That day I was riding Lady and Mmoloki, my best friend, was riding Buck. We always rode paired up like that. Though the horses were Mmoloki’s we both saw Lady as mine and Buck as Mmoloki’s. That day we rode to the very end of the Black River with my dog, Mighty, running behind us like he always did. We rode to where the Black River branches to become the Setlhare and Corbet rivers. It was December school holidays so all day we were free to do as we liked. At the fork in the river, we climbed down from the horses. We’d brought a small picnic lunch. Mmoloki spread out the blanket while I unpacked the food. The horses grazed nearby. Mighty chased frogs in the river.

“It’s perfect weather,” Mmoloki said, lying back on the blanket and looking up at the wide, blue sky with its puffs of white cloud.

I lay down next to her and we watched two male masked weaver birds weave their hanging nests near the water. I heard a grey hornbill whistle in the distance, just as a fish jumped to catch an insect flying past. It was a perfect day. What I didn’t know then, but would soon find out, was that it would be the last perfect day I would have for a long, long time.

We finished eating, swam in the river and then raced the horses back home. My mother had said I should be back in time to help with dinner. I helped Mmoloki put the horses away before getting on my bike and cycling to our farm.

When I turned off to ride up our long, gravel driveway, I straight away knew something was wrong. There were three vehicles parked in front of the house. One was my grandfather’s bakkie, the other two I didn’t know. What was Ntatemogolo doing here in the middle of the week? He often drove out on a Sunday for lunch, but he was always busy with his general dealer in Nokeng, the nearest village, during the week. He had no time to drive out to see us.

I parked my bike and went inside. My mother was sitting on the sofa with a woman I didn’t know. The woman had her arm around my mother’s shoulder and my mother was crying. The minister from church, Pastor Reginald, was there too. He was in the corner talking to Ntatemogolo. When they noticed me, my mother let out a shriek and began to cry harder. The unknown woman pulled her closer and patted her back and said, “Everything will be fineYou will get through this.”

Ntatemogolo came to me and led me into the kitchen where it was quiet. Too quiet. No pots were on the stove. No vegetables ready for me to wash and cut. No meat sizzling in a pan. What had happened?

“Baleka,” Ntatemogolo started, “there’s been an accident.”

“An accident?”

“Yes, with the tractor.”

He went on to tell me how my father had been ploughing a new field to plant a second maize crop. It was a field he’d never ploughed before. It was rocky and quite hilly, even steeply-sloping in places, but he wanted to expand the land that was cultivated. Farming was tough nowadays and he needed to use every bit of his land just to make enough to break even. But something went wrong. He was alone so we would never know exactly what happened, but a neighbour saw the tractor upside down near a hill. When he went to investigate, he found my father trapped underneath, already dead.

“You must be strong for your mother, Baleka,” Ntatemogolo said that day as I wept in shock and grief.

I tried my best. That summer I worked hard. I woke up early, before the sun, and Mighty and I got to work. I helped everywhere I could. I fed the chickens and let the goats out. I made sure the two cows we had were milked each morning. I collected eggs from the nest boxes. I helped Pete, our field hand, with the crops. But it wasn’t enough.

My mother tried, I know she tried, but something in her died when my father died. It would be many years until I heard my mother laugh again. And, even though grief pulled her down, she tried her best to keep the farm running, to try to make enough to keep us going. But she failed.

***

Tell us what you think: How did the first scene in this chapter make you feel? Do you like being in rural areas?