So anyway, Bossboy was turning 21 and he had a gedoemse 6/6 party planned. He invited everybody we could think of and even some we couldn’t – he had a few important friends we didn’t usually mingle with. Captain Dlamini was there from the local force. He booked a band, he bought us new clothes, Shoes new shoes. Bossboy had plenty money, he bought himself a snazzy gold colour show-off car and he had a girlfriend, Zinzi who liked to lie all over the bonnet of it and all over him too. We didn’t ask him about his money because he didn’t have a job so it was obvious he got it in other ways - it was better we didn’t know about them. Some weekends he didn’t hang out with Shoes, Unlucky Dube and me because he was away visiting his cousin in Mozambique. At the end of those weekends he always came back bouncing along on the balls of his feet, a big fat smile on his face and Zinzi in a new dress.
I was jealous about the car, it was an old Merc and I was good at telling Bossboy how rubbish the engine was when he asked me to lift the bonnet to check it. The truth was I wanted my own wheels. I was still the best driver in my job and worked as mechanic for the car pool now too but I didn’t have my own. Cars cost too much on my wage.
Bossboy liked to wear a fedora hat and smoke cigars, like a movie gangsta. His black eyes shone out from underneath the brim through the smoke like two dung beetles on a misty morning. I remember that party well, it was about three in the morning when I was sitting next to Bossboy on a new leather sofa outside his house and we were sharing a joint. He was taking turns on the cigar and the joint. My head was light as a feather and my eyes half shut but there was my girl with me, Vanessa, who was the younger sister of Shoes and she was keeping me awake with her eyes, chatter and smiles. Vanessa was my first girl. She stood up to go and get me another beer and then Bossboy leant over to me.
‘NP’. It was hard to hear him over the beat of the music, his voice was low and rumbled like a thunderstorm approaching from the horizon. His eyes slowly moved over the crowd, like those of a lion who is confident of his hunting ground.
‘Yes Bossboy.’
‘NP, I hear your mother is not well’.
‘That’s true Boss’. I was surprised, he never asked about my family before. He was the kind of man who told you about his affairs but didn’t ask about yours. My mother had heart troubles, something the nurse at the clinic had called angina and she needed medicine. She couldn’t work and had retired and I was living together with her and Jacob. Josephine tried to send us money too but a cleaner earns very little and now she had a husband and a child. Besides saving up for my own set of wheels, I had a girlfriend - everybody knows girls are too expensive.
‘I have a job for you NP.
‘I have a good job Boss’.
‘A good job yes, but a bad wage, no?’
I shrugged. ‘It’s not terrible but it’s not fantastic either’.
‘My cousin needs a new car, a special type of car, and I said I know just the car and just the man to drive it’.
‘You want me to be a driver for your cousin?’
‘Only a short way, from here to the Komatipoort on the border. I have my friend Dhlamini, he will let you through to the other side, there my cousin will meet you. I can only ask you NP as I know you to be the finest driver around, the best at handling any vehicle. But you need to fetch the car first. I know you know how to start a car without the key. It’s at Dr Van Der Weshuizen’s house, you know that big pink house with many pillars up on the hill in Hazyview?’
Bossyboy could tell I was confused by the way my mouth was hanging open. I liked what he said about my driving abilities but I wasn’t one hundred percent sure what he was meaning about ‘fetching’ the car. I had a feeling I knew and I didn’t like the feeling. Also the ideas of driving the car two hours to the border of Mozambique did not sit well with me, I had not been on that road before. I looked about for Dhlamini but couldn’t see him. I spotted Vanessa, she was drinking my beer and chatting to Zinzi over in a group of girls by the old bath tub filled with ice and bottles of beer that acted as the bar. It was a hot night and I admired the way she stroked the icy bottle up and down her neck. Bossboy’s smoky breath brought me back to the moment.
‘What about it NP? I can give you the same as two months of your wages, simple job. The Dr has a BMW M5, which is what my cousin needs. Nothing faster on the road than that baby, you will love to drive it. You can go up there tomorrow night, under cover of darkness. Unlucky D will go with you and show you the way, just bring your weapon for in case.’
I swallowed, my throat felt raw from the smoking. I had never done a job like this before. Vanessa turned and smiled her big white-teeth, bright red lipstick smile at me. She was lovely, her hair was combed out into a huge afro, enormous gold loop earrings grazed her bare shoulders, her brown skin shone with perspiration from the hot night. She and Zinzi made their way over to us, I watched how their bodies swayed to the music beat, their tight dresses and high heeled shoes used for maximum desired effect.
‘You tell me tonight NP, Dhlamini is only on border shift for the next two days.’ Bossboy lifted his chin and sent up a stream of blue smoke, he looked at the girls, ‘Otherwise...’
I didn’t hear what he was going to say as Vanessa was pulling me up by the arms to dance. She pulled me close to her soft body and I turned my face away from Bossboy’s beetle eyes. My head was spinning and I felt warmer than a potjie on a fire. There was low pitched drumming faintly sounding in my ears, almost like the melody of the music, but I recognised it as the call of an Emerald-Spotted wood dove.
‘NP?’
‘Yes Nessa.’ We were swaying and she was talking in my ear.
‘Can you believe tomorrow is our anniversary, a month together!’
‘Hawu, so long already!’
She pouted a little, ‘You know it is the custom to get your girl a gift?’
I didn’t, boys don’t know these customs so well as the girls do.
‘Oh yes, Sunshine, I have it, you will love it, it’s very expensive’.
She smiled and put her arms around my neck. I felt like I would explode with the heat and my head was pounding now. I pulled myself away from Vanessa and said I needed a drink. Unlucky Dube and Shoes were now sitting with Bossboy, leaning in to hear what he had to say. Shoes was looking at me, his latest footwear proudly stretched out before him, Unlucky was rubbing his arm which was in a sling from when he had fallen out a taxi last week. I turned my back and walked away towards the bar to get a beer and tried to think while I took a couple of quick slugs from the bottle.
The thoughts flying around in my head where like a nest of flying ants that had been disturbed by a boot. I wanted this job. I wanted the money but I felt a coiling snake in my stomach. Robbing purses was one thing, a car was a different thing altogether. If I needed my hand gun it could mean serious stuff. I had not used my weapon outside my work but in work it felt good shooting at those evil scum - the poachers, although I never actually hit one yet. Two month’s wages equals medicine, Vanessa’s gift and maybe wheels. I was angry about this crooked Dhlamini fellow. I felt somebody bump into me from behind and I spun around, my fist curled. It was Vanessa.
She frowned at me, ‘What’s the matter?’
I shrugged, ‘Nothing Nessa, just need a drink, and time on my own to think’.
She rolled her eyes and made her way back to join the group of closely knit dancers.
I looked over my shoulder and noticed my three friends were missing from the sofa. I wanted to speak to Bossboy, ask him about what he meant by ‘Otherwise’. It sounded like a puffing of the chest to me, I didn’t like that attitude of his. I walked to the edge of the garden and looked around the groups of people clustered drinking and dancing. Then I glanced up to the sky and noticed the moon, it was a day away from being full.
I heard the words of my Kokwana telling me how my name Alhulani means ‘separating the good from the bad’ and in that moment I made my choice to leave the party. He could find another man for his dirty work, I was needed back at the park in top form for a possible raid. I walked the sunrise hour along the dusty, half ruined roads of the location back to the taxi rank in Hazyview.