Chapter 12
Close to death, far from dying
“Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful.
It’s the transition that’s troublesome”
~Isaac Asimov~
One afternoon, about six months after I moved in with Paul and his family, I was sitting down with a few things I had to do and had a couple of questions about the upcoming tenders. Paul was looking at the plans and I walked over to him, where he was sitting at the dining room table, and passed him my Filofax to look at the prices I had got for one of the tenders. I wanted him to review them before I entered them into the system. We were a bit under pressure because it had to be submitted in a few days.
Amy came in and said, “Azelene, your Dad’s on the phone.” I left my Filofax with Paul and walked over to the office area to chat to my Dad. I hadn’t spoken to him in weeks.
“Hey Dad, how are you. I miss you.”
“Hi Azelene, we’re doing fine. I miss you too. How are things your side?”
“Well, I’m learning to do tenders and I go on site quite often with Paul, helping him measure before we do a tender. I’m enjoying it.” I replied.
“That’s great my girl, but you should think about your future as well. I realise living in Garsfontein without any wheels, it’s a bit difficult to get around, so Mom and I have decided to get you a flat in Arcadia and pay for it until you get a job. That way you’ll be able to walk to interviews and your scope to find a job will be much bigger. How does that sound to you?”
“Wow, Dad really, my own flat?”
“Yes, you can start looking for a place anytime.” He said.
I was ecstatic! My head was spinning and for a second, I pictured myself in my own flat. Oh God, I was so lucky to have a Mom and Dad who supported me, who loved me and who were there when I needed them.
“Do you want to speak to Mom?” Dad asked.
“Uh, Dad no not now, I can’t wait to tell Paul the good news, can I phone her later tonight?”
My Dad laughed and said “Sure, give her a call this evening.”
“Dad, I love you and thank you SO much!”
“You’re welcome my girl, I’m glad we can help you get back on your feet.”
I put the phone down and ran to the dining room, grinning from ear to ear.
“Paul, my Dad just called and gave me the best news ever! My parents are getting me a flat, my own flat and I can start looking for one today!”
Paul’s eyes filled with rage and he grabbed my Filofax and banged it against his head so hard that the skin above his eyebrow burst open and blood started pouring from the cut, down the side of his face. He threw the Filofax away and jumped up from the dining room table. The chair he was sitting on fell to the side and the plans he was working on flew all over the floor.
“Maria! Maria!” He shouted to the maid who worked for them.
“Where’s my Mom’s revolver?”
“I don’t know.” She quavered with wide eyes.
Paul pushed Maria out of the way and ran to his mother’s room. I realised that he was totally out of control and that he was serious when he looked me in the eyes and shouted, “I would rather kill you than let you go, where is the fucking revolver!”
With all the commotion going on Amy and the kids came rushing out of their room. I grabbed Ben by the arm, picked Max up and ran out the door, shouting, "Amy get out of the house!" We ran into the garage and I left the kids with Amy so that I could run back inside to get Maria. When I reached the outside wall of the garage, I heard Paul at the window of his mother’s bathroom and I stopped dead. Paul’s hand was sticking out the window through the burglar guards holding a .38 special straight at me. The next moment he pulled the trigger and I felt particles of cement from the wall next to my head explode all over my face. I ducked and ran back into the garage. Ben and Max were hysterical. I told Amy to keep them safe and that I was going to go next door to call the police. My eyes were tearing up and hurting from the particles of cement that were lodged there. My right ear was making a buzzing sound and I was overwhelmed with fear. But I knew I had to stay calm. To this day, I don’t know how I held things together.
I had a flashback to April 1988, when I was one of a number of civilians caught in the middle of a bomb blast and remembered rushing out of Sterland just after the explosion and seeing people running in all directions trying to get to safety. No one knew if there was another bomb and then the second one went off. I grabbed my friend’s hand and ran down the street. I looked up and saw the Holiday Inn Hotel and knew that I would be safe there and able to call my Mom. Suddenly, here I was a few years on running down the street again. Running around a neighborhood that I didn’t know, desperately seeking help.
I was scared to look back in case he was following me, afraid of the next shot. Was he going to get another shot off and if he did, would it hit me in the face this time? I ran past the house next door; it was a corner house, but the entrance was in the next street. I ran around the corner, slipped and fell on the pavement. I got up and bolted to the front door. I banged hard and shouted, “Help, Help, Help!” through my tears.
A woman opened the door and grabbed me by the arm, pulling me into the house. She told me to keep down because somebody was shooting in the neighborhood. I started crying even more and shouted, “He wants to kill me, he was shooting at me!” She grabbed the phone and dialed the police. While keeping a tight hold on me and hiding under the dining room table she told them, “Yes, yes, a child, she’s with me, she’s from next door. Somebody is trying to kill her. Yes, she’s ok but she’s scared. I heard the shot, it came from the house next door. Hurry, I’m not sure if he followed her to my house, please hurry! Ok, I’ll stay on the line.”
