Busted! - Chapter 13.2: So Good To Be In Love

When the festivities of the day ended, I headed to my room to get some work done. Lincoln stayed downstairs to prepare himself a cup of coffee. He loved late night coffee. I had a lot of fun that day and I was just happy that things were feeling normal, almost as if nothing had happened. Lincoln came up to the room and he had prepared two cups of coffee. He then sat next to me on the bed and because I’m clumsy I spilled the coffee on my lap and slightly burnt my thigh. He then went downstairs to get ice so that he could nurse the burn. I sat there facing the ceiling with my eyes closed because I was in pain.

When I opened my eyes, I found Lincoln looking at me smiling. “Do you know how much I love you though?” he asked. I just blushed and told him I loved him too. He then said he had a confession to make. My heartbeat tripled. I hated confessions, especially when they came from Lincoln. I sighed and sat up straight as I prepared myself to hear whatever he had to say to me. “I don’t even know where to start, I think after I tell you this, you might want to leave me…” he said. At that point I felt like throwing my hands in the air. “Do you remember the conversation we had earlier on in your office?” he asked. I nodded. “Truth is I had just received a call from Kelebogile” he said. “Yes and?” I asked as I was running out of patience. “Baby… Kelebogile is pregnant...” Lincoln confessed.

My brain stopped working. I felt a tap of tears opening inside of me and I couldn’t hide it. I wanted to say something but I was in so much shock that I couldn’t even move my lips. It felt like someone was pulling my hair from the inside. I was speechless. At that point I even forgot where I was, I just zoned out, completely! “Babe, are you okay?” asked a concerned Lincoln. When he asked me that, I realized that I wasn’t dreaming. Everything he had told me was true.

“I’m fine!” I said as I faked a smile. “My parents know about it and they’re so excited” Lincoln added. I didn’t know what to say, in fact I don’t think I’d be lying if I said I looked like a fool. Kelebogile had found a way to keep Lincoln in her life. I really wanted to stay up and talk about it but I forced myself to shut down and slept. I told Lincoln that we’d talk about the situation some other time.

Busted! - Chapter 13.1: Breathe Again

After work, Lincoln and I headed home together and because we were so tired, we decided to sit on the couch and cuddle whilst watching TV. It felt so surreal but I was still bothered by the conversation we had earlier that day.

I had a hectic day. KG called me and we talked about everything that had happened. He apologized for his behaviour and reassured me that he will support me with whatever it is that I chose to do. KG really did love me and I didn’t think it was that serious. Truth is I never was in love with him, I just saw him as a friend… with benefits I guess. I knew though that I cared about him a lot and that he needed me.

He then told me that his father would be buried on that same weekend. I told him that I’d go see him before the funeral just to see if there’s anything I could help with. He was so grateful. He asked me to alert the other housemates about the funeral since he couldn’t get hold of all of them.

Sihle and Malcolm were returning to the house later that night. Morithi on the other hand wasn’t taking my calls and he’s the one person I really felt I needed to talk to. I just accepted that he was still angry and that when he comes back to his senses he would call me back. I spoke to Thobile as well and the only thing she could do was cry over the phone and it had me worried because she couldn’t afford to be stressed especially because she was pregnant. She also hadn’t heard from Morithi and it was just too much for her to handle. Nigel and Zama broke up for obvious reasons. Nigel called asking for permission to move back to the house the following day. I told him that I never kicked him out and that he was welcome whenever he was ready. So it was evident that the house would move from having just two people to at least five. Not even half of what we were.

Later on that night Sihle arrived with Malcolm and we went to welcome them. Malcolm gave me a long hug and whispered words of encouragement in my ear. Lincoln got a bit jealous and split us up. We just laughed at him. People were starting to mark their territories. We chilled and watched TV before deciding to play Monopoly. We had a lot of fun. It was good to see that Sihle and Malcolm were brought closer by the drama that had happened.

Busted! - Chapter 12.5: Solve It

As much as I wasn’t looking forward to seeing them, I really missed my best friends. Sihle, Gavin and I had come a long way and a big part of me just didn’t want to believe any of the stuff that had happened, and even if they did, I believed that we were so much bigger than that. Of course I didn’t know where their heads were at concerning this situation but I was pretty much ready to forgive and move on.

We got to work with Lincoln and we immediately bumped into Sihle. Lincoln just walked on by without even greeting him. I didn’t know if I should do the same or stand there and wait for him to say something. He then stopped me and we looked at each other for a long time without saying anything to each other. I was too afraid to say anything I guess. “Malcolm and I are at the Washout Hotel” he said. “Well that’s… nice!” I said as I nodded. The moment was so awkward, I stood there looking around for something to use as a scapegoat. He had papers in his hands; I asked him what they were for. Not that I cared, but I was just trying to create conversation.

“Do you really want to know or is this you creating small talk?” he asked. “Look, I really wanted to tell you about Gabriel but…” I said before he interrupted me by telling me that his case was even worse because he had slept with the one man he knew I had always loved. “Well it’s water under the bridge now, there’s nothing we can do to change what has already been done. We just have to move past this.” I said. “You’re right, I’m really sorry hey, I can’t even justify my actions. Anyway, I’ll see you later? At home?” he asked. I just smiled and nodded. “Later friend!” I said and we parted ways. The only thing that we were both left to deal with was our trust issues. I then walked to my office and found Lincoln sitting on my chair face down.

“Lincoln, are you okay?” I asked. “I’m fine, I’m just thinking about yesterday. Do you think I made a mistake by leaving Kelebogile for you?” he asked. I had no idea where he was trying to go with that question so I simply asked him if he was starting to have regrets. “Hell no babe! I’m happy with you” he said. “Then what’s the problem?” I asked. “My family. How am I going to tell them I broke up with Kelebogile? It’s just going to be a dramatic turn of events and I don’t think I’m ready for that because they will find out that I actually left Kelebogile for you, a guy” he said. I just looked at him and nodded. I was so sad.

I felt like the more that Lincoln and I moved forward, the more we went backwards instead. I couldn’t blame him for being worried about what his family would think of him. In fact I knew exactly how he was feeling. He then left my office and I just started working just so that I could get my mind off things. I told Lincoln to think long and hard about our situation, in the mean time, I was trying to teach my heart to be cautious.

Busted! - Chapter 12.4: After The Storm

The next day I woke up next to Lincoln and started reflecting on the things that had happened the previous night. Everyone in the house was moving back to their respective homes and the house was starting to feel so lonely. I tried to get out of bed that morning but Lincoln was holding me so tight that I even had a hard time breathing; I figured he thought I was also going to leave. My return to Johannesburg had ruined a very happy home. Had I just stayed in Cape Town and continued living my life there none of what happened would have. This situation however showed me the amount of power I had over certain people in the Gigolo’s Castle and it also taught me the truth about people whom I considered to be my friends.

I laid there in my bed asking myself how things would be between Sihle, Gavin and I. A part of me wanted to fire them but I couldn’t do that because they were major shareholders. I didn’t know exactly what it was that I wanted to do about the situation but I knew that a lot of happy families were destroyed because of my reunion with Lincoln. It was so quiet, in a perfect world it would have been that way because the housemates were sleeping, but the reality was that they had all left.

As much as I woke up lying next to Lincoln, nothing happened between me and him the previous night obviously because of the state the house was left in. The time for me to wake up and go face my demons, in this case Sihle and Gavin had come. I jumped out of bed and went to take a shower and prepared for work. I woke Lincoln up and he too started preparing himself for work. He tried to start a conversation with me but he saw that I was just not in the mood to speak about anything or anyone for that matter so he just backed off and did what he had to do.

Busted! - Chapter 12.3: Life Is Not So Good (Continued)

We drove back to the house and as we entered the house Lincoln grabbed my hand and held on to it for everyone to see. Kelebogile’s eyes popped out! KG’s face just changed immediately, his face was boiling. Everyone else was confused but the people that knew what was going on had already started reacting. “Lincoln… Please babe… No!” Kelebogile cried. I felt like crying with her because for some reason I knew exactly what she was feeling. “I’m sorry Kelebogile… I can’t do this anymore” said Lincoln. “Really Earl? Just like that?” KG added. “I’m sorry” I said. “I’m really starting to feel like I’m lost in my own home, what’s happening this time around?” asked Morithi. I had nothing to say. Kelebogile just screamed, almost as if she had been stabbed in the heart, KG just looked at me and walked up to his room. I knew what to expect when I agreed to Lincoln’s request but I was in love! KG came back downstairs with an overnight bag and asked Sihle to drop him off at home. Malcolm stood up and opted to leave with them because he too couldn’t handle what was happening. “I hope you rot in hell you filthy bitch!” KG said as he walked up to me as if he was ready to attack me. Lincoln blocked him in my defense.

“Don’t even touch me guy, does your Earl know that you slept with his best friend Sihle?” KG said to Lincoln. I immediately let go of Lincoln’s hand and I saw Sihle looking for a hole to hide himself. “What?!” exclaimed Malcolm. KG confirmed it and I begged him to stop whatever he was doing because I knew exactly how it was going to end. “You are such a fool Earl, you trusted me didn’t you? You trusted me enough to tell me that Malcolm was cheating on Sihle with Gabriel but you couldn’t tell him that! And then you call yourselves best friends?” KG added. At that point I was getting angry so I swore at him. Sihle then turned around and asked me how I could go on being his friend knowing that his man was unfaithful. I found him to be so hypocritical especially given the fact that he slept with the one man he knew I never stopped loving. His excuse was that I had broken up with Lincoln and I needed not react in the way that I did. I turned around and looked at Lincoln and asked him if all this was true and he said it was a mistake. “Mistake? Is that what you call me? When you are the one who came crying to me telling me how much pain Earl caused you and how you wish you never asked him out! Don’t test me Lincoln!” Sihle replied.

I didn’t know what to say in reaction to that so I just kept quiet and tried to compose myself because if I was going to say anything I would mess things up, unfortunately for me, God was in the mood for a show that day. Kelebogile who had been crying the whole time calmed down and tried to absorb everything as it was happening. Morithi and the other guys tried to intervene. KG warned them not to but they just insisted. “Morithi, if I was you, I’d be worried about the blanks that I’m shooting, those kids that Thobile is carrying are not yours buddy!” KG said. “Oh my God Earl, how could you do this to me?” Thobile cried. “I didn’t say a thing, I swear!” I replied. KG then confessed that it was Nigel who told him the truth about the pregnancy. “So you knew Earl?” Morithi sadly asked me. I felt so weak because I could see the tears in his eyes. I tried to explain myself but he just walked up to his room and I stood there looking like a fool. He then came back down and came straight to my face. “Oh, you are not exclusive to KG buddy; see your best friend Gavin? He’s been there too!” Morithi said.

There was an awkward silence. Nobody saw that one coming. I just slowly nodded as I took that in and Gavin didn’t know what to do with himself.  The atmosphere in the house was very tense. Everyone was angry at the next person. Morithi was angry at me and Thobile. Thobile was angry at Nigel. Nigel was angry at KG for outing him. KG was angry at the world. I was angry at my friends and Lincoln, everyone was just angry! These kinds of things happen when KG decides to open his mouth. I then saw a side to Sihle that I had never seen before when he decided to lie about me using Lincoln just so that Lincoln could be mad at me and walk out on me. That’s exactly what he did. Everyone dispersed and I was left with Sihle. “You bitch! You lied!” I said as I was readying myself to attack him. “There’s no way you can get to keep Lincoln and I lose my Malcolm. You are so weak and clearly boring in bed because I always get your men. Tshepo? Thebe? Lincoln? I’ve slept with them all” Sihle added.

I just cried. I was speechless. I couldn’t believe that Sihle would do that to me, but I just left it as it was. Everyone packed their overnight bags and they left the Gigolo’s Castle that night. I had no idea if they were coming back or leaving for good but I didn’t care to ask because I knew that I would be left alone in the end and I was welcoming to the idea. Lincoln came and sat next to me in the lounge where I sat drinking wine trying to avoid everything that was happening in the house. “I’m not leaving you this time. We are going to talk about things and sort this out, they can leave, I’m not!” said Lincoln. He then hugged me and I just succumbed like a little baby.

Busted! - Chapter 12.2: Life Is Not So Good

I woke with the mother of all hangovers. I was so confused; I think it’s only at that time that things started sinking in. I was in a relationship with KG and everything just happened overnight. The previous night Kelebogile had told me how I was making her life difficult and I didn’t even understand what she was talking about but I figured Lincoln might have just reacted in a certain way to the announcement KG had made about us. I was feeling all sorts of things, I wasn’t even sure if I wanted to be with KG. I felt like everything about us was based on lies and I was just feeling sorry for him so I dated him just so that I do not hurt his already hurt feelings. I had an idea that KG would make me happy if I gave him the chance but my heart was with Lincoln and there was nothing I could do about that. I just didn’t know how to get over him. That morning I woke up and decided that I was going to just claim what belongs to me regardless of what Kelebogile or KG felt. Lincoln belonged to me and I was just not letting it go.

“Good morning” KG said as he woke up reaching for a kiss. I immediately jumped out of bed and said “Morning!” I went downstairs to brush my teeth and washed my face before waking people up and sending them home. I started cleaning but when I realized that the workload was too much, I woke the rest of the housemates up and asked for help. Everyone helped, even Thobile whom I told to stay in bed because she was pregnant. When we were done cleaning, we started cooking and chilled in our cliques.

