Page 124 - The Mending Season

“I am. On behalf of the paper.”True to her word, Tihelo wrote the letter. She even came to our house to read it to me.I felt like she was treating me like someone her own age. She wanted me to let her know what I thought and if she needed to add or change anything. I took the opportunity to say that she should praise the school a little more because from what I had observed they valued the medias approval. “You should have seen how they were about the new head girl,” I told her. Tihelo listened to me, taking notes and shar­ ing some ofher ideas.Two weeks later, mid-term, KB moved to St Andrews. Veronica was allowed back after Beths parents enrolled her in another school, which had not yet desegregated. White girls continued to leave the school, and the make-up of our class changed a lot.One day in class, Marianne said something about how she had seen Beth at a hockey match oyer the weekend. Mrs Tanner overheard her and asked, “How is Beth?”Marianne said, “Shes fine, still an excellent hockey player.”Tamz said, “And a netball player?” Everyone laughed nerv­ ously.Mrs Tanner resumed the lesson. The teachers never said that it had been unfair to suspend Veronica. Even in our class, opinion on that was divided.After a while we shoved the memory ofthe incident on the netball court to the back of our minds. It was not a distant memory, only one we wished to ignore.Mma Motsei spoke to the Masemola sisters regularly now ... while they still kept to themselves and never went into otherpeople's houses, they greeted others andfelt more a part o fthe neighbour-124