VOID Novel Chapter 7

CHAPTER SEVEN

SINENHLANHLA

Last night shattered my spirit. Not with broken bones or blood, but with a mosaic of fear, desperation, and pain. Each piece sharp enough to carve me hollow from the inside, yet too small for anyone else to see.

My eyes burn and my throat feels scraped raw from crying. I’ve never been this confused in my life. I keep clawing for answers. Why is this happening? As if logic could undo what my body has done. The same way my leg just stopped working, I wish it would just start again.

I last spoke to Siphokazi last night when I informed her about my leg. She hasn’t called this morning. I pull my phone under the pillow and dial her number.

“Sinenhlanhla,” she answers. Her voice is cold, no ‘sweetheart,’ none of that strange tenderness she’d been dripping into every call lately.

“Hey, Mom.”

“What do you want?”

“I wanted to say…” I trail off. We’re back to factory settings, back to being two strangers bound by blood but not by care. This is normal. Her sudden affection was the lie. This coldness is the truth I grew up with.

“I wanted to say I woke up still the same. My leg isn’t moving.”

“Why are you telling me then? Don’t you know where sick people go? Go to the clinic.”

“I will go. But… I’m afraid they’ll think I’m crazy. I feel like I am.”

“I think you’re cursed,” she says, “Your house burnt out of nowhere. Now you’re a cripple out of nowhere. What’s next?”

“I’m not a cripple, Mom.” My voice cracks. I already regret calling. I thought she’d be soft like a sponge and soak up my panic. Instead, she’s the knife that cuts me deeper. “One leg not working doesn’t make me a cripple. Please.”

“Whatever. I don’t want you near me. And stop with the calls. I don’t want your bad luck rubbing off on me. Who knows, perhaps it started when you met Lihle. Those people are witches. I don’t know why you won’t believe me. And I heard you were disrespecting my father yesterday. May it be the first and last time. Never mention the dead again.”

“It’s not me, it’s Kayise.”

“It’s me who did what?” Kayise walks in, arms crossed, hair still damp from washing.

“Who was exchanging words with Methembe and shouting dead people’s names.”

She clicks her tongue. “If that’s your mother on the phone, tell her I said: She slept with Butholezwe Ndlovu and gave him two kids and it’s not a secret. If it’s a crime, she can tell her soldier husband to come and shoot me.”

“I can hear you, wena khanda khulu!” Siphokazi shrieks through the speaker. “If Methembe kicks you out, you don’t even have a place to go. Ngobubi la!”

“You’re so quick to judge others,” Kayise fires back. “When are you going to tell us that you were drinking at our father’s burial? Who’s the soldier who threatened to arrest my grandfather? The only version we have is that you got kicked out. What had you done?”

I narrow my eyes at her. “Where did you hear that?”

She gestures for me to stay quiet. “Speak, phela, Siphokazi.”

“It was long ago! Honestly, how do you expect me to remember things from over twenty years back?”

“Your memory’s selective, then. You only remember what others did to you, never what you did. And for someone who claims they hated you, it’s interesting they helped you get a death certificate, which you claimed you wanted to use applying for dependent’s pension. If they really wanted you gone, why would they help you? Since you’re making yourself a victim of the Kalanga people, don’t come with the edited version of the story. Utibudze lebeswa lihele hatitohaka lebeswa lemanyepwa.”

“Are you interrogating me Kayise? I have a lawyer. I will sue you for harassment.”

The line goes dead.

I stare at Kayise in disbelief. “You know Kalanga?”

“Just a few words I asked Chimney yesterday,” she says, a faint smile playing on her lips.

“Is he the one who told you Siphokazi was drinking at the burial?”

She nods.

I scoff. “And you believed him? Where did he hear that?”

“I believe our aunt. She’s the one who told him everything. I’m not saying Siphokazi lied about being kicked out, but a lot happened that led to her being kicked out. Who drinks while pregnant? You heard it yourself; she failed to answer the questions I asked her. Isn’t it suspicious to you?”

“I was young. I wish I could remember. I only recall Lihle carrying me. Grandmother took me and placed me on her lap and …”

I close my eyes, trying to pull up the day our father was buried, any fragment or any words. Nothing. Blank. It’s like my mind erased it all to survive.

“That’s why I’ll never forgive you,” Kayise says softly, “for not telling me about Lihle. For not giving her a chance to speak. You decided it was all lies before she even opened her mouth. Now she’s gone and we’ll never hear the whole story. Not even the lies you’re so sure of.”

“Kayise,” I start, voice low, “you can’t go around believing people with their own agendas, people trying to paint themselves innocent. Did you really expect Lihle to say, ‘Yes, my family stole from your father’?”

She sighs, tipping her head back like she’s pleading with the roof. “Right now, I don’t care who says what. All I want is to meet my father’s family. That’s it. Because the truth is, no matter how angry you are, nothing changes. We can’t rewrite the past, Nhlanhla.”

A tear slips down her cheek. She blinks fast, but more follow. “There’s nothing wrong with knowing my roots. Just like you said the other day, we’re grown. We don’t need anything from them. I just want to know them and see my father’s resting place.”

Hearing her say it like this—the ache in her voice, the quiet hunger behind her tears, makes me realise I underestimated her. This isn’t just curiosity. It’s grief. It’s identity. It’s the hole left by a father she never met.

A part of me wonders: Was I selfish for not telling her about Lihle? But another part, the older sister, the one who’s carried her since she was two whispers back and assures me that I protected her. She has no one but me.

I can’t risk her getting hurt because of some ghost from the past wearing a kind face.

But right now I’m not strong enough to be her shield. I’m filled with uncertainty. What’s wrong with my leg? Will it go back to normal again?

“I’m going to prepare breakfast,” Kayise says as she stands up.

“You know how to cook?” I ask teasingly. She is the laziest person I know. Her hands are only good at plaiting hair and hiding money under mattresses.

“You have one leg Nhlanhla, you need to mind your language because right now you’re at my mercy.”

I smile slightly and watch her as she leaves. I take my phone and dial Gift’s number.

“Hey you,” he answers. I miss you.”

“I miss you too.”

“When are you coming back to work?”

“I don’t know. I need a favour urgently.”

“Shoot.”

“You remember that social worker who claimed to by my aunt?”

“How can I forget when you nearly strangled her in my presence.”

“I need her phone number. Please ask her colleagues if they’re still there, look even in the visitor’s log book. It’s urgent and I need to talk to her.”

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