Playing in the Light: a Novel by Zoë Wicomb

Author:Zoë Wicomb
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: The New Press
Published: 2011-05-31T00:00:00+00:00

A man comes into the office just before they are about to close and asks Boetie if he is Mr Campbell. Tiena, peering from where she stands pressed against the kitchen wall, lets out something between a snort and a giggle, so that Marion looks up. Boetie blinks; he has been struck dumb by the thought of being Mr Campbell. Marion rises and, holding out her hand, introduces herself.

Vumile Mkhize, the man says, holding her card in his left hand. His is the black BMW she drove into some days ago. In town, in Long Street, he reminds her.

Yes, I know, she says, it was at the bottom of Long Street. The other car I drove into was in Scott Street, in Observatory – a Ford Cortina it was, and that was my first driving lesson. It was on my eighteenth birthday.

Not so long ago then, he says; and the man, who is tall and handsome and expensively dressed, laughs a deep, roaring belly-laugh that makes her start. It happens, he says, shit happens. The dent in my car was just the first of a number of terrible things that happened last week. That’s why I didn’t get in touch earlier.

The others are packing up, ready to go home. Marion, fearing that he might tell her of the terrible things that had happened and by way of making amends for her sarcasm, says she’ll make some coffee. But the phone rings.

It is Geoff. She explains that Mr Mkhize is there about the car, the accident. Geoff says he’ll be over right away, that he’ll sort Mkhize out for her. No need, she protests; there’s no problem. But no, he says, of course he’ll be over. Does she think he’d leave her there alone with a stranger? Really, she ought to have called him.

Marion flushes. She hopes that Mkhize has not heard any of it, but when Geoff arrives she knows that the man cannot fail to infer that he has come to protect her. They have already agreed that she will simply pay the panelbeater’s bill, the damage is nothing much. There is nothing for Geoff to negotiate, and thankfully he does not interfere. But Marion is embarrassed, she must make amends, or perhaps she is touting for business. She hopes that Mr Mkhize will pop in, should he be in the vicinity. Perhaps she could help out with air tickets, perhaps they could go for lunch, she says nervously. She gives him her card. He appears not to notice that he already has one in his left hand, and leaves clutching both the old crumpled card and the crisp new one.

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