Fly Away Home (8 page)

M
onica sat at her desk, reading the week's letters to the editor. Sometimes these were reactions to a story she had written in the previous issue, other times they were complaints—about potholes, the postman missing a day of work, the high price of drinking water, all of which would be better directed to the mayor. Only three letters to the editor made it into the pages of the newspaper each week, but Monica still tried to answer all the others personally, even if only with a line or two.

Francina and Hercules had left yesterday morning for Johannesburg, and Mandla was looking forward to coming to her office this afternoon after school. The first week without his brother had been tough on him, and now that he wouldn't have Zukisa to pester every afternoon, Monica would have to work hard to amuse him. She hoped that Francina and Hercules would find Zukisa's cousin and manage to help her give up drinking so that she was capable of returning to look after her children.

Shortly after she and Dudu had finished their tea break, Zak arrived at her office.

“To what do I owe this honor?” she teased.

He closed the door so Dudu wouldn't hear their conversation, then he sat down heavily in the chair across the desk from Monica.

“Jacqueline and her husband want to move to Australia.” His expression was deadpan, but Monica knew his emotions always roiled when he was forced to deal with situations created by his ex-wife.

“And Yolanda?”

Zak took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes, as he often did when he was exhausted. “Jacqueline asked me if they could take her along.”

“You'd never give permission, would you?”

He shook his head. “I told Jacqueline that. But she's the most manipulative person I've ever met. We both know she's not to be trusted.”

This was the first time Zak had spoken openly of his ex-wife's infidelity. His reluctance to do so in the past had never bothered Monica, because she did not want to be reminded that he had once been perfectly happy with Jacqueline.

“But she can't take Yolanda out of the country unless you agree.”

“Monica, what if Yolanda chooses to go with her mother?”

Monica moved around the desk and took his hand. “I can't believe she'd ever leave you.”

Zak sighed. “I'm going to phone her this afternoon when her mother's at work and tell her to find her passport. And then I'm going to drive to Cape Town to get it.” He sounded so tense Monica wondered how he would make it through the hours until it was time to go.

 

Later that afternoon, he phoned to report that Yolanda had searched for her passport and it was not to be found.

“I knew Jacqueline would try something,” said Zak. “I'm going to call the police.”

“Are you sure that's—”

Zak didn't allow her to finish. “I can't do nothing.”

She had only wanted to ask if that was the appropriate first step. Perhaps he should consider speaking to Jacqueline first. If his ex-wife knew that he was onto her plan, then she might not carry it out.

“What about talking to Jacqueline?” Monica said quietly.

“You don't know that woman. When her mind is made up, nothing can change it.”

His words stung; Monica knew he was referring to the efforts he had made to hold his first marriage together, even after he'd discovered that Jacqueline had been unfaithful.

“Maybe I should pick up Yolanda on Saturday morning as usual and then never take her home.”

This was the most irrational statement Monica had ever heard Zak make. He was more upset than she'd thought.

“Do you want me to come to the hospital now?” she asked.

“No, we'll talk about it tonight. I have patients to see.”

Monica hoped that he would calm down enough to do his work with a clear head.

 

That evening Zak announced that he was going to have a word with Jacqueline and scare her out of doing what he knew she was planning.

“Good,” said Monica.

For the rest of the evening, he didn't say another word about it. But Monica could tell the situation still played heavily on his mind, from the way Mandla had to keep reminding him it was his turn in their board game.

T
he sound of doors slamming woke Francina from her deep sleep. For a few seconds she could not remember where she was. Then she recalled the long, tedious drive to Johannesburg and checking into this hotel near the airport. The room, not much bigger than an office cubicle, was fitted with a bunk bed, a dresser and a tiny television. There was no en suite bathroom, but Francina had noted the communal facilities when they'd arrived last night, after midnight. Now, leaving Hercules asleep on the top bunk, she hurriedly pulled on her clothes, grabbed her toiletry bag and left the room, taking care not to let the door slam. The bathroom was entered by pushing a button on the outside wall, which not only unlocked the door, but, to Francina's shock, also started the shower inside. In an instant her clothes were drenched. On the wall was an automatic soap, shampoo and conditioner dispenser, and a timer ticking down the minutes from ten. Afraid of not finishing in time and being left all soaped up, Francina quickly undressed, hung her clean clothes on a hook out of reach of the spray, and stepped into the shower.

After she was done, she left the bathroom and heard the water inside go on at full force. Wondering if she had done something wrong in this fancy, futuristic bathroom, she tried to go back in, but the door remained locked.

“It's disinfecting itself,” said a bemused woman walking by with a little child. “I almost jumped out of my skin when I first heard that noise.”

“I wish I could get my bathroom at home to do that,” replied Francina, chuckling.

