Gold, however, well, that’s another story. It’s complex. Layered. Much harder to create, and it’s also so much more than just a color. Gold contains a certain magic, an extravagance, a mystique.

I tried to sigh but the breath got caught in my esophagus. I turned my back on the window now too. I’ve never liked the sea. Too much water. Too much sand. Besides, I’m not exactly a bikini kinda gal. I haven’t been beach-body ready since, well, forever. How ironic then that I’ve landed here, in the middle of bikini-Barbie, thigh-chafing hell.

Clifton, Cape Town. A place where you’re either wearing activewear because you’ve just left your early morning gym sesh—green smoothie in hand—or you’re in swimwear ’cause you’re headed to the beach, green smoothie in hand. And don’t even get me started on what it’s like when the sun goes down. Let’s just say you won’t find a moody jazz club on these streets. It’s more upscale eateries, shucked oysters, and cham-bloody-pagne.

Currently, I’m staging a silent protest against my mother for uprooting my life and dragging me here. But what’s new? My mother and I have been locked in a kind of protest for the last four years now.

I do, however, understand why we came here. I just can’t help feeling that I wasn’t consulted. Which I wasn’t. The closest thing to a consultation came when she’d walked into my bedroom three weeks ago and declared, We’re moving to Cape Town. She might as well have detonated an atomic bomb—that’s how it felt as I sat on my bed and saw my entire life explode into a million pieces.

We came here for my brother, Zac. I’m not blaming him for this, how could I—I love him more than I can probably describe. He’s nine. He’s also specially abled, as my mother prefers to say. She enjoys upbeat euphemisms, but between you and me, he’s on the autism spectrum.

Over the last few years, his symptoms had gotten worse, until his school had finally “suggested” that he attend a facility “better aligned with his unique needs.” (Everyone likes euphemisms, it seems.) So, after a quick google search by my mother, the best assisted learning school in the country was located, and now here we are. Sunny, beachy, activewear central—with green smoothie in hand.

“Crap!” I pulled yet another outfit off and tossed it to the floor, adding to the massive patchwork of clothes that lay twisted at my feet. My floor was starting to look like a Hannah Höch artwork, my favorite collage artist, and I swear, if you looked hard enough, you could see a galloping horse desperately trying to break free of the tangled mess.