Cape Town, South Africa
3rd March 1998
Wayne drummed his fingers on the side of the car as Jamison pushed the intercom on the gate. Someone inside pressed the button to allow the gate to open, and Jamison drove up the driveway to park their car alongside a dark blue BMW under a carport in the front of the beachfront home. The front door was already opened when Wayne and Jamison strode up the steps.
Wayne looked Gabe over. He was the same height as him, and he looked as if he belonged on the cover of a fancy GQ magazine. Even his black shoes had a shine to them.
Gabe greeted them in a hushed tone. ‘At long bladdy last we meet. I told her you would come!’
Wayne liked Gabe instantly. ‘Nice to meet you too,’ he said, keeping his voice quiet. ‘This is Jamison,’ Wayne said in introduction as he shook Gabe’s hand, and Jamison did the same.
‘I’ll take you through. She’s sleeping, but should wake soon. It’s the pain drugs, they knock her for a six, but they lessen the headaches,’ Gabe said.
They passed through an open-plan lounge that combined with a dayroom in the front of the house. Wayne’s palms sweated, and he could feel his heart rate had elevated. The large room overlooked the sea, and was decorated to match the surroundings in whites and light blues, with a nautical darker blue flowing throughout. The white wicker chairs, with their overstuffed blue-striped cushions, seemed to invite you in, to enjoy the comfort and the view. He could see an antique chaise longue set up near the window, and Tara lay propped up on cushions, a light blanket covering her from feet to shoulders.
Tara.
Fourteen long years had passed since he had last seen her, and now she was there, in front of him. He snatched a quick intake of much needed oxygen, as his eyes travelled further into the room.
A willowy boy was sprawled in the chair next to Tara. His hairy right leg twitched as if he was keeping the beat to some music. Wayne noticed the set of headphones over his fair hair. He wore rugby shorts and no shoes, and was slouched at an unusual angle over the chair as only a teenager could manage and still be comfortable. His eyes were closed.
It had to be Josha.
He wanted desperately to rush up and hug him tightly. He had missed everything with Josha: his first smile, first step, and first day of school. He had a son who was a total stranger to him.
He took a deeper breath. Since receiving Tara’s letter, the haunting question had been, did his son know about him?
He had assumed that his son would be in school, that he would have a chance to speak to Tara before meeting Josha, yet his son was there, an unexpected gift he wasn’t sure he was ready to face just yet.
Jamison was right behind him, and had bumped into his back when he had stopped so suddenly.
For a moment more, Wayne simply drank in the sight, Josha’s eyes closed and his large foot tapping haphazardly.
He walked slowly into the room.
Josha didn’t notice the intrusion. He didn’t move from his position in the chair, his foot still tapping.
Wayne couldn’t stop his heart thumping in his chest.
Good God, when last had he been so nervous? He wiped his hands on his Wranglers.
Gabe tapped Josha on the foot.
The moment of truth had arrived.
Josha opened his eyes and jumped up. He stared at Wayne as he took the headphones off, leaving them dangling around his neck.
‘Josha, this is Wayne,’ Gabe said.
Wayne held out his hand as he looked at his son. He was tall, not quite the same height as himself, but he hadn’t filled out yet. He was almost thirteen. He was at the stage where his arms and legs looked too long for his body. His baggy T-shirt top didn’t hide the fact that his son stooped, as if conscious of his height and hating it. His thick blond hair was cut in a typical boy’s school cut, blunt fringe and short back and sides. Eyes as blue as the African sky stared back at him.
Eyes he’d stared at in a photograph for years, now connected with his.
Josha looked like Tara, the shape of his full lips, his pixie nose. The freckles that touched his face as he had been kissed by the sun. But he could see his younger self in Josha’s face too, the way he held his head, the cheekbones and dimples. There was no mistaking they were related.
‘Hi,’ Wayne said.
Silence could have shattered every glass pane in the room.
Wayne watched Josha opened his mouth to talk as realisation struck him, but no sound came out. Not even a voice-breaking squeak.
Josha stumbled backwards, the chair catching him in the back of his knees, and he thumped down into it.
