Grade 11, PUSH
It’s on a Friday afternoon when Lebohang Mabaso decided to visit her friend Busisiwe. In the house, she greeted everyone who was there. Busi and Lebo sat down, and had an interesting conversation until Busi’s sister came in. “Busi, didn’t you see…” the sister stopped immediately when she saw Lebo. They both looked at each other for a moment, and then Busi shouted, “Love at first sight!” and both of them came back to the real world, smiling at each other. “Hi, I’m Lebohang, and who are you?” said Lebo. “I’m Thembi, Busisiwe’s older sister.” Lebohang couldn’t stop staring at her; she couldn’t resist the beauty she was looking at, falling in love with her from that moment.
Thembi was a short light-skinned girl with beautiful eyes and a cute smile. Lebohang, on the other hand was tall, and light-skinned with beautiful eyes. A few days went by and the two became closer, with Lebo developing more feelings for Thembi. Lebo was so taken by her beauty that she couldn’t go a day without seeing her or talking to her. Lebo was scared to tell Thembi how she felt about her, thinking if she told her, it would break their friendship. Lebo decided to keep everything to herself.
Lebo’s uncle was a taxi driver; he had a daughter, and he was a smoker, but he didn’t drink. It was on the Saturday evening when he came back from work and found Lebo busy with her phone, listening to music. He asked her something and she didn’t hear him because she was on her phone; he snatched the phone from her and gave her a hot slap. She was confused as to why he slapped her, but he started to shout, telling her how useless and lazy she was. This broke her heart because she was always getting slapped and shouted at for no reason, and would break down in tears. Karabo, Lebo’s mother, was the only one who always supported her no matter what she was going through, but Lebo hadn’t told her mother that she was lesbian.
Only her mother knew, she had noticed that Lebo liked hanging out with boys and had started to dress like them. She kept quiet, because she knew how hard it was for her to walk in the streets while other people were judging her because of her sexuality. Pinky, her grandmother, also didn’t understand this thing of LGBTQ, but she forced herself to accept and support her grandchild. A few weeks passed and Lebo’s uncle started to change his ways; he stopped smoking, and started to treat Lebo better than before. Ever since he had started going to church, he had learned that he had to understand and accept Lebohang just the way she was, because he had been too hard on her. He had always thought that he was doing the right thing being hard on her; after the news came out that Lebo was a lesbian, it hadn’t sat well with him and he had become even harder on her, but now he realized that he was breaking her rather than supporting her. He made peace and everything was fine between them.
A few months passed, and Lebo and Thembi started to spend more time together. There was this kind of connection between the two, and Lebo couldn’t go a day without thinking about Thembi. They were having so much fun together, having lunch dates, going out to the movies, ice-cream dates and fun days. With all that time they spent together, the stronger Lebo’s feelings for Thembi got, and that was when she realised that she needed Thembi in her life. Someone who makes her happy, someone who was there for her when times were hard. When she was down and when she needed a shoulder to cry on. It was on a Friday afternoon that Lebohang decided to tell Thembi how she felt about her. Lebo went to her and greeted her, “Good afternoon, beautiful,” and Thembi smiled and said to her, “How are you doing today, my love?” They then took a walk and Lebo told her and that she had been hiding her feelings because she was scared of rejection. Thembi told her that she was feeling the same and they both decided that they would be together for as long as they loved each other.
A few days later Lebohang took Thembi home to introduce her as her girlfriend. Karabo her mother was so happy. Thembi met the rest of the family, and they were so excited to have Thembi around, Lebohang’s mother said that since they were together, they might as well just celebrate and have a braai. Lebo’s uncle went to buy the meat for the braai, the braai started, and they all enjoyed it and had fun together celebrating the peace and love in the family. Lebohang and Thembi were finally together just as Lebo had dreamed would happen, and together with her family and friends they both promised to love and protect each other, no matter what happened then or in the future.