Page 7 - The Mending Season

oneNumber 4 Mabele Street stood veiled by a large lemon tree at the corner of the only street with a name in Bofelong, our township. The tree gave us a scrap of privacy, something we needed desperately since our shame seemed to hang like the bright lemons at the treetop. Everyone knew things about my family that I wished would be forgotten - stories of what neighbours called my aunts’ madness were spread all over our street. Stories of how they came to fear and disapprove of us. We walked around fully exposed, while our neighbours worked hard to keep their secret pleasures and their woes as safely concealed as money in a womans bra.Being young, curious and bored, I had learnt to look at the neighbours closely, and I knew a lot more about them - these people who never came near our house - than they knew about us. In the middle ofthe day, I would climb the lemon tree and watch them walk around holding their heads up and exchanging morning greetings and afternoon news as if all was right in their world. While watching them, I tried remembering each ones private story. It was my secret game - secret because only I knew about it and because it was about other people s secrets. I listened when neighbours talked at the shop, at the rent offices, at the market or while standing on opposite sides ofthe fence, chatting in between cleaning, cooking and doing the washing.I knew that Mma Motsei s husband our next-door neigh­ bour - had died of a heart attack, but everyone knew that. What they did not know was that he had died at another womans house, and not at work. I was not yet sure what was7