Maina had been a young man who came from Mwea.
This was the hottest place in the whole of Kirinyaga County. Many boys from this
village walked almost pausing nudity. In classes, boys wore inner vests while
girls wore no underwears. Though tough weather, the children from this area did
very well and made it to Campus. They believed in the power of a book and a
pen, they had no otherwise. Those in nursery school, did their chants amicably
well while those in high schools enjoyed the joy of poetry. They enjoyed the
poetic texture of rhyme,consonance as well as assonance. Those in Universities
enjoyed phonetics, phonology and literature, they really lived up to their
dreams. Most of the parents from Mwea spitted saliva on their chests in the
Gikuyu way of thanking the God of Mt. Kirinyaga.
Maina sat under
a Mukuyu tree and read the following.
‘
Maina, you’re the most cutest boy I have
ever seen. I sought for a chocolate boy, I didn’t want a brown boy as too am
brown. This would have made the matter worse. I also sought for a slightly
taller than me boy. A boy I would look up and would look down to kiss me. A boy
I would give the French kiss. Not a big
oversize boy but a slender and size number one
handsome boy. A faithful boy who would care and give me all his heart
without reservations and divided royalty. I would embark on giving him all me solely, that
would turn us to forever soulmates. I write this letter informing you the much you means into
my life. Maina, I like your height, your swaggish hairstyle, your tall limbs,
bewitching eyes, soft lips and your sweet tasting tongue. I also like your
coolly face texture, what of your walking style? it kills me dear. Aki Maina I love you, woishey come and pay me a
visit at my home ‘coz my dad and mum are so strict. They said if I gets out
without their permission ill have to move in with you. Please come and save me
from your love, my heart stops beating at the thought of you. It resumes back
after the thoughts of Njeri, Ciku or even Mwihaki. But these womenfolk have
nothing good to give me, poor them. Please come, come dear come. I miss you
very much. Come dear come.’
Maina could
not read it anymore. Not with those touching vibes. Maina had to rise up for it
was in the hour of need. He would be her saviour. A saviour who would turn her
to a hero. A hero who would join other womenfolk. A fellow womenfolk who would
turn to his legend. A legend who would die for him thereby becoming a matyr.
This was all she wanted.
Maina was a
student at Zito University, they had
nicknamed it Wazito. He was a handsome
young man, the typical boy that all chicks in the world dream about. Indeed ