I woke up shivering, my whole body was numb. As I tried to turn and face the other side, I felt massive pain all over my body. Then I remembered it all as if it had just happened but before I could think more about it, he came in. He looked amazing as always. "Morning babe", he said with a huge grin on his face. I could not make out whether or not it was an actual smile or just some evil grin of satisfaction.

"Andrew morning! Did you make me breakfast? Well that's something new"

"I just wanted to surprise you", he said while pushing the tray of food towards me.

Surprise me? Oh, he had done that already and I was not in the mood for another surprise. I hated him so much but not more than I hated how handsome he was. I hated that I still loved him. I had to fake a smile so that I could be rid of him as fast as humanly possible. I hated his expensive furniture which was always spotlessly clean. His bedroom smelt of the most expensive perfume. This was definitely unlike the small backroom my mother rented from the Zulu family which sometimes got too cold in winter because there was not much furniture in it.

My mother was proud of everything we had. She would always remind me of how blessed we were to have achieved all we had so far. Most foreigners we knew had either left their children in their home countries with grannies and aunts but my mother had made it a point to send for my sister and me as soon as she had employment. It always amazed me how a mother who had carried a child inside her for nine months could not feel that there was anything wrong with leaving that same child behind with a granny eating pap and kale while she enjoyed the richest delicacies in a foreign country. I have never understood how this whole parenting thing is supposed to work anyway. There are some who believe that the bond between a mother and child is unbreakable. Society might forgive a father if he abandons his children but a mother! There is no chance she is getting away with it. The economy in Zimbabwe destroyed families so much that in a family of seven children you might find two are in the UK, three in South Africa, and only one left in Zimbabwe, who occasionally visits the parents in the village.

"Yemu, you should never forget who you are", my mother would always say. I guess she always worried that my sister and I might forget that we are Zimbabwean or better yet Shona. At school, we were exposed to Xhosa, English, and Afrikaans so she would worry about us forgetting our mother tongue. There was no way however we would forget Shona because as soon as my mother's foot was on our doorstep she would start speaking Shona and only Shona. When my sister was still in primary school she had started speaking in English and responding to my mother in English but she did not succeed for long. My mother threatened to beat her up if she continued with her attitude. It was simple really, my mother's line of thinking. According to her you could easily forget and disregard your culture and morals if you abandoned your mother tongue. To some extend, I felt she was right. In English, you have the same greeting for someone you just saw recently and someone who you saw ages ago, it's just how are you. However, in Shona one statement asks about your wellbeing and how you have been fairing for so long. Saying "makadini" does the trick.

My father had left us for aunty Lizzy(my mom's younger sister) two years after arriving in South Africa. For the longest time, I had worried about mama. She isolated herself from everyone and was unusually quiet. She however never stopped praying. Until the day she came home from work a changed person. To this day, I can not figure out what happened and changed her mood. The wildest guess I have is that the prayers were working. Mama prayed every day with tears streaming down her cheeks. She asked God to help us since my father had left us. Sometimes she prayed in strange languages I could not understand, she called them tongues. "It is the language of the angels Yemu", mama would always say each time I asked her what she was saying. She never gave a straight answer of what it meant. My assumption was that she didn't even know what it meant but just said it since everybody at our church knew how to pray in 'tongues'. What surprised me about mama was that she never asked God to punish father and aunty Lizzy for what they had done to us.

I wanted to be more like mama but every time I felt like I failed her. She was a hardworking and independent woman. Mama was fearless and always optimistic. Mama always said that one day she would own a big house full of beautiful furniture once she got promoted at work. She was just a receptionist but somehow she believed that she was going to be a manager of some sort one day.

"Babe! Hey! Where is your mind?" Andrew's voice startled me and I jumped up from the bed. I had not realized that my mind had wandered away from the current situation.

"Sorry love, so what's for breakfast?" I quickly asked avoiding any eye contact. "I made pancakes and don't look so surprised they are actually quite tasty". I still looked puzzled and confused because Andrew did not even know how to fry an egg to save his life.

"I know I don't cook much but while you were still sleeping I found an application on your phone about baking and I saw the recipe there ", Andrew said but I was still puzzled and then I was full of rage. I did not show it on my facial expression though but he must have guessed what I was thinking because he then said, "babe seriously you can't be surprised that I cracked the password on it. I mean I am a software developer, after all, I hack into far more sophisticated systems than your little phone and besides, I know you." Of course, why was I not surprised.

"I want to go home before Mama comes back from her shift," I said while getting up from the bed and gathering all my things." 

"What about breakfast?" Andrew asked 

"Thanks but I'll just grab a pancake on my way out otherwise mama will get home before me"

As I was walking out he looked at my arm and said, "Wait! You need a bandage for your arm, I have a first aid kit, let me clean the wound for you"

"It's ok, Sandra will clean it at home."

