My chest feels tight as I reach inside the bag and pull out the gift. A leather portfolio. Rich brown, soft but sturdy,DKembossed in the corner.
“Thank you. I’ll carry it well.”
Gogo takes my hand. “This is where you are going, neh? Not where you’ve been.”
“Yebo, Gogo.” I nod, understanding what she means.
“Neo, watch the grill,” my father says. “DK, walk with me.”
I follow him toward Gogo’s garden beds. He’s a quiet, steady man. A civil engineer who migrated from the Philippines to South Africa for work in his twenties. He met my mother at a church social and fell fast. She worried about their racial and cultural differences, about what people would say and do. But he courted those fears away. They married within months and have been together for thirty-four years. I’ve seen them battle the rough periods that strained their marriage, but love and respect for each other always pulled them through.
My dad’s a good man. A good father. The kind who read bedtime stories and tucked us in. The kind whose quiet presence never felt like absence. The kind who only talks when he has something to say. So when he speaks, you listen.
“Your mother and I worked hard to build a life in Gauteng and then here,” he says. “We wanted to instill that ethic in you and your brother. Neo works on his own terms—he isn’t defined by it. But you…” He exhales, the weight of it heavy. “You worked yourself to the exclusion of everything else. I never wanted that for you.”
“I know.” The memory crowds my chest, the breaths squeezing through the guilty clutter. “It’ll be different this time,” I promise. “Smaller town. Smaller role.”
“The size of the role isn’t the issue, DK.” He looks at me squarely. “It’s what you give it—and what you keep for yourself.”
“I hear you.” I’ve had months of therapy. Months to reflect. I have tools… a game plan. “I’ll be fine, Dad.”
He squeezes my shoulder. Firm, caring. Still worried.
It wasn’t just me who experienced that crash and burn. None of us came out unscathed.
“Asidleni!” Gogo calls out, cutting through the moment. “The food is getting cold. I didn’t spend all morning cooking for it to be eaten like ice cream.”
“We better get back,” he says, “before Gogo hunts us down.”
Beneath the joke, he’s actually a little afraid of my grandmother. She didn’t approve of a Filipino man who spoke broken Zulu for her only child. But she’s developed an affection for him, seeing how much he loves his family. She just keeps it well-hidden.
After great food and birthday cake, I load my bags into the car. Gogo sends me off with enough leftovers to feed the town. There are goodbye hugs all around, and I make a sworn promise to be back in a few weeks for Gogo’s birthday.
While everyone waves from the porch, Neo jogs down to catch me before I climb in.
“You good?” he asks, rare seriousness breaking through his carefree demeanor.
“Yeah. Fresh start. It’s what I need.”
“And Luna?”
I shake my head. “One-time thing.”
“I saw your face when you brushed me off. Didn’t read over and done.”
“That’s what we agreed to.”
“So? Plans change. This kinda thing doesn’t work on a schedule.”
“Leave it, Neo.”
Luna’s already reached the shore and taken off toward something important—and I’m still treading water.
He studies me for a beat, fighting his instinct to push. I can see the moment he decides to let go. He nods and gives me one last hug. “I’ll come see you next weekend. Check out your new digs.”
“Sounds good.” I open the door and start the engine. Cue up my amapiano playlist for the hour drive, letting the syncopated beats of deep percussion, log drums, and piano fill the car as I point toward Bayside?—
Putting distance between me and that one incredible night.
