26th of January 2023🥀

“Your anger is blinding, Leonardo.”

Letting his words hang in the air, Mkhulu (Grandfather) stands at the door of my room. Black cane in hand. His salt and pepper beard with more black than grey hairs along his formal attire. His sharp, dark eyes that mirror mine with stark similarity.

He casts his gaze down, where the model of my black airplane is broken beyond repair.The airplane that literally went flying moments ago and almost collided into his face as he opened the door. The airplane that I threw across the room, in a fit of rage moments ago.

From the look on his face I can tell that he is not happy. That makes two of us.

"Look at the mess it causes you to make." Mkhulu gestures to the floor, his eyes piercing mine, his nose flared.

I look away, pretending to busy myself with getting ready for school, as I fix the sleeves of my white shirt.

"You're blind." Mkhulu continues, walking further into my room, his cane clanking along with his footsteps

"Because,"he starts off but I cut him off, finishing the sentence for him.

"-Because all I see is red at this moment." I hold my gaze in the mirror, as I fix my blue tie, a whisper of a smile almost touching my lips and forming my dimples.

"Don't act smart with me, boy."

Mkhulu is a recovered, Angerholic, his words not mine. He's been anger free for twelve years, again, more of his words. So as any recovered person he feels like it's his right, no, his purpose to turn me from the path of anger and to the path of whatever he's doing right now.

"All you see is red." Mkhulu makes himself comfortable on my bed, his cane still in a tight grip as he continues his lecture that I've memorised from heart now.

"That's not how it's supposed to be, Leonardo. With anger you can't control the feelings within you.You just feel. We're not supposed to just see red. You're blind and you don't even know it."

His words, like many other times never ease the situation. In fact it only adds as this fuel to  a sort of unquenchable fire and I want to ask him to leave. I want to lose my manners for a moment, forget he's and adult and I -

"Maybe I want to be blind."

Mkhulu catches my dark eyes from the mirror and for a moment no word is uttered. My hands freeze on my tie.

"I have a cane and I'm not afraid to use it boy." He clanks his cane for emphasis but the tilting of his lips is not missed by me. The lighteness that contrasts so much in his dark eyes that it cannot be missed.

Mkhulu stands up, making his way to me with his metal cane. There was a time when I fainted before the cane even landed on me but I'm not afraid of it now.

No matter how loud it clanks and how close he gets I know he won't beat me. He told me that the beatings were for my youth and that if the rod didn't discipline me then I was a lost cause. I wonder if he thinks of me like that or if I'm becoming the man he wants me to be.

I turn to face him, my dark eyes holding his identical ones. He frowns at me the wrinkles forming on his face. Then he immediately gets to the task of fixing my tie properly.He unravels the angry mess I've made of it and starts at it again.

"When will you learn?"

The chuckle dies in my throat, I stay quiet, not trusting myself to say the right words.

Mkhulu says that anger is blinding because it makes you see red and only red but sometimes I disagree. Like right now. It's not that I don't see but it feels like I see everything, and with clarity. I see it all, to the tiniest details and that's what makes me angry.

I see it all and it shows me how much of a fool I've been.

Mkhulu adjusts the blue tie, pushing it further to my neck. Once he's satisfied with how it looks he smiles down at me. His hands holds my shoulders, squeezing gently as his eyes hold mine and no words are shared.

Both of us sigh at the exact same time and it ends with this heaviness in the air.

"She's not worth it." Mkhulu says, his eyes more gentle.

My eyes flick to  the airplane broken on the floor.Why'd did I do that, I think to myself.My heart sinks and every fiery feeling within me dissipates to smoke.

Mkhulu moves to the side in a way that blocks my view of the damaged airplane.He holds my gaze, hands still on my shoulders and I hold his and I see what he wants me to see.

For me, to understand that he understands and for him to see that I understand that he understands. Excellent communication.

Mkhulu takes my navy blue blazer off my bed and puts it on me. I catch the look in his eyes as  he skims over the merits that decorate my blazer on the sides.

"Go to school now you Grumpy boy" he says, amusement dancing in his eyes.

"Bye." I pull up my black bag and make my way to leave the house that feels oddly suffocating.

I cannot walk any faster, it feels as though the walls are closing in on me but as soon as I'm out with the door slam shut behind me, it still feels like I'm a roar away from being fine.

Promises. So many broken promises and that's what makes me mad.

She's what makes me mad.

Mkhulu used to say that my fits of anger are my way of crying for attention.

Unfortunately no matter how angry I get my mother will never give me the time of day. Nope, not even a second.