Wayne put his hand back by his side.
‘Woah, it’s okay, easy, Josha. And that is Jamison,’ Gabe said.
Jamison just waved from where he stood.
Wayne frowned. Damn, this wasn’t how he’d dreamed of this moment happening. ‘Pleased to meet you,’ he said, his voice betraying emotions he tried desperately to keep in check.
Josha sat frozen in the chair. ‘Um.’
‘You scared the kid,’ Jamison said looking at him.
‘N—o,’ squeaked Josha. ‘Sur—surprised. Not scared. I aways thought I looked like Mum, but now I see some of you in me, just old!’
‘Gee, thanks,’ Wayne said.
Gabe chuckled at Josha’s choice of words.
‘That’s okay. Give it time. Perhaps we both need time. It’s a shock for both of us meeting today, I’m sure,’ Wayne said. His mind reeling with the shock he’d seen on his son’s face.
He didn’t know who I was before he spoke to me.
Was it possible she never told him, or was it shock because he didn’t want to see Wayne?
He had never anticipated that Tara would have poisoned their son against him … panic swelled in his throat, and he swallowed it hard.
He needed a distraction to diffuse the situation. He needer to get his emotions back under control. Get the kid to talk to him. He stepped away, giving Josha physical space, hoping it would help. He switched tactics.
‘Will Tara sleep for long?’ Wayne asked, forcing Josha to focus on his mother instead.
‘She’s been sleeping a while already. She always sleeps when she comes back from the beach and her meds kick in. She should be awake in another fifteen minutes or so.’
‘You obviously know her routine well,’ Wayne said.
‘It happens when you spend your days at home with her. If she’s not at home she’s having tests, scans and things,’ Josha said, in a voice far too adult for a teenager.
Wayne wondered just how much Josha knew about his mother’s tumour. He suspected far too much, but then what reference point did he have to make a judgement like that? He knew nothing of his son’s abilities or his maturity, of how his life had been.
He was longing to ask Josha so many questions, but like a wild newborn colt, this long-legged teenager would bolt if pushed, of that he was sure, so he just played it cool instead. Buried the curiosity deep inside and attempted to make friends.
Wayne turned his attention to watching the gulls out the window as they rode the thermals and the winds. ‘A beautiful view you guys have here, peaceful, and great weather,’ he said.
‘The weather? You are going to try get a teenager to discuss the weather?’ Gabe said. ‘You seriously don’t have any clue with kids, do you?’
‘No, I have no idea.’ Wayne scratched the back of his head with his hand.
Jamison backed him up. ‘Ebony and I have a five-year-old and a newborn. Wayne won’t hold Joy because he says she’s too tiny, but in his defence, I have seen him attending tea parties hosted by Blessing. He just hasn’t had exposure yet to too many teenagers.’
Wayne laughed then, it was nervous and came out a bit loud, but suddenly Josha was laughing too.
‘It’s okay,’ Josha said. ‘Uncle Gabe warned me you were coming, but it’s all still a bit of a surreal moment.’
Gabe reached over to him and ruffled his hair, the affection between them obvious.
‘So-you-really-are-my-biological-father-as-in-Wayne-Simon-who died-in-the-SADF?’ Josha spoke as if the words were bursting inside him and needed to be said.
Wayne was taken aback, and had to process what Josha had said, then he worked it out, and replied, ‘My full name is Wayne Simon Botha, I was in the SADF but I didn’t die. And yes, I’m your father.’
Wayne stared at Josha. Damn, Josha didn’t look like a clone from when he was that age, but he could hear a younger him talking. A teenage him, from a time before Tara got pregnant and took Josha from him. Clever, taking his middle name and using that and not his surname. No wonder no one could find her.
But Josha thought that his father was dead.
Eventually, he said, ‘You know, I spent years looking for you, once I knew you were in the world. I searched for Tara before that too. I never stopped.’
Josha nodded.
Then every time the boy opened his mouth to talk, he shut it again, as if the words stuck in his throat, and wouldn’t come out past his thick tongue. Wayne knew the feeling.
