The Winter Blues That Made Neema

Standing there, Neema had never been more grateful for her name. Neema is a Swahili word that means grace, and if she was a Hindu, she’d be kneeling, thanking Vishu for saving her life. But what about Njenga and Kagz? What in not her God’s name was she going to do about the bodies?

DECEMBER

April was a girl that liked to flirt online. Neema was the classic chic tomboy. But, as April Neema on her ID card, she was a girl born in Nkubu, a small village in Meru, Kenya. Her Meru was awful to say the least, and that is what Kagz saw as the cutest quirk with her. She insisted it was not a quirk, but one time he told her, “You can’t hear yourself like I do. What I’m saying is that it’s sexy. I love how awful you are with the ‘Ms’ and ‘Bs’ and how you try to add musicality to your tone. It’s really terrible but I’m still with you. So, you win.”

Njenga on the other hand was not a sharing man when it came to his cars and women. He was a man who would never hit a woman in his life, rather, he’d threaten you with death. One time Neema had lied about her whereabouts and, upon arriving at the house, Njenga arrived to an empty ghost land. He’d rented the two bedroom apartment in Kilimani for the specific reason of keeping Neema ‘away from prying eyes and greedy bastards who could harm her at any time’. Some rooms had cameras placed on the edge of a lamp, or a picture frame, or right above the bulb that supposedly ‘cannot be fixed and you should drop this topic Neema!’ But, the day he threatened her he said, “What you did is something that will make your mother and I grieve you next time.” He kissed her, they had dinner, they fucked, and he went back to his wife.

Did you think he was a free man? Where do you get those these days? Top shelf stuff those -top shelf, if he’s disease free...

In the month of December, she helped Kagz in choosing a bed at the store. He had been sleeping on a plain mattress placed in the middle of a small cream room with wooden floors. He had two white pillows, two pairs of shoes to his left against the wall and a grey bin the size of a stool for all his clothes. But that month, he went from cleaner to a stock clerk in the supermarket and just like that, a raise! So then, he had his mattress on top of a white wooden frame and a curtain instead of a blanket to cover his windows. He still needed to fix his toilet which broke about two weeks prior, but 17^th March was Neema’s birthday, and he wanted to save up as much as he could and buy her something she completely could not possibly at all anticipate. He would take the chance to go to his neighbor’s toilets whenever he hanged out with them, piss in public toilets and sometimes, he’d throw a careful glance over his shoulder to make sure no eye is watching him, stand by the thicket beside the road, and it’s see you toilet at dawn. He’d also avoid drinking water past six pm so he could resist the urge to use his bathroom. It was leaking yellow liquid all over the bathroom floor and smelled like sewage, but just for a little while. He was sure she would love the gift.

JANUARY

The year before, Neema’s new-year resolution was to develop communication etiquette. That January, she begun to pick up her friend’s phone calls instead of ignoring them. She would even return calls but that was not the biggest deal of all. She downloaded a dating app and declared in writing in her journal that she would not be single in one year. That she would have so many options to choose from and she would be so happy then.

She met Kagz on the dating app. Njenga on the other hand first spotted her at a car show event; Concours d'Elegance. However, he never approached. Just a week later, he saw her again at Biz Baz, an event where you could buy art, clothes, furniture, eat and lose money to beautiful expensive things you’ll use once or, never at all. So you better look good! That second time, Njenga followed Neema around, watching her try on this shawl, examine that piece of art, wiggle her bedazzled fingers in front of her face, sit on a chair then a stool then pick up about twenty fridge magnets like forty times before finally deciding that out of all that hard work, all that walking around alone, she would come out with a fridge magnet that said ‘Kesho pia ni siku’ meaning tomorrow is also another day. That’s more than he could stand, so he walked up to her and asked that he accompany her for one more sweep only this time, she came out with an African blackwood trunk that had been split in half and turned into a coffee table with a glass top running through the middle. 

That same day she met Njenga, Kagz sent her a message on the dating app. It’s unfortunate how beautiful the man’s smile was. Maybe she could have resisted a grumpy-looking collection of profile pictures but in each picture, there was a smile that curved more towards the left than the right which made Neema just stare at her screen -smiling.

By June of that year, she had confessed her love for Kagz back to him. He’d said to her on her birthday, I know it’s not much to give but look,” and pointed at a drawing in the sand. I love you, it said. She didn’t doubt she had feelings for him and also didn’t doubt that, if given time, these feelings would mate with each other and produce baby feelings. She asked that he give her some time, so he did.

