Fimbo Publishing

There was plenty of rivalry, most of it unbeknownst to him because the antagonists played their cards very close to their chest. One girl was different from the rest. She seemed to care for him more than she cared his cash. On several occasions when he had blacked out, she drove him home, in his car, and laid him on bed. She would leave before he was awake or sobered up enough to know what was going on.


Her name was Christina Kalekye. Christina Kalekye loved to party. She lived in the party, with the party and for the party. She was tall and slender with chocolate brown skin and a slight gap between her front teeth that easily identified her as a beauty from the lakeside region of the country. She walked as she danced, gingerly with a seductive gait like a giraffe. Her shape wasn't perfectly curved by western standards; her bottom was rather large for her thin long legs, but what she lacked in form, she made up for in zestfulness. Her charming smile and boisterous laugh, after a few beers, was renown for smiting unsuspecting tourists. After flunking out of Kenyatta University’s Home Economics program in her first year, she had worked on and off as waitress, backup singer and dancer for about five years. Easy money from her expert belly dancing to lingala music made it hard to return to school or try another line of work. Until now she had not shown any interest in David.

Christina ensured that nothing bad happened to David when he was inebriated and running low on the day’s allowance. Since most girls in the club feared her tall physique, she often intervened before David was emptied of all that he had in his pockets, or car.

David’s house keeper took over when he was dropped home. The house keeper, Maria, cleaned his room every morning, sometimes before he woke up, and made sure that he lacked nothing that she could prepare. She also hid from David the true identity of the girl who often drove him home most nights. Christina didn't mind, she feared David would refuse her help if he knew what was going on. For Maria little had changed, she continued to do for David as she had always done since he was a child. She knew that where household chores were concerned, David was like a helpless infant, he had never really grown up.

When David returned to college, this time driving himself without waiting for lifts from Njeri, Maria invited Christina over for a little girl-to-girl talk. Christina came, dressed smartly in simple sun dress that made her look like a Sunday school teacher. Maria was waiting when she arrived, and to her great relieve, David wasn't at home.

It was a lovely compound surrounded by a trim hedge with an electric fence on it and a well manicured grass lawn. The trees in the compound were planted with considerable planning and selection. It seemed to her that whoever had built that home had an eye for aesthetics. There were many flowers including a bed of roses; white and red roses. When she had seen everything in view, including two well laid stone carving at the far end of the compound, she joined Maria for tea and samosas laid out in a picnic table in the compound.

Maria realized that Christina was tearing. She did not intrude on the young girl’s pensive moment; instead she began to prepare a cup of tea with hot milk the way it is done in most regular Kenyan homes. Mumbua had preferred that one ask whether she wanted her milk hot, or cold, rather than ask why she hadn't touched her breakfast.

Questions like, are you okay? Why are you so down ma'am? Can you talk to me about your worries? Were out of bounds and merited no response.

"How many teaspoons of sugar?" Maria asked softly as she was opening a tin can of tangawizi spices.

"No no black coffee will do for me thank you.” Christina replied in a casual tone. “Kahawa coffee with three sugars." Christina added as if to emphasize how far she had advanced from her modest upbringing.

Maria was taken aback. She knew Christina meant no harm, but the vanities of this nyayo generation astounded her. She silently made the cup of Kahawa coffee with three sugars and passed it to Christina. When she was done, she looked at the cup of tea and decided she might as well drink it herself. She added a teaspoon each of sugar and tangawizi.

"Christina!" Maria said softly in a maternal way that only mothers of a certain age can pull off, "I observed the way you walked around the compound, and now your mood seems to have completely changed. Did anything displease you?"

"Hapana mama. I'm okay."