Road to Redemption - Michelle Dalton Page 0,12

to the man in khaki waving for him to follow. “By the way, probably best not to mention my midnight smoking excursions.” He winked.

Ray nodded. They weren’t allowed to smoke in their cabins. Why Cyril saw his nightly gwaai breaks as an issue only he knew. It wasn’t like he was the only one taking them. Probably nerves. They all hated the police.

Ray wiped sweaty palms down the front of his pants and walked up to where the ranger stood waiting to escort him to his interrogation.

I am safe. I am stronger than my need! I am in control.

The evening was cool. Ray sat on a plastic garden chair outside of his room, pen and paper in hand as her tried to enjoy the soft hum of crickets as the sky morphed from scarlet to deep indigo. He opened the pen the writing pad. They had access to computers, but Ray didn’t have an email account and hadn’t owned a phone since his last arrest.

He rather enjoyed the feel of the hand gliding across the sheet as he penned a new letter to his pa. Another memory from a different life popped into his head.

He’d loved journaling and had written many poems in his youth. He’d loved reading too…

It’d been a boiling-hot day, the heat following the moist breeze into the night when he’d walked out to their oak tree. “Thought I’d find you here.”

Moonlight cast a silver blanket across Mina’s bare shoulders where she sat wrapped in only a blanket, her hair bundled up in a mess atop her head.

“Couldn’t sleep either?” She smiled.

He sat down beside her and tucked her beneath his arm as he paged to his favourite poem and read. “Tyger, Tyger, burning bright …”

He’d not picked up a book of poetry in yonks.

Shit, he’d wasted so many years. If only he’d been more of a man, if only …

Three days had flown by since his run-in with Mina, and he’d not heard a word from her, not even a whisper. Not that he deserved any sort of explanation from her, but the thought that she lived only a few hundred metres from where he now lived, ate at him daily.

He’d figured out she was the owner of Redemption Farm and that she was usually more involved with the inmates. In his conversation with the counsellor, he was told she’d taken a step back to deal with the break-in, but Ray knew better, and the thought irked him.

She must hate him, and he couldn’t blame her, but it still hurt to think that he’d turned the most beautiful soul in his life to a bitter woman.

Too bitter to involve herself in the work she was apparently passionate about, but too proud to make him leave, he assumed, as he was still here.

Ray blocked out his thoughts. Perhaps his father would understand? It was time to tell him what had happened so long ago to turn his son into the monster Ray had become.

Pa,

I’m not sure how to word this, and please know that I am not angry. Confused, yes. Deserving of all the hurt coming my way, absolutely, but not angry.

Grace still runs the house at Nooitgedacht, I take it? Did you know about Mina …

Ray scratched out her name. She’d made it clear she wanted no one to know, and their mail was read and checked before it was sent out.

Did you know?

He wrote instead.

I don’t blame you for never telling me.

There was a robbery here. Everyone is okay, but half the abalone harvest was taken. This was when I found out. God, Pa, beauty has no age limit! Is that inappropriate? I don’t care. It’s time to explain what happened. Not that it will ever excuse any of the crimes I’ve committed over the last years, but I promise to spend the rest of my life fixing it all.

It was the last game of the season just before mock exams for matric started …

Ray handed the unsealed envelope to Mr. Meintjies who collected the mail the inmates wanted posted.

Mr. meintjies gave him a cold stare as he pulled the letter out and began to read it in front of Ray.

Ray didn’t budge. Barley breathed as he fought his anger.

“Aw, isn’t it just a shame how all you poor fuckers always get to blame someone else for your bullshit?” He tucked the letter back into the envelope and sealed it.

He’d get his own back and Mr. Meintjies would pay for his condescending shit, but not