Klap!

“Hey! What was that for?” I ask, rubbing my cheek. It was sore from the slap I’d just gotten.

The gorgeous woman in front of me frowns. She starts speaking a language I can’t understand.

“Listen lady, I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I tell her.

She lets out another string of words and I’m betting it’s Spanish.

“Fernando?” she says, grabbing me.

Fernando? Me? Come to think of it this lady looks familiar.

“Wait,” I say. “Esperanza?”

And with that, I get another klap from her. Then I wake up.

“Argh. Hangover from hell,” I moan as someone opens my bedroom curtains and lets the sun shine onto my face. “And the weirdest dream ever.”

“Good morning, sunshine.” Mervin walks over and pulls my blanket off me.

“Is this how you guys fix me? By breaking me more?” I can’t even open my eyes properly.

Vusi jumps in. “Come on. We used to do this all the time before your downfall.”

We did, but now it felt like I no longer had the energy to face the ‘morning after’.

“Why are you here? Don’t you guys have jobs to get to?”

“It’s my day off,” Mervin says.

“And I have nightshift later,” Vusi joins in.

“And I,” Kent says, as he enters with a McDonald’s bag filled with what I hoped was breakfast, “don’t have any lectures today.”

Kent is still in college because he failed a semester. The rest of us graduated last year, and this year isn’t at all what we planned. Vusi works at a retail store, as a shop assistant. Mervin is a waiter. And me? I haven’t even found a job yet. Thank God my parents send me money every month. They have to cos I’m their ‘miracle baby’. My mother thought she was infertile, then I came along. Needless to say, I’m their golden child.

“Come on, guys,” Kent ushers us. “Coffee is in the kitchen.”

The bag was, in fact, filled with breakfast and we ate until we couldn’t take it any more.

“Thanks guys,” I start. “Without you, I don’t know where I’d be right now.”

“Wait a moment,” Vusi says, walking over to Kent’s backpack. He whips out a big sheet of paper and sticks it to the wall with tape. Then he grabs a marker and scribbles a heading.

Things we hate about Khanyi.

“What is this?” I ask.

“Her eyes are too far apart,” Kent says and Vusi writes it down.

“She’s a bitch,” Vusi writes next.

“She’s a shallow, greedy little gold digger,” says Merv, and writes.

They look to me, waiting for me to say something bad about her. I couldn’t. I still loved her, no matter how things ended with us.

“I can’t, guys. I’m sorry. I think we should stop.”

“Really?” Vusi grabs his phone and starts scrolling. He shows me Khanyi’s status and profile picture on WhatsApp. How the hell does he still have her?

“I thought she blocked all of us!” I say.

“Is that the point right now?” Vusi yells. “Look at her.”

I look at the pictures. She’s in her bikini, sitting on some shirtless guy’s lap, drinking. No, not ‘some shirtless guy’. It’s Joseph. In some, they’re kissing. In others, they’re just enjoying the sun and beach. She told me she hated the beach because she didn’t like getting sunburnt. Then what is she doing there with Joseph?

“She’s a cheap two-faced slut!”

The boys laugh out loud and write my comment down.

We went on for a while and just spent the day laughing and joking around. Whatever happened, I knew that my boys always had my back.

***

Tell us: Is this a good way to help someone get over an ex?