Josha suddenly asked Jamison, ‘Are you Wayne’s bodyguard?’
Wayne smiled at his blunt question.
‘No. Does he look like he needs a bodyguard, kid?’ Jamison said. ‘I’m his business partner, but he was adamant that he would fly the chopper down to Durban at first light, and hop a plane to Cape Town. He was worried sick. So I did the only thing a friend could do, and came with him. He was in no state to do much, so I’m just here to make sure he’s going to be alright. This is a moment we have waited a long time for.’
‘Neat,’ Josha said.
Wayne relaxed a little. ‘And as Jamison mentioned, he has a newborn baby in the house who screams, constantly,’ Wayne said. ‘So Jamison was happy to take off for a few days.’
‘That’s not true, I don’t hear her screaming. Ebony takes good care of the girls all the time. Besides, Joy is a colicky baby, they all sound like that,’ Jamison defended his family.
Josha looked at Wayne. ‘You really have your own helicopter?’
‘Sure, we use it for game capture, mostly,’ Wayne said. ‘Do you like flying?’
‘I’ve never flown anywhere, so I don’t know,’ Josha said, ‘but I’d like to try it.’
‘Perhaps …’ Wayne stopped himself from making the invitation.
He had no right to invite his son for a trip to his farm, to fly with him in his helicopter.
He still had no rights to Josha at all and until he had discussed that with Tara, he couldn’t – wouldn’t – make promises to his son that he couldn’t keep. He wanted to be a better father than that.
Josha stood up to check on Tara. He tugged her blanket up a little, sat on the edge of the daybed and looked at Wayne again.
Wayne looked back at him. ‘I suspected you were tall, but seeing you in real life is different from how I imagined. You grow much more and you’ll be as tall as me.’
Josha straightened out his shoulders and seemed to uncurl from his stooped teenage position, sitting up taller. ‘I never knew you were so tall,’ he said at last.
Wayne smiled. ‘Well, I don’t know what your mum has told you about me, but I would like to get to know you and at the very least be your friend.’
‘Mum always told me you’d died. When she found out that she had the tumour, and she was going to have her op, she told me that she lied to protect me … you were not really dead.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Why are you sorry? It wasn’t you who lied to me.’
Wayne could hear the hurt in his son’s voice, and the betrayal he had faced, having to deal with his mother’s lie.
‘I’m sure she had her reasons,’ Wayne volunteered.
‘Humph.’ Josha made the universal non-committal teenage answer.
‘Guess we both have lots to adjust too. I assumed you would at least know who I was,’ Wayne said, and he watched his son’s body language closely. It said that he was angry, but it also said that he was agitated. ‘That’s okay, we can work on details later. We have time. Lots of it.’
Gabe stood up from the chair he was sitting in. ‘You alright, Josha?’
Josha nodded, and he gave Gabe a thumbs up.
‘Good, then I think I’ll go ask Lucretia to make us some refreshments and bring through lunch for when Tara wakes up. Jamison, you want to come see the rest of the house?’ Gabe asked, providing Jamison an excuse to leave Josha and Wayne to become acquainted.
‘Do I have a half brother or sister?’ Josha asked Wayne once the others had left the room.
‘No. You don’t have any siblings. You are my only child.’
‘Are you married?’
‘No. Never married. I was always waiting to marry your mother.’ He looked over at Tara, then back at Josha.
Josha walked back to his chair. He flopped backwards into it, the wicker groaning under the impact. ‘Adults, I don’t understand them!’
‘You and me both,’ Wayne said.
Josha pulled a face, and Wayne smiled at him. It was easier talking to his son than he had expected.
Almost natural.
Silently he wished the last years hadn’t happened, that he could have been here earlier. For Josha, for Tara, for himself. Hindsight was a luxury he couldn’t afford, but he knew he should have fought for her right from the beginning.
‘I wish things had been different,’ Wayne said. ‘That I wasn’t meeting you under such awful circumstances. But know that I’m so happy to meet you. To get a chance to know you.’
‘Um – okay,’ Josha said.
