Matebese's Constant

Trigger Warning: This story contains references to child sexual exploitation, domestic violence, bereavement, and alcohol abuse. Reader discretion is advised.

Shamrock green grass blanketed alpine peaks pointing to bright blue skies. The sun observed from afar as the biting wind chased her away. Below, longer blades undulated as one Drakensburger nibbled gently, moistening her feed. Matebese Lebajoa dreamt that one day the sun would shine on him. Makeshift cowbells clanged about as he threw on his grey blanket and emptied out the pebbles inside his worn Wellington boots. Matebese watched on as the herd made its way further into the open field searching for delectable pasture. He sauntered along to observe the cattle feeding. Here and there, a moo would be heard. Occasionally, Matebese threw a rock in the direction of wayward cows, sending them back into the pack.

He returned to the homestead at around six o’clock in the evening. The winter sun had bolted by five-thirty. Above, the roof was made of thatched grass, while the walls were made of sandstone, as was the prevailing custom. The ‘mokhoro’, painted white after mud plastering, had exactly one small window and one door. Cow dung was used to plug any crevices that would aerate the single room. Inside, there wasn’t much to indulge in either.

Electricity was a scant luxury. Thaba-Tseka was considered too far for such splendour. Any mobile phone charging needs were abated by the kindness of neighbours who’d fought to have theirs installed.

Matebese had to sleep by the door, being the only male in the mokhoro, so that any foe would have to contend with him first. Mathabiso Lebajoa, his mother, did her best to feed the family, with barely a penny to her name. Nthabiseng Lebajoa, his younger sister, was the pariah of the household, acting with impunity, with no regard for curfews.

Her eyes dropped on Nthabiseng’s new clothes. “And where did you get those pants?”

“Leave me alone,” Nthabiseng retorted, retreating to her corner of the bedsitter.

At sixteen, she was just another girl lured by the contractors working on Katse Dam, their promises of money a trap for ‘favors’.

In the morning, Matebese donned his uniform: a crinkled white shirt, grey pants that had edged up his shins, and a single navy jersey sagging at the clavicle.

He walked the ten kilometres to Phomolong Secondary, his old maroon backpack slung over his shoulder, already salivating over promised school lunch—pap, moroho, and khoho.

“Where have you been?” asked his friend, Chabeli.

“Herding,” Matebese replied.

They slipped into the classroom where Ntate Francis was already teaching.

“The main thing,” he articulated, “is to define your limits of integration.”

#

Matebese returned from school around four o’clock in the afternoon, after another 10 km walk as the sun retreated, hoping to be swallowed by a baying earth.

The air in the mokhoro was always still, heavy with cooled ash and held breaths. Mathabiso entered, her shadow falling across the floor where Matebese sat.

“My son,” she said, her voice a low thread of sound.

He looked up from his book. “Ma?”

She didn’t sit. “The exam fees… they might as well be on the moon.” The words were dust, falling between them. “I cannot reach them.”

A cold stone settled in Matebese’s gut.

“There is still time. A way…”

“Time is a rope that is fraying,” she said, finally meeting his eyes. “Your brother carried bricks at your age. Soon, you must carry weight.”

“Thabiso carries a grudge. I do not want his life. I want something better for all of us.” He leaned forward, the textbook forgotten.

“Has there been nothing from Dad?”

A faint, tired smile touched her lips.

“Your father, Tšepiso… the city lights are bright. They make a man forget the kerosene lamp back home.”

The old grief was there, worn smooth like a river stone.

Matebese’s mind raced.

“The black bull. The one with the crooked horn. We could sell him.”

“That cow is for droughts. For worse than this.”

“This is the drought!” The plea burst from him. He knelt before her, his voice dropping to a fervent whisper.

“Ma, the exams are the gate. If I pass—when I pass—the scholarship is the path. A real path. I could send money home. We could fix the roof. We could breathe.”

He searched her face, a map of all their struggles.

“Give me this one chance to lift the weight.”

She looked at him, at the fierce hope in his eyes, so different from Thabiso’s resigned coal-fire anger. Slowly, she nodded. Just once. It was a pact.