❄️❄️❄️

Vistelia High School. A school with a population of half the students who all look, think and breathe the same. And the other half who all differ in various ways, which makes for serious clashing.It's been four years in this school and it still bothers me.

I can't wait to get out.

I step into the greengates along with the other latecomers who all run to their classes with urgency.

Running won't make them any earlier.

After walking down the hallway, I step into the classroom. A hush falls over the class and all eyes are on me, a few of my friends flash me teasing smiles.

I smile, dimples and all to Mrs Jones, apologetically. "Sorry I'm late."

"Again." Mrs Jones clarifies, shaking her head, with a tight lipped expression.

All eyes are off me, as the class pays attention to the lesson. Walking further into the classroom I take a seat in the back corner by the window. I'm slightly irritated by whoever is sitting next to me. I've sat alone in this class for awhile and have enjoyed it.

I stare at the brown desk that has been scribbled on with horrid words and couples initials. I try to focus on the lesson, but Mrs Jones voice cannot be anything but background noise.

It's irritable. Everything is. The person sitting next to me. The birds chirping. The two girls gossiping in the seats ahead of me. The cackling of the boys in class.The clicking of someone's pen.

Irritable.

All of it adding to the rising of this dramatic unquenchable emotion within me. I hate that I feel, and how that makes me feel. I hate that I feel and it's deep and it cuts like a knife, like the very first time, every single time.

I pull out my ear pods from my blazer, my movements, desperate, as I connect them to my phone and press play on a song.

Flight.

The song starts and everything is drowned out, and it's easier to breathe again. It's rap.

But it's not hard and harsh with beats louder than the lyrics. It's easy, chill and soul cutting. It means something. It's my favourite song, hit on replay more times than a song should but it's because of how it makes me feel.

Like I'm literally taking flight. In the clouds.

The rapper, with his deep, velvety tone keeps it poetic and slow, not in a hurry but then it gets deeper and faster and realer and every word hits. Every word relates, like it was written just for me.

Cause all the sorrow, gonna oneday take flight.

Take flight, is spoken a couple times and each time he mentions more things that he wishes, prays and hopes would take flight.

It's in the chorus of the song, where the choir harmonizes, so richly that I feel it from my chest and the melody  
grows into a way that would only be described as the feeling of flying.

With my shut eyes, and the music drowning out everything, it all comes back to me in pictures, feelings and words. This morning, I got a call while getting ready for school.

It was an unknown number.

I paused, like I always did when I received a call and then picked up a second later.

The line was quiet but I could clearly hear breathing.

"Hello?"

"... Leonardo."

And even though it had been years since I saw her face to face, her voice was one I could identify even when drowsy.

"Mama."  I held the phone closer to my ears, like that would stop her from dropping the phone. I felt the rising and falling of my chest.

"..."

"Ma... wha- I -where um-" My brain stuttered, my words were failing me because it had been so long, so much so that I forgot that I missed her.

"How's school? Mkhulu?I heard you're in grade eleven."

"Twelve." I corrected her." School's fine, Mkhulu's fine. Why'd you call?"

A pause.

"I just...I just called to say I love you." And she sounded like she'd been crying.

"Mama, are you coming home? A few months ago, last year. You told Mkhulu that you'd be coming on the 30th of January. It's in a few days and —"

" I'm sorry. I can't." She sounded so much like herself, more believable than the I love you, she sputtered a few seconds ago. This was her.

"..."

"Maybe in the next few months..."

"..."

"You understand,right?"

"..."

"It's just that work has been so hectic and life all the way in another province." And she continued listing of her excuses, forcing me to understand what didn't make sense.

"I'll call again soon. Goodbye Leo." And she dropped the phone.

Before I could say bye or tell her I love her she dropped the phone and it's almost like I could hear her sigh all the way from the province Free State like she was glad she got rid of the burden labeled, Leo.

It would be months till we received another call from her. A call in which she'd make a promise to come back. Then she'd be silent for months and when the date she promised to come approached, she'd call me and cancel.

She'd  done this for years, since I was fourteen and it's crazy how each time, despite teaching myself not to, some part of me believed she was coming back. Some part of me always waited.

I felt like a fool, with my ear still to the phone like she'd call back and say she was lying. I let the phone fall to the bed limp and for a moment I didn't know what to do with myself.

I felt the hard, tightness in my chest and wished with everything in me that I didn't receive a call from the unknown number.

My eyes caught the black model airplane on my black desk. It stood with it's antique beauty, telling a story of it's own and it made me furious.

I picked the airplane up, holding it in my hands, going over the intricate details. It was the only thing my mother bought for me. I was four years old.The only —

With the loudest heartbeat, I threw the airplane across the room, a grunt tearing out of my chest and it hit the door just as it was opening, with Mkhulu on the otherside.

