After the Act

                    

In the morning, after moaning all night, there was mourning.

It was chilly, very chilly, outside. An ominous silence characterized the outside of the house despite it being a Monday morning; very uncharacteristic of Huruma Estate Mondays. She started reflecting. She was to be at work by this time. She had promised to change. They had gone over her conduct at work with her supervisor and she had felt the need to turn over a new leaf.

“I’ll be the first at the office next Monday,” she said very fast to end the long lecture that had taken her whole Friday afternoon. She could hear her phone vibrating, she knew he would call, but she had made up her mind to stop seeing the foolish guy. It must have been him calling. He was the only one who called during working hours. Mike couldn’t match Kim at all. Kim was the courteous one. He was the TDH description type; tall, dark, handsome. He couldn’t just call during working hours. Mike was a complete idiot. The only good thing about Mike was aaaah… mhhm… good in bed-yes, in snoring. It’s sad, quite sad for such a rich man not to be ‘all-rounded’. She pitied his wife more than herself for having to experience the ‘inexperience’ of Mike every other night. At least for her it was just part of a sad day, part of a needy day or part of a thirsty weekend when she needed to obey her thirst that she had to think of Mike; and only after trying to find Kim, Jimmy and Kevo in that order of priority and satisfaction to no avail.

On this Friday she was not interested in any of the men at all. She had promised herself, in the washroom before her reflection at the mirror, after the long talk with her supervisor, she was going to change. Actually, she had thought of transformation. Transformation is holistic, isn’t it? She had to transform. She had to become new. Niumbie moyo safi, niumbie moyo mpya, moyo wa kunyenyekea na kubondeka mbele zako. The song played at the back of her mind as she went back to her seat at the office, to wait for 5.00pm so that she could leave for home. She had made up her mind. People would see how transformed she would turn to be, her supervisor would see.

It’s however 9.30am on Monday and here she is lying prostrate, lying to herself that she is changing and lying to this man that she is in any way emotionally connected to him. It’s surprising though how she agreed to come here after a five minute call. She knows what has happened already and she tries to conceal her pity and regret every time Jimmy is looking at her as he puts on his pants. She has been hiding her fury every time they have been mating. To her, it is pure biology. No chemistry. She has been very good at it –the hiding that is. However, it is now getting to a point that she feels she is at the brim of it. She has to release it. Things have begun spilling over. The cold she has had is now two weeks old and she has been on and off the nearby dispensary with serious fever. The doctor is nice but she cannot heed to the prescriptions of the doctor. That she decided long time ago. Soon she will not hide anymore. She knows what she has decided to do about it.

While Jimmy was bathing, she was still lying, face up, on the king size bed. What an ambitious man Jimmy was! Jimmy, a fashion business owner and an investor at the NSE at the age of twenty eight, was all one could wish for. He had a good life. “What a pity,” she thought to herself. She continued writing on the piece of paper she had withdrawn from her purse. She cried as she wrote.

 “Sweetheart! Breakfast is ready! Do I bring it there or you will get to this side as you explain to me why you have not gone to work?” Jimmy had what people refer to as a heavy voice. He could easily convince anyone of something with that kind of voice. And he did that exactly.

“I will wait for it here,” she responded as she just finished writing.

A platter full of slices of bread spread with margarine, fried eggs and two smokies placed near two oranges, one of which had a knife midway into it. What a lover! She wished he was his man. She wished she could call him his. He on the other hand knew himself as the only man. After all, how else could he explain why she agrees to his demands so easily? But she was really good. Smart. Conniving.

They exchanged romantic glances as they relished on the food. Jimmy was talking fast that she could not hear what he was saying. She was thinking fast too. She was remembering old times and reflecting on the future. It was as if she was trying to live in both the past and the future at the same time, and forgetting the present. She did not realize Jimmy had finished eating and he was at the bedroom window looking outside. Maybe thinking. Maybe regretting too.

“Eat the oranges, I got them from ocha. They are sweet. It’s their season back there. My younger brother will bring more when he comes next week. He’s joining campo sasa nahitaji kusaka fees yake.”

The knife was sharp and big. It was like those ones she normally saw at mutura joints that looked like they were eked out of water tanks before being sharpened into wedges. She withdrew it from the orange. She looked at it carefully. As she rose to her feet, tiptoeing, she made sure that she was ready. She held the knife strongly in her right hand and she stood behind Jimmy who was still looking at the window. Her left arm went over his left shoulder from behind, her breasts rested on his back and her nose made its way over Jimmy’s back of the neck. Jimmy, aroused, turned. The only face Jimmy could make was one of shock before he felt the taste of raw blood in his mouth. The knife did a quick job. It had gone into his left side deeply. As she withdrew it, blood gushed out heavily. He went dizzy shortly. Thud! Jimmy hit the floor face down.

There was a knock at the door. There was a man calling Jimmy at the door. “Manze fungua! Nimeskia uko ndani na msupa! Yaani ata baada ya kutufanya tusilale usiku bado hamjaachana? Jim! Jim! Shit! Jim mi navunja mlango! Jim!” He started hitting the door.

She looked at the knife again, went to the bed and sat down at the edge of it. She held the knife with both her hands, raised it up facing backwards and with some strength she possessed at the moment she brought the knife into her lower left of the chest and twisted the knife. She tasted human blood-the taste of iron, the taste of her own blood. She could only manage a whimper before she lay prostrate again on bed, still.

By the time Jimmy’s neighbor got in, they were both kaput. He turned to peep into the bedroom and one body, Jimmy’s, was lying face down on the ground. One step further and he raised his eyes to see another body, a beautiful lady’s body, lying face up on the bed.

On the small table at the bedside lay a piece of paper that bore everything; the crime, the evidence, and the cause:

"Dear mum, Kindly do not write another eulogy for me. Do not lie like me. 

I have killed this one with a knife. I have gone with him as well by the same knife. United in the way we died at least. As for the others; Kimani Ernest, Kevin Otieno and Mike Muli, they are to follow us later with AIDS. 

Bye! 

 With regrets, 

 Ciku. "

End