Wayne moved into the other chair to face Josha. ‘I love your mother. She’s always been the love of my life but I wasn’t strong enough to walk away from my roots. To stand up to my mother. I guess in the end, I didn’t fight enough for what your mum and I needed.’
‘So you abandoned her—’ Josha said.
‘It was complicated. She moved away—’ Wayne sat quietly watching his son.
‘Why are you staring at me?’ Josha asked.
‘I don’t mean to stare, but frankly I’ve thought of not much else since I found out that you had been born. I still find it hard to believe that my son is almost thirteen years old. Your mother was lucky having you near her all these years.’
Josha’s eyebrows went upwards. ‘You didn’t know about me?’
‘No. I knew your mum was pregnant, but once she went away, I didn’t know if she had you.’ He thought a moment if he should censor the rest, then threw caution away. His son needed the truth. ‘I was told that she had an abortion, but I hoped it wasn’t true. Not until my own father, your grandfather Johnny, died, then I learned that you were alive and well, and that you have a birthday next month.’
Josha shook his head. ‘I’m not leaving her to live with you now that you know where we are—’
‘I don’t expect you to. I’m not leaving her either.’
Wayne crossed over to the bed and looked at Tara sleeping. She was still as beautiful as ever. He took one of her hands in his and slowly he brought it up to his mouth, kissed it gently. ‘I’m here, Tara.’
Her eyes flickered open.
‘Hi, precious,’ Wayne said, his voice coming out like a croak, his emotion raw and evident to anyone else.
‘Wayne. You came,’ she said. ‘I didn’t know if you would. I mean I wanted you to—, but I thought that you might not still be at the farm—’ she managed.
‘Mum, you got some visitors,’ Josha said, stating the obvious.
Wayne smiled, hearing his son. ‘I got your letter yesterday. And here I am.’
‘So Mum, this is Wayne. My dad who isn’t dead.’ Josha pointed out.
Wayne saw her tense.
‘You met already?’
Wayne nodded.
‘Ja, Mum. Don’t worry about me. Wayne and I are doing okay,’ Josha said from his chair.
Wayne bent over and kissed her softly on the forehead. ‘I’m with you for as long as you want me here, Tara.’
She slipped both her hands up onto Wayne’s cheeks. Wayne saw tears well in Tara’s eyes as she held his face. She touched his face as if trying to see if he was real, as if trying to understand the difference from the image of the boy she had in her mind, to the man he had become. ‘My Wayne,’ she whispered.
‘I promised, now and forever,’ he said, and kissed her. Then taking her hand in his, he reached out his other one, palm upwards to Josha.
Josha rose from his chair. He walked slowly towards his parents, and then he reached out and tentatively touched his father’s hand.
‘I love the both of you,’ Wayne said. For a moment the family stood together for the first time, each touching the other, connected for a moment, then Josha pulled his hand from Wayne’s.
Tara frowned. ‘So are you okay with Wayne being here, Josha?’
‘Ja. We’re cool,’ Josha said with a shrug of his shoulders.
‘I’m glad.’ Her eyes filled with tears again. ‘I’m sorry, sweetheart. It’s so much for you, all on top of each other.’
Josha smiled. ‘You could have picked worse you know, he could have been a total loser …’
Wayne almost choked as he tried to swallow the laugh that wanted to burst from him.
Jamison, who had just come back into the room, wasn’t so quick, and his laugh came out loud and clear.
‘Mum, that’s Jamison, Wayne’s friend. Not his bodyguard.’ Josha filled his mum in.
‘Nice to meet you,’ she said politely to Jamison, but her attention was on Josha, and she barely looked in his direction.
‘I’m glad you’re alright with him, give each other time, sweetie. Time …’ A single tear slipped down her cheek, and slid down under her chin.
Wayne looked at Tara, still in awe that she was so beautiful. Time had improved her, her hair was now more golden than white, her nose had a few more freckles sprinkled over it, and her lips were fuller. Those of a woman.
Her body was still petite, and even in her day bed she had an air of confidence about her.
