A Break in the Clouds

By Licollin Bonga Kekana

A Break in the Clouds

This is the story of a girl growing up in a poor family environment. Much like many others in her situation, she dreams of taking her family out of this situation. After the heart-breaking loss of her mom, everything takes a sharp turn in her life. Her world is thrown into further turmoil when her father’s obsession forces her to take a spur-of-the-moment decision. Through her decision, she endures pain after pain. Will it ever end? Will there ever be a silver lining in her life?

About the author

A South African born in Limpopo near Mokopane at a village called Vaaltyn (Mokerong) Moshate. First born daughter of Cynthia Kekana.

She loved reading from a young age and through reading she developed her love for writing, however, she only saw her potential to write in her years at Tshwane University of Technology.

Her writing ability was inspired by many other authors from the other books she read.

She has different styles of writing and in her writings she writes about what people experience.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Licollin Bonga Kekana
• Release date: Nov 20, 2020
• ISBN: 9780463496954

Book preview

A Break in the Clouds

Licollin Bonga Kekana

Copyright © 2020 Licollin Bonga Kekana

Published by Licollin Bonga Kekana Publishing at Smashwords

First edition 2020

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information storage or retrieval system without permission from the copyright holder.

The Author has made every effort to trace and acknowledge sources/resources/individuals. In the event that any images/information have been incorrectly attributed or credited, the Author will be pleased to rectify these omissions at the earliest opportunity.

Published by Licollin Bonga Kekana using Reach Publishers’ services,

P O Box 1384, Wandsbeck, South Africa, 3631

Edited by Bronwen Bickerton for Reach Publishers

Cover designed by Reach Publishers

Website: www.reachpublishers.org

E-mail: [e-mail]

Licollin Bonga Kekana

[e-mail]

Dedication

My special dedication goes to:

Ledile Stephina (RIP) and Shibe Josephina Kekana for making sure that we do not forget our roots, culture, love and kindness, and to all who grew up under their wing.

An extended dedication to all the education facilities that played a role in my academics, namely Vaaltyn Lower Primary, Moshupsa Primary, Mmadikana High, Dennis Matlhaba Secondary School and Tshwane University of Technology, and to the readers.

Acknowledgements

A general thanks to everyone who bolstered my concept; to those who contributed in the books I read to increase my vocabulary and galvanise my reading ability. Special gratitude goes to Cynthia Kekana for raising me singlehandedly. I grab this opportunity to thank Motlalepula and Ethel Kekana for collaborating with my mother in nurturing and loving us unconditionally. For that I salute and embark on waving the flag for you. Mando Tshepo, Peter Fana, Tshuni Glenda and Molebogeng Kekana I appreciate your generosity in sharing our parents and the love for one another. For that I will forever be beholden to loving you. A special thankfulness to my girls Ofentse, Katlego (Tiisetso), Kamogelo and Lehlogonolo Kekana for loving and tolerating me when I sometimes require space for my craft. One love for that. My earnest gratefulness to my colleague Nonjabulo Dlamini for reading my few manuscripts and entrusting my way of enunciating a story. Kamogelo Selahle, I want to express my sincere gratitude for you believing in me and for extending that by hooking me up with an article publisher. I will always remember your words when you said, ‘My author’. Motsilisi Moseneke I know you were not obliged to listen when I read my few manuscripts but you chose to listen attentively and for that I want to extend my indebtedness for your patience. Mogaleadi Mashamaite, you are my inspiration and thank you for your selflessness. It is true when they say birds of the same feathers flock together. Lonkie Tebatso Kekana I blame you for my constant writing because in one of the Facebook comments you said something about my way of penning words and that made me think deeply about it. Nonetheless, I thank you from the bottom of my heart for waking me up from my sleep because I am now sleep walking. Benjamin Balebogeng Bapela, when you said we have stories to put on a paper I did not take that lightly. Lesego Phakedi, Paulina Mere and Oupa Segoe, thanks for believing that I have proficiency and showing an unwavering support. Mando Kekana, my genuine gratefulness for your courageous words when I kept myself awake in the middle of the night to come up with a better concept. My deepest appreciation to Ofentse Dimakatso Kekana for always being willing to assist when I have computer challenges. Conclusively, thanks be to God for giving me life, strength, knowledge, proficiency and above all, wisdom. You are all worthy and deserve my unconditional love.

To those who thought I won’t make it sorry but I am not surprised because that is how life is. I know you did not underestimate me you just thought less of me but trust me, God knows me better than you do.

Chapter 1

We are going to the local modelling classes.

As we approach the building, we hear the footsteps of someone coming behind us. We look back and there is a guy walking behind us.