"Ok if you insist. So when will I see you again? You have an early lecture tomorrow, right? I will pick you up at our usual place"

"O...k", my response startled me. My mouth was saying a different thing to what my mind was saying.

On my way home I met maZizipho, "mntanam(my child), where are you coming from this early? Where is your mom? Wait! No mntanam why are you limping and your arm? Oh My God! Did those tsotsis rob you?" I was thinking fast about what I was going to tell her but she still continued asking questions.

"You know when abahlali(community members) met last week I complained about these boys that are attacking us. I'm against killing them but at least let's get them arrested"

She was too talkative but I knew it was because she cared. She stopped in her tracks when she realized that my eyes were tearing up.

"What is it, my child? Talk to me", she now had a worried expression on her face.

"Ma, I was not robbed"

"What? Then what happened to you? Gugu! Gugulethu! Check my isdudu (mealie porridge), I don't want it to burn." She called out to her daughter who was inside the house.

"Come, come inside my child so u can tell me what's wrong. You can even stay for isdudu, I know how you like the way I make mine. It is the best you'll ever find I'm telling you. Your mother tries but hers is not as good as mine." I found myself smiling from all that she was saying. Somehow she always knew how to lighten up the mood. Gugu met us at the door and started being dramatic when she saw the state I was in, "Yemu! Yoh! Yoh! Yoh! What happened to you? Oh my word, Mama what happened to her? It looks like she needs a hospital, yoh!"

"Hey! Stop talking and just continue cleaning. You like talking too much like a parrot", ma Zizipho snapped at Gugu.

When maZizipho and I were alone I started to tell her everything about Andrew and me. "We met at school ma. His company had come to my school for a career fair and we just liked each other. He told me that he was a software developer and had been working for that company for two years. He was so sweet and would buy me everything I wanted and more. I did not have to ask for something but he just bought me different stuff. He always said that I was his wife and there was nothing he wouldn't do for me. We were happy but everything changed after a sermon I heard at church. The pastor explained how premarital sex was a sin and that God knew it was for our own good to abstain from it. He explained how it is a spiritual thing as well and how demons can be transferred through sex and that is why it has to be an ordained action. I thought about my life and how I wanted to change so I decided to tell Andrew the truth about how I felt. That night I went to his house and we talked. I told him that I wanted to repent and that the bible said we should not be unequally yoked with unbelievers so I had to break up with him. He and I had different values. I told him that we had been living in sin all along. He told me that I could not break up with him, he just couldn't allow it. He said that he had invested a lot in me. I walked towards the door so that I could leave but he grabbed me by my arm. He did not listen to me when I said that he was hurting me. He started to kiss me and I told him to stop but he didn't. I slipped under his arm and ran for the door but he got there before me and threw me against the wall. He picked me up and threw me on the bed then he forced himself onto me. Later on, he told me to call Sandra and tell her that I was fine since she was the only one at home. I spent the night at his place and woke up thinking only of getting out of that house.''

Once I was done maZizipho was also crying. "I am so sorry that happened to you Yemu. We should go to the police and report him though. Nobody deserves what he did to you."

"No! Ma I just want my life to be peaceful and without drama. He says he wants to see me tomorrow but I won't see him. I have already deleted his number and I am no longer on Facebook so he cannot track me down. He never got to see where I stay so I am safe." I said this last statement with a deep sigh.

"We should tell your mom"

"No ma, I will just tell her that I fell. She has already been through a lot since father left. I don't want her to stress about this as well.''

''It is ok mntanam I won't tell her or anybody else."

As soon as I got home I went straight to the bathroom. I could smell him all over my body and could hear his heavy breathing all around me. His smell that had given me goosebumps and butterflies in my tummy was now the worst stench I had ever smelt. Just thinking about him made me sick. The hastiness I had in going to the bathroom when I arrived surprised my sister because I had always taken my time in going to bath. She must have sensed that something was wrong because she rushed in front of me and said, "Hey! Hey, what is going on? What happened last night? And the sudden readiness to take a bath? What really is going on?" I couldn't bear the thought of Sandra finding out what a horrible person Andrew had turned out to be so I had to lie.

"It's nothing sis, just that I feel like aunty Mary is visiting well sooner than expected." I didn't have to explain any further because we both respected aunty Mary's visits. It was nothing to be taken lightly. My sister and I had formulated a name for when we had our monthly periods so that it would sound less embarrassing in public. But I had lied about the visit and I had no idea why I was trying to protect the image of the one person I hated the most at that moment. Maybe it was because I had always painted Andrew to Sandra as this heaven-sent one-in-a-million kind of boyfriend that the thought of having her think of him otherwise was frightening. This was my secret and my own mess to deal with. I was the one who had been so blindly in love and had acted like a naïve teenager to not have realized the kind of person Andrew really was.

