Members of the mob hurled stones that bashed open wounds in their skin, others threw fruits and different types of food. One community member had showered Nkosinathi with a big pot of hot soup. Some community members whipped them with whips that looked like instruments of slavery while others beat them with sticks as if to crack them open like pinyadas. To say that they looked like a mess by the time they reached the middle of the community is actually an understatement: their appearance emanated something worse than a horror movie.
One would think that they had already received their punishment in full. But no thought could be further from the truth. This was just the introduction… the ill fate the Sangoma spoke of was drawing near.
‘Maybe I should have listened to that stupid boy! My brother,’ Nkosinathi thought.
The gang members spotted their third partner in crime, in the centre of the enraged mob, looking just like them – stripped and full of heavy bruises, cuts and wounds. Each gang member had a tyre placed around their shoulders, so as to restrict the movement of their arms. Nkosinathi and his boys were then put together in the centre of the crowd where containers of petrol were emptied onto them. Like a disease that needed to be evaded, a thick ring encircled the gang and separated them from the mob.
Thick, sharp stones still remained flying in their direction, just as food and all sorts of other objects. These were all shadowed by insults that degraded Nkosinathi and his ‘boys’ of all their humanity.
The fury-driven mob threw incessant tirades.
“You don’t deserve Life!”
“You are more worthless than dog shit!”
“You don’t belong in this world, we are better without you!”
“You are not fit for your wives and girlfriends, someone else must take over! They deserve better than you.”
“God created you by mistake.”
“Even a disease is better than you.”
“We should cut off your manhood, we don’t need men like you.”
Nkosinathi and his boys trembled in fear as they soaked in petrol. They looked on ahead as the community leader addressed the enraged mob, stating that the community shall be cleansed of them and they shall never bother anyone ever again. The leader dipped a wooden plank in petrol and set it alight. He then tossed it. Nkosinathi’s eyes locked onto the burning plank as it flew across the air.
Memories of everything he and the boys had done to hurt the innocent had flashed before him. He closed his eyes, the plank landed on the puddle of petrol surrounding them and the petrol was set alight.
The rest is history…
The End.