The door exploded inward.

Thabiso filled the space, reeking of sorghum beer and bitterness.

“Still feeding him dreams, Mother? While I break my back for your bread?”

“Thabiso—” she began, rising.

“No! You let him grow soft with books. Your favourite. Was I just the practice child?”

His words were thick, poisonous.

“No wonder Dad fled this house of weaklings.”

“Get out!” Mathabiso’s command cracked like a whip.

But Thabiso’s fury had found its target. He loomed over Matebese.

“You. A little man in a uniform. I will take you to the mountain. I will make you a man.”

Matebese stood, meeting his brother’s bloodshot gaze. The fear was ice in his veins, but he did not look away.

“You think that stare makes you strong?” Thabiso cackled.

He raised the bottle in his hand.

“Let me show you what strength is.”

The world erupted in a shower of brown glass and sudden, stunning pain. Matebese staggered, warmth flooding his temple, but a raw instinct surged. He shoved with all his weight, sending Thabiso stumbling back over the worn threshold of the door. His brother crashed onto the hard earth outside.

Mathabiso was there instantly, her hands on Matebese’s face, tilting his head. Her fingers came away colored crimson.

From the ground, Thabiso clutched his back, his rage deflating into a wounded snarl.

“You are finished,” he spat.

“Never come back here!” Mathabiso cried out, with a final, shattered authority.

“Why? To see the whore and her scholar?”

Thabiso dragged himself up, weaving into the darkness.

“A pair of fools!”

Matebese caught his mother’s arm as she moved to shout again.

“Leave him, Ma. He is not worth it.”

She turned back, her eyes clearing, focusing on the wound. She pressed the edge of her shawl to his head. The cut burned, but her touch was steady.

“It’s not deep,” she murmured, more to herself than to him.

In her eyes, the pact was now sealed in blood and glass. There was no turning back.

Matebese winced in pain as his mother cleansed his head until the wound was left gasping in air. She had an ointment left over, fashioned from aloe ferox sap, and petroleum jelly. She slowly applied it on the wound and the surrounding skin. She then fastened a doek on his head as a makeshift bandage.

Matebese sat on his floor mat for a while, with his back against the wall. The herd mooed as pangs of hunger set in them.

“They’ll cope; it's only a day. You should get some rest, it’s already dark”, Mathabiso said.

“I have to study”, Matebese said as he stood up and sat at his work area.

Matebese grabbed his maroon school bag and retrieved his textbooks, setting them on the small table in a stack.

He beat the backside of his solar scientific calculator, until it displayed the digits of the last answer stored in memory. He lit a blue candle in its stand; the flame pushed back the darkness, revealing a dark smudge on the edge of his exercise book, his own blood. With meticulous care, he wiped his hands clean.

The rhythmic sound of a knife chopping moroho began behind him, a steady, familiar cadence. His mother moved in the candlelight, preparing their meal with focused grace.

“Eat. For your strength,” she said, placing a plate beside him.

Matebese consumed his meal as dogs howled outside.

#

“Matebese. Wake up.”

Her voice was a thread, taut in the dark. Her hands, shaking his shoulders, held a tremor of their own.

“Wake up. This is serious.”

He surfaced from sleep like a diver, disoriented.

“Ma? What’s happening?”

She sat on the edge of his mat. The candle had long died; her face was a pale shape in the pre-dawn grey.

“My son… your father is gone.”

“A phone call. From the mine.”

“How?” The question was a reflex, his mind still grappling with wakefulness.

“An explosion. Deep in a shaft. They said gas…” Her voice trailed off, the explanation as distant and meaningless as the event itself.

A cold clarity washed over him, shocking him fully awake.

“Joo!”

The sound escaped him, a soft exhale of dread.

“What will we do now?”

“I need your help. With his papers.”

She moved to the corner, retrieving a small, dented tin box. Inside, the family’s history was pressed in faded ink: birth certificates, worn booklets, a fragile stack of memory.

Matebese took the documents, his hands steady where hers were not. He scanned the pages.

“You’ll need your marriage certificate. And to register the death.”