He sees us, raises his hand and waves at us with a smile. We wave back with smiles and continue walking. Wow, the guy is clean, good looking and tall. His face does not look familiar. We look at each other with awe.

Candice, do you know the guy? Bella asks.

Honestly Bella, I don’t know him, I doubt he stays in our neighbourhood, I say.

While we walk Bella keeps glancing behind to look at him. After a while she gawks straight at him, not glancing anymore until she suddenly misses a step and falls. The guy rushes to us and helps Bella to stand up. Oh sorry, lady, let me help you dust yourself off, he says.

Oh my word, I gaze at Bella and she looks mesmerised.

Bella is my friend and we grew up together. We have been friends since young but I have never seen her behaving the way she is behaving right now. I am even ashamed, thinking about what the guy will think of us. I glance at the guy once and find him gazing at me.

It feels awkward because I am asking myself why he is gazing at me and not at Bella who just fell down because of gazing at him? Oh no, why was Bella gazing at him? He is now walking in tandem with us. We are all silent although Bella is smiling until suddenly the guy breaks the ice. Where to ladies? he asks.

Without wasting time Bella answers him. We’re going to the community hall. My friend is doing modelling.

Oh I see. It seems as if we’re going to the same place, he says.

Although they are talking, him gazing at me while talking makes me feel uncomfortable. Bella notices that and to get his attention she introduces ourselves to the guy. I’m Bella and this is my friend Candice, we stay around here and who are you? I know my friend can talk but I just felt that she is acting weird and somehow forward. She is acting like someone desperate.

I am pleased to know you Bella and Candice. I am Walter, although people call me Wally, he says.

"Ehhhhh, so Wally where do you stay if I may ask?" Bella asks.

By this time I am quiet and annoyed by Bella’s deeds.

She has even changed her movement, shaking her body and trying a catwalk. I am the one who should be cat walking. I am the modeller, not her.

Bella though-, I say within.

It is unfortunate that I model for better things, not to charm boys. Bella is my friend but she does not have the body of a model hence she is not even in the modelling team. I on the other hand have got an attractive body and I know my body will pave the way for me. Brain wise I am also intelligent but with my poor background I doubt I can finish my studies and be an academic. My mom is just a domestic worker trying hard to support us, and my dad is an uneducated builder.

Education is important; hence my dad struggles to find jobs. These days when people build their houses they prefer hiring someone who is educated, the exact word is professionals. That leaves my dad on the dole most of the time. My mom is the one always taking care of the family with the little money she earns as a domestic worker.

My dream is to make them proud one day and I know I will as an international model. I even have a picture of Naomi Campbell in my room and every time I look at it I see myself in her.

While thinking, Wally is busy scrutinizing me and it makes me feel uncomfortable. Bella looks at Wally. I know she will take his eyes away from me. Most of the times when people look to me she does that. When I am with her and other people I barely talk, I only talk when it is necessary. Bella can talk and all I do most of the time is listen to her. Maybe that is the reason we are still together because I am a listener and she is a talker. So Wally, where do you stay around here? asks Bella.

My mother’s home is in Sandhurst, but I grew up here in Diepsloot, he says.

Oh, so you stay in the burbs? Bella asks.

Not really, my parents stay there. I’m hardly in Sandhurst because I spend most of the time at school and over the holidays I come here to Diepsloot.

How come we hardly know you? Bella keeps on pestering Wally with questions that demand attention.

"Hahahaha, he giggles before he answers. It’s funny because I know you and where you stay," he says.

But this is the first time we have seen you, Bella says.

So true, I’m hardly on the street but I know one day you will know where I stay, he says assuringly.

Wally does not tell us where he stays and somehow I like the way he answers Bella. I feel she asks too much and after knowing where he stays what will we do? He is a guy and we hardly hang around boys. Maybe if he was a girl I would be interested to know where he lived.

We get to the community hall. I rush to change into modelling attire and high heels. At the time Bella is bonded to Wally, she does not want him to leave her side and I care less. If she wants him as her friend then let it be but she will have to count me out on that. What I know is that I do not befriend strangers and especially boys. Wally is a stranger to me. We just met him.

The hall is crowded and all the girls’ eyes are directed at Wally. I am not surprised by that, he is an eye-catcher. We start practising modelling. All the girls go to the stage and I am always the last one to go to the stage because I am the tallest on the list. The audience makes noise, even laughing at some of the girls because they are still struggling to walk in high heels. Composure is not something I struggle with. It is as if God created me for modelling.

I enter the stage and there is a commotion in the hall. The noise fills up the hall. Everyone wants to see me. They are all screaming, ‘Candy, Candy, Candy’. On the flag is written ‘Our future Naomi Campbells are up; Kendell Jenner, Anok Yai, Fatima Siad, Alek Wek and Candice Swanepoel.’ The list of the best models written on the flags is long. Oh my word, is that how people see me?

