Chronicles

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I have interviewed several people who said things like, “God spoke to me.” When I ask them what that means, they say, “God speaks to us a lot but we are not always listening.”

Oh yeah? What does he sound like?

“It’s a conscious voice,” they say. “We just need to quieten ourselves and listen. ”

Two days ago I was seated on the balcony, looking at my ponytail palm’s torso and thinking, “She’s such a big girl now. She needs a bigger pot.” The sun was setting behind a cloudy sky and I was tired of drinking tea. I thought I heard a voice telling me to leave the house. It wasn’t a booming voice or anything, and it certainly didn’t come from the small bush of ponytail palm. So I wore my shoes, grabbed a jacket and Ubered to Club 213 in Lavington. My body wanted whisky in it. I wanted to sit at the bar counter, nurse two doubles, a bottle of water for two hours and listen to old school music. Nothing too heavy. I planned to wake up very early on Eid and write.

It was coming to 7pm and so I easily found a spot at the new bar counter where I could see the whole room. No sooner had I settled in than I saw this chap I haven’t seen since 2009 walk in with a lady who wasn’t his wife. He spotted me and turned to the lady and said something, as they made their way to the counter.

“It’s like seeing a ghost.” I said as we hugged and shook hands vigorously.

He turned and introduced the lady who was standing there trying not to look awkward. “This is my wife, Pam*.” Well, this wasn’t the wife I knew. But you know how these things are; the wife is who he says the wife is.

My drink came. He ordered a beer for himself and a gin and tonic for her. Then we started catching up. And catching up. And laughing. Then he ordered a double for me and their drinks. More chatting. I ordered a round for them. And when he offered to order another double for me I tapped out. I said I was working early in the morning. “Nonsense, we haven’t seen each other in dog years,” he said and ordered anyway. The whisky warmed me. My head grew lighter. It grew louder and the music got better. I went to the loo and as I washed my hands, this bathroom attendant, a young man of maybe 19, was there holding a paper napkin for me, while leaning on a mop. I said, “Oh, thanks, boss.” When I went back he had ordered another drink for me. We continued catching up, trading war stories and laughing at jokes that wouldn’t have been that funny during the day. But what the heck. We were alive and we were there. At some point I whispered, “I think your wife is bored.” He turned and asked her, “Babe, are we boring you with our stories?” She smiled and touched his arm and said, “No, of course not!”

He told me how he got into the horticulture business and “got seriously shafted by the cartels.” He told me how he put two Ubers on the road and they did so well until one was stolen and the other started developing many mechanical problems, so he sold it to the driver. He told me about starting a small IGCSE Afterschool and Weekend tuition center. And export business, he didn’t say what, just “export business.” All these while maintaining a day job, getting divorced, raising children from the first wife, making children with the new wife and finding time to run five half marathons and two full marathons.

So when he asked me what I have been up to I said, “Gosh, I wish I had gone first.” The wife laughed loudly for the first time. We had to turn and look at her with amused smiles.

I went back to the washroom and that boy offered me the napkin again. So I tipped him handsomely because when you have had a few whiskies in you, such things like a boy holding a mop, handing you a paper napkin makes you very emotional. It makes you wonder what he dreams of. What he thinks of people who wander into the loo drunk. Makes you wonder if he sends money back home to his mom. And the house his mom lives in. And the prayers she prays for him. And how it is to stand there the whole night, in the loo, wiping, cleaning, smiling at people who don’t smile back at you, who don’t see you and when the sun comes up you are confronted by a different day with different fears. Whisky brings all these emotions of empathy and compassion. And when you hand him the tip and he says, “Mungu akubariki sana, bro,” You tell him, rather unnecessarily, “Usiwahi give up,” and you push the door out.

The music was getting better and better. I think a new deejay had taken over and he was shredding it to pieces. Great old school music. At around 11 the couple started whispering to each other like couples do. Then she said she was going to head out. “Already?” I said and my pal said, “Yeah, ebu tell her. It’s only 11.” But she insisted. She was tired, she said. “But you guys can continue hanging out.” My pal said, “Really? Are you sure?”

“Yeah, yeah,” She said. “I can catch an Uber home. You boys have fun.”

I nudged my friend with my knee. It was a trap. She would never forgive him for leaving her to take a cab home alone at night while he stays drinking with a guy who is technically an acquaintance. She wouldn’t forgive him if she left him with his own brother, sembuse me?

“Let me walk her to the cab,” he told me as she gathered her shit and flashed me with a deceptively sweet smile and said, “So nice to meet you. Keep writing.”

I thought, Oh, this bugger is going to have a bad hangover and a woman who isn’t talking to him the whole of Eid and half the week. He walked her out. When he came back I told him, “She isn’t happy. You should have left with her.”

“Oh, she’s fine. She’s an easy chic.”

“Oh lucky you.” I said sarcastically.

“I gave her the car.”

So we watched TV the whole time. Because that’s what you go to do at 213. You watch the musical videos. You watch Naughty by Nature. You watch PM Dawn. You watch Aaliyah and R. Kelly and Bobby Brown. And you sing to Fresh Prince’s theme song. And you keep drinking against your better judgement and when you look at your watch it’s 3:30am. And you say, “Shit. I need to go home.” But you don’t go home. You are homeless. You are under some sort of spell. You go against everything you are and want to be. The music holds you captive. At some point we stop talking, we just stare up at the TV screens, watching videos, pointing at a song and saying, “Oh my God. That’s my jam.” But every jam at 213 is not only your jam but everybody’s jam.

At 4:15am, I say, “I think I’m going to call it a night, bro.” When the bill comes you squint at it cross eyed. You struggle to read it. It would be easier to read it if it was written in Mandarin. We walked outside to look for our Ubers.

“Let’s do this again, bro.” He said.

“No, let us not do this again.” I said. We laughed and hugged and shook hands vigorously.

“Do you think God talks to people?” I asked him as I held the back door of the Uber open, one foot in.

“Yeah, definitely….for sure…yeah….I think he definitely does.”

Then I went home and I didn’t write.

Blame Club 213.

See you next week.

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