Vusi's Gift

"Please help! My baby," she screamed. "Help, somebody help! Please somebody, she is in the car! My car has been hijacked! My precious baby is in the back seat of the car!" Screamed the woman again. She was in her early thirties, expensively dressed, and she was screaming hysterically.
I could not take it anymore. You see, the unspoken rule in the township is, when you hear noises or footsteps outside your house, you don’t go out! Actually, you need to switch off everything, including the TV! Because you might never know who is watching you. So when this lady started screaming, I knew something serious was happening outside.

"What was she doing out at this time of the night?" I asked myself.
I immediately switched off the lights and the TV! My heart pounding heavily, I peeked outside. Yes, it was a young woman, although it was dark, it could tell that she was slim build and tall, actually she looked taller than I was. I have a thing with tall women, so when I saw her, I thought she wouldn’t make it as my girlfriend, so why help her? Then again my Christian upbringing got the better of me.
I grudgingly walked to the door, unlocked the door hook, and turned the key, then I deactivated my security alarm. The funny thing is all this time, the thought; that; she was taller than I was, was ringing at the back of my head.

"Psss! Psss! Come over here," I whispered. Just in case one of those thugs was still out there. This is Kanyamazane, one of the most dangerous townships in South Africa. She looked towards my direction.
"No, no, please do not hurt me, please!" She begged.
"Lady, I just want to help! I heard you screaming and I came outside from my own house, risking my own life, so you either let me help you or I go back!" I said sternly.
"Please help me, they took my car, and my baby is in the back seat!" She said sobbing, tears running down her face.
"Ok, come, let's go inside and we can call the police for help!" I said to her. She was reluctant at first, then she seemed to change her mind. "Ok!" She tardily said.

"Would you like a glass of water?" I asked, actually, I already had it in my hand.
"Yes, thank you!" She replied, and took the glass. Then silence took over, neither of us spoke. I looked at her. She was dressed expensive, one of those designer clothing labels.
Her hair was beautiful. Long and shiny. Her face was covered and smeared with makeup from the crying. She still looked beautiful though. She was looking down on the floor as if she was praying.

"What’s your name?" I finally got the courage to ask her. "Where were you going at this time of the night?" I asked again, before she answered.
"Thembi, my name is Thembi," she said. "I live in West Acres, Nelspruit. My boyfriend and I had a fight; he chased me and my baby out from his house. I was on my way to my parents' house in zone 4, here in Lekazi, Kanyamazane, when two men forced my car off from the road and hijacked it with baby at the back seat."

"I'm very sorry for what has happened to you, I think we should call the police. Is that okay? Do you have your parents' number also, maybe we can call them too." I said to her.
"No I don’t. They don’t have a phone. It was stolen a week ago," she replied. So I called the police. They said we should give them an hour to come. I went to the bedroom and brought a blanket and gave it to her. "Thanks," she said.
"So what’s your name?" She asked.
"John." I said.
"I'm sorry to have woken you and your family," she continued, I'm sure your wife is not pleased with you, helping strange women, but please thank her for me!

"No, it’s okay. I don’t have… (I cleared my throat) I don’t’ have a wife." I told her. "She passed away from cancer two years ago, we never had any kids."
"Oh, I’m sorry to hear that, my sincere condolences!" She said.
I called the police again, they said only one vehicle was available and they were waiting for it to return from another call out, then they will attend to us. We sat and talked. She told me about her life and so did I. It seemed as though we had met before. We connected.

She was beautiful, smart, educated; she reminded me a lot of my wife. Maybe it was the company that made me felt joyous and alive this night. She of course, could speak of nothing except about her baby that was in the car. Hoping and praying that the child will be safe and protected. After all she is a mother.

Around pass midnight, a knock came on the door. "At last, it has been a long wait, but now it’s over," I told her while on my way to open the door. I deactivated my alarm, unlocked the door hook, and turned the key when suddenly… the door was kicked from the outside!

"You bitch, you think you can run away from me and shack up with your boyfriend. You take me for a fool!" Said this man who forced his way through my door and went straight to where Thembi was sitting. He slapped her on the face. Thembi screamed and tried to run away to my bedroom. She was too late. The man held her with her hair and pulled her towards him. She screamed from pain. Another man walked in and came straight to me with his fists clenched. He punched me on the face with his right fist and I went down like a sack of potatoes. It was funny really, because, here are these men whom I don’t know, force their way into my house and start beating the hell out of me.

I tried to scream for help, it was useless. The bulky man hit me again in the face and I blacked out.
"Wake up, wake up!" Said a man’s voice. I could not move. My hands and legs were tied to a chair.
"So you think you can have my girlfriend for yourself," he asked. "The bitch disrespect me and she come running to you! Look at you now, I'm here, do you thing!" Said this man.

"Please I don’t know what you are talking about!" I told the man.
"Shut up, shut up," he said again.
"You think you can mess with my girlfriend? You and Thembi take me for a fool? I told her; that I will find her boyfriend!" He hit me in the face again. Blood was all over the floor. It was my own blood.
"Where was Thembi?" I asked myself. I heard a sobbing noise behind me. I slowly turned around, I saw her. She was lying on the floor, face down, and covered in blood.
The bulky man came and hit me again, I screamed in agony. The pain was unbearable.

