Fathers and Films

Chapter 14: Fathers and Films

The screening took place in a small black-box theatre near Braamfontein. The kind of space built not for spectacle but for soul. Just fifty chairs, a borrowed projector, and a blank white wall. That was all Thabo needed.

Katlego arrived early, heart thudding in his chest like it was opening night of a play. His hands trembled slightly as he greeted the students setting up. He hadn't seen Thabo in three weeks—not since returning from Gqeberha. They'd exchanged texts, sure, but the distance felt deliberate.

The film was titled: "Echoes of the Absent."

The name alone told Katlego that this wasn't going to be easy.

At 6:00 p.m., the room filled with friends, classmates, lecturers, and a few strangers. Thabo entered last, calm but focused, nodding to Katlego without a smile, but without hesitation either.

"Thanks for coming," he said simply.

Katlego touched his shoulder. "Always."

The lights dimmed. Silence wrapped the room.

The screen lit up.

What followed was a twenty-minute flood of visuals, sound, and silence. There were no speaking parts—only music, voiceovers, and black-and-white scenes of a boy walking through empty rooms, sitting at dinner alone, staring at photographs of a man with a blurred-out face.

The voiceover was Thabo's.

"I used to think silence was something people gave you when they had nothing left to say. But I've learned that sometimes, silence is just where the hurt hides."

Scenes flashed of a boy practicing basketball alone. Burning letters in a sink. Sitting across from a man in a cafe—clearly older, clearly nervous. The boy watching. The man speaking.

Then, a close-up of a tear falling. Not dramatic. Just... honest.

More voiceover:

"They say forgiveness is for the strong. But no one tells you how heavy strength feels."

The final shot: the boy and the man sitting on a bench, not speaking, just breathing. The screen faded to black.

The credits rolled. People applauded.

Katlego sat frozen.

Thabo stood at the front. "Thank you for watching. This film was a reflection, not a revenge. I made it because I needed to. For me. And maybe… for him too."

He turned toward Katlego, meeting his father's eyes.

"I didn't name the characters. You know who they are."

Katlego rose slowly and clapped. Others followed.

Later, after the crowd had thinned, they met outside near the theatre steps.

"You wrote that for me," Katlego said quietly.

"I wrote that for us," Thabo replied. "I needed to put the past somewhere other than my chest."

"It was beautiful," Katlego whispered. "Painful. But beautiful."

Thabo nodded. "I'm still learning how to love you without resenting the years I missed."

"I understand," Katlego said. "And I'll wait for whatever version of love you have to offer. Even if it changes with time."

For the first time in a long while, Thabo smiled.

The next day, Katlego sat on the rooftop of his apartment building with Zanele, watching the city settle into dusk.

"You've come far," she said, sipping her wine. "You know that, right?"

He nodded. "Sometimes I forget. I look in the mirror and still see the man who left too many things unfinished."

Zanele smirked. "That man's dead. You buried him under every page you wrote."

He laughed. "I suppose I did."

They sat in silence for a bit before she turned to him. "Are you going back to Gqeberha?"

"I think so," he said. "Naledi's restoration is nearly done. She's thinking of starting her own architecture firm. And there's a job opening at a local college—they're looking for a part-time creative writing lecturer."

Zanele raised her eyebrows. "You thinking of applying?"

"I already did," he admitted. "Got an interview next week."

"Katlego Moloi," she said, shaking her head fondly. "You really are starting over."

"No," he said. "I'm continuing. This was always the journey. I just got lost for a while."

On Sunday, he returned to the cemetery. He hadn't been since the day he wrote to his mother in the rain. This time, he brought the first printed copy of Shadows and Light.

He sat cross-legged in front of her grave and placed the book gently against the headstone.

"Mma," he said aloud, "this is for you. Every word."

He sat there for over an hour, reading from the book, pausing, smiling, remembering. For the first time, he didn't feel like he was visiting the dead. He felt like he was reporting back to someone who had been rooting for him all along.

Before he left, he whispered, "Thank you for being my first home."

In the weeks that followed, things moved quickly. He was offered the teaching post in Gqeberha. Naledi's lighthouse project received a provincial award for cultural restoration. Lefa won a local writing competition. Thabo submitted his film to an international short festival.

Everything was growing.

On the last evening before his permanent move, Katlego walked through Johannesburg one final time. The city that raised him, broke him, and rebuilt him in silence. He passed the school, the bookstore, the park bench where he once wrote his first poem after thirty years of silence.

He stopped there again.

Pulled out his notebook.

Wrote:

"I used to think becoming a man meant hardening. But now I know—it means softening, slowly, until truth fits inside your skin without bruising."

He closed the notebook and smiled.

It was time.

Not to leave.

But to arrive.