Gabe came back into the room, bearing a tray laden with food.
Lucretia bustled in after him. ‘You forgot these, Gabe,’ she said, holding out the condiments, the plates and the serviettes. She stopped when she saw Wayne.
‘You,’ she said in a frosty manner.
‘Hello, Lucretia,’ he said politely.
‘You try not hurt my Tara this time,’ she said as a warning, as if she had a say in their relationship.
‘Lucretia, shoosh!’ Tara said.
‘I’ll be watching you,’ Lucretia said, and Wayne smiled, glad to know that she was still with Tara. That Tara had a friend who had stood by her all these years.
Lucretia bustled out the room after placing the forgotten items next to the tray laden with sandwiches, cut into dainty fingers with their crusts cut off, that Gabe had set on the coffee table.
‘So can I expect the same reaction from your mum and Dela?’ Wayne asked.
‘I doubt it. They’re kept too busy. My gran developed Alzheimer’s disease. Mum and Dela both live with her now. Dela is a really good artist, and she tutors advanced art students. She has her studio set up at home so that between them, they watch over gran, look after her, and they have managed to keep her with them at home where she is comfortable and recognises things sometimes.’
‘Sorry to hear about your gran. That can’t be easy, for any of them.’
‘It’s life,’ Tara said.
Wayne looked at the sandwiches. It looked like ham, cheese and salad stuff, and something that resembled tuna and mayo with lettuce or bully beef and cheese. He dithered with his selection, but Tara helped herself to some.
‘Bully beef, yum, I love this stuff. When I was pregnant I would eat it out of the tin, the whole tin … used to drive Lucretia mad,’ she said. He stiffened. This was the first time she’d said anything to him about her pregnancy, and he wasn’t sure just what to say.
‘Because you were eating disgusting bully beef?’ Wayne finally asked.
‘No, because I wouldn’t use a plate. She used to have this thing about leaving food in tins. She would go off about some sickness you could get from tins. So my solution was that if I ate the whole thing she wouldn’t get mad. But as my pregnancy progressed, my tastes changed, and soon eating a whole tin of caramelised condensed milk just wasn’t an option, too much sweet. I would eat half, and then put it in the fridge. Lucretia would always scold me about it when she found it, without fail.’
Gabe said, ‘She still doesn’t use a plate, and Lucretia still goes off at her.’
‘Gabe, I so do!’ she said.
‘No you don’t, Mum.’ Josha backed up Gabe.
Wayne looked down to where she had a sandwich in her hand, without a plate, and battled to cover a smile.
‘Oh, you siding with Gabe is just not fair,’ she said to Josha. She glanced briefly at their other guest, but it was more a passing glance as she focused back on Wayne even before she spoke. ‘Jamison. Do you have children?’ Tara asked, in what was a blatant manipulation of the conversation away from her.
‘Yes, Joy was born just last month on the fifth of February, and her sister Blessing is five.’
‘What beautiful names,’ Tara said and she frowned, turning her attention back to Wayne. ‘And your family, Wayne?’
‘You and Josha have always been the only family I wanted,’ Wayne said.
Unshed tears shone in her eyes.
‘Come on, Tara, don’t cry, it’s a happy time. I have got to meet my beautiful son, and see his beautiful mother,’ Wayne said.
‘I know, they are happy tears, but I was so sure you would have gotten married, had a family. Settled down.’
‘No family. I did buckle down, got to work and made as much money as I could, but it didn’t help me find you,’ he said.
Tara smiled.
‘So are you up to explaining more about your tumour?’ Wayne asked. ‘I did ask Gabe but he said you needed to tell me what you wanted to tell.’
‘That’s Gabe,’ she said looking at her cousin with obvious affection. ‘Always looking out for me. I don’t know what I would have done without him all these years. He’s my rock. I have just under three more weeks until I have the surgery.’
‘So how did you know you had a – you know.’ He pointed to his own head.
