If there is a hell, this jail was it. With ten of us squashed together in a space smaller than my room in Wegbreek, I could not move without bumping into a knee, an elbow, a head. The cement was freezing cold against my bare feet. There was a puddle of wetness in the corner that gave off a stench that clung to my nose. It reminded me of the truck that emptied the septic tanks in Wegbreek. Dull light peeped through a window below the ceiling. In the corner of the prison cell, I had seen a rat bigger than any I had ever seen in Wegbreek.

I had been locked up for three days. In my terror I had not eaten for the first two. Hunger won on the third day and I swallowed the brown mass I was given.

I was supposed to have been home on Sunday. I imagined Mama. I imagined Papa. I knew Mama was in church praying for my safe return.

There was a girl who squatted in the corner of our cell and rocked from side to side and cried. They said she had been there for a year.

I was sitting on my thin mattress when the commotion started. Shouting was coming from the cell next door to ours. I heard the steel door clang open. It squeaked loudly. I thought I heard a voice I recognised and strained to listen, but the wailing that was coming from all around me made it difficult to hear.

A woman appeared at the cell door. She called out a name and the girl who was crying paused mid-wail.

“Please take me. I want to go home. Please. I did nothing wrong.” She scrambled to her feet and I heard the clanging and grinding of the keys in the lock and the creak of the door. She left. I wondered where she was going. There was no-one to ask.

I was thinking this when the noise began again. A woman who had come the day before was here again. She handed out pens and pieces of paper. She said in her heavily-accented English we should write letters home, to our loved ones.

What could I say to my mother and father? Would I ever see them again?

Dear Mama and Papa…

The scrap of paper stayed blank. I didn’t know what to say to my parents except sorry. Sorry for not listening.

I imagined I saw a man standing next to me. I could just make out his figure in the hazy light. He looked like Michael. Michael, the man who put me inside here. I kept my eyes closed, wishing that when I opened them I would find out that it was a nightmare. I would open my eyes and I would be out of this hell hole. There was no man when I opened my eyes.

My mind was playing tricks on me.

I heard a voice saying, “You, there. Stand up.”

I struggled up from the mattress, smelling the dirt on me.

“Letang? You are the one from South Africa?”

I nodded.

“Come.”

And fear ate me up again. The girl who had spent her days crying had not returned. No-one said out loud where she had gone.

It was the man from the airport and a woman I had never seen before. They led me to a room that had no windows, only a desk and chairs.

“Sit down,” said the man.

I did as he said, all the while struggling to understand his accent.

“Letang Phiri, do you know this man?” he asked.

I looked at the picture he held out to me. It was Michael Adeleke standing outside Entrance 2 at Wegbreek Mall. In the next one, he was in his warehouse. Then there I was with him in his car. Then he was pictured leaving my home.

I looked up at the man, shocked. “Yes! He is the one who sent me here to deliver shoe samples. He is the one who knows what was in the heels of the shoes he gave me to wear. I am not a drug smuggler. I needed a job to help pay my university fees. I have never used drugs. I don’t even kno–”

“Listen to us,” interrupted the woman. I would have continued talking forever to make these people understand that I was innocent.

The woman explained that Interpol had been investigating Michael Adeleke for over a year. I had been instrumental in getting him caught, they said. I was going to get out of prison. I was going home. I was free, but I would have to testify against Michael Adekele.

*****

I had seen images of people kissing the ground of their home country when they arrived after a long time away. When I stepped off the aeroplane on to South African soil, I looked up at the sky instead, and felt the sun on my forehead. Tears of gratitude spilled from my eyes.

There was a detective there to meet me, to take me home to Wegbreek.

I found my mother and father sitting together on the stoep. I felt tears of relief streaming down my face. I would tell them about what happened, but not on this day. We walked inside. Papa sat in his usual place. I sat next to him. Mama sat on the floor with her legs outstretched as usual.

On the coffee table in our living room, there was a letter from the Department of Education addressed to ‘Miss Letang Phiri’. I opened the envelope. They were giving me a full bursary that would cover all my expenses. I would be late for the start of the year, but that did not matter to me.

Papa switched on the TV. The first news item was about how a drug syndicate had been smashed.

“Drug king-pin Michael Adeleke was arrested after an extended, country-wide and intercontinental investigation. He is being held in police custody.”

***

Tell us what you think: Letang was a poor, innocent, ignorant small-town girl, but many drug mules know they are transporting drugs. What drives them, despite the enormous risks?

About 600 South Africans are jailed in countries across the world for drug smuggling. Read about them at http://www.lockedup.co.za/.