She made quick work of the remaining streets by walking off the pavement and zigzagging her way around the cars parked diagonally at coin-collecting meters. Lobengula Street was, as always, a triumph and a revelation. There was so much colour, noise, movement and excitement and just the right amount of danger that one could not help but be infected by it all. Sitshengisiwe brushed past brown and black skins that did not mind human contact as she allowed herself to be jostled this way and that and carried along until she was deposited into a store that called itself a bazaar, where she spent too much time gazing longingly and lovingly at pastel-coloured dresses. Before she knew it, it was four o’clock, the very hour she was supposed to be at home preparing the meal that Philemon would expect to eat at six o’clock sharp – exactly thirty minutes after he had arrived home from work.

Sitshengisiwe made her way out of the store and onto the street, too eager to be home to look both left and right before crossing. As she ran across Lobengula Street, a car screeched to a stop right at her feet. Dear God, I almost died. I will have to tell Philemon that I almost died, she thought, as she crossed the street more carefully. The person driving the car that had almost hit her rolled down her window, and, over the impatient and angry hoots of other cars, called out Sitshengisiwe’s name. Sitshengisiwe made sure she was safely on the other side of the road before she turned to see who was calling her name.

The driver of the car was Eunice Masuku, the woman who had once worked with Philemon. She had been the Rutherfords’ housemaid, and now here she was driving her own car, obviously having moved up in the world. Eunice Masuku gestured to Sitshengisiwe that she would park the car and Sitshengisiwe should wait for her.

Once parked, Eunice invited Sitshengisiwe to join her in the car, which she did.

‘A present from my son,’ Eunice said by way of greeting as her hands proudly ran over the steering wheel of a Datsun 120Y. She said these words easily, as though it had not been almost fifteen years since last they had spoken.

‘Your son? You mean the boy? He bought you this car?’ Sitshengisiwe said with the sufficient amount of astonishment in her voice to satisfy Eunice. Sitshengisiwe was very suspicious of the verity of the information she was receiving, and so she was happy that her misgivings were not evident in her voice.

‘Well, Dingani is a boy no longer. He is a man now. Living in America. Training to become a doctor,’ Eunice said with a pride that puffed out her chest until it almost interfered with the steering wheel.