Hook Line & Sinker - 3. Derailled

Flashback

“What happened? I could hear screaming,” Thembi asked as I walked into his room.

“I couldn’t drop the wine glass on the floor because the bastard made the announcement when I was leaning on the kitchen counter. So, I decided to throw the glass at him. Tsala I was sure it was going to hit him, but he dodged and then it hit the wall. Guess what this drama queen does next?” I asked, so caught up in the thrill of it all.

“What tsala?” he asked with this wide grin plastered on his face.

“I go running to him, then kam shapa, kam shapa with those Brooke Logan hits, those weak ones. Then he threw me on the floor. That was when I went crazy with the cries, I’m sure you heard them. Fell in place, so I was right on top of the glass then I grabbed one and made sure it cut deep. When he tried to clean it for me, that’s when I made the big reveal. You should have seen him tsala, it was like someone told him his mother was a prostitute in Hilbrow.” That’s when Thembi and I laughed; we were practically rolling over with laughter. When we finally broke up the laughter he poured me another glass of wine. We sat up all of that night talking and I was filling him in about what happened with KG. We laughed and had what seemed to be the best time I’ve had for the past three months. KG may have ruined my original plan by dumping me first, but Thembi and I would come up with a second plan. Maybe he'd have to extend his holiday for another week.

When I finally went to sleep I had only three hours before my first class. You’d think three hours sleep and an eight-hour working day would be too much for me, but I was so happy and well rested. It’s not the fact that I slept. No! It was the fact that I am so happy to get KG back. You dedicate so much time and energy to a person, you give them your heart, you tell them things you’ve never even told your twin, and guess what he does? He tells you he has a wife and his leaving you for her after he told you he wanted out of the marriage. To say I’m angry is an understatement and I know a lot of people will judge me for half of the things I will and have done but I’m a woman scorned and you know what they say about those.

It had been three days since the fight and I told myself that I was ready to move on from it. I was hurt that KG still hadn’t spoken to me; everything was taking its toll but I was sure to move on from all of it. But life keeps moving like a rolling stone. So I went about my life and continued what I did best.

“So, who can tell me why Meursault is not looking for redemption in this book?” I asked the small number of students in my class that day. As I scoped them out, I saw that they all had blank faces. “Okay, let me dumb this down and sensationalise it a bit. Let’s say your favourite celebrity… Lauryn Hill… yeah, that’s it. Let’s say Lauryn doesn’t pay taxes for six years and she gets busted. Why would she be calm and not mad about being arrested, or be willing to face the consequences?” No shade, I love Lauryn, but I had to find an example that would get them to react. But guess what? All I got were eye rolls and someone girl filing her nails.

“Miss Bail, would you care to answer, or are your nails more fascinating than you passing?” I asked Bevany Bail as I tapped her on the shoulder. I knew I was picking on her, but I needed answers; I wasn’t hosting these classes for my own health.

“Well, because the culprit knows what they did was wrong and accepts their wrong doing.” She answered.

“Thank you for that philosophically rich answer.” I responded sarcastically, for usually the class was more alive and vibrant, but I guess everyone wanted to go home. So… “Since none of you want to partake, I think I’ll end the class and you can all go and do that which excites all of you. Class dismissed.” I saw the class start to eagerly get up and leave the venue.

I made a mental note to give them a minor assignment due for the next class on the work I was covering on that day. On my way out I saw one of my students waiting for me at the door.

“Sir…” he started.

“Mat. Sir would be your lecturer; I’m just an assistant,” I replied with a smile.

“Mat,” he said tentatively. “I wanted to ask about the question of suicide that was posed last week.”

“What about it?” I responded. At that point the young man and I had already made our way out of the building and I was heading to the coffee shop to get a caffeine session. “Wait! Before you say anything, can we sit down? I want to grab a cup of coffee and answer you properly. That’s if you have the time.”

“Actually, I only have thirty minutes before my next class.”

“Okay, then fire away,” I said and stood, turned to him and looked at him.

“Well, last week… Okay… Uhm… So, I’m sorry I don’t know how to put this,” he said nervously.

“Just breathe. Remember I’m just a person, also remember that last week was a build-up to all the views and workings of Albert Camus that we will be doing. If you have a problem with his view on suicide then that’s fine, you can argue it all you want just as long as you understand his background. It seems like a whole lot of work, but start the way I started it; read about his background, google him and find quotes on him. Don’t make him an academic project; just treat him and his work like your favourite singer, that way you get comfortable with the work,” I said while gently patting the younger boy's arm.

“Thanks, I think I’ll do that and see if I still have the same question. But what are your views on suicide?” he asked, throwing me completely off my game.

“Personal opinion or the opinion the institution wants me to have?” I asked with a slight giggle.

“Personal,” he said more confidently than when he started this conversation.

