Tea-time and Bontie’s latest text is on my phone:

U win, Leah. U r right. Life is not all about the guys!

I can’t believe what I’m reading. Has Bontie really just written that? Just shows you – you think you know your best friend inside-out. Then suddenly she surprises you.

Maybe she is on a mission now to find a job she likes? Because I know she doesn’t enjoy working at the sports ‘boutique’ – well, except for the fit guys coming in all day. But the rest of her duties don’t interest her much. So maybe she’s thinking about getting a job that will use her art talents?

Bontie was always the best artist in our school. Weekends, she would sit for hours and hours finishing a drawing. The teacher used to rave about Bontie’s sketches.

But in these last few years, she’s left all that behind her. How lovely it will be if she’s rediscover her passion for art!

That evening I pop in at Bontie’s home, even though I am exhausted.

“So what’s this I hear, Bontie? You’ve decided life isn’t all about the guys now?”

She smiles at me and her eyes are glowing. Alight.

“True. Life isn’t all about the guys. No ways, Leah. Life is all about one guy only. Theo! I’m in love, girlfriend. Totally, hopelessly.”

“Don’t talk crazy!” I tell her. “You’ve only been on one date.”

“One date is all it takes. They are just the most special guys! Tell me you don’t feel something for Tebogo. I bet you do.”

“No, I don’t.”

“You’ve gotta be kidding me!” says Bontie.

I shrug. I shake my head.

“Oh well, maybe with our second double date then?” says Bontie. “Maybe you just need more time to warm to him. That would be brilliant: you and Tebogo, me and Theo.”

I don’t say anything. But I doubt if a hundred dates would make me warm to Tebogo. Maybe it’s just about our pheromones. You know, those chemicals that our bodies all give off? Maybe my pheromones and Tebogo’s pheromones just don’t connect.

Bontie is frowning now. “You must watch it, Leah. You are getting obsessed with that job of yours. You’re getting obsessed with old folks and forgetting you are young, and that your life is just beginning.”

I decide that I will do my best to warm to Tebogo this Friday evening. I will try really hard.

But Friday morning, something happens. Something really sad.

I’m pushing Mrs Harding around the garden, way down to the back wall where the pansies grow. They are such colourful flowers, looking up at us with their sweet little faces. Well, that’s what I’m telling the old lady. I have my Windolene bottle ready, just in case. Then I start chatting about Mr Khumalo, who is having his birthday today. His ninety-second!

Mrs Harding is silent as usual. So I push the wheelchair towards the hedge where I have spotted a lizard sunning itself on a rock. Mrs Harding will surely enjoy looking at the lizard?

But it strikes me suddenly: something is not right. Something has changed in these last few seconds. I turn cold and begin to shake.

Yes, Mrs Harding has died, right there in the garden, right there between the pansies and the lizard. Her head is slowly slumping forward. And oh, I am panicked. With one hand I push the wheelchair; with my other arm I hold her upright, even though it terrifies me to be holding her lifeless body.

Somehow, somehow, I make it back to the building. And thank goodness, Sister Thembeka is there to rescue me. To tell me exactly what I must do next.

This time, I don’t get into a state. Yes, there are tears running down my cheeks. But I’m not sobbing uncontrollably. Matron gives me half an hour in her office to calm down. But this time, I don’t need to be sent home.

Still, I am very sad. So Friday evening when our double date starts, I am not good company.

“What is it, Leah?” Tebogo asks.

We are at a lake party with the twins and their friends. There is music and dancing, even fireworks. “You don’t seem in a party mood. Are you OK?”

I tell him about Mrs Harding. And he is kind and sympathetic. He doesn’t say ugly things about ‘coffin-dodgers’. He doesn’t ask me what else I expect when I work with old people all day.

Instead, he says, “But at least she died happy, out in the sunshine in the garden. Doesn’t that make you feel good, Leah? To know it was you that made her feel happy just before she died? Doesn’t that comfort you?”

I nod, because he is right. That’s what Matron Mannathoko said as well. It is a comfort to know this.

Tebogo strokes my cheek. He tells me I am a special person, doing a special job. He really is a decent, lovely guy.

But still, there is no spark in me. No flicker. Not even a tingle. I like him very much – just the way I like my elder brother.

Maybe it is all about the pheromones? About those chemicals our bodies produce, even if we can’t see them or smell them. But maybe they are working away, choosing who we are attracted to and who we aren’t attracted to? Controlling our desires?

***

Tell us what you think: Pheromones are real, scientifically proven. Do you believe that they can affect whom we are attracted to?