The attention I am getting is out of this world. I mean I am just a mere township girl from a three-room shack constructed by my dad with the corrugated steel my mother’s former boss gave her when they were renovating their house.

I have four siblings, three girls and one brother. We use one room as a kitchen, my parents sleep in another one while we share the last room.

I have started my menstruation and every time when I bathe I have to ask them to go outside. Some months I do not even have sanitary towels. My mom gave me two cloths that she tore from an old sheet. I wash them and use them every month when I am on my period.

The situation in the shack house is bad because I even hear when my parents are having sex. There is privacy but no secrecy in the corrugated steel houses. We hear everything that is happening in the next room. I even know how many rounds they go for, how they scream during euphoric moments.

When I was still young I used to think that my dad was beating my mom because of the sounds she used to make. It made me resent my dad a little until I read about sex in one of the old magazines my mother brought from work. From that time I realised and understood that the noise my mom makes is not that she is being beaten but is for sex. I then rekindled the love for my dad. In the township they even call me ‘Daddy’s little girl’. That is how close I am to my dad.

I kept the magazine so that my siblings can read them one day because I also encourage them to read more and not necessarily their school books. Maybe lady luck will hit one of us. I want what is best for them. I wish for them to understand what is happening in case they hear the noise of my parents. If they do wake up at night, surely they will hear them and I wonder what they will say about them.

My parents enjoy each other sexually and they make love almost every day. At times they even kick the partition because of the joy and sex positions. One day I remember my mom and dad were home during the day and I came back from school at an unusual time because of a runny tummy. When I was about to open the kitchen door I heard the banging and the screaming coming from the house. I know I always heard the sounds from my parent’s room at night but that day it was explicit and in the kitchen.

I stiffened in front of the door. I could not open the door or even move away from the door. It was as if something magnetic glued me there and I heard my mom screaming. Say something Suzie, he said.

"Oh Joshua, fuck me, pump it faster, you are doing it nice, I want you even more," Mom said.

I can’t hear you, say it louder, he said. Dad was talking dirty, screaming and I could hear some of the steel dishes falling to the floor. At that time my dad was saying to my mom, "You used to complain about my endowed Johnson Suzie, asking me how will you get used to it and here you are today wanting it more than ever. Dad continued talking while breathing heavily. Even after four children you still give me pleasure," he said.

While at the door I pictured how innocent my parents always looked. I started imagining them naked on each other, like the picture I saw in the magazine. I heard my dad spanking my mom’s buttocks and then he said, These periods of yours, how I missed it but tonight you are going to pay for the missed days and the next round I want you from the back Suzie, there is no time like this one. Let us just indulge, our children are still at school, he said. At that moment my mom was screaming loudly and my dad was saying, Oh, you are coming for the fourth time Suzie? Open your legs wider. Do you like it hard Suzie? he asked.

My mom could not finish what she was saying. All she said was, "Ohhhhh Joshua … ahhhh Joshua … yeah … ahhhh. I heard the pound of their buttocks. It seemed as if my dad was coming to my mom faster and harder, groaning while my mom was screaming. Mom was now moaning louder. Oh my God, come Joshua, otherwise you are going to tear me," she said.

At that time my dad was breathing heavily faster and all of a sudden there was stillness in the kitchen. I moved away from the door, thinking maybe they had heard me. That day my mom had given us money to eat at school so as not to come back in lunch break. Surely she knew that was going to happen. Maybe at night they couldn’t express themselves better.

I left the house and went to the shop to buy time so that they could give each other from the back. I know that is how they conceived me but I never imagined my mom and dad in the dance and now I have a picture of them. I am not complaining, in fact I am happy because in the magazine it says a good sex life keeps the fire burning. I see fire in them. Even though we are poor, their love for each other is stronger and amazing. I witnessed that and the good thing about them is that I haven’t heard them fighting.

I am not surprised how many children they have. Maybe it is because they don’t have anything to entertainment themselves with and sex entertains them. Perhaps if we had television they would not always have sex. If we had a radio maybe we would not hear them, they would just put the radio on and increase the volume.

With the talent God gave me I am going to make them proud one day and build them a house of their dreams. Maybe my little sisters will also follow me because we all have the same looks. I see myself being an international model with my own talk show that will motivate and inspire young children who are like us.

I parade onto the stage and go back to the changing room to change into another costume. Bella is still with Wally

Reviews for A Break in the Clouds

[Dibonx Kekana · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A good book to read. It encapsulated life's experiences. It is well writted. The author is on a higher level.