‘A brain in my head? Or a tumour?’ Tara smiled. ‘It started a few months back. I began getting these headaches, almost migraines, they were so bad, and I’d never had headaches before. So I went to the doctor, who referred me to the specialist. I had the first MRI done and blood tests galore, and that’s when they saw it, and Mr Brits broke the news and said that he wanted to operate. The date is set for the twenty-third of March.’
‘So why a whole month from diagnosis to operation, why not right away?’ Wayne asked.
‘So I could get my life sorted.’
Wayne frowned. ‘As in you could still die, even if he takes it out?’
‘Yes. There could be complications—’
‘Like having me come back into your life?’ Wayne said.
‘Like having to admit to Josha that I lied,’ she said and she looked over at Josha, who had just stuffed a whole strip of sandwich in his mouth.
Wayne dropped his voice, knowing that he was talking about Josha and yet he was in the room. ‘That must have been rough on him, he seems like a genuine kid, with a good moral compass.’
‘He is, and shattering his trust in me—’ She sniffed. ‘I knew one day I was going to have to tell him, but the days just went so fast, and turned into years, and soon he was almost thirteen. He’s a great kid,’ she said. ‘Not that I’m biased or anything as his mother—’ She looked at her son, and she smiled.
Wayne had missed that smile. Whenever she smiled at him when they were younger, he thought that the world was made just for the two of them. It had been many years, but he had never forgotten her smile, and the happiness that came with it.
‘Tara, how did we come to this?’ he asked.
‘I got pregnant, remember.’
‘Like it was yesterday—’
‘I can’t do the hurt again, Wayne, I can’t go over all the hurt. I don’t want to rehash what has passed.’
‘Then we don’t. We wipe the slate clean, leave it behind. Maybe one day we can talk about it, maybe after your operation. I want us to have the happy ever after that we didn’t have.’
‘But you don’t know anything about me now. I’m not who I was. I work here in Cape Town with Gabe at the paper. I consult with the other reporters—’
‘I’m not asking you to change your life, but to give us a chance. Let us get to know each other as adults.’
‘I can do that, because soon after this operation I’m going to return to a normal life,’ she said. ‘Perhaps it might help you and Josha to spend some time together, just in case. So he knows a little more about you, where you live—’
Wayne shook his head. ‘I’m not taking Josha to Kujana without you. His time with you at the moment is just as precious as my time getting to know him. I don’t see why they can’t be done together. You are not dead yet, you can come and visit with Josha to Kujana, then you will both know where I live and what I do.’
‘Hluhluwe is a long flight and a longer drive away. I’m not sure I can cope with that,’ she said.
‘You can cope with it, you just need the incentive,’ Wayne said. He grabbed a plate, and dumping the sandwich she had abandoned on the small coffee table on it, he passed it to her. ‘Eat, you need your strength.’ He sat down at the end of the daybed again.
She glared at him.
‘Wayne has a helicopter, Mum,’ Josha said matter of factly from his chair.
‘You seriously have a helicopter?’ she asked.
Wayne nodded.
Jamison said, ‘You won’t need to drive to Hluhluwe. It’s just under an hour in the Squirrel from Virginia Airfield to home.’
Wayne said, ‘Piece of cake, you can manage that.’
‘Will there be room for all of us? Uncle Gabe too?’ Josha asked, all of a sudden paying lots of attention to what was being said.
‘Yes,’ Wayne said as he looked at Tara. She looked uncertain, but everyone could hear the excitement in Josha’s voice.
‘Come see the Kujana we have built. It’s not the sugarcane fields that you knew. It’s a game farm.’
‘You own a game farm?’ Josha said, extending the last word in the way that only a teenager could.
Wayne nodded, and Jamison smiled.
‘I guess it’s settled then, we are going for a visit. Gabe,’ she said. ‘You’re coming with us, aren’t you?’
‘You couldn’t leave me behind if you stuck concrete boots on me!’ Gabe said.
‘And Lucretia?’ Josha asked.
‘We can fit her in too. And all the luggage,’ Wayne said.
‘Where is everyone going?’ asked an elderly woman who just at that moment walked into the lounge as if she belonged there in it.
‘Mum,’ Gabe said, getting up from his chair and hugging her. ‘I didn’t hear you come in.’
