“I’ll get there when I get there.” Her mother was not a woman to cower in the face of danger. Like most South African women, when danger came, she picked up arms and got to work against it. Her way of combating the danger was to stay close to her daughter and keep a sharp eye on everything.
Kedi’s mother had never learned to drive when her husband was alive. He would never have allowed it. She started driving school still wearing her widow’s weeds. Kedi wondered sometimes how her mother had ever managed to pass the driving test. She was a terrible driver and she was a complete demon on the road. She weaved in and out of the traffic as if she were at Kayalami.
Kedi leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes. She didn’t want to know what all the hooting was about. It was a relief when her car finally came to a halt and she found that they’d made it to the studio without an accident.
Kenamile was waiting for them when they came out of the lift on the floor from where Ebony Music operated. After graduating from university with a business degree, she’d taken over as Kedi’s personal assistant. Kedi liked having people around her whom she could trust. It was all about loyalty. There was no one she trusted more than her little sister. Kenamile was efficient and knew Kedi so well that she took care of most things before Kedi even knew she needed them done.
The sisters and their mother headed to Kedi’s office to drop off her bag. Ebony was big enough now to have their own studio at their business premises, and since Kedi was their biggest artist, she had an office of her own too. It made everything very convenient.
“The band thinks it’s best to start with ‘Land of Love’, especially since we needed to hire the sax and trumpet players to sit in,” Kenamile said. “If we can get it down in the next few days, Louise thinks we should release it as a single before the album is ready, to get people excited. Especially with the tour coming up.”
“Sounds good.” Kedi loved that song. It was a haunting ballad about the continent, a land of love, brutalised for centuries but always resilient. She knew it would be a hit everywhere, not just in South Africa. She hoped it might even be her big breakout song overseas. That was one of the goals she was still aiming for, to make it big in Europe and the US.
The band was already working on the arrangement in the practice room down the passage from reception. “Okay, I need to get to work,” Kedi said, hoping her mother would get the hint.
“I’ll come with you,” Baitse said.
“You really don’t have to. I’ll be here until late. Why don’t you call one of your daughters-in-law and go shopping, or go and see your grandkids? You can take my car,” Kedi suggested. She didn’t like the idea of her mother wasting her time at the studio, and her two eldest brothers lived in Joburg, one a lawyer, the other the owner of a plumbing company, both married with kids.
“Nope. I’m fine,” her mother answered. “I’m here to take care of you, and that’s what I’m going to do.”
The woman was stubborn when she got her teeth into something, Kedi had to admit. It could have been why she had withstood twenty-four years of marriage to a man almost every person he met couldn’t stand. That was probably why she was so successful at business too. Baitse just didn’t give a business the option of failing. Kedi sighed and headed for the practice room, her mother following closely behind her.
Everybody was there. Sipho, the lead guitar player; Ace, on bass guitar; Dintwe on keyboards; and Clipper on drums. They were like a family. They travelled all over the continent together, doing concerts. Each of these musicians had a high work ethic, which was part of the reason Kedi was so successful. She never forgot that. She knew she would not have managed without them.
“Hi, guys!”
Dintwe gave her a hug. “You feeling up to this?”
“Sure, I’m fine. I just need to get to work. Get my mind off things.”
Kedi greeted the trumpet and sax players, both women she’d worked with before. She’d already worked out the logistics to take them on tour with the band after the album came out. Eventually she’d love to have them permanently in the band, if they could manage that. She liked the depth horns gave to a piece of music, and both of these women were very talented and committed musicians.
Kedi slipped out of her shoes, kicked them into a corner of the practice room and got straight to work. The time slipped away as she and the band tried various arrangements of the song. Kenamile brought lunch for everyone; they broke for thirty minutes and then were back at it. Kedi got lost in the work, in the music. Security and stalkers disappeared. None of that mattered. All that mattered was getting the song right.
She was so thankful for the music. The almost mathematical intricacies that could be shifted to take a song from good to magical completely took over her mind. They were doing it and it felt fantastic.
The practice room had no windows, so it was only when Kedi walked out of the room and looked down the passage to the window at the end that she realised it was dark outside. She checked her watch: it was 21:15. “Hey, it’s late, guys. Sorry.”
“No problem,” Clipper said. “We got it where we wanted it, tomorrow we record.”
“Anyway,” Dintwe said, “what could we say, you’re the boss.”
Kedi looked at him and he smiled, but she could see he wasn’t happy they were leaving so late. “Sorry, I hope Princess won’t be too upset.”
“I’m sure she’s in bed by now,” Dintwe replied.
Kedi felt even worse. No one else in the band had kids, at least ones that lived with them. She reminded herself that she needed to be more sensitive to Dintwe’s situation. She rubbed his shoulder. “Sorry, really.”
Just when they were about to take the lift down to the parking garage, Louise came out of her office. Her face showed she was under some sort of stress. She seemed reluctant to say what she obviously needed to. “Can I see you before you go?” she said to Kedi.
“Sure.” Kedi turned to her mother and Kenamile. “Can you guys hold up just a minute?”
They both came back out of the lift and sat down on the sofas in the reception area as Kedi followed Louise to her office.
Louise sat down behind her desk and Kedi seated herself in one of the visitor’s chairs.
“I know you didn’t want to do this, but . . .” Louise started.
“Dumela, mma,” a voice said from behind Kedi, a voice she knew. Though she didn’t want to, she turned to see the man sitting on the sofa against the wall. He looked relaxed, his arm along the back of the sofa, one leg stretched out in front of him. He wore faded jeans and the worn brown leather jacket Kedi knew only too well.
It was Sefhemo. His hair was shorter and the moustache was gone, but the eyes were the same. His head was shaved nearly bald, which brought out his eyes and the good bone structure of his face even more. He seemed just as fit as he’d been when he was twenty-five, the last time she’d been this close to him.
She tried to ignore the racing of her pulse and to banish all thoughts of how he looked from her mind.
Kedi stood up without speaking to Sefhemo. “Louise, you said you would take care of this – that was our deal. I’m
