IT WAS 19 May 2012. We’d just beaten the Waratahs in a pretty dull Super Rugby game at Newlands, and I went to Gino’s, an Italian restaurant in Stellenbosch, with my girlfriend at the time, some of the Waratahs’ boys and the cousin of a woman named Rachel Smith.
We’d been there a while when Rachel arrived with her brother and sister. She didn’t think I was anything special: in fact, she thought I was quite rude because when they arrived I was sitting in a corner and didn’t get up or say hi to them.
Then she sat down on the other side of the table, so I didn’t really speak to her too much all evening. But there was something about her that really got to me.
It wasn’t just that she was beautiful, though she was: it was the way she carried herself, the sense that there was someone special and not like other women.
I sent her a Facebook message not long after that, and we began chatting. At first, it was just as friends; I was in a relationship at the time, even though it was on and off and not particularly serious.
I was young, still 20, and full of it. I loved rugby, I loved drinking, I loved girls. Although I liked Rachel a lot, I behaved badly.
But gradually I realized that, whoever else I was with, I always wanted to be with her. We were good for each other. She brought a lot of calmness to my crazy.
I could get caught up in this world with a lot of money and the extreme stuff that sportsmen get up to, but she’d never been about either of those.
This story is from the 21 October 2021 edition of YOU South Africa.
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This story is from the 21 October 2021 edition of YOU South Africa.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
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