Untitled by Kgebetli Moele Page A

nothing.”
    For me it was nothing because I had never been in that position. MmaLekgope, one of Lebo’s friends, said:
    â€œHe cuts the call when you are calling him with your own money?” She slapped her thigh. “He cannot do that to you. Who does he think he is? He is not God and he is certainly not the only man on this earth. Dump the dog!” She slapped her thigh again, very hard. “Girl, dump that dog so it knows what it is – nothing but a dog.”
    Lebo called for a third time and he answered, confirming everything:
    â€œI am with my wife now and you are disturbing me.”
    Tumelo then gave his phone to his wife, telling her that somebody wanted to say hello to her. A very sweet voice said hello three times before Lebo ended the call.
    That call ended the intelligent Lebo that I had always wanted to be. She was no more. The sweet-talking, smiling Lebo was no more. We all paused for a moment, then MmaLekgope said:
    â€œGirl, dump the dog.”
    Silence. I was feeling sad because I had introduced Lebo to Tumelo.
    â€œLebo, you can have any man you want. You have a queue of men just waiting and wishing. Why cry for one when there is still the whole of Mars waiting and wanting. Dump the dog, forget him.”
    We were not really helping her to feel any better, but somehow she managed to put on a smile, a hurt smile.
    â€œGirls, I am not crying. You make it sound like this is the end of the world. It is not.” She looked at us and for a moment I believed that she was not affected at all. “Girls, I am not crying, it is just that it came as a shock.”
    We went our separate ways – there was nothing left to hang around for. Lebo said that she was going home.
    Monday – before I picked it up from the street, actually it was literally minutes before I heard it from the street – Lebo called me to the back of the class after lunch break and said:
    â€œYou are not going to believe it.”
    â€œTry me.”
    I looked at her.
    â€œI had sex with Mr LS.”
    I was still looking at her.
    â€œI fucked him, we fucked ... I didn’t want you to hear it from anybody else because you are ...”
    She couldn’t finish because at that moment I puked up everything that I had just had for lunch.
    â€œWhy did you puke?”
    â€œIt is disgusting.”
    Then James and Mamafa arrived, James looking at Lebo as if she had committed a criminal act.
    â€œYou won’t give it to me, but you will give it to him?”
    Back then James wanted to have sex with Lebo, he would have died for it, but Lebo thought that he was just a small boy with not enough experience. She said that young boys came with too much energy, playing very rough, as if they were in a playground, and after they finished with you, you hadn’t enjoyed anything.
    James and Mamafa had come to warn me about Lebo. They did not like her much. James didn’t like her because she didn’t want to have sex with him and Mamafa, well, he didn’t like her because he felt that she influenced me negatively.
    They took me away from her.
    â€œYour friend is the latest of Shatale’s trophies.”
    â€œI know.”
    â€œYou know?”
    â€œShe just told me now.”
    Mamafa looked at me as if to say “I told you so”.
    â€œTold you long ago that she has a decaying mind, and that if you hang around with her, listening to her, it will affect you. I cannot let that happen.”
    â€œI do not hang around with her that much.”
    â€œBut you are listening to the things that she thinks and says.”
    I felt, somehow, tenderly cared for, important – these two people cared for me and would do what they could to protect me because they loved me just the way I was.
    â€œStay away from her, Mokgethi, please. Stay away from her.”
    â€œDo not listen to what she says to you.”
    Later, when I was walking home with Mamafa and James, I asked them why it