As she enters in the gate, her eyes are taken by the cars, so many cars, from the garages, on the grass, and all the way, two are parked just slightly away from the swimming pool. Strange! Has everyone in the family bought a car? What on earth is going on? For some naive reasons she thinks it might be about her competition earlier, but she quickly rubs off the thought and pulls herself back in the moment.

The door is widely opened, both the frames are opened. So unusual! She gets inside the house though the lounge door. A flush of fear scans through her whole body. Why is everyone crying? Where is Daddy? Tabitha is sitting down on the floor, her shoulders are covered with an issa blanket, and she has a doek on. Something she never does, not even when she sleeps.

“Oh Baby…” Aunty Zannie jumps to Luhle and opens her arms towards her, her face is wet, Luhle pats her twice then quickly slides down to the floor, next to Tabitha. Tabitha could hardly look at her. She is sobbing, her whole body is shaking.

“Tabitha!” Luhle calls out, shaking her. “Tabitha what happened? Where is my father?”

Tabitha raises her head and she faces her, everything in her face says it all. But No! It can’t be. Luhle’s intestines turn cold instantly.

“Tabitha! Tabitha tell me where is he?”

With her sorrowful and heavy voice she manages, “Luhle… He… Your father is…”

“You killed her! Why don’t you just tell the child?” grandmother shrieks from the passage, follows by a coarse cry that sounds more hateful than sorrowful.

Luhle turns back to her stepmom quickly, desperate for a quick and straight answer. “Tabitha! Where is He?”

“Luhle He…” Tabitha cries, “He passed away this morning!” then another cry follows. Luhle stands up immediately, for a minute there, she doesn’t know what it means when someone has passed away. What on earth does that mean? Okay, if he has passed away then where is he?

“Tabitha what are you talking about? I’m not asking that, I am asking where is my father Tabitha” her voice is so loud it fills the whole house.

“Tell him to come downstairs!”

“Luhle you’re not… You’re not hearing me…” She manages to say, through her tense cloud of sorrow and heartbreak, “He is No more! He is not alive anymore” then she buries her face in her issa blanket. For a split second, Luhle’s world stops! Nothing is anything. Everything is in here but out of here. Her dad passed on. He died. She slides down again to face Tabitha, she lifts Tabitha’s chin so she faces her, and yes, everything in her face agrees.

Luhle lets her abruptly, and then moves back. She screams on top of her voice! It’s a scream of everything, disbelief, shock, acceptance, denial, confusion and a let out of something that grew in a second when she entered the gate.

Few moments later, the funeral car comes to fetch the body, Luhle and Tabitha hold on to Dad’s lifeless hands for minutes before letting go. Few hours later they are sitting in the lounge, on the mattress that the Aunties have brought from one of the guest rooms upstairs. Tabitha, Luhle MaKhumalo the grandmother, and Aunty Rebecca are sitting on it. Since the body was taken, Luhle has not been able to let go of Tabitha, on the mattress she leans on Tabitha’s shaking shoulder, then on her chest, then she pillows with Tabitha’s thighs, then up again holding on to her arm. It’s eight pm. People have not stopped coming in. Close friends, relatives, and other family members.

At night Tabitha struggles to sleep. Luhle sleeps for a few minutes, then up again, she checks if Tabitha is still next to her, then she nods off again. Repeat, until morning. The competition feels like it happened centuries ago.

In the morning, more people are coming in, colleagues, friends, relatives and church members. Uncles have stopped grandmother’s accusations and insults, threatening that she won’t be allowed to spend the rest of the mourning here.

To her surprise, Luhle’s English FAL educator and school talent guardian, has come and are entering through the kitchen. They get into the lounge, and they sit down in the carpet next to the mattress. What a humble gesture, Luhle thinks, everyone’s been sitting on the couches, what does it matter anyway, dad’s no more. No More! Luhle’s red and swollen eyes fill with tears. Not sure if it’s appropriate to just sit and not acknowledge their presence since they’ve come to her, she crawls towards them. They hug her. Long, tightly and warmly.

“You came…” She manages to say “news travel fast I guess” she laughs faintly.

“Of course we came baby as soon as we heard. We’re here to pass our heartfelt condolences to you and your whole family.” Ms Watson says.

“Please allow the process, allow the moment, and don’t be hard on yourself. None of this is your fault. Sometimes we think such things are our faults but in actual fact, they aren’t. You don’t deserve this, none of your family does. It’s just how life’s designated” the Talent guide says. Nothing of what they are saying makes sense, but Luhle listens anyway, and she imagines and wishes if they just stayed quiet. That would mean a lot more than their incomprehensible words. Only now does she understand why Job’s friends stayed silent for seven days next to him without a word when he had lost everything.

“Another thing Luhle, I don’t know if this will help you, but since you left before the end of the competition yesterday, you missed out on your glory.”

The talent guide continues, “You won the competition! You were on the first position; your trophy is in the school glory trophy board. You will have a mini celebration when you come to pick it up”

A sudden and hot pain strikes in the tips of Luhle’s fingers. The lump grows hugely in her throat. She turns to Tabitha,

“Do you remember when I told dad about the surprise and he said it might be too late?”

Tabitha gasps, she remembers. It was indeed too late.

“Couldn’t dad at least wait for the results?” Luhle says, the cry starts again.