Dog Eat Dog: A Novel

thirteen

thirteen Dunga and Vusi were still sitting on the lawn outside my house drinking beer. Theks and Lerato, Theks’s friend who lived a few blocks away, had joined them. It was obvious that Lerato had been organised to accompany Vusi to the street party. Loud kwaito music that was coming from the house of the street party organisers overpowered the music we were playing. A pleasing smell of braaied meat also permeated the air. Themba and I had agreed not to say anything about the guys in the microbus. I was embarrassed at my lack of courage and didn’t want them to know that I had been robbed so easily. As we arrived Dunga started giving us a tongue-lashing. ‘You guys are useless. What took you so long? What were you doing with those kids?’ ‘Chatting up ladies is not an easy job, my bra,’answeredThemba . ‘Suka! Don’t pretend as if you are mafikizolo in the game.You have fathered three kids by different ladies,’snapped Dunga. ‘What if I tell you that the mothers of my kids were of easy virtue?’ ‘How could you talk of Nthabi like that?’interrupted Theks. ‘Because we have fallen apart,’replied Themba. ‘Since when have you stopped being so possessive?’asked Vusi. ‘Since we fell apart last week.’ ‘Speak of the devil, here she comes now,’I lied playfully. ‘Where?’asked Themba looking around in every direction. ‘Just kidding. I wanted to see if you were telling the truth.’ ‘Of course not. She’s still mine.’ ‘So where is my gun?’asked Vusi in a worried voice. 93 ‘I lost it,’I replied. ‘What? Voetsek wena! Don’t shit on my head please,’said Vusi. ‘Give me the gun before I lose my temper. Because if I lose my temper I will make you find it with only one bullet from this other one.’ ‘It’s true. We’ve lost the gun,’ confirmed Themba. ‘And the reason we came back late is that we were still searching for it.’ ‘I hope you have not bartered it for sexual favours,’said Dunga, nosing at my pants like a dog. ‘You lie. There it is,’ said Vusi with a relieved voice when he saw the bulge in my waistband. I went inside the house to see my aunt who had been away when we arrived earlier during the day. I found her seated on the sofa with two female Jehovah’s Witnesses. They were trying to convince her to convert to their church. My aunt had not been near the church recently. I knew this was due to one of the preachers, as I had overheard her relating the story to my uncle the other day. According to her account it all happened during one of those never-ending collections. The collection had begun with donations of ten rand, but because my aunt didn’t have a ten rand banknote, she had donated her last five rand coin. After the collection the preacher had stood in the pulpit and told the congregation that there were still some people around them who took the church for granted, and used her five rand coin as an example. Since that day she preferred to go to church only when she had enough money.This meant that, as a pensioner , she had to wait until her monthly allowance came in before she could set foot in church. I felt sorry for my aunt. She had been a servant of that church for almost half of a century. ‘Oh Dingz, I nearly forgot. Your brother left some money for you to pay for the electricity and rent at the municipality office,’ said my aunt. ‘That is, if you will have the time?’ I hesitated; I could suddenly see a way out of my cashless sit94 uation; I could use the rent money to celebrate the elections and then get Dunga to bail me out when he got paid at month-end. ‘I think I will,’I stammered.‘Because my first class is at eleven. But I’m not sure whether I will be able to come straight home tomorrow,’I said doubtfully. ‘Well, you can bring the receipts on Friday then when you come home.You will come home, won’t you?’ ‘Yes, of course I will,’I replied. ‘OK then, just look under my pillow and you’ll see one hundred and eighty...