“We were married by custom. There is no paper.”

“Then you must see the Chief. She can verify them.” He looked up at her.

“For whatever he might have left for us at the company.”

She nodded, her eyes already on the distant task.

#

Two weeks later, in the morning, right before Matebese could leave for school, two men materialized at the edge of the homestead, anomalies in their sharp suits. The taller one wore grey, a fedora shadowing his face, his shoes polished to a cruel shine. The other, in black, stood slightly behind.

“Dumelang ka-tlung,” said the man in grey, extending a hand. His voice was smooth, rehearsed.

“Good morning. How can I help you?” Matebese asked, his schoolbag heavy on his shoulder.

They removed their hats.

“I am Letlotlo Molefi. I worked with your father in Maseru. My deepest condolences.”

His gaze swept past Matebese, assessing the mokhoro.

“Simon Lesako,” said the other. “Your father was a good friend. I… I was the one who left him at the mine that day.” He shook his head, a performance of regret.

“Is your mother home?” Molefi asked.

Matebese called for her. When Mathabiso emerged, Molefi offered a slight bow.

“A private word, ‘M’e?”

Matebese retreated inside but watched through the crack in the door. His mother listened, her posture rigid. Lesako shifted, his gestures becoming fluid, suggestive; a hand briefly opening, a tilt of the head that seemed to offer something unsavory. Mathabiso’s arms crossed, her entire body turning to stone. The conversation ended with nods, not handshakes. The men left, their fine shoes picking through the dust.

When Mathabiso re-entered, the air was cold around her.

“What did they want?” Matebese asked.

“Nothing for you to carry,” she said, her voice flat, final. “Go now, or you will be late.”

She turned away, already folding into the next quiet battle, leaving the unspoken words hanging like the fedora’s shadow in the room.

“Son, look.” Mathabiso’s voice was low, urgent. She pressed a thick brown envelope into his hands.

“It’s all there. Your exam fee. This… this is everything. You must pass now. There is no more.”

The weight of it was physical.

“I will. I swear it,” Matebese said, his fingers tightening around the paper.

“Go. Pay it. Keep it safe.”

#

By dawn, fog choked the valley. Sounds were muffled; only the restless shuffle of the herd hinted at life.

Tšepiso’s older sister, Reabetsoe found Mathabiso sitting alone in the mokhoro. She eased onto a mat, her smile a flicker.

“Tšepiso was my brother. Your pain is ours too. He spoke to me before the end. He said I should move the herd to our father’s homestead.”

Mathabiso didn’t turn. “The herd stays.”

“You must consider the family.”

“The cattle are for my children.”

Matebese entered, dust on his clothes. Reabetsoe’s face twisted.

“This one,” she hissed, “does not even look like Tšepiso.”

“While he broke his back in the mines, you became the fancy of every man in Thaba-Tseka! You want his cattle for yourself!”

“Perhaps we all shared a bed. Should I expect you tonight, then?”

“Nxaaaa!” Reabetsoe scrambled up. “You killed him!”

Reabetsoe spat on the earth and stormed away.

By midmorning, people streamed into the homestead. A woman’s voice lifted a funeral dirge.

Nthabiseng arrived. Inside, she saw Mathabiso in mourning black, turn her face away.

“Matebese, what happened?”

“Dad is gone.”

Nthabiseng’s tears streamed down her face.

The service began. Matebese stood vigil beside the casket. Thabiso, reeking of drink, stumbled forward.

“Leave me!” He threw his weight onto the casket. The bier shuddered. Matebese lunged to steady it as Thabiso wept bitterly. The herdsmen held Thabiso back.

“Ma! You’re letting them do this?”

Mathabiso did not move. Her voice was a whisper of absolute exhaustion.

“Thabiso. I am tired.”

The hymn swelled, but the sound now held the chill of the lingering fog and the distant, restless lowing of the herd.

#

The silence in the mokhoro was brittle, sharp as a splinter of glass. Matebese’s exams loomed, a distant summit he was struggling towards through a fog of grief, but the air at home was heavy, pulling him down. Nthabiseng was its source. She drifted from corner to corner, a silent column of dread. A pot clanging outside would make her shoulders tense.

