famous, Mpho huh?” She asked with a smile.

“Uhm,” I said and blushed. “Yes, that’s me.” I said the moment I found my voice again.

“Well, it’s a pleasure to finally meet you my dear. He shows me your conversations on his phone all the time and he says you remind him of me.” She declared. She continued speaking before I could blush at his betrayal of my privacy. “Did he tell you that I’m mentally unstable, according to the doctors?” She asked. I was at a loss for words. She continued and asked me, “How do you feel being compared to a crazy person?”

I stayed calm and replied with, “What is crazy though?” I didn’t want to make her feel uncomfortable or show her that I was.

“Well crazy is the fact that when I was three-years-old, I had read three books about the importance of white supremacy, that when I was turned five I understood how pleased my ancestors were with my uncle Sam, with how he called upon them, how he prayed to them and with how he was true to them. Crazy is me being told that school is necessary, but certain books were not.”

***

Tell us: Do you believe that books or reading for pleasure is made to seem unnecessary by schools or society?