Daria's diary

22Oct

The Door Sealed Behind Me

I kept thinking that if the fire door held, the ventilation warnings would become an ordinary emergency. People would gather outside, someone sensible would cal…

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21Oct

The number follows me

The silver token made the back of my neck sting. Not because it proved anything clean and simple, but because it made the pattern feel deliberate. Felix does no…

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20Oct

The Sketch I Cannot Unfold

Solomon not recognising the room frightened me more than I let anyone see. I keep thinking that memory can leave a person while the truth is still sitting besid…

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19Oct

The Lie Did Not Fit

I keep thinking about the moment Tamsin spoke through the glass. Not because it rescued me. Because it made the accusation so small and so deliberate that I wan…

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18Oct

Keeping One Eye Open

I hate that being cornered made me feel small for that awful second before fear sharpened into something useful. I hate even more that fear woke me up completel…

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17Oct

What Felix Took From Me

I keep replaying the moment the blue door crumpled under Felix’s boot. Not the evidence, not Tamsin’s breathing body, not the chaos at the gate: the paper. I kn…

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16Oct

The Door I Refused

I kept thinking about the crushed house sketch. Whoever drew it expected the walls to survive, and I hated how quickly Felix reduced that hope under his shoe. T…

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15Oct

The Route Beneath My Pillow

I felt strangely calm when I saw the cut in the brake hose. That is the part I do not like about myself. Fear should have hit first, but I looked at that sabota…

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14Oct

The Photograph Looked Ordinary

The photograph looked ordinary, and that frightened me. Aisha, the receipt, the stamp, the ledger page—all of it fitted into one bedside frame, as if a life cou…

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13Oct

He listened through the walls

The worst part was watching the officers become ordinary again. They wrote down what Mrs. Steyn could prove, walked where they expected danger to be, and left m…

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12Oct

What staying actually means

The drawer moved. Not opened — shifted, the way a drawer shifts when the house breathes and something inside it settles. I was washing a plate. I had made mysel…

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11Oct

Nineteen thousand is not enough

I found Gerhard van der Merwe's name on the co-op board today. Not the Gerhard. Not the one who owns Pieter's farm and his Caltex and his girl. A different Gerh…

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10Oct

Pieter se meisiekind

Someone filmed me. That is the part that will not leave. Not the word — I have heard worse on the farm roads at midnight from men who meant it — but the phone h…

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9Oct

What patience costs

The man in the kitchen window with the silver watch. I told my brother I could not explain why he frightened me and that is the most honest thing I said all nig…

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8Oct

He did not look away from it

The patient man appeared at the Goodwood stoep without being called and he did not say a single word. He walked between me and Wikus, opened the door of the Hil…

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7Oct

Notebook logic and the thing I almost said

I have read the line four hundred times. Citrusdal receipt. 2026-10-03. Four days ago, which means he was in Citrusdal four days ago, which means either he live…

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6Oct

The patient man's empty lane

He was there. Lower Tankwa turnoff, silver SUV, engine off. I saw it in my peripheral the way you see a cop car on the highway even when you're doing the limit.…

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5Oct

The Polaroid won't stop

I keep seeing it. Not the snake on the concrete — the photo sliding off his sill like something he was done with. And I know what Tannie Mia's gate looks like.…

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4Oct

The Float Keeps Shrinking

Another ordinary day. No haul, no call. I sat in the flat and the silence did the thing it always does — it started asking questions I cannot answer. The float…

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3Oct

The Math I Refuse to Do

The insurance bounced on the third and I paid it from the venom float like it was nothing. Like that money was always meant to be split three ways: snakes, me,…

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2Oct

The watch and the clipboard

The man with the silver watch was inside that storeroom in Parow. I did not say it out loud on the neighbourhood walk. I said it to myself, once, on the quiet s…

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1Oct

What Werner put on the counter

I have been telling myself for three years that the house in Greyton means nothing. A GPS coordinate I delete from memory. A stoep with cracked cement and a ket…

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30Sep

The membrane, the culvert, the quiet

She made me show the bag on camera and the hatch membrane slid out of nowhere — translucent, almost pretty, and it hit my boot like an accusation. I swore befor…

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29Sep

The thorn tree photograph

I keep looking at the sent message like it is a receipt for something I am not sure I bought. The photograph of the empty tub. Empty. Eight scorpions I spent tw…

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28Sep

The Catalog and the Weight

A day spent counting what I already have, and it does not help. The wrap on my palm is three days old now. I should change it but changing it means looking, and…

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27Sep

The Route Is Not Proof

I keep treating the route recording like a witness I can control. It cannot ask why I am doing this, or decide my account sounds inconvenient. It only keeps the…

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26Sep

The Bag Between Us

I keep telling myself the only decision that matters is whether the bag stays sealed. That sounds clean and professional. It is not clean. I am furious that Pie…

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25Sep

Reading his sentence seven times

The gully is quiet in a way the city never is. I keep checking the dial on the cab because I don't trust the wind. If it swings too far south tonight I'll have…

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24Sep

Still carrying the photo

I woke up on Karel's narrow bed and for half a second I thought the bag was breathing. It was just the canvas settling. Sun already in the valley, that pale Kar…

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23Sep

Holding the bag at the gate

The jack kicked and I took it in the palm. Bound it with the elastic from the Constantia adder's cash — felt right, using that man's money to close my own wound…

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