She quickly found her room and entered by waving a hotel ID card at a flashing pad next to the door. Hercules was awake and checking the weather on the television.

“I thought that the beds might have made themselves while I was away,” said Francina. She told Hercules about the shower.

He didn't find it amusing. “There are a lot of people out of work in this country. I don't know why the government allowed this foreign hotel chain to establish here, if it wasn't going to hire locals.”

Sometimes Francina wished that Hercules's could just laugh without thinking. Delayed laughter was never as good. Hercules, of course, would say the opposite, that nothing could be more amusing than an intelligent joke.

The weather that day would be mild, and since it didn't rain in Johannesburg in winter, in Francina's opinion there had been no need for him to even check the weather. But that was Hercules: always prepared.

As she tidied their belongings—just in case the room decided to vacuum itself while they were away—her thoughts turned to Zukisa, who would be preparing breakfast right now for those infuriating boys and their sweet little sister. At fourteen, Zukisa was more capable in the kitchen than some adults, but Francina still worried about her daughter. The scars that ran from Zukisa's chest to her knees were a reminder of how this little girl had always assumed roles beyond her years. Her injury had happened when Zukisa had been boiling water to make pap for her family and had tripped over a dish towel.

“For breakfast, shall we finish the leftovers from our trip?” she asked Hercules, knowing he would say yes because he hated to waste food. The faster they got to Orange Grove to look for Zukisa's cousin, the faster they'd get home to Zukisa.

They ate the cheese, nuts and crackers in silence, Francina thinking of the words she would use to persuade Lucy to come home, Hercules poring over a map of Johannesburg and plotting his route. Francina admired his courage for undertaking to drive in a city he did not know. She didn't drive, but if she did, she wouldn't be inclined to do it in Johannesburg, where drivers flashed lights for cars to move aside, tailgated and used the emergency lanes for passing. Whenever she'd traveled by minibus taxi in Johannesburg, she would shut her eyes and pray.

 

Orange Grove might once have been a rural area east of downtown Johannesburg, befitting of its name, but the land was now divided into postage stamp-size lots. The main street through the neighborhood was a blur of restaurants, nonprofit organizations, music studios, dance halls and barbershops.

Francina rolled up her window and instructed Hercules to do the same.

“Look at all these men wanting to wash our windshield,” she said. “Any one of them could be a crook who'll grab my purse.”

“Or they're just honest people who can't find work and are doing the best they can,” said Hercules.

Francina shot him a warning look and he rolled up his window.

“Where on earth do we start looking for Lucy?” she moaned.

Hercules stopped at a red light and a man began to wash their windshield.

“We just got it cleaned two blocks back,” yelled Francina through the closed window.

The fellow ignored her and continued swiping away at the soapy suds with a rubber squeegee. Hercules opened his window and dropped some coins into the man's upturned hand. The light changed before he could begin clearing the passenger side, and Francina was furious to find herself peering through a curtain of white soap.

“I don't know why you pay these people,” she muttered. “Look at this. I can't see where we're going.”

“Would you like to argue with them?” Hercules asked calmly. “They might throw a stone at the back of our car if I don't pay.”

“Extortion. That's what it is. Everywhere I look nowadays I see extortion. From these guys to the so-called parking attendants.”

“According to that sign we just passed, we've left Orange Grove,” said Hercules, ignoring his wife's tirade. “I'll turn around, and we can start at the first business establishment, working our way back down the road.”

Francina was grateful to have levelheaded, practical Hercules to bring her to her senses. There was something more important at stake than menacing panhandlers. She took the out-of-date photograph of Lucy from her purse and handed it to Hercules. Until she calmed down, it would be better if he did the talking.

A barber shook his head and said that he'd never seen Lucy before. “You should come back at night when all the runaway kids are sleeping in the doorways,” he said.

Francina examined the photograph again. Zukisa's aunt had said that Lucy had been twenty-eight when it was taken, but the barber could not be blamed for presuming that she was a kid, because she looked no older than fifteen.

“Lucy's not a runaway,” she told him. Not technically, anyway. She hadn't snuck out in the dead of night; she'd calmly told her family that she was leaving to live on her own in Cape Town. Which, in Francina's mind, was even more cruel.

 

Three hours later they had entered every establishment on one side of the main road in Orange Grove. Nobody had laid eyes on Lucy. Francina was close to tears. What if she had moved on from here? A person could disappear for good in the huge black hole that was Johannesburg.

“Let's have something to drink in that café,” said Hercules, pointing towards the other side of the street. “And then we can carry on the search.”

