The village sighed a sigh of relief because at last Dikeledi would have no choice but to be and act like a woman.

For her part, Dikeledi took to standing naked in front of the tarnished mirror in her grandmother’s hut, and, in the paltry light provided by a candle, tried to bring herself to hate her soft places – her breasts, her belly, her thighs, her behind – but found she could not. They were a part of her and she could not hate herself, no matter how hard she tried.

She remembered how her mother Daisy had leaned her softness across a counter and used it to bargain for something she wanted in exchange. She remembered the hands – black, brown, white – that had touched Daisy’s soft places, and the shy giggle they had received in return for their endeavours. She remembered how the shy giggle had allowed Daisy to walk away with a packet of toffees, a few yards of fabric, an exercise book. Dikeledi remembered the rich, buttery taste of those toffees, the feel of the blue-and-white dress made from the fabric, the stick figures she had drawn ad nauseam in the exercise book, and the shaky handwriting that had written her name for the first time, the D looking like an A.

Dikeledi looked at her soft places and decided that she would never use them as her mother had used hers – to curry the favour of men. She, Dikeledi, would never lean. She had always been clever about her body, and she would continue being so.

When, at eighteen, Dikeledi finished her schooling, she knew that only a few options were open to her. She could leave the village and make her way to a teachers’ or nurses’ training institution. She could stay in the village and take some home-craft classes. After doing one of these three things, she could go to the City of Kings and make a living. She knew that whichever option she chose did not really matter because at some point in all of this, she would have to find herself a husband, have his children, and become a wife and mother. It would only be after she had had the husband and children that she would be deemed a successful woman.

Dikeledi did not want to be a teacher. She did not want to be a nurse. She did not want to be a homemaker. She did not want to bring just knowledge, wellbeing or joy to others. She wanted to bring the thing that could contain all these things and more – she wanted to bring the post. Dikeledi’s ambition was to be a postman. She loved the idea of delivering the world to her small village nestled in one of the many almost-forgotten corners of the world.