In the short story "Dark Matter" from Gothataone Moeng's collection Call and Response, which takes place in Botswana, childhood friends Tumo and Nametso love swimming in the river and they love school. Daughters of teachers, they are inseparable until Tumo's mother is transferred. The girls meet up again at university in Gaborone. In her second year there, Nametso really needs a friend when she discovers she is pregnant.

Much of sub-Saharan Africa struggles with educating girls partly for reasons related to pregnancy. In "Dark Matter," Nametso becomes pregnant at the university level, has an abortion, and continues her education. Her (albeit fictional) experience is aspirational. While Botswana's economic development and investment in education are higher than that of many other sub-Saharan African countries, it still experiences some of the social problems that make gender inequality in the region's educational systems an issue. Nametso's pregnancy happens at university, but ...