When Njenga told Neema about his ‘deepest and most sincere connection he has ever had with a female, he talked about his dog. It was a jet black Rottweiler that looked more as if it had had its hair dyed. She did not ask. “A man will never fully trust a woman, you know. You people started betraying us from day one with Eve.” They were at home in bed watching a thriller movie on the flat screen with the lights out. Just as that statement had suddenly appeared out of nowhere, he added, “I love you.” First she was quiet and, sitting in this silence, he shifted his body, unnerved by her nerve not to answer back but held back by his gentlemanliness. 

“Can I answer in the morning?” she asked with a soft voice. She laced her hand with his and asked again, “Can I answer in the morning?” Calmly, he said, “Sure.” After the movie, they fucked and went to bed. It was a wide-eyed night for both of them but each facing their own demons in their heads with their backs against each other.

Later on at around four am, he got up and left. When she woke up, she found a note on the pillowcase with instructions for what to wear that day, where to go and a credit card with her name on it. A few hours later, she sent him a message, “I love you too and I can’t wait to see you again next week. Five days feels like five years but I’ll be here. Also, thank you.”

She would receive her instructions from then on about what her day would look like if it would look like anything at all. By November, as far as she could tell, one might as well have located her gps and found that it’s hell. She could never call him. That was the most important rule. He was around politicians, oil tycoons, CEOs and the who’s who in tech industries and had done well for himself as an investor and did not want to explain her presence, be that in public or on the phone. All interactions were done face to face and because of that, he would randomly pop up at the house just to see if she is there.

As a man, he was rich enough to buy himself the most expensive of services from women through exclusive packages provided by an elite escort service. He’d pay extra just so the woman is made unavailable to other men while he was with her. Eventually, he got bored of the whole thing and just like bloody magic, his eye was caught by Neema. What grace! His ‘I love you’ came in June, the previous day before Neema sneaked out at 9 p.m. to confess her love for Kagz at his bedsitter. It was also on this very day that Njenga decided to show up at the Kilimani house only for the watchman to tell him that she was away. From that day on, the two watchmen were put on payrolls for daily investigative duties with immediate feedback. He’d waited for her to come back home, fucked her and went back to his wife. He’d then had the cameras installed that week under the guise of renovation. “We’ll let these men do their jobs and go out for some java.”

“No, Artcaffe.” Neema protested playfully, appearing grumpy then suddenly smiling.

“Artcaffe.” He said, and kissed her against the door ready to take her on that floor. But, priorities.

After one year of watching Njenga sleep and sleeping in Kagz’s arms, she had come to the conclusion that she wanted none of them in her life. If she left Njenga for Kagz, he would have them both killed and if she left Kagz for Njenga, his already low self-esteem would hit an all-time major low and his suicidal thoughts may be triggered again. His financial poverty would infect his mind as well and the problem with Kagz is that he kept on comparing himself to his age mates who were driving, or had closets full of clothes and fridges stuffed full of foods of all colors and taste. If he knew she had secretly been seeing another man, wealthier than he had ever dared to dream for himself for a whole year, and still came back to his tiny house with just a mattress with a thinning blanket, a few cutlery, some clothes and important toiletries like tissue and toothpaste, he would die of shame. Worst still, he would die of heartbreak. In her mind, it would hurt less if she left them both that way everyone loses, including herself. A fresh start, she thought.

Right after her birthday.

FEBRUARY

If Neema could tell you one thing, it’s that in the end, if you gamble with someone's open, kind and loving heart, there is bound to be some karma in that. . 

Neema called her friend Shiru over for some wine. As her only confidant, she explained the situation in full, seeking advice from someone who had been in a stable relationship for seven and a half years and counting. First, Shiru emptied her glass then poured herself another one, this time going past the half mark to three quarter. “You have to choose. Why loose? Honestly if it was me, I’d go for the rich one.” Neema squinted her eyes at her glass and drank two sips of her white. She expressed her surprise saying, “I thought you’d tell me to follow my heart or something. You chose to be with Sam despite his persistent financial struggles.”

“Yea, and do you think I enjoy being poor?” Shiru asked and took a sip, pushing her braids out of her face and crossing her legs. “If you love both of them, why opt for struggles?”