I poured an enormous amount of bath jell in the bathtub with the quest of removing as much of Andrew from my body as I could. After my bath, I could still smell him so I went back straight to the bath and took another bath. I even washed my hair even though it was braided. When I felt clean enough I went out after about an hour of this exercise in futility because no matter how much I washed I still smelt him. He had succeeded in leaving a mark forever. I hated him so much I wanted to die so I went back to the bath and filled the bathtub with water. I had often seen a lot of stressed-out people do it in movies. It looked really painless. I went into the bathtub and lay there with my face down and the water still running. The tub was now over-pouring with water and I was suddenly feeling at peace. My breathing was slowing down and suddenly it felt like someone was shocking me. I closed my eyes so that it would be painless but before I could go into my deep sleep I heard my sister's voice and the door being opened violently. "What the hell? Yemu what are you doing? Oh my God! "She was asking all these questions and trying to get me out of the tub at the same time but I did not respond or show any interest in helping her help me. She stopped the tap from running and lifted me from the tub. Sandra was not a large person but she was bigger than me in terms of size so it was easy for her to lift me. She just dumped me on my bed and went back to the bathroom. From then on all I could hear were the sounds of the birds outside then I fell asleep.

I woke up an hour later and begged Sandra not to tell mama about my little incident. I explained to her that it was nothing and that I had just fallen asleep in the tub by accident. She believed me and didn't mention it to mama when she came back from work.

Two months after the incident I started feeling sick and feverish most mornings. When I went to the doctor he told me that I was pregnant. The last thing I wanted was to carry that monster's child. If I kept that child he was going to have a hold on me forever. At that moment I realized how much I hated him but I hated myself more for not trying to stop him or get him arrested. He was going to do what he had done to me to another innocent girl as well. On my way back from the hospital I had a thousand thoughts rushing through my mind. When I got to a four-way stop I just couldn't move. I was standing in the middle of the road feeling nauseated. Cars started to hoot at me but I just could not get my feet to move. Pedestrians were shouting at me to get off the road. Then I started to slowly walk although my feet felt heavy but I was too late. A car came speeding down the road and hit me. After that everything was just dark.

I opened my eyes and everything seemed blurry. I couldn't make out a lot of things but I saw mama. She was sitting on a chair next to my bed with her bible in her lap. "Mama, ma..."I said in a very soft whisper.

"Owh Yemurai you are awake. I thought you were never going to wake up. How are you feeling?"

"Tired, mama I'm sorry. It all happened so fast and I ..."

"Sssh it's ok my child, Zizipho told me everything, and don't worry God will deal with that boy. By the way, the doctor said you lost the baby. You know I wish you had told me all these things.''

''Well, I'm just glad I lost that monster's child."

"No Yemu that was an innocent soul. You cannot punish it for the father's mistakes."

"I know mama but it was just a lot to deal with. I would have found it difficult to love that child. Thank you mama for everything."

"On a happier note, my sister Debra called me yesterday and told me that her son has been staying in Cape Town for four years now. She said he is doing some fancy job here and it pays well. I spoke to him on the phone and he said he would visit you"

"He was aunt Debra's only son right?"

"Yes, he is, such a sweet boy."

"I left Zimbabwe when I was so young I don't even remember what he looks like"

"Yah I think you were 4 and he was 10 years old. It is about time you both reunite again."

"Did you tell him about my whole boyfriend saga? I don't want to be meeting with my cousin on such a note, it would just show how stupid I had been."

"Of course not, I just told him that you were involved in an accident. He must be excited as you are to meet you because he said that he had always wanted to meet you."

At that moment I realized how blessed I was to have such a mother. I hugged her and I knew I was going to be alright. God had a greater calling for me and this was just the beginning of my journey. I was ready to work for him in every way I could. Why I had not stopped seeing Andrew after he started showing signs of abuse was something I still didn't understand but one thing was sure that I was never going to let anyone do that to me again. God was my life and it had taken me a long time to realize that He is the one person that never disappoints.

The next day while mama was reading me a bible verse from her bible she suddenly stopped and jumped out of her sit,

"Hello my child, you were so little when I last saw you but now you a man." I lifted my face towards the doorway and saw Andrew standing with a bunch of flowers. I thought I was mistaken but mama went ahead and hugged him. I was speechless. Mama was smiling from ear to ear.

"Yemurai remember your cousin Andy? Doesn't he just look handsome?" mama said pulling him towards me. Andrew looked as shocked as I was. The only thing I could get out of my mouth was,

"Mama that is the same Andrew I told you about." Mama's face looked so still as if she had been struck by lightning. Mama held on to my bed for support then weakly sat on her chair and said "Oh my God!"

THE END