November 2, 1999

      That summer, in what would be the last year of Tata’s life, we drove out to see another herb specialist in East London.

      At least, that’s what my aunt told him as we got in the car, but when we entered the city, she turned up Oxford Road and drove us to the office of a GP she knew from university. The car went silent then. I didn’t turn to look at his face when we stopped.

      Inside, my aunt cut past the line in the waiting room and forewent a greeting: “Smilo, you should be able to do something for him,” she told the doctor. “This is my brother.”

      The GP’s plaque read Dr Khathide. He was a short man with a salt-and-pepper goatee. He sat behind his desk and listened to her. His thick glasses were tinted in the glare that came in through a picture window above his desk, and he appeared calm. He smiled at my aunt and held out his arms, dappling them in sunlight. “That’s the reason I’m here,” he said.

      Tata was silent on our trip back to King William’s Town. Each time my aunt tried to speak to him, he closed his eyes and shifted in his seat, ignoring her until she gave up. As we drove past the BP gas station in Berlin, just outside East London, he turned on the radio and dialed up the volume.

      From the back seat, I watched as the two of them rode in silence. I opened a water bottle and swallowed my latest regimen, Faverin and Zoloft, and looked out of the window, thinking of Mama and what she could’ve done for us, if anything.

      Tata’s silence hung over us until we reached the driveway. Doris killed the engine and leaned back against her headrest with a sigh, taking a moment before getting out and opening the passenger door for him. She extended her hand, but as expected he waved her away, refusing to look at either of us.

      My aunt stood back and watched him undo his seatbelt, taking his time. Then she went ’round to the trunk and retrieved the groceries we’d picked up on the way. “Take these inside.”

      I carried the bags into the kitchen and dropped them on the counter. I could hear the car door slamming—Tata’s footsteps down the corridor—and then his bedroom door doing the same.

      My aunt came into the kitchen and sat at the table, her palms kneading her eyes as she sighed for the umpteenth time. “Do you know how to cook?”

      “I do.”

      “He used to like lamb stew and dumplings.”

      “He still does.”

      “That’s what we’ll make for him tonight then, but first go lock the front door and take his medication to him.”

      I didn’t lock. I took the bag of pills from her and went down the hallway, where I knocked and received what I expected from him, too. His silence. When I knocked a second time, the door opened and I found him sitting at the foot of his bed. The curtains were drawn on all of the windows but one. I found the stillness of the room hard to absorb; I’d grown used to his rasping.

      “I have your medication,” I told him.

      Raising his left palm, Tata motioned me toward his bedside table, where I put the plastic bag next to a sealed box of menthols and an empty tumbler. I filled the water glass from the faucet in his bathroom and set it back on the table.

      On my way out, Tata cleared his throat and asked me to wait. He was bending down to undo his laces, taking his time to liberate each foot. “How much better do you think this is,” he said, waving a hand at the table, “than the tonics I got in Ginsberg?”

      “The tonics?”

      “From the out-of-towner.”

      I knew which tonics he meant, but I’d wanted more time to think of an answer. I didn’t know what to tell him. I’d never shared his belief in herbal medicine.

      “I don’t know, Tata,” I said, and I didn’t.

       RTR: 008 / Date of Recollection: 05.30.2002 / 5.5 min

      My aunt’s engine stalls this morning just before we reach the school turn-off, which shouldn’t be embarrassing, but is. Through her windshield, I watch the scholar-patrol team holding up rusting steel beams, shifting old traffic cones through the drizzle.

      “This again,” I say.

      “Quiet.” Doris sighs. “This car has its problems and that’s not a new thing. You know that. Dumisani said he’d look at it, of course, but does he ever listen when a woman talks?”

      “I don’t know.”

      “He never listens when a woman talks.”

      I pick up a newspaper lying near my feet. The Eastern Cape Premier’s office wants credit for the release of 33 political prisoners, says the front page, but the national government’s refusing. Most of the inmates were attached to the ANC. I turn the page, and see a headline about how the police are still seeking help with the missing girls.

      My aunt clears her throat. “Don’t bother reading about the premier,” she says, twisting the ignition and causing the car to cough. “Even if it was Stofile and not Mbeki who released those men, what difference does it make? He’s still building the biggest house we’ve seen for blacks in this town.”

      “Is it true that 57 percent of them were convicted of murder?”

      “I don’t know. They would’ve done what they had to do.”

      “Tony Leon says they’re criminals.”

      “How would he know?” My aunt laughs and shakes her head. “You know, I never understood