Lincoln kept giving me the evil eye and it was starting to bother me. The rest of the housemates were still trying to figure out if they are the ones that were drunk when KG announced that we were an item. I couldn’t shake off the feeling that Lincoln was repeatedly stabbing me in his thoughts so I went up to him to talk to him about the whole situation.

“Hey, are you okay?” I asked. He just gave me a blank stare and asked me what I wanted from him. “I just want us to talk, that’s if it’s cool with you” I replied. He nodded. His reaction just made me so weak that I just felt like walking away because I was starting to feel humiliated, please note that I HATE feeling that way. When he could see that my mood was starting to deteriorate, he decided to hijack the conversation. “I just don’t know how much I have to do for you to realize that it’s you I want to be with. You just keep doing things to provoke me and it’s getting to me now. You know I love you, you know I want to be with you, you know everything but you just insist on making me look like a fool! I can’t pretend anymore…” he said. It was always about him and how I am the bad person when he was the one who was still with the girl that he left me for but the mature Earl in me told me to relax and think before I spoke. When he saw that I wasn’t saying anything, he spoke again. “I love you so much Earl, almost as if my life depends on it and every day I look at you and kick myself for letting you go” he added. He then banged his hands on the table and ran for the door. That attracted a lot of attention from everyone in the house. He ran out of the house. A few minutes later, when it started to register to me, I drove out on a quest to find him wherever he was. I couldn’t see him anywhere. I drove around the whole area and when I eventually found running him I parked ahead of him and stood in front of him to stop him. He then knelt down and grabbed my leg as he gasped for air and started crying.

“Why are you doing this to me?” he cried. “I’m so sorry Lincoln, I’m so sorry! I love you, you know that I do but you’re with someone else and I also can’t bear it anymore. It has just gotten too much for me, if we’re going to be together again, we need to leave this place and start over” I replied. I apologized to him for not paying attention to him when he needed me the most. He kissed me and I kissed him back. I really loved Lincoln and I kept on convincing myself that I didn’t but it was just getting harder for me to pretend. We got into the car because it had started raining and we talked a bit more about where we were headed. Lincoln just said that he wanted us to announce our reunion to the housemates. You can only imagine how I felt at that point. Lincoln and KG had underlying issues with each other and they were using me to prove a point to each other. “I say we tell Kelebogile and KG everything, what do you say?” asked Lincoln.  

Busted! - Chapter 12.1: All Night Long

We got home from the mall and people had already started arriving. There were a lot of new faces and some old faces that I last saw before I left for Cape Town. The atmosphere was very positive, the housemates seemed to be enjoying themselves even though the sun was still out and the party had not really began.

KG was adamant about letting people know about our “relationship”, even though I told him I wasn’t ready for one, especially with him. It seemed like the information went in one ear and came out of the other. He then called the housemates separately and led them to my room where he sat them down and announced the big news about us. I cringed. We got some blank stares. Lincoln couldn’t control his emotions, he immediately left the room and then Kelebogile followed. Everyone was in disbelief and I could feel the judgment. “You are really good at your game; you managed to drag KG out of the closet? Wow!” said Malcolm as he walked out with a smile. I just laughed.

Later on in the night, the party started pumping. The turnout was more than I had expected, so much that there was no more parking space. There were all types of people, straight ghetto girls and classy gold diggers, straight spoilt boys and closet cases; it was just a hot mess! The music was good, the food was good and the vibe was awesome. We needed it because there was a lot of tension in the house at that time. Lincoln and Kelebogile returned at about 9pm. Kelebogile walked straight up to me and told me that I was making her life difficult. I really felt nothing when she said that, all I thought was that she had to stop trying to change Lincoln because that clearly wasn’t working for her. In the mean time I was trying my utmost best to avoid KG because every time he’d come across me, he would want display some form of affection in front of everyone and that made me feel very uneasy.

In the early hours of the morning, people were starting to pass out… EVERYWHERE! Even on the stairs. I just left them as they were and headed to my room to get some sleep. KG followed me and joined me in bed. We then talked about anything and everything. We gossiped about some of the people that came to the party, where his life was headed since the death of his father, life, love and babies. He told me he wanted a child and since I couldn’t give him one, he would get someone to carry our babies. I just froze. KG was moving at a rapid speed and I was really starting to question if he wasn’t trying to fill the void he was feeling by entertaining the idea of being with me so I started becoming cautious.

We were both drunk but he was more drunk than I was so I decided not to take anything he said seriously. When I was about to pass out, KG got on top of me and literally seduced me. I did mention that KG was just perfect, so I gave in because I just couldn’t resist him. There was something about him that was so hard to turn down… literally! That night we had the best sex ever, I can’t even find any ex to compare him to when it comes to that department. That’s just how good he was.