“At some point you must eat,” Mathabiso said one morning, her voice frayed. She nudged the bowl of pap closer.

Nthabiseng only stared at the cold meal, her hands limp in her lap.

With a sigh, Mathabiso turned to the hearth. As she reached for the black iron pot, her hand grazed Nthabiseng’s forearm.

The effect was instant. Nthabiseng jerked back as if burned, a choked sound caught in her throat. She folded over herself, arms wrapping tight around her middle, becoming small.

Mathabiso’s hand hung in the air. She saw it then, not defiance, but a raw, visceral fear trembling through her daughter’s frame. The sight was a cold knife in her chest.

“What…” Mathabiso began, but the words died. The question she had meant to ask, ’What is wrong with you?’, crumbled into ash. A darker, more terrible understanding took its place. This was not waywardness. Something was done to her.

#

The morning hung low and grey. Matebese exhaled, his breath a ghost. Phomolong Secondary stood silent.

“Hey. I’m sorry about your father,” Palesa said.

“Thank you.”

“Will you be okay?”

“I have to be.” She squeezed his arm before they entered.

Inside, the silence was a living thing. He found his seat, the scrape of the chair leg impossibly loud.

“Place your bags at the front,” the invigilator said. Chabeli patted his back.

The ritual began. Rules, papers, permission to begin. Matebese stared at the first page without seeing it. His mother’s voice: This might be all we will ever have.

“You may begin.”

He bypassed the first questions, seeking the one with the most marks—a monstrous binomial expansion, each equation’s solution a step closer to a new future.

Then, a vibration. It was low, insistent buzz that froze every hand.

It came again.

The invigilator’s heels clicked. She followed the sound to a maroon school bag at the front.

Matebese’s blood turned to ice. He raised a trembling hand.

The invigilator pointed at him, then at the door. Every eye upon him.

In the hallway, she pulled the phone from his bag.

“It was off,” he whispered.

“Just an alarm. Please.”

She held his gaze, then nodded.

“Go back. Now.”

He stumbled to his desk, shame and relief warring. He picked up his pen, his hand steady with a cold, clear fury.

#

The days after the exams were a hollow silence. Matebese moved through chores, frying an egg, serving pap.

The quiet between Nthabiseng and their mother had settled into the walls, thick and unspoken.

Mathabiso returned from town, her face drawn. She pulled a crisp envelope from her bag.

“You know I don’t understand English. Read it,” she said, handing it to Matebese.

He read the mining company’s letter aloud. “…the total disbursed amount is M250,000…”

Mathabiso nodded.

“Your father’s blood turned to money. We must be wise with it. For your university.”

“We don’t have the results yet, Ma.”

From her corner, Nthabiseng kept her eyes down. The sum was escape money, and she was not the one escaping.

Mathabiso turned to her. “Nthabiseng. Look at me.”

When her daughter met her eyes, she continued.

“I failed you. I saw your fear and called it shame. What those men did is not your fault. Do you understand?”

A tear traced down Nthabiseng’s cheek. She nodded.

“This money is not just for him. You will go back to school. A desk and a book is the only thing they cannot take from you.”

Nthabiseng’s composure broke. “I’m sorry, Ma.”

“No,” Mathabiso said, pulling her into an embrace. “I am sorry. For not protecting you.”

Matebese slipped outside. He drove the few remaining cattle to the pasture, where the sky had cleared to a vast blue. He sat on a sun-warmed rock, removed his boots, and let his feet breathe.

He switched on his mobile data and held his arms up to catch the signal. The inbox loaded. And there it was.

Congratulations. Mathematical Statistics. University of Gauteng.

A shuddering relief washed through him, so profound it felt like a new kind of weariness. The gate was open.

He looked back toward the homestead; the relief settled into something more complex. The money was a target. Molefi and Lesako would hear of it. Thabiso was still out there, a wound waiting to reopen. His mother and sister were piecing together a broken trust. His escape was real, but it was not the end. It was a new weight.

###THE END###