Oscar: An Accident Waiting to Happen Read Online Free

he stayed with other family members and friends, and then, at age 17, bought a house and started living on his own.) I always felt such compassion for Oscar when I thought about that time in his life, losing his mom while he was really still a child, and then being obliged to take care of himself, never mind having to deal with a challenging disability. I thought he must be very brave.
    Sam and Oscar both loved the outdoors and they went on long, scenic drives, hiked up mountains and spent time near the ocean. Once, after they went for a walk in the mountains, Sam came home and told me how he had carried her on his shoulders and what fun they had had. Afterwards, on that particular day, they went to have breakfast with Granny.
    Whenever Oscar came to Cape Town, he used to message all his CT friends to join him for a game of touch rugby at the beach. They’d all meet up at Camps Bay or Llandudno, both scenic areas along Cape Town’ s beautiful ocean front and Sam (and sometimes, I) would go along and watch. Oscar got such joy out of things that involved physical exertion; it was as though he had all this energy bottled up that he needed to use up.
    One thing I noticed – no matter how swelteringly hot the day was, Oscar never swam in front of people. He once told me that when he was a little boy, he was really comfortable showing his stumps but as he got older, he had become much more self-conscious. Despite being so open in front of the world about having had his legs amputated, I was sad that he didn’t feel relaxedenough to take off his prosthetics and enjoy a swim. In fact, the only time he ever took his legs off at our house was when he slept.
    But Oscar had many other interests, besides sports. Like food. He really adored cooking and enjoyed preparing salad lunches and healthy meals together with Sam – mainly chicken dishes – with no carbs at night. He was strict with his diet, apart from a sweet tooth, and he was insistent on avoiding oily food. He was also a very creative chef and sometimes spoke about how he would love to have his own restaurant. He dreamed of settling down in the wine country, getting married and running a restaurant where he would do all the cooking. Cooking, it seemed, gave him the opportunity for some serenity in his demanding schedule.
    In those early days, Sam really enjoyed being at Oscar’s side and sharing this time with him. At his house, they enjoyed relaxing, and watching a lot of movies and sport on TV. Oscar was the one who first told us about the series My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding after which we all started watching it together and laughed together over it. Even now we’re all still hooked on it.
    Oscar got up really early and often napped in the afternoons. When he was training, Sam learned how to time his running. We all became more interested in athletics and more aware of running times; we were especially aware of what times he had to achieve to qualify for the Olympics. Ampie, his trainer, was usually at the track to oversee his training. He was always very nice to Sam, except for one day when he made a faux pas and called her Jenna by mistake, making Sam presume that his ex, Jenna, must have recently been with Oscar at the track, something that upset her a lot.
    Yet it seemed with Oscar, for every feel-good story, there was a troubling one. Soon after he and Sammy started seeing each other, I heard that he had broken the speed limit by driving over 300 kilometres an hour in one of the fast cars he was so obsessed with driving. Sammy was in the passenger seat next to him. I was furious when I found out and made him promise never to speed with her in his car again. He didn’t deny it and acted very contrite, promising me it would not happen again. I soon foundout, however, that his promises were short lived. That was another discovery I soon made about Oscar: he was able to seamlessly distort the truth, while being extremely convincing. These often took the form of “white