THE FIRST WEEKS AND MONTHS OF 1987 are sealed off in my memory like in a glass cabinet with little porcelain figurines that have been taken out by some invisible hand, moved about and put back inside – up to now they are stuck in that very moment.

Can I open it and go through the motions again?

I will try.

The doctor's phone call set us in a state of panic.

‘Could you and Victor come to see me? It is about Dambudzo.’

This was a couple of days after I had found Dambudzo in his flat in a frightful state. He was running a high temperature, coughing blood, emaciated. Open books between dirty sheets, a half-eaten pie on a table. I had dragged him into my car and driven him to the doctor's rooms around the corner in The Avenues.

‘You are not looking so good today, Dambudzo,’ Nick C., our family GP, said, and after a brief consultation, to me: ‘Here is a referral. Take him straight into Parirenyatwa Hospital.’

Visiting our GP was always an uplifting experience. He would usually see you off with the prescription: ‘All you need is TLC!’ On the phon he had seemed concerned, which got us worried. We wracked our minds. What was wrong with Dambudzo? Why had Nick not wanted to tell us over the phone? Was it cancer? Or – what if it was AIDS?

‘I have no contact details for any of Dambudzo's relatives,’ Nick said when we had settled in his office. ‘He was always very dismissive when I asked him to name someone –’

‘Yes,’ I confirmed, in order to calm my nerves ‘– he wouldn't want his family interfering with his life.’

Nick nodded. ‘So for me you are his closest kin,’ he said.

Victor and I waited.

‘The news is not good. I have been phoned by Parirenyatwa. Dambudzo has a far advanced pneumonia which is caused – as a test has proved – by AIDS.’

Nick must have seen our faces freeze, but he did not know our story yet. I only told him after we had received our own test results.

‘So … what does this mean?’ I stammered. ‘How are they treating him?’

‘With antibiotics, which will bring some ease to his lungs.