‘Not surprising with all the excitement in this room,’ she said.
‘Mum, meet Tara’s Wayne, and this is Jamison,’ he said. ‘Mauve, my mother.’
They all shook hands and Mauve crossed over to Tara and kissed her on the cheek. She spent a moment rearranging Tara’s blanket.
Her affection for Tara showed as she touched Tara’s cheek lightly. Then she turned to Josha, and opened her arms.
Josha got up off his chair and went and hugged her.
‘How you holding up, kid?’ Mauve asked.
‘Good. But it’s been a rollercoaster day.’
‘I bet,’ Mauve said. ‘If you need breathing room, we can go shopping. I need some new potting mix and I thought you could help me to choose the new flowers for that front bed.’
‘Nah, I’m cool. But I’ll go with you tomorrow if you need me to—’
‘We can cross that bridge tomorrow,’ Mauve said, and then she sat in a chair that Gabe had fetched for her.
Lucretia came in and brought her a cup of tea. It was obvious that she was a welcome addition to the party.
Wayne felt emotion lodge in his throat. This woman had an obvious deep love for Tara and for Josha too, and they seemed like a tightly woven family unit.
He envied Gabe. His mother was so accepting, and so openly proud of her son and his extended family. It was a stark contrast to the relationship he had with his own mother. He shuddered just thinking of the last call she had made to him. He still tended to avoid her calls, not wanting the confrontations that she always attempted to embroil him in.
Despite his father now having been dead for eight years, his mother had not remarried.
She had, however, spent every rand she had, and was now about to come home to live on his farm with him again. He knew that she was family. He wouldn’t abandon her, but he’d quickly started construction on a new cottage for her. Not near the safari camps, but closer to his home, in the grounds of the homestead area, but independent from him. He had ensured that she would have her own garage and driveway as part of the plan. Her cottage was almost finished, and there would be no happy mother–son time in his house. She would move directly into her own house, and he hoped to see as little of her as he could.
It wasn’t that he didn’t love his mother, she was just a hard woman to love. Besides, he held her directly responsible for ripping Tara from his life. That he had never been able to forgive or forget.
His mother was a cold fish.
Such a contrast to Gabe’s situation.
Gabe looked like he loved having his mother around, and she was so good with Josha. Everyone was so great with Tara, he felt like the intruder.
He stood up and shook his head.
So many mistakes, that both he and Tara had made. But they had a second chance now.
She wasn’t having her operation for just under three weeks, and there was a chance that she would be alright afterwards. He had time to get to know her again.
Now he had met Josha there was no way he wasn’t going to be part of his son’s life.
He looked at Tara.
She’d been the most selfish person he knew for keeping Josha from him, hiding away all those years.
He should hate her.
But he didn’t.
He still loved her. A deep love that burnt in his chest, that made him feel ill just thinking about loosing her again. But he felt pity, and sadness too. Pity for who they once were, and how dominated and manipulated he had been by his parents at the time, without realising it. And sadness, for the fact that they had lost so many years when they could have been happy together.
He cleared his throat. Getting rid of the emotion, ensuring that he could talk.
‘What day are we planning this trip to Kujana?’ he asked.
‘I’m happy for it to be this week. We don’t have lots of time before the operation, so we might as well go there and see it. See how Josha gets on. He’s the most important factor in all this,’ Tara said.
Wayne nodded. ‘Great.’
‘I have a travel agent that does all our booking for the paper, I’ll give her a call and she can arrange our side of it,’ Gabe said, ‘ensure we are all on the same flight into Durban together. I’ll get her on the phone. Today is Tuesday the third, let’s say Thursday morning, first flight out? Tara, does that work?’
‘Yes!’ said Josha, punching the air. ‘My first time in a plane, and then a helicopter!’
Tara was frowning. ‘It’s fine. I might snore a bit on the plane when I’m dead to the world from the drugs, but hopefully Josha will close my mouth if it hangs open, won’t you my son?’
‘Mum! You are so funny!’ Josha said and he got up and went and hugged her.