Salome is sitting in a cuca shop, fanning herself with a makeshift menu. It is one of those days in Windhoek where it feels like the sun is punishing her for enjoying the previous winter too much. Salome feels as though she is in an oven, sweat dripping down her forehead. She removes a tissue from her handbag and dabs it to her face. She scans the shop and notices she is overdressed in her formal dress and high heels. Meme Ruby’s cuca shop, built from corrugated iron sheets, is situated in the Havana Informal Settlement. As Salome was trying to locate the shop, young men hurriedly approached her with corn, vetkoek, cell phone covers, and toilet paper rolls. Meme Ruby’s serves as a daily needs shop that sells maize meal and sugar but it is also a shebeen and a local restaurant of sorts. A waitress waits to take her order as she checks her phone.
“Five more minutes,” she says to herself, “I’m sure he’ll be here soon.”
The waitress gives Salome a perplexed stare, then nods before making her way to the couple at the next table.
The couple orders pap and matangara. The man stares into the woman’s eyes, her arm intertwined with his. He tells her about accidentally falling and tearing his pants at work. The woman laughs out loud. Her laughter affects Salome and she finds herself giggling too, even though she feels a bit embarrassed to be listening to a conversation she is not a part of.
She checks the time—13h35—and sends a text.
—Where are you?
When she looks up from her phone, the waitress is standing in front of her. “Miss, are you ready to order?” she asks.
—You’re late.
Salome was hoping to have more time for her thoughts, but this is the third time the waitress has come around and she can see the annoyance on her face as she waits impatiently for an answer.
“Just some chips.”
The waitress looks shocked, her eyes wide. “Just chips?”
“Yes. Just chips, please.”
“Matangara and pap, yes?” the waitress suggests to Salome. Salome shakes her head. The waitress nods and makes her way to the kitchen.
Jackson Kaujeua’s “Winds of Change” blasts on an old stereo, blending with the laughter of the crowd that begins to fill Meme Ruby’s. It is lunch hour and the regular crowd is here.
***
Salome steps outside to take a break from the loud music and the rowdiness. She takes out a cigarette pack from her handbag, a habit she picked up from working long hours as an auditor at a firm in town. She is about to light a cigarette but decides not to. She takes out her phone to make a call when she spots a young woman with a toddler balanced on her hip. She is shouting into the phone, roughly readjusting the toddler every time he slides off.
The ping of a text message breaks her gaze.
—Five minutes away.
She steals a glance at the young woman once more before returning inside.
***
The waitress didn’t even bother to inform her the chips were ready. Instead, she left them on the table. If it were at one of the more expensive restaurants in town, Salome would be demanding the quality service she paid for. But this is not the kind of place to demand such things. Besides, she is not here for the food, she’s here to meet up with her boyfrie—Dantagob—she doesn’t know what to call him anymore.
Things between them have been strained for months. He is not the sweet, thoughtful man she fell in love with. He has become detached; he checked out of the relationship a long time ago.
They met at the National Art Gallery. He walked up to her as she stared at a portrait of a faceless woman. They had a brief conversation about their respective careers. He was an English and History teacher.
“Why that?” she asked. “That seems like such an odd pairing.”
Dantagob could not help but admire Salome, her confused expression made her more adorable.
“I always loved history,” he responded, “knowing where we come from, and the sacrifices our people made for us to be here.”
She kept sneaking glances at Dantagob. His full lips. White teeth. They made his smile even brighter. His tall and slender figure. His haircut and well-groomed nails.
“Is all Namibian history about The Struggle?” she asked, turning her attention back to the portrait. She had noticed him staring at her.
Before he could give her an answer, her phone rang. She excused herself. When she did not return, he ran out of the gallery in search of her, finding her about to enter a taxi.
“May I get your number? So we can finish the conversation we were having.”
***
They spent the next few weeks on phone calls for hours on end. Later, they went on dates. Once, Dantagob came to her office to surprise her with the portrait of the faceless woman he bought her. When he asked her to be his girlfriend, she accepted. They talked about moving in together, and did when they found a flat.
In the early days of their relationship, he would call or text her to find out how she was doing and bring her lunch at work. It seemed as though he knew what she needed before she told him.
But all of these sweet things soured.
