Giving and taking, where does it end?

I waded into the water and got a bit scared of the big waves.

I waded into the water and got a bit scared of the big waves.

Published Feb 9, 2016

Share

Cape Town - On Saturday, I went to the beach alone.

It’s something I’ve wanted to do all summer: lie on the sand reading a book, the sun on my back.

I usually go to the beach with my husband and dogs. The dogs swim and then come and sit on me, or fling sand on me while they dig. My husband hates the sun and stands behind us with his arms folded, muttering about cancer.

It was bliss. Lying on my stomach, the sand acted like a giant shell held to my ear. There was the swishy sound of the sea and snippets of conversation came in pockets, as though from underneath. I read two pages of a book about an old lady with a bad-smelling coat. I dozed and felt disoriented when I woke up. I watched a little boy wearing a too-big wetsuit, his butt like a deflated dinghy. I waded into the water and got a bit scared of the big waves.

A boy with shiny earrings came and swam next to me. He said he was scared. When we dived under the waves, his elbows hit me and I would often surface wearing him on my head. He got out when I got out. His friends slapped him on the back.

I rolled a cigarette and settled into that relaxed state only swimming brings: skin tingling, hair like wet spaghetti, eyes emptied of worry. One of the swimming boy’s friends came and asked me for a cigarette. I asked how old she was. Seventeen, she said. Because I was feeling damp and magnanimous, I gave her tobacco and paper. Another girl squatted down and asked for tobacco. She picked up my glass water bottle and asked if it was wine.

She opened it and drank. Suddenly, I was surrounded by the entire posse, all asking for cigarettes, including one boy wearing a hat and a downy strip of hair on his upper lip. This boy’s eyes were funny, like he wasn’t really alive. He had cuts on his arm. He asked for a cigarette. Then he asked for money. I said no. “Can you guys go away now?” I said. “I just want to lie on the beach and read my book and get sunburnt.”

The boy in the hat kicked my backpack. Then he tried to snatch my tobacco pouch from my hands. He poked me hard on the back and walked away wearing one of my flip flops. The posse followed him up onto the railway tracks. They were gone. I sank back into zombie mode, watching a cormorant drifting on the water. Then I saw a shadow on the sand. It leapt off the wall behind me and grew bigger. I looked up. “Just give me a gwaai. Why are you being like this?” He was standing above me, his hat pulled low over his eyes. “Just give me one, or else.”

I stood up, picked up the water bottle and held it by the neck. I imagined I was a Glaswegian bouncer. I had a pitbull called Caesar and a day-job carrying steel tanks. At night, I liked to fight. I had only one of my original teeth.

“Or else what?” I hissed at the boy.

“I’m not scared, Aunty,” he replied. “I’ll hit you straight back.”

And I knew he would.

A man with a towel thrown over his shoulder came up to us. “You alright?” he asked me. “What’s going on?”

The boy sauntered off, stopping to pee against the wall before picking his way across the rocks and up onto the tracks.

I left the beach and drove home, passing the posse still walking on the train line. They were laughing and carrying their shoes. They looked small and young. As I drove, I thought about giving and taking. I thought about trust and the word “no”. I thought about the boy in the hat and the death in his eyes, and his pubescent face.

I felt ashamed for having threatened a kid with a bottle. I felt relieved that the man with the towel had arrived. And I thought about the violence breeding in every corner of the world – in a boy with a hat and a woman with a book.

Cape Argus

Related Topics: