his chair and reached for his cup of juice. ‘For them the island isn’t just a tourist site but a place of pilgrimage, and their one visit, maybe the only one they’ll ever make, was ruined by an American. Don’t get me started. For foreigners it’s just atrocity tourism. We can’t rebuild a society on atrocity tourism. I don’t know, maybe I shouldn’t have told you to go. I feel guilty that you’re not as connected to this country as I am, and jealous, too, that you’ve been free of it for so long.’ Dylan drank his juice, ate another spoonful of yogurt, and his eyes began to droop. Greg lifted him out of the chair and handed him to Nonyameko, who took him off to bed. ‘Don’t get me wrong,’ he said, ‘I’m thrilled you’ve finally come home. It’s just a shame you and Sarah are going to live in Jo’burg.’
We sat for a while in front of the fire, drinking a cheap bottle of pinotage that would cost four or five times as much in New York. Greg has been more or less single for as long as I’ve known him. There’s never been anyone else permanent in his life until Dylan. I know the boy is biologically his, but I don’t know the other details. The mother was either hired, or a friend I don’t know.
I think of our first meeting, at a depressing drinks event for new graduate students at NYU. Greg stood out in a pink sweater with his tattooed hands and black hair that had been dyed a shade of blue so dark the colour appeared only when the light hit it, making him look like an eccentric superhero. Discovering we had something more specific in common than mere foreignness, we spent the night talking in the corner and soon became close friends. A year later, he returned to Cape Town while I stayed in New York, finished my doctorate, married Sarah, and taughtpart-time at three different colleges, running up and down Manhattan until I was senseless with fatigue. When I was commissioned to write Clare’s biography I knew it was the opportunity I’d been looking for to do something different and, more importantly, an opportunity to try coming back home.
Absolution
They saw only one house, and it was so obviously perfect that Marie looked as though she had decided Clare would buy it even before they went inside. Clare was not as certain. The estate agent, a sunburned man with an overhanging stomach and a voice like curdled cream, met them at the entrance to the driveway, opened the gate with a remote control, and indicated they should follow him. The perimeter wall, half a metre thick, was topped with barbed wire wrought and painted to resemble ivy, with a staff of electrified wires above. It was self-effacing security for people embarrassed to think they needed it.
‘You’ve got all the security features here,’ the agent said, stepping from his car. ‘Cameras watch the exterior of the house, the entire perimeter wall, the gate, all the time. These guys are the best, primo . If they could smell the intruders they would, believe you me.’
They stood in the front garden, in a paved courtyard overlooking the steep terraces of the lawn falling down towards the street and the electric gate, now shut again, enclosing the three of them and their two shining cars. A group of gardeners, arms lax with fatigue, unloaded from a truck across the road, spilling out and trudging to the properties they were paid to tend, each announcing himself at a residential intercom, then waiting until the doors or gates opened, allowing access. It was the kind of neighbourhood in which Clare swore she would never live: a warren of celebrities, foreign dignitaries, and arms dealers. Perhaps it was fitting that she and Marie, scarcely less foreign in their way, possibly more dignified, should retreat to the company of such rabble.
‘So I should be paying for the privilege of being surveilled.’
‘Huh? Ja, well, they’ve got dogs, too, fully armed response with semi-automatic weapons and there are panic buttons in every room
We sat for a while in front of the fire, drinking a cheap bottle of pinotage that would cost four or five times as much in New York. Greg has been more or less single for as long as I’ve known him. There’s never been anyone else permanent in his life until Dylan. I know the boy is biologically his, but I don’t know the other details. The mother was either hired, or a friend I don’t know.
I think of our first meeting, at a depressing drinks event for new graduate students at NYU. Greg stood out in a pink sweater with his tattooed hands and black hair that had been dyed a shade of blue so dark the colour appeared only when the light hit it, making him look like an eccentric superhero. Discovering we had something more specific in common than mere foreignness, we spent the night talking in the corner and soon became close friends. A year later, he returned to Cape Town while I stayed in New York, finished my doctorate, married Sarah, and taughtpart-time at three different colleges, running up and down Manhattan until I was senseless with fatigue. When I was commissioned to write Clare’s biography I knew it was the opportunity I’d been looking for to do something different and, more importantly, an opportunity to try coming back home.
Absolution
They saw only one house, and it was so obviously perfect that Marie looked as though she had decided Clare would buy it even before they went inside. Clare was not as certain. The estate agent, a sunburned man with an overhanging stomach and a voice like curdled cream, met them at the entrance to the driveway, opened the gate with a remote control, and indicated they should follow him. The perimeter wall, half a metre thick, was topped with barbed wire wrought and painted to resemble ivy, with a staff of electrified wires above. It was self-effacing security for people embarrassed to think they needed it.
‘You’ve got all the security features here,’ the agent said, stepping from his car. ‘Cameras watch the exterior of the house, the entire perimeter wall, the gate, all the time. These guys are the best, primo . If they could smell the intruders they would, believe you me.’
They stood in the front garden, in a paved courtyard overlooking the steep terraces of the lawn falling down towards the street and the electric gate, now shut again, enclosing the three of them and their two shining cars. A group of gardeners, arms lax with fatigue, unloaded from a truck across the road, spilling out and trudging to the properties they were paid to tend, each announcing himself at a residential intercom, then waiting until the doors or gates opened, allowing access. It was the kind of neighbourhood in which Clare swore she would never live: a warren of celebrities, foreign dignitaries, and arms dealers. Perhaps it was fitting that she and Marie, scarcely less foreign in their way, possibly more dignified, should retreat to the company of such rabble.
‘So I should be paying for the privilege of being surveilled.’
‘Huh? Ja, well, they’ve got dogs, too, fully armed response with semi-automatic weapons and there are panic buttons in every room
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