“But what about the part where I told you that I think he is watching me. Even right now, I’m sure there are cameras in this house. I checked everywhere but didn’t find any but my gut tells me I’m being watched because when I’m alone I still feel a strange presence around.”

“Should I get a bible?” asked Shiru and they laughed heartily, clinking their glasses ‘to sex and sorrow’ and taking sips.

“I have to ask for permission to get out of the house and on top of that, explain where I am going. He picks out my clothes, jewelry, perfume and I’m not complaining because he has impeccable taste but, I don’t know. I guess I can’t breathe.” She took a drag of her breath and folded her arms across her chest, biting her lower lip and furrowing her brows. “If there is this much doubt in you, then I think you already know what you want. Part of you is just afraid to face it.” They proceeded to sit in silence for a few minutes and once she got a call from Njenga to meet him at a car dealership, Shiru escorted her. It was around fifteen minutes away. She left when they arrived a few meters close.

Njenga bought her an Audi A8 that day, the very same day she had made her final decision to leave him. However, about Kagz, she decided to give it a few days to think over. 

MARCH

Each man had prepared his own kind of spectacle for Neema on her birthday. Njenga would only be available from 6 p.m. which gave her the whole day to spend with Kagz. All her bags were packed, having finally made up her mind about the direction she wanted to take next.

She got dressed in an earth brown oversized shirt with folded sleeves half-tucked inside loose denim shorts and nude thigh-high four inch block boots. By ten o’clock, she was at Kagz’s place ready for this big surprise he had been gushing about all this while. On arrival, she found him seated by his door on the floor; one sock inside his shoe the other shoe nowhere in sight, a tie tied on his head, bare-chested with his arms hugging his body. Life is hard by Fred James was playing on repeat. Her first reaction was to hug him until he said something.

Finally, after a good few minutes of hugs and soft placed kisses on his cheek and forehead from Neema, he finally said, “I lost it all.” He took in a deep breath. Now that the words were here, there was a sudden urgent need to explain himself to her quickly. “I had been saving up some money over a period of months to surprise you with David Bowie's 1974 Diamond Dogs album on vinyl. Yesterday, I placed the money on what I thought was a sure bet and upon waking up today to check the status of my bid, I had lost everything to a market crash.”

He rubbed his head and stood up abruptly but just as fast, Neema also stood up and assured him that no physical gift could ever be wrapped like the package that he came in and because of that, she had everything she wished for. To cheer him up, she suggested they walk around the open air Maasai market and then go to Uhuru Park but he insisted that they go window shopping so that he could show her all the things he would buy for her when he became rich.

“There’s no limit to what you can point at,” said Kagz and so everything, big or small, was hers for the taking if she wanted it. Tighter is how she held his hand as they walked through the mall. “I’ll buy you the mall too, if it pleases my queen,” he teased as he bowed. She only smiled uncomfortably, playfully slapping his hand. To their right, on the second floor, there stood Njenga with murder in his eyes staring at them –now eye to eye with Neema.

With sweaty palms, she grabbed Kagz’s hand and begun to run past people who were now clearing the way for them ahead of time, making it easier for them. Her gaze was fixed on the exit but Kagz was resisting the pulling, asking her to stop. Behind them, Njenga followed running just as fast except, he pulled out a gun from who knows here and shot up. Screams bursted through the air, every person shuffling their legs as fast as they could to the nearest exit. When Kagz looked behind, he realized that the mad man was actually chasing them then after a few seconds, a suspicion as to why he might be doing so nudged him then almost immediately, a gut feeling hit him. He stopped in his tracks which made Neema also stop.

“That’s him, isn’t it?” he asked. “The other man?” he continued. Neema, Neema! She repeated in her head, her eyes now spilling warm liquid. “But you did love me…?” he continued. By the time he turned back, Njenga was standing right there behind him. In the scaffold that ensued between them, the gun went off killing a security guard and immediately, one shot was fired by another guard. Its bullet went through Njenga, causing his finger to pull the trigger. As for Kagz, his ears popped with the second shot. The third one that went through Njenga’s heart went through Kagz’s chest as well and the fourth from Njenga went through Kagz’s stomach.

Standing there, Neema had never been more grateful for her name. What in not her God’s name was she going to do about the bodies? How was she going to love them? She turned herself into the police for ‘being a bad girlfriend’ but that was rejected. Faith, she thought, and became a sister. She died a sister having served the church for sixty-eight years.