Dantagob became distant—he was always working and his free time dried up. When he did have free time, all he wanted to do was go to Meme Ruby’s. After their last argument, he packed up and left.
It has been a few days since she sent him that dreadful text that made him respond to her.
As she scans the shop, Salome does not see why Dantagob chooses to come here.
He walks in looking defeated. His shoulders are slumped. There are bags under his eyes. He greets everyone in the place hurriedly, as if he has urgent business to which he must attend. He spots Salome sitting at the far end of the shop and smiles at her.
When he approaches the table, she stands up with her arms stretched out to hug him. Instead, he sits across from her and signals for the waitress.
“How’s life?” he offers in greeting. He avoids her gaze, takes out his phone, and acts like whatever is on it is more important than the woman sitting across from him.
Salome frowns. It was not the type of response she expected from someone she has known for two years. “Fine”, she tries to match his energy.
Meme Ruby, a bubbly, round woman walks up to their table. Dantagob stands up when he sees her approach. “Good afternoon, Meme,” he says with a bright smile.
“Good afternoon, my best customer,” she replies. “Is this the vroumens that has been keeping you away from me?”
“You know I could never stay away from you,” he replies. “It’s just work.”
Meme Ruby looks at Salome and walks up to her with her arms stretched out. “Kom hier my kind. Any friend of Dantagob is a friend of mine.”
Salome stands up, offering her hand for a shake, but Meme Ruby engulfs her in a hug instead. It is awkward and stiff.
Meme Ruby looks at Dantagob from head to toe and pinches him. “I can feel your ribs. You are skinny now.” He smiles at her. “This is the second lady you have brought here. I see I am no longer important in your life.”
Another woman.
“No woman could ever replace you. They can’t cook as good as you do,” he responds.
Salome stares at them as they banter.
“Let me feed you, my kind, you need to gain back your weight.” She waves towards the waitress. “Linea, please get my favourite customer some food.”
Ordinarily, Salome would not be bothered by women flirting with Dantagob. Today, she finds this interaction annoying. They have important things to talk about.
“Aren’t you going to touch your chips?” Dantagob asks when they sit down once more.
This is the first time they make eye contact. She searches them for some sort of affection. In the past she could surmise what he was going through from a simple look. Now he is a stranger.
“There’s no use in pretending like we’re catching up over a meal.’’ Salome has to get back to work and would rather get this conversation out of the way.
“I was hoping to eat something— ”
“You’re late, I’ve been sitting here for more than half an hour waiting for you.”
Dantagob takes out some pills from his satchel bag. He pushes them towards her and turns his face. She picks up the pills, confused. “What are these?”
“It’s to take care of that little situation.”
“What?”
“I need you to stop calling me.” He does not face her, he speaks as though he is addressing a distant person. “I know what I’m asking you to do is difficult, but we both know it is for the best. We’re not the same people we were when we met.”
He looks away. He did not expect it to be easy. But he had hoped she would not put up a fight in public. Dantagob looks at her.
“I’m getting married next weekend.”
The waitress arrives with his meal, she places it on the table and smiles at him. He does not even look at her.
“Getting married.” Salome repeats the words. Until a few months ago, they had been planning their lives together. Now he is getting married.
Salome stands up. Dantagob grabs her hand and puts the pills in her hands.
“I’m sorry,” he says.
She pushes him away and throws the pills at him. She walks out of the cuca shop with a noise buzzing in her head.
Dantagob is getting married to someone else and she is pregnant with his child.
Salome is not paying attention to her surroundings when she steps outside the shop.
There is a horn.
Beep-beep!
And a lack of movement on her part.
Jason Kooper is a Namibian screenwriter and playwright. He staged his play ‘The Encounter’ in 2017 at The National Theatre of Namibia under their mentorship programme, Theatre Zone. He wrote, directed, and co-produced a short film titled ‘Trauma’, a Namibian Broadcasting Corporation (NBC) and No Plot Productions film, that premiered in 2023. He graduated with a diploma in Television Production from the College of the Arts in 2019, specialising in scriptwriting and directing. He also worked on the feature film ‘Hairareb’ as a production designer, winning the award for Best Production Design & Costume Styling at the Botswana International Film Festival in 2023. He wrote the short film ‘Uno & Hatago’ (2024), a film by the Women’s Leadership Centre.