“Who will you be sending my money to, Sandile?” asks Nancy.
“You said it is payment for the work I do around here.”
“Shut up! Who are you talking to on the phone? How did they get my landline number?”
Sandile turns to face Nancy. Sandile is nineteen; Nancy is a very young looking forty-three. But when she is in her furious moods she looks her age.
“But Nancy, I told you when we first met that I left a pregnant girlfriend back home. She was calling to say she has given birth.”
“I don’t care if she has given birth. I don’t want to hear anything about that little whore of yours. I can’t be feeding you as well as the rest of rural Pietermaritzburg. Every month I pay a hefty telephone bill. Is it all because of you and that little whore?”
Sandile is out of words. Nancy’s assault of insults is so sudden he cannot think straight.
“You are worse than a dog, Sandile. You were a homeless nobody when I met you. I gave you shelter, I cleaned you up, I made you the man you think you are today. Now you have the audacity to tell me about a girlfriend! Sneaking around in my house, talking to her on my phone?”
“But Nancy, you–”
“Shut up! Where was your girlfriend when you were sleeping on the street, Sandile?”
Sandile looks down at the floor. He can never reason with Nancy when she gets like this.
“Today I want to teach you a lesson. I’ll show you who I am. I can’t be played by a rural boy like you. Even worse – a rural boy without education. You don’t even have Grade 11, but you think you know more than me!”
Sandile looks up to see Nancy walking out of the dining room. She comes back dressed in a tracksuit. Nancy picks up her car keys from the table and bangs the door as she leaves. The car kicks up a cloud of dust as she speeds out of the yard.
Sandile knows Nancy is going to her only friend, the notorious sangoma, Naidoo. He is known to provide muthi for criminals. He is loved by cash-in-transit robbers, because they say his muthi makes them invisible to the police. Sandile wonders what Nancy does at Naidoo’s. Why does she keep going to him?
Sandile wishes he could just run away, but he can’t go back home yet; he needs to save more money. He will stay a bit longer; just one more month then he will leave.
***
Tell us: Do you believe a sangoma can actually help criminals? Is Sandile silly to stay?