Meat sizzled, the braai stand spewed white smoke. It was around then that the girl on Nhlanhla’s arm started to complain about her shoes. We offered chairs.

Nhlanhla’s girlfriend had told me her name when we were introduced, but I’d given her my own name. A whole sentence that basically called it how I saw it: She Who Is Tall, Slight Built and Loose Limbed.

It was her complexion that delivered the killer blow. True dark chocolate black beauty. Tall. The high-heels she complained were hard on her feet made her tower over Nhlanhla and everyone there. I only stole glances at her. Her beauty was alluring, magnetic. It had way too much pull. Nhlanhla was mesmerized for most of the two hours I was there.

I told him about how I married the girlfriend I met in university, about my little girl in grade one, my job of all day titrations in a lab.

“Are you still with that girlfriend?” he was astounded.

“Yes, Nhlanhla, that girl.”

“You never were sharp in that field,” he chuckled, “the poor girl has been your wife since you guys were 19.”

“Since we were 18,” I corrected him.

“Sweet,” said his girl in a definite model-C twang. Her clear eyes grew large in astonishment.

“Really? That is sooo special. More than a decade in a relationship! Has to be that soul mate thing.”

I just looked at her beautiful face and nodded.

“I mean I’m 25 and the longest relationship I’ve been in was 3 years.”

“You can do it. I mean if you start now. It’s just about understanding each other,” I said.

“You know you are right. Wow! That is such a sweeeeet story.”

Dark chocolate, alluring, hypnotic beauty tilted her head when she said this. She flashed the truest of smiles. She embodied the sweet she had just over pronounced.

She is hot, I realised again.

She sipped from her wine glass and glossed her thick lips. “More than a decade is so long. A beautiful thing. You guys are proof that love exists. You give people hope,” she rolled her eyes away from mine to Nhlanhla’s.

Nhlanhla brushed her cheek, publicly plastered a peck on her fine skin and told me about his progress. How he was deep in major road works. As he brought me up to speed he name-dropped some political heavyweights. When he said his three houses were paid for I compared that to the 15 years on the bond I still had to pay for mine.

He went on, talked about money making ventures he was involved in outside of road works. He had a property portfolio of note, with a growing stake in the hospitality industry. His Italian tailored high-collared shirt swallowed his stout neck whenever he giggled at my amazement.

I meet people who know only this wealthy version of Nhlanhla and smile to myself because they don’t know that there are other shades to the same man.

Before the wealthy Nhlanhla there was another Nhlanhla. The one who, at 16, became involved in coaching the Meteor FC soccer team of Umlazi.

Tell us what you think: What do you think Nhlanhla was like at high school?