Everyone glared at Lebo’s friend suspiciously.

“Well, Yankee?” Lebo asked him. “How did you know?” 

“There’s a ton of them going round at the mo. It’s like this thing. Na mean, like last week everyone was dissing each other on OuToilet, now it’s hot pics.” 

“You best not be showing my little sister any ‘hot pics’ on YOUR phone, Yankee,” Sbu bristled. 

Yankee got defensive. “Yankee is what my peoples call me. YOU can call me Kagiso.” 

Lebo rolled her eyes. “Boys, get over yourselves! Sbu, I can handle myself and you should be nice to my friends. Yankee, you need to show some respect to my big brother, even if he IS an idiot sometimes. Now say sorry. Both of you!”

“Sorry,” Sbu mumbled, but he didn’t really mean it. He didn’t like this guy and he didn’t like him hanging around his sister.

“Yeah, me too,” Yankee said. “So what’s this pic all about?”

“I got this weird MMS and Sbu reckons it might be of a friend of yours.” Song held up her phone, covering most of the photograph with one hand, so they could only see her face. 

Lebo recognised the girl straight away. “Oh snap, that’s Mpho. Where did you get that photo?”

“Someone sent it to me,” Song explained. 

“She hasn’t been at school for the last couple of days,” Lebo said. “I figured she was sick.”

“Do you have her digits?” Song asked. Lebo read it out and Song checked it against the MMS. The numbers were different.

“Okay, so whoever sent the pic wasn’t Mpho.” 

“I’m gonna to call her!” Lebo said and dialled her friend’s number. 

But Mpho’s phone didn’t even ring. It went straight to voicemail. “This mailbox is full. Please try again later.” 

Lebo hung up. She looked helplessly at her big brother and his friends. “Now what?”

Image: Teach and Learn, CC-BY-NC-SA

WHAT DO YOU THINK: What would you do next?