Leon's Monologue

“You do look like her … You have the same facial shape … Even the same colouring. Sam was always darker in complexion, like our mother … I say, if Sam was a boy, she would have looked like you.”
Panicking, my brain goes into overdrive. I cannot respond.
Finally, Leonie swoops in for the rescue. “He managed to track you down. He also wants to find his father. Would you happen to know who he is?”
Manda steps back. “How about you come in?”
I hold Leonie’s arm, until the other are a little ahead. “What the hell are you doing!”
“She won’t remember. You know that is how it works, just in case someone is tempted. We have an hour at the very least, until her brain goes into reset mode. If my experience is anything to go by, she won’t remember how we
Leonie had separated from the group, and rushed to her previous home. Using pictures she kept for that specific purpose, she proved who she was to her mother. That only lasted for an hour.
All I will say is Williams had to pick her up at the police station.
With a feeling of trepidation, I enter my old home. Everything looks exactly the way it did three years ago. The only difference is my bike is no longer there. My painting of Nelson Mandela, for which I won a prize in Grade Six is also gone.
“Sit,” Manda says. Her gaze falls on me, and stays there. “Speak.”
“Who is his father?” Leonie asks.
If Manda finds it odd that Leonie seems to be doing the talking for me, she doesn’t mention it. When she speaks, she still addresses me however. “I don’t know. That is the honest
“We told each other everything. Besides, I was with her when the doctor gave her the results. You can’t fake that amount of shock.”
Leonie presses her point, “Ye, maybe there was still someone …”
“Sam was not into men. Never showed any interest in men, whatsoever.”
“Oh.” That seems to momentarily fry Leonie’s brain.
There is silence. It goes on for almost five minutes. Manda’s eyes never leave my face.
At last, I stand, “Thank you. You have been of help. We’ll chase down other clues, and get back to you.”
Before I can take two steps, Manda jumps up, and grabs me. “You are always welcome here.” Tears fall from her eyes, as she pulls me in a very familiar, very tight embrace. “Visit any time you want. Please visit.”
I work hard to hold my own tears back. But I want to cry. Heavens know, I want to sob.
That embrace, just these few seconds remind me of everything I use to be. They remind me of watching lousy American sitcoms on Saturday. It reminds me of ice creams on Sunday, after church. Her smell of print now also reminds me of the smell of takeaways from the Pakistani place, that we bought every week night because we were both too lazy to cook.
After she releases me, I nearly fall over in my haste to get out of her house. In my haste to escape the only true home I ever