Alone in my house, without child, without husband. Kian is at his granny’s for the weekend. Angelo has been gone for hours by now. What on earth was Angelo doing leaving school so early, only God knows. Mxm, I can’t believe he swore at me like that, and nogals at Jonathan too. My heart is so sore!

I’m still in shock because of what Jonathan said last night. He always loved me. This is something new to me, the love of a man. The love of a good man. But my children, Angelo … I don’t know how to balance it all.

I walk up and down in the kitchen, until my foot hits something. Ag, the child sommer left his bag here! I move it and a plastic bag falls out. I stare at it. What the hell! Dagga? Dagga!

The door opens. It’s Angelo.

“Angelo! Wat de hel is going on here?”

“What now?”

I sigh. Hands on my head. “Angelo. Are you out of your mind? What the hell are you doing with drugs? I definitely didn’t raise you like this!”

He looks at the bag on the floor, frowns. “Ag Ma, it’s just dagga, it’s not real drugs.”

“Kyk hierso, this is how it always starts! This is drugs! Doesn’t matter what kind it is!”

“Ag Ma, kak man!”

I feel my blood starting to boil. I am on the verge of losing it. I am on the verge of beating the devil out of this boy.

“You’re not a skollie! What is wrong with you? Do you want to become like your pa?” Immediately my hand flies to my mouth. I didn’t mean it, but I’m furious.

There are tears in his eyes. “My pa? I don’t even know what happened to him. Ma, you don’t tell me anything! I wish I was with Pa and not with you!”

His words hurt me deeper than he will ever know. Not only because he hates me but because he knows fully well his father is dead. Is my child now also suicidal? God help ons.

“Angelo, drugs is not the way. Are you selling it?”

“How do you know the way, Ma? Huh? We never have enough money, enough food. We suffer. We struggle. There’s nothing else for me! There’s nothing else to do but to join a gang, become a skollie.”

I shake my head. “Angelo, you can’t be serious.”

“Ja Ma, I’m not good at school. The teachers scarcely like me. The children laugh at me. For once in my life I just want to do something that makes me feel like a baas.”

“Do you really think your future is to sell drugs? I didn’t carry a skollie for nine months!”

That’s it. I’m not going to lose my child. Not to drugs. Not to a gang. It’s the moment of truth and he needs to hear the cold, hard truth of what happened to his father.

“Angelo, your pa was involved with drugs.”

“What kinds of drugs?”

“Everything, dagga, tik, mandrax, als.”

“What happened Ma? Did Pa OD? Did he overdose?”

“No, my child. Your pa didn’t even use drugs. He sold it, he was …”

“Only sold it? But then what …”

“Angelo, your dad was shot when you were small.”

“Shot? But … but… w-why? What about his friends?”

“Angelo, belonging to a gang doesn’t mean you have friends. Those people are not your chommies. Your pa wanted to leave. He wanted to be done with it all. Your pa loved you. He didn’t want to continue that thug life anymore. He never started out as a skollie. He had the wrong friends and before you know it, he became exactly like them. A real skollie. Always in trouble. Hiding from the police. Gang fights right here outside my house. That is where your father was shot. Right outside our very house. He wanted to marry me, he wanted to have a family and be done with the skollie life, but it was too late Angelo. The life of a skollie is not a life of safety.”

Tears rolled from Angelo’s eyes. For the first time I saw my son again. My seun. My innocent child, trapped in the middle of a broken society.

“I’m so sorry Ma, I … I don’t want to be like my pa.”

***

Tell us: Do you think Petronella should have told Angelo the truth about his father?