He froze, his dark eyes taking in my position, the rising and falling of my chest, the broken airplane on the floor that almost collided into his face.

He didn't have to ask what happened because he knew only one thing could get this rise out of me.

"Your anger is blinding, Leonardo."

❄️❄️❄️

I pull out the earpods as the song ends although I want to hit replay for a couple more times, I know I shouldn't.

Grade twelve, I have to keep reminding myself sometimes before I make stupid decisions.

After drowning out everything for three minutes through music, it feels like I've come up for air. This is the last place I want to be. Everything is more  irritable.

The lecture. The talking. The cackling.The clicking pens. The shuffling of shoes. The person sitting next to me.

A  small hiccup interrupts my trail of thoughts. I decide to take my books out so I can at least look busy.

Another hiccup.

There are already a lot of notes on the board and Mrs Jones  lectures on in a tried, frustrated tone. Her eyes flash to mine, like she knows I haven't written anything. "Get to work Mr July and stop playing the staring contest with me."

Another hiccup.

I pull out my pen and start writing.I can already feel the hand cramp that I'll have after all these notes.

More hiccups.

Doesn't this person have water or something?!

I glance to my side, and and am met with the sight of a  girl with small eyes, warm brown skin and braids tied into a bun.

She stares down at her notebook, writing like she's not hiccuping every second, jolting in her seat like she's been zapped.

Sighing frustratedly, I pull out my blue water bottle from the side of my bag and hand it to her.

She lifts her head and her coffee brown eyes meet mine. We lock gazes, wordless until she hiccups, looking away.

" You should drink this."

She hesitates for a second staring at me in a mix between shock and utter embarrassment.

She hiccups again but this time she takes the bottle, our fingers brushing slightly. She opens the lid and pours the water in her mouth gulping audibly.

She hands it back to me, her small eyes avoiding mine.

"Thank you."

"Sure" I reply,a small smile on my face.

She looks back at her work writing the notes on the board but my eyes never leave her.

Mkhulu was right. I guess my anger can be blinding or else I definitely wouldn't have noticed her earlier. Has she always sat next to me?

She bites her plump pink lips in concentration as she reads the words on the board and writes them down quickly.

She freezes for a second. Then turns her head and catches me openly gawking at her.

"Hey." I say, smiling-my dimples,prominent.

She blinks. Once. Twice.

"Hi."

"I'm Leonardo. "

" I know, " she says in a duh tone.

" You are?"

She looks insulted and also annoyed but in the blink of an eye it's gone.

She smiles at me and it's simply beautiful.

"I'm Olivia "

"Olivia " I repeat, tasting the name on my lips.

A small smile adorns her lips, but it's quickly gone. She looks back at the board and continues writing.

"Have you always sat next to me?"

I can't be that oblivious.

" Nope just today. Before you came we were all reassigned new seats."

"Oh" I try not to sound too happy.

She holds my gaze a little longer and I wonder what she's thinking.

The bell rings loudly and half the class is already running out ignoring the teacher's rant about how the bell doesn't dismiss us but she does.

Olivia packs her books into her pink bag and gets up to leave.

"Make sure you get that hiccup treated earlier next time." I tease her.

She smiles,embarrassed and walks away leaving me alone in my thoughts.

❄️❄️❄️

"You're smiling. Don't tell me you killed someone" Mkhulu jokes, as he leads me in the house.

"Can't a boy just have a good day at school" I argue, pulling off my blazer.

"Not if the boy's name is Leo," Mkhulu  settles on the grey couch, pressing play on the  soccer match he was watching before I came.

I take a seat next to him and we're quiet as we watch the game. Every time his team scores he clanks his cane on the ground so loudly I'm surprised the earth doesn't shake. On the other hand when his team seems like it's losing he looks like he's minutes away from throwing the cane at the television.

After the game concludes, he throws his fists in air smiling victoriously and it's so contagious.

"Go take out your uniform," he orders me.

"Okay Mkhulu." I get up, picking my blazer up and walk away.

But before I can completely leave the dining room I turn around.

"Mkhulu?"

"Mmm" he says, eyes still on the television.

"You were.... right.Maybe my anger is blinding and...I'll work on that I guess " I say say, rubbing the back of my neck.

" But when I open my eyes it sure is good to see something different something new. Something I've never seen before" I continue,a fond smile on my face.

Mkhulu turns his head and looks at me, completely baffled.

"What types of drugs did you take boy? Go take out your uniform before I knock you out with this cane."

Laughing loudly, I head off to my room and when I shut the door. I taste her name on my lips with a goofy smile on my face.

"Olivia"

★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★

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