Chapter Four: The Ghost of the Coloured Boy
725 Words
The café in Glenwood was a soft sort of quiet—chalkboard menus, clinking cutlery, mellow jazz humming through ceiling speakers. Dodo stirred her iced latte slowly, watching the door. She hadn’t seen Thuli in years.
When she finally walked in, Dodo recognized her instantly. Her friend’s hair was still cropped and natural, but now dyed a warm gold. Her skin glowed, and the slight roll of her belly peeked beneath her linen blouse.
“Motherhood looks good on you,” Dodo said, rising for a hug.
“Girl, it’s exhaustion that wears bronzer,” Thuli replied, laughing. “How are you?”
They sat across from each other, eyes drinking in the time passed between them. The silence between their words was full of things unsaid, but not unwelcome.
“I heard you’re writing now,” Thuli said.
“Trying to,” Dodo said. “Between the taxi drops, homework wars, and dodging my mother’s prophecies.”
Thuli chuckled. “That part hasn’t changed.”
They sipped and giggled for a while, until Thuli leaned in, voice lower.
“You ever hear from Portia’s dad?”
The smile slid from Dodo’s face. She shook her head.
“No.”
“You ever want to?”
“No.”
“Liar.”
Dodo sighed. “Okay, yes. But not for the reasons you think.”
Thuli sat back, letting her speak.
“When I told Ma I was pregnant,” Dodo began, eyes fixed on her glass, “she went mad. I thought she’d faint. She just... stared at me like I was a stranger.”
“She always wanted you to be... clean,” Thuli said.
“Holy,” Dodo corrected. “Untouchable. Especially because of where we came from. That mud house. That pensioner father of mine. That shame that clung to her like Sunday stockings.”
Thuli nodded, lips pressed.
“And then to hear the father was him? The coloured boy from the house with a car, a pool, and a mother who never greeted her after church? Ma nearly threw me out.”
“I remember,” Thuli said softly.
“She told me I’d humiliated her. That I had opened our door to more shame.”
Dodo shook her head. “And then he ghosted me. I told him I was pregnant and he just... stopped calling. I’d see him in the streets, in his maroon Golf GTI, girls in his car. And he’d look away. As if we’d never... existed.”
Thuli reached for her hand. “You loved him?”
“I thought I did. He had gold chains, leather jackets, and I mistook charm for care. But no... I think I loved what he represented: escape. From poverty. From church whispers. From Ma’s tired eyes.”
Thuli let the silence sit. Then she asked, “Did Portia ever ask?”
Dodo nodded. “She did. I told her parts. Not all. I don’t want her to think she came from shame.”
“She didn’t,” Thuli said firmly.
“I know,” Dodo said, voice small. “But sometimes… it still feels like she did.”
Thuli leaned forward. “Dodo, you survived. You raised her. You loved her. That counts more than any man who ran away. You made something whole out of what tried to break you.”
A lump rose in Dodo’s throat. She looked away, blinking hard.
“She’s too good for me, Thuli.”
“No,” Thuli said, voice firm. “She’s just like you. Smart. Brave. Tender. Even when it hurts.”
That night, after putting the kids to bed, Dodo sat on her bed with her journal. She opened to a fresh page and began to write:
He was rich and reckless. He had that confidence you only get when your mother never skips her salon appointments and your father never misses a car payment.
He didn’t love me. But I thought if I gave enough of myself, he might.
Ma hated what he reminded her of—everything we lacked.
I hated what he took: the parts of me I never got to grow into.
But what I got…
was Portia.
And sometimes, when I see her laugh like the sun is hers,
I think God gave me a better return than I ever bargained for.
- Writer
