“He’s HIV positive but it hasn’t yet advanced to full-blown AIDS. I’m sorry we didn’t tell you about his status. We were trying to protect him because there’s so much stigma around the disease. I promise that you’ve never been at risk of contracting the virus at any point. I made certain of that. Those idiots don’t know what they’re talking about. There’s no way Mandla could infect any of them, never mind the whole town. Ignorant bastards.”

Zodwa’s face is a picture of misery and I feel such a rush of affection for this girl who’s saved my boy’s life not once but twice. She’s his guardian angel, there’s no doubt about that. “We’re about to get him onto a cocktail of medication that should help him. It’s only just been approved but they’re seeing good results—”

“There’s medicine that will cure him?”

“It can’t fully get rid of the HIV but it means he can live longer. It’s very expensive and we’re having to get it from the United States but it’s worth a try. He doesn’t stand a chance without it, so the timing is really lucky. If he’d been born a year before, there probably wouldn’t have been any hope for him.” I take her hand. “If you want to leave and work somewhere else, I’ll quite honestly be devastated but I’ll understand completely. You need to do what feels right for you.”

“No,” she says fiercely. “I’m staying with Mandla.”

I wish I don’t wonder why, but I do.

CHAPTER EIGHTY

Zodwa

3 February 1996

Magaliesburg Clinic, Gauteng, South Africa

Zodwa Khumalo?” the nurse calls into the waiting room.

Zodwa stands. “Here I am.”

“Please come with me.”

Zodwa follows her down the now-familiar hallway but the nurse turns into a different room than the one she did Zodwa’s blood test in a week ago.

“Is there someone here with you?” the nurse asks, and Zodwa lies and nods.

And then the nurse tells Zodwa what she already knows. “I’m afraid that your test came back positive for HIV.”

The nurse talks for half an hour, giving Zodwa brochures.

She thinks of Thembeka, who also has to be HIV positive, though she will have contracted the virus from sexual intercourse willingly entered into with Mongezi. Or, at least as willingly as Zodwa had when she’d had sex with Ace, who she will have infected because he refused to wear condoms.

The ripple effect is astonishing. In a country built on discrimination, a pandemic is breaking out because of a virus that does not discriminate. When the nurse advises Zodwa not to fall pregnant because of mother-to-child transmission, she has the strangest urge to laugh.

“Do you have any questions?” the nurse asks.

“How long do I have before I get sick?”