Daria's diary

6Nov

Courage Borrowed From Naledi

I keep replaying the moment my foot slipped on the wet stones. The wall was right there, and Jonas close enough that I could see the calculation in his face: wh…

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5Nov

What the Blue Cup Proves

I am most afraid that the cup will mean nothing. That I carried it through a locked gate, injured myself for it, and Ruth will still die without knowing it reac…

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4Nov

The Lie Under Nia’s Voice

I keep turning over the sentence Gideon supposedly heard from Ruth: I closed the door on you. It sounds clean enough to be rehearsed, and rehearsed lies are usu…

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3Nov

The Silence After the Shove

I keep replaying the moment Gideon’s shoulder hit mine. The workers saw it. They looked away with the particular discipline of people who have decided whose tro…

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2Nov

The Plan I Cannot Unmake

I keep looking at the photograph instead of the dark window. The chain looks ordinary. That is what unsettles me: a lock can look ordinary while deciding whethe…

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1Nov

The Blue Cup Stayed

I said yes too quickly. I know I did. Ruth barely had to explain what she wanted before I was already calculating routes and inventing obstacles in my head. Tha…

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31Oct

The Part I Could Not Control

I hated that Tamsin’s refusal came out sounding braver than anything I could have given her. She stood inside the truth and put her own name on it, while I was…

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30Oct

The Cost of Being Useful

I stared at the sale date until it stopped looking like a number and started looking like a door I had quietly nailed shut. My mother is losing the family home…

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29Oct

What I Chose Not to Keep

I keep touching the empty space where the camera used to be. It is such a stupid little gesture, like checking for a tooth that has already fallen out, except n…

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28Oct

Every Safe Place Is Temporary

Felix knew where I was staying. Not merely where I slept, but the exact place I had chosen to feel almost safe. I read his message twice, then a third time, hop…

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27Oct

Bait Under My Pillow

The thief accusation bothered me because it sounded rehearsed. Naomi did not look caught out; she looked relieved to have the whole room staring at me. That is…

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26Oct

The Exit They Chose

What unsettled me most was not the resignation. It was how ordinary the moment was: a business failing, a man deciding he no longer wanted to carry it, and ever…

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25Oct

Things I Refuse to Say Aloud

I kept the silver token where Leanne could not see it. Not because I trusted the depot office, and not because I wanted to protect her. I wanted the time to thi…

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24Oct

One Clean Wish, Then the Evidence

I wanted Fatima's wish to stay clean. A wedding photograph, a granddaughter, and one delivery before sunset. That was all I needed it to be. When she turned the…

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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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