“Well look, I think death in all forms is horrible and suicide is just a permanent solution to a temporary problem. But before I go on you’ve got to understand I’ve had people that I’m close with commit suicide, a few successful and a few not. What I’ve come to realise is that suicide is selfish, but us thinking suicide is selfish is selfish in itself; you think I’m crazy huh? Well, maybe I am, but I believe we all think more or less the same.” I received a nod from him at the last point and that urged me to go on. “However, when it comes to pain and suffering only one person feels the pain. One philosopher I’ve encountered stated that ‘the basis of the self is not thought but suffering, which is the most fundamental of all feelings. While it suffers, not even a cat can doubt its unique and un-interchangeable self. In intense suffering the world disappears and each of us is alone with his self.’ So we cannot judge people’s actions during their suffering, even when you think like that person, you haven’t and may probably never experience their pain the way they have and know how deep that pain and suffering goes.” I looked at the guy in front of me while he looked a little confused.

“I hear you, but I don’t understand,” he said while scratching his head.

“Have you ever suffered? Don’t answer me, but if you’ve ever been in pain or suffering you’ll understand. Think about it. Think about what I’ve said and how it links to your questions about suicide.” I gave him one last pat on the shoulder and walked off to go get my caffeine fix before my next lecture and a day of marking essays.

That day all I thought about was the question on suicide and whether that would make sense for me with KG not answering me after I told him about me having AIDS and him leaving me for his wife. I may sound crazy but I had fallen madly in love with KG. When I say madly, I mean it in the literal sense. I went to go and catch my cup of coffee at my favourite place on campus and as I was thinking about how KG would never talk to me I got a message from him. I message that got all the crazy in me to come out.

“It’s over between us; I never want you to contact me ever again. You put my entire life at risk, I could never forgive you. P.S. I’m negative. Keep your sickness to yourself”

That was when I decided to go and retire into my office, let out a few tears and after that. After the tears, came blood. He was the first to draw blood in this war on love but I would be the last one standing. I would hurt him more than he hurt me.

***

After that message he sent me I went to talk to Thembi. He managed to calm me down and we had a conversation about how to modify plan B to hurt him. I loved times like this, as much as Thembi doesn’t feel my pain right now he sympathises. He’d gone through an even worse break up and he was only sixteen, the guy had done a number on him and the guy was his first love, first time, first everything. So, the fact that he was willing to help was no surprise. I wanted my revenge to be poetic.

“What do you want to do?” I asked Thembi eagerly.

“Let’s wait a few days, I’ll get Michael to track his phone, and when he has one of his long days at work I’ll give you a go.” He replied while he stirred the pot of Umphokoqo, my favourite meal for when I was down. It always reminded me of home and how my mom used to make it when it was warm outside. The warm days were the best days to have Umphokoqo, my brothers and I would be playing outside and Mom would call us all in during the day to have some and we’d speed out again going to play in the yard. Trust Thembi to make this meal right now. At the time he was just our neighbour he hadn’t become my best friend and someone I regarded as my twin. It was more than a reminder, it was a way to calm me down and just the smell of it had me in a trance.

As he continued to cook, I made my way to call my mother. Her and I had a long conversation about home, life, and everything else that was going on. I was happy to hear her voice, before my father stole the phone and asked me if I’ve decided whether or not I’ll move back home because they missed me. He and I laughed before I said my goodbyes and went back to the kitchen to have what Thembi had made.

A week went by, and I could honestly say that there was slight progress in my anger towards KG; I’d gone from never wanting to see him again to wishing he were dead and to I don’t care about his life - which was where I was at when Thembi had to pack his things and head home. His two-week leave was over; we had a drunken night in and said farewell to each other the next morning.

Then it was loneliness. It was the first time since KG bought me the place that I was completely alone. No guests, no one to come rushing home to cook for. For the first few days I was miserable; there was no Thembi to make jokes with me. I was alone with my feelings, with my hurt, my pain and memories of him. After the feeling of loneliness came that of indifference, okay faux indifference, and I remained in the faux indifference for that week after Thembi left. He called often to check on me. One of my favourite phone calls happened two weeks to that day that KG had left me.

“Hey, my friend,” Thembi’s cheerful voice sounded.

“Hey you, how’s life at home?” I asked enthusiastically.

“All is great, how are you holding up?”

“You know how I am,” I replied with a little more sorrow than I liked.

“Don’t worry, baby, because tonight is your night,” he said with way too much excitement.

“What do you mean?” I asked anxiously.

“Well, I got all the details we wanted so… I think you should take the picture we talked about, and of course you know the rest.” The idea of what Thembi just told me was wonderful; I had forgotten all about my anger. I was so busy feeling sorry for myself that I forgot to take charge.

“I’m on it darling, so you say for the next three days?”