"Who are you; You are making a mistake!" I said, begging these men to stop beating us.
"Thembi was carjacked outside and I was helping her call the police!" I continued. "I'm innocent, I was trying to help her from the carjacking, we are not lovers!" I said convincingly.
"Not only that you are a coward, but also a liar! You are telling me that you are not messing with my girlfriend?"
"Yes, yes, yes, I am!" I said. "Thembi," please tell him.
"Vusi, Vusi, please, love; please listen to him, he’s telling the truth, he is not my boyfriend! He was helping me because I was carjacked while on my way to my parents' house."

"Your parents' house? Here in Lekazi? You told me that your parents lived in Barberton," said an angry Vusi. "You lied to me? Why? Tell me Bitch!" Vusi continued.
"I was afraid that if you knew where my parents lived you will terrorize them, so I lied to you for their safety," said a sobbing Thembi. "Remember what you did to my brother’s house! When I ran to his place after we had a fight, you broke all the windows of his car, just to force him to give me up! You did the same to my friends, and I didn’t want that to happen to my parents. You are doing that right now!"

"You lying Bitch," he shouted, slapping her on the face, she screamed in pain. He slapped again.
"You are a fool Thembi! I gave you everything you ever wanted, and this is how you thank me? Bad mouthing me in front of your stupid, useless boyfriend! I will show you both, and teach you a lesson you will never forget!" Said Vusi enraged. In all the people I have met in my life I have never seen an angrier man as I was seeing this man today! I was afraid. Then the torture began. The bulky man came, clenched his fists and started beating me again. His fists were as big as a hammerhead. I had never been beaten like this in my whole life. It reminded me of school. When one of my Math teachers used to force us to learn a sum. Every time you made a mistake you were beaten until you got it right. That just made me hate Mathematics and many other kids did too.

"Sgidi, bring the gift from the car," said Vusi to the bulky man. Like a dog, taking instructions from its owner, he obeyed, stopped hitting me and went outside.
"Please Vusi, don’t kill us, at least don’t kill this man, he is innocent, please let him go and you can do whatever you want with me, but please don’t kill him!" Said Thembi begging her boyfriend.
"Spoken like a true lover," replied Vusi. "I have something for you two!" Then the bulky man, Sgidi entered; holding something in his hands.

"Here; you Bitch, here is your baby! You thought I didn’t know that, he was the father! You lied and said her father died, but you knew all along… and you made me support you and your baby all this time!" Said a grinning Vusi.
"My Baby, oh my baby, where did you get her! Thank you God! I knew you will protect her!" Thembi cried, praying out loud as if she was in a trance.
"God, protecting her? Yeah! Very funny Thembi! It was me who arrange for your car to be carjacked, I ordered them to follow you and take the car. The fools brought the baby with them! They showed me where they carjacked you, and we searched every house in this neighborhood until we found you here!"

"Sgidi, kill them! Commanded, Vusi. I want you to start with the boyfriend, while I entertain her!"
"No, please, Vusi, please, don’t kill him, he’s innocent, his crime was just to help me, please don’t kill him!" Pleaded Thembi.
"Shut up," screamed Vusi. He dragged her to the bedroom and threw her on the bed. As he was forcing her legs apart, a gunshot went! Bang! Bang! Bang! She stopped screaming and knew it was all over.

Vusi was undressing himself as the gun went off; he had no care in the world of what was happening in the other rooms.
Then the bedroom door was flung open! And John walked in, staggering, like a wounded soldier, with a gun in his hand. He had shot the bulky man dead, and he was here to save her. His Thembi. Thembi screamed, Vusi turned around, jump to his gun which was on the floor lying next to his pair of trousers. He took aim; then John fell down before he could even shoot at him, his face went bewildered, and he didn’t understand because he had not shot him! Who did? He asked himself. The room went silence; Thembi just lied there on the bed. And John was lying down on the bedroom floor, blood coming out....

A few days later…

"Ouch!" Said the voice.
"Sorry, is it still painful?" A woman’s voice asked.
"Yes." Replied the voice again. "What happened?" Asked the voice, it was a man’s voice.
The woman, sighed, sounding sad, she held his right hand with both her hands.
"Vusi is dead. He was killed by the police just after… they, they shot you, by accident, as they discovered later," she said stammering. "The police though you were one of the thugs and they shot you and then shot at Vusi too, because both of you were holding guns, I'm so sorry for all the pain and trouble I’ve caused you. I never meant for any danger to happen to you!" She said sobbing lightly, it was Thembi.

"What? How come I’m alive?" Asked the man. It was John. He was confused, didn’t know, nor understand how come he was alive.
"I thought you were dead too, when I saw your body on the bedroom floor, I screamed after Vusi was shot and I ran to you on the floor, the police came in, I told them that they had shot at an innocent man, an ambulance was called, you were rushed to the hospital. The doctors said you needed a new liver. I was scared. They told me that you had been suffering from liver failure for the past three years and was waiting for a new liver. The bullet from the police had hit you on the left arm, and passed through to the wall in the bedroom, you fell because of the shock and tiredness from the beatings from that thug, you were unconscious."

Then to everyone’s surprise, Vusi was an organ donor. All his major organs, he had donated all of them to the hospital, the only thing needed to be done was to find his next of kin, and I was there!! I was asked to sign for the release of these organs, and you were given a new liver in a matter of hours, Vusi’s hate turned out to be his greatest gift….