Fourways Mall
It’s Saturday at 1:37pm. I’ve been sitting in the 2nd floor parking trying to muster the energy to walk in there to do everything on my to-do list: buy bread rolls for the kids’ lunch, new school shoes for Khanyi, check on the price of a new iron, and maybe just maybe upgrade my phone contract.
Zweli, you can do this. You can do this in 3, 2, 1, GO!
I jump out of the car resisting the pull-back and run through the doors. First place, Checkers. To the bakery section. I find the bread and put it in the basket. I can see they’re selling fans. Maybe I should check on the price of fans elsewhere in case I need to buy it from here. Put the basket down, run out of the store, and off to Game.
Getting inside of Game I look for the electronics aisle. On the way there, I see a bicycle chain. I’ve been meaning to buy a bicycle chain. But will a chain from Game last? Let me keep this in the back of my head for now. Where are the fans again? One-thousand-four-hundred-and-ninety-nine-rand!? For a fan!? How much was the Checkers one again? Flip, let me run back there to find out.
On the way there I pass through the atrium. Crowds are passing through everywhere. I hate understanding what people are saying. Now their conversations are in my head. But I like the pretty summer dresses. I can see on the big advert screen that Jumanji is out. The kids would love that. I should probably buy tickets and surprise them before getting home. Where is Ster-Kinekor again?
“Zweli!?”
If I ignore her maybe she’ll go away.
“Zweli! Wait up!”
I guess I can’t ignore her. I turn around slowly “Hi Claire.”
“Hey. What are you guys doing next week Friday? We are having a braai.” Claire says.
I really don’t want to go. “I’ll have to check with Liz and get back to you. What time will it be?”
“ZWELI!!” a shriek comes from across the atrium. I can see hands waving in the air but can’t quite make out who it is as he walks closer. Oh, it’s Mkhokheli from work. Is now the time to be talking about work?
“Bro it’s all over the news! There’s been a data breach. They’ve sent us company-wide communication and we need to act now. Go read it yourself”
I still need to give Claire an answer. But I need to rush to Exclusive Books to get the newspaper to read about this. Maybe also buy a book about data breaches. Then rush to Postnet to look in my postbox for the company comms.
I tell Claire “let me get back to you, I promise” as I rush to read the news. The incomplete threads in my head are getting entangled into a ball of anxiety and sinking slowly down to my stomach. What did I come here for again?
This restless trip has been ludicrous. But would probably appear less so if it happened on my phone. As it usually does.