We drive in the police van to the beachfront. Nomkhita is suddenly ice cold, shaking. Her nerves have kicked in. We leave her to huddle in the van while Inspector Khumalo and I hurry into a surf school. The inspector speaks to a beautiful boy with sun bleached dreadlocks, who is behind the desk.

“Adrian?” he says. “That big gym guy?”

We nod.

“Dammit. Pig! I had a feeling.”

I nod. “Shark,” I growl.

“You know his surname?” the policewoman asks him.

“Sorry, no.” Then, “Wait! He signed for a hire board on the weekend.” He whips through a thick register. “Adrian Reynolds.”

“Okay. That’s a start,” Inspector Khumalo says.

A slim, coloured girl with dripping wet hair comes from behind him.

“His ex-girlfriend lives in my road,” she says to the boy. “Lydia went out with him for two months.”

His brown eyes light up. “Of course! Lydia. Come, I’ll show you.”

In the van, Nomkhita is shivering convulsively now. The policewoman drops us off at our block and the boy with dreadlocks goes with her to investigate.

Nomkhita and I scurry up the stairs, lock the door. I make her tea with five sugars. The sugar gets her talking.

“How did you know to come?” she asks me.

“Gut feeling.”

“I thought you were being paranoid. Bitter about men.”

I sit on the bed with her. It is my turn to start shivering. I talk through shaking lips. I am flooded by random memories.

“I told my father I wanted to surf. I think I was seven. He bought me these arm bands from a shop in Buffels Bay. They were bright orange, like emergency orange. My father said the first thing I’ve got to do is to learn to swim. He took me to the farm dam every week and slowly, slowly he let a little more air out of the arm bands. Just before I could swim without them, a bus smashed into the farm truck outside Knysna. My father died in the accident.”

“That’s so sad,” Nomkhita croaks. She put an arm around me. “Thank you, Yonela. You’re a wise one.”

“And you.”

She shakes her head miserably.

I grab her hand, squeeze it too hard. “You were wise to know it doesn’t matter how you dress, it doesn’t matter even if you flirt outrageously! It’s not an invitation to rape. How dare they say it is?”

Nomkhita nods. The truth makes her stronger.

***

Tell us: Do you agree with Yonela that ‘nothing is an invitation to rape’? Or are there some things girls mustn’t do, or else boys will think they deserve to be raped?