She stayed on the phone until the police knocked on her door. All that was going through my mind was “next door, child”. I was a teenager but looked so young, even this woman saw me as a child. I might have thought that I was mature, but I was only 18. “Look at me now” I thought, “hiding under a dining room table in somebody else's house, trying to get away from a man who’s supposed to love me, but is now trying to kill me.” Nothing made sense. Why? My God, what was going on? What just happened? Why did he freak out, what had I done to deserve this? I was only a teen; I was scared and confused.
The woman opened the door when the police arrived and walked out with me. I was crying hysterically. They asked which house it was, and she pointed it out to them. They asked me to come with them, but I was too scared. The one cop said, “Ok we’ll go check it out first and then we’ll come and get you.” They went next door, firearms drawn. It looked like a movie playing out in front of me, but it wasn’t, this was real life. I knew how to handle a gun myself. I started target shooting and hunting with my Dad when I was six years old, but suddenly I was shit scared. Maybe because I knew what it was like when you shot something? It doesn’t matter how long you hunt, it’s never a pleasant feeling to see something dying in front of you. I now knew how the birds and buck that we used to hunt on the farm felt. I’m sure they were just as scared as I was at that point.
A couple of minutes later one of the policeman came back and said it was safe. We walked towards the house and I saw Paul outside on the lawn. The other cop was walking to the police van with a .22 rifle and a .38 special in his hands. He had taken Paul’s weapons. Amy and the kids were still sitting in the garage. The officer I was with called to Amy and told her that it was safe and that she could take the kids back into the house. The other cop joined us and said to Paul, “We need to take a statement from you, Paul. Can we do that inside?” Paul nodded and waved them in. I walked between him and the cops and just before we got to the door, I felt a fist in my back. Paul shoved me from behind, so hard that I fell into the flowerbed next to the front door. As I hit the ground the cops turned around and Paul bent down to help me up saying, “Are you ok? She fell”. I thought to myself “You asshole; yes I fell, because you fucking punched me with a fist between my shoulder blades! You knocked me to the ground. Who are you, you sick psycho?” The one officer walked me through the house to the outside area at the back, where he took my statement. The other one stayed inside the house with Paul. Amy and the kids were nowhere to be seen. In the distance, I could hear Max crying somewhere. The statement took about an hour. The officer that took Paul’s statement came outside and asked if I wanted to phone someone. He said he didn’t think it was a good idea for me to stay at the house. He suggested I call someone while they spoke to Maria and Amy.
I phoned Ronell and told her what had happened and that I needed her to come fetch me. She was there in less than half an hour. We left Paul’s house while the cops were still there, and Ronell turned to me and said, “I know what you need. You need a stiff drink.” The two of us drove to Hatfield and ended up talking late into the evening. I didn’t tell her about all our issues, just about the day’s happenings. By the time we got back to her house, I was more than a little tipsy. As we turned into the driveway, I heard her say,
“Azelene, look up.” I lifted my head and saw hundreds of red roses scattered over the drive, leading to her front door. I knew this was Paul’s handy work. We got out of the car and I started picking the long-stemmed roses up. I didn’t see his Honda parked on the other side of the road. The next moment, I saw his headlights as he drove in and stopped behind Ronell’s car.
He climbed out and started crying like a baby. I could see the pain on his face as he pleaded with me to come home with him. He was shaking and looked so pathetic there in the moonlight, the tears streaming down his face. Now I can’t even remember all the lame excuses he came up with, as to why he pulled the trigger on me just hours earlier. But what he said worked, because under a half hour later I was in his car, driving back to his parent’s house. I have a mental block about what happened over the next couple of days, until the weekend when my parents came through from Meyerton for a meeting with Paul’s parents, Paul, Ronell and I, at my sister’s house. What was said in that meeting is also a bit of a blur to me, but I do remember Paul taking the bible out, talking, praying and he even had my Dad in tears! My Dad was a tough guy; he didn’t cry easily.
In fact, I do believe that was the first and only time I ever saw my father in tears. My Mom kept a stony face. She had her own issues with Paul and nothing he said or did persuaded her in any way to believe in his innocence. Ronell also had a huge problem with him, I think she saw straight through him. After a lot of talking, pleading, praying and crying from Paul’s side, I left with him and his parents. I stayed another couple of weeks with them. Not long after, my Dad contacted me to tell me that he had found me a flat and that I’d be moving in at the end of the month. Paul handled the situation much better this time and it all suddenly seemed normal again. He played the ‘good boy’ card and at times it felt as if nothing bad had happened. But I was wary, scared to trigger anything. We didn’t go out much and spent most of our time with his family, just lying around the house.
In a way, it was good because I felt safe with his parents around, but I also wished that we were a bit more social. I missed my friends and the fun barbeques and parties we used to have. At times, I missed my Majella days and the friends I had made there. I was very popular and had a lot of friends. I often wondered how my life would have turned out if I had gone back to college and completed my fashion design course.
I was also really missing my modeling career. I loved being in front of the camera and had worked with amazing people and made good friends that I didn’t see any more. In a way, I felt isolated, even though I was with the man I loved. Was this love or was it confusion? Was I old enough to make adult decisions? Was I old enough the day I left home? Looking back, I don’t believe I was, but would I have listened if my parents had tried to force me to do what they wanted me to? I highly doubt it.