Francina leaned heavily on his arm as they crossed the road. She felt weak from thirst and disappointment at not finding a single lead. Each day spent away from Zukisa was a day too long. She knew her thoughts should have been more compassionate, but she could not understand how Lucy could have walked out on her children.

“Everybody deserves a second chance,” said Hercules as they sat down at a round table covered with a red-checked, plastic tablecloth.

“What was that?” asked Francina, thinking that either her ears had deceived or her husband had gained the power to read her mind.

Hercules pointed at a headline on a newspaper next to the shop counter: Fraudster Pays Back Millions to Scam Victims.

“Humph,” said Francina. She was so eager for the cold drink Hercules had taken from the refrigerator in the café that she chose not to comment.

They sipped their drinks and stared glumly out of the window at the pedestrians on the street. The task of finding Lucy was beginning to seem so monumental Francina wasn't sure they'd have time to tackle it properly. Hercules couldn't stay away from Green Block School for more than a week.

“I'll do the talking this side of the street,” she told him.

He agreed without an argument, which told her that he, too, was growing frustrated.

The café owner was no help, nor were the employees of the next four stores. When Francina showed Lucy's photograph to a lady wiping tables outside an Italian restaurant, there was a brief flash of recognition in her eyes.

“I think I've seen her before,” said the waitress. “But that photo was taken awhile ago. She looks very different now.”

“You mean like a drinker?” asked Francina.

The lady nodded.

This was the fragile thread they'd been hoping for. Lucy had been here, after all. Their journey had not been in vain.

They continued their search with renewed energy, suggesting to everyone they approached that the young woman in the photograph looked older and a little worn now. After ten more stores, two beauty salons, three restaurants and a church, their hope had dwindled.

Francina was so exhausted she longed to go back to the car to nap, but there were three more blocks to explore.

“If only we had a more recent photograph,” she lamented.

Outside an electronics store, an elderly lady sat on the sidewalk behind an upturned milk crate, with small bags of potatoes and onions for sale. Francina watched in resignation as Hercules held Lucy's photograph out to her. What was the point, Francina wondered, in showing it to someone with only a makeshift business in the area? And why bother even carrying on, when the whole exercise was turning out to be pointless?

“Pretty girl,” said the lady, studying it closely.

Yes, yes,
thought Francina,
but we don't have time for a chat.
The poor woman was probably lonely. Why was she out on the street trying to earn money at her age? Nice sons and daughters she had. Francina longed to sink into the passenger seat of their car and rest her aching feet. She wished Hercules would retrieve the photograph so they could leave. Standing still was even harder on her feet than walking.

“Terrible, terrible,” the vegetable vendor was muttering.

The poor woman was losing her mind. Francina sent Hercules a look imploring him to move on.

“What was terrible?” he asked.

Oh, Hercules. It's sweet to offer an ear to a lonely soul, but not now.

“He didn't even stop.” The lady clicked her tongue in disapproval.

“Who didn't stop?” asked Hercules gently.

“The driver who hit her.”

Francina moved in closer. “The woman in this photograph was hit by a car?”

The woman nodded. “Right in front of my eyes.”

“But nobody else mentioned that,” said Francina.

Seemingly unperturbed that the veracity of her words was in doubt, the lady continued in a quavering voice. “I arrive here early each day, at about five. I don't know why she was still drunk at that time of the morning, but she stepped right in front of the car. The only people around were some street children and a boy selling newspapers.”

The woman was telling the truth, Francina suddenly knew. Her ability to read people the instant she met them had let her down for the very first time.

“Did she die?” Francina held her breath, waiting for a response to her question.

The lady shook her head. “She was still alive when the ambulance took her to the hospital.”

Francina sighed with relief. “When did this happen?”

“Maybe two, three months ago.”

Francina's heart sank. Lucy would have already been discharged from hospital. Their search had come to another dead end.

Hercules asked if the lady knew which hospital Lucy had been taken to, but, of course, she didn't.

“We'll try them all,” he said.

Francina's mood brightened as she realized that the hospital might have an address on record for Lucy.

“Thank you, for your help,” she said. “We'll buy all your potatoes and onions.” She turned to Hercules. “Please pay the lady.”

Both Hercules and the woman looked at her as though she had appeared in town wearing pajamas. Hercules's raised eyebrows said, “What are we going to do with fifteen bags of potatoes and onions?”

“You should go home and rest,” Francina told the lady. She came close to expressing her outrage that the woman was sitting out here in the first place, but she didn't want to hurt her feelings. No matter how ungrateful her children were, the lady loved them as any mother would.

Hercules handed over the money.

“God bless you, my children,” the vendor said, as Francina and Hercules left with all her vegetables.

At the car, Hercules set down the bags so he could find his keys. “What on earth are we going to do with all these potatoes in a hotel room?” he asked.