“Next four, I’ll send you something wonderful to make an add on. Just know to start tonight.” With that I hung up and I knew that Thembi wouldn’t mind me just leaving him on the line. Shit, I’m sure he’d do the same to me.

Now, this was stage one of the plan, and I had to be precise about it. First part of phase one was to get in my room. Second, was to go on twitter. Third tweet to @MissDesignerEverything, and the fourth and final stage was to wait. I was in my room so excited about what we were, I mean, what I was about to do. I took out KG’s shirt, the one that his wife had bought him; remember I told you about it? His favourite one? Well it was still there, and so were a couple of others. I guess that’s why I had false hope; he never came to get his shit. Anyway, I got the shirt out and put it on my bed and took a picture. After taking the picture I loaded it to my laptop and made a couple of edits. When I was finally done I was ready to be a bird, and tweet. The tweet read:

@MissDesignerEverything Your husband forgot his shirt in my house, please tell him to come back and fetch it.

I attached the pic of his shirt and his wedding ring; well, the wedding ring was photoshopped into the picture. I got the picture of his wedding ring from a Facebook picture his wife posted a few days ago. Once I got the notification that my tweet was sent I relaxed and went to go get myself a glass of wine, and got on my phone.

“Excuse me, is this Mr Lock It?” I asked the man on the other end.

“Yes, how can I help you, sir?”

“Well, I lost my spare keys just yesterday and there’ve been a string of robberies. I just want you to come and get my locks changed. I’m awfully terrified,” I said, making sure my voice sounded extremely vulnerable.

“You're lucky we extended our trading hours to seven, but it’s not a problem. Give me your address and I’ll send one of my boys.” With that I gave the man my address and sat in my lounge waiting. This is an important part of the plan because should KG get angry he might want to come barging in here and open up using his keys. But this house, the one I was in right here! This! This was my house, and no nigga can come and do as he pleases. It took the lovely young gentleman twenty minutes to arrive and he changed all my locks. I made sure to give the guy a generous tip for helping me and he went his way.

After my door got serviced I went to my laptop and saw that I had three notifications on twitter. Two of them were reply tweets from KG’s wife.

Keep the shirt, I’ll keep the man. @UnderTheMat

What does having his shirt prove? Does he even know your name? @UnderTheMat

I loved the dialogue, but I needed to steerher in the right direction.

@MissDesignerEverything The shirt means nothing, but not his wedding ring, which should mean something to you.

That was the last time I could access her twitter, after that she blocked me, and according to Thembi she went on a rampage cussing me out for that night. Thembi called me laughing, telling me all the things she said.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t have beef with her; man, I hardly know her name. I do however want her to leave him, taking half of everything if not more. I want her to get angry and want to hurt him, because it was clear that I wasn’t capable of hurting him.

That night I slept like fairies were dancing on my skin, the best part about all the mess I created was the fact that my twitter account didn’t have me as the profile picture. It had a painting of an angel with this wonderful quote on it. She wouldn’t catch on to who I am, not until I wanted her to. Her task was only to get mad, and divorce.

The next day at work was a breeze. It turns out my students just needed to stop being lectured about death, suicide and existentialism in order for them to wake up. I noticed once the class gravitated more towards Plato and Socrates they started to come alive, I swear they thought my class was just supposed to be about those two. That day was one of many strings of dates with Charles. He and I had been randomly going on dates for a few weeks now. Charles turned out to be what I needed, to be honest. He and I had a nice lunch date off campus; he took me to wonderful restaurant where we had a good meal and good laughs. I totally forgot about everything that day.

“So, when can we become a couple,” he asked.

“Look, I don’t want to play you. You're a great guy, but I just got out of something messy,” I said truthfully.

“Which year is that?” he said as he let his smile show.

“Okay fine, we can discuss this over dinner tomorrow,” I replied shyly.

“Your place I’m guessing?”

“I love your guesses, they are educated.” I joked.

“Just like me,” he laughed and managed to sneak a quick peck on my cheek.

I said goodbye to him and went back to the rest of my schedule. The rest of that day was fine as well, and nothing could’ve disturbed my peace and happiness.

Later that afternoon, just before the end of my day, Thembi called to remind me of phase two. So I got even more excited and all but ran to my apartment. I was so happy that day I forgot all about the second phase. Before I got onto the second phase, I called Charles.

“Hey,” I said being shy.

“Sup?”

“I want you to come over tonight and spend the night,” I blurted out.

“What about dinner tomorrow?” he asked.

“Well, we can have dinner tonight and maybe we’ll have dessert tomorrow,” I said suggestively. He let out a laugh and told me he’d come around in an hour. Giving me an hour to cook and get phase two out of the way.

Phase two still required a shirt, but this time I stood in front of a fulllength mirror wearing one of his shirts that covered just a little bit of my ass, I had my dreads loosened and took a pic of my reflexion from the back. I took three different shots and sent them to Thembi, and waited for him to choose the best one for me to send. I quickly changed into my sweatpants and started cooking after my photo-shoot.

I decided to make chicken linguini for Charles, seeing as it was my first time entertaining him. I wondered if we’d have sex. Was I ready to have sex with a guy though? Of course Charles had made me happy ever since we officially became friends a year ago, and I knew he made me laugh and made me happy. I had always thought to myself that if I hadn’t been in a relationship I would’ve made him mine. Maybe I should give him a chance. What could it hurt? Oh wait, it could hurt; he could have a wife. My thoughts were disrupted by a knock on the door. I ran to the door and saw Charles standing there.

In all honesty this man is handsome; the pure textbook definition of it and his smile was just the most captivating thing about him. It carried an innocence and aura of goodness to it, and that was just his smile alone. The rest of him was just a whole different story; Charles was 1.92m tall with the same dirty blonde hair he had the year before, which I'd though was bottle made. He had this whole artistic surfer boy look to him, with a swimmer's build. His eyes were a beautiful emerald and his lips were full and his tongue was making its way over his lips. I don’t know how I missed this guy; I really don’t know how I spent a year dating KG and not Charles.

“So, you just going to stare of me like a piece of meat?” he asked playfully.

“How did I not know you are this hot?” I asked as I opened the burglar bar and stepped out the way for him to enter.

“Maybe it’s because you are blind?”

“Shut up, asshole,” I said as I shoved him in and closed the door.

“Where should I put these?” he asked as he raised his overnight bag and the wine he brought.

“Wine comes to me, and the other thing goes in the guest room, which is down the hall the second door on your left,” I said making my way to the kitchen. I put the sweet rosé he brought in my wine rack and took out a nice Sauvignon Blanc for the dinner.

“Food is almost ready and then I’ll give you a tour of the place,” I shouted from the kitchen, noticing he hasn’t returned.

“No need, I’m already comfortable,” he retorted and as I walked out the kitchen. He really had made himself comfortable in the lounge.

“What’s on?” I asked him while making my way to the sofa he was sitting on.

“Well, I wanted to watch soccer but I didn’t want to get too caught up,” he said as he looked at me, giving a devilish smile. “I see you have a PS3, do you have FIFA?”

“Fuckoff, Charlie,” I said feigning anger. You see he was taunting me; we once discussed things that piss us off and I told him about my one ex who had invited me over to his place only for him to tell me to wait while he finishes playing FIFA with his friends. I guess Charles really did pay attention to me.

“When do we eat?” he asked while still laughing.

“When you stop being an asshole,” I said playfully shoving him.

“Don’t think I can eat when I’m dead.”

“It’s not like you need to eat, you fat enough.” That’s when he grabbed me and playfully tried to smother me with one of the cushions I had put on the sofa. We fooled around for a god ten minutes before I remembered that I had something in the oven.

“Wait,” I said trying to catch my breath. “I need to finish preparing food.”

“Go on, the man of the house needs to eat,” he said shoving me.

“You right I do need to eat.”

“Smart ass.” He joked.

“Nah! Fine ass,” I said laughing as I finally got into the kitchen and took the mini cakes I was baking for us out of the oven. I stepped back out of the kitchen to go to the dining room and caught Charles asking me something about a movie he might want to watch. It was a Friday, and apparently that meant movie night to him. I finished setting the table, dished out and put the food on the table, after having to shout at Charles three times.

“You like a kid, you know that?” I asked as he finally sat to eat.

“Nah, I just had to finish listening to that news headline.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, it was about some millionaire business guy from here having some heart attack or something like that.” It was so weird that he was playing with his food yet looking me dead in the face while I nodded and ate.

“Did you catch any names?” I asked trying to engage with his conversation.

“Something with a K -you know how I can’t pronounce Sotho names.” I laughed at what he said; I found it cute when he had finally managed to get my full name right. He was making an effort with me. I started to get caught up in the idea of having him be mine when I heard him say something that ripped me completely out of my fantasy world.

“I think his surname was Dinokeng, and he owned like a large number of lucrative businesses. To be honest, from the details on the news, I doubt it was a heart attack. I think the wife poisoned him.” With that he continued eating and I just froze, dead in my tracks, I froze.

“Matsi? You okay?” he asked, waving at me.

“Yeah, fine. Give me a minute.” I got up and walked to my room; as soon as I got in I headed to my laptop and waited for it to come to life. It was one of the longest waits in my life. When I finally had access to my desktop I went onto three credible news sites and searched for what Charles had told me.

I guess I need to find a new plan because three credible news sources say:

Millionaire Business mogul Kgotso Dinokeng passed away several hours after being found on the floor by his wife at their Port Elizabeth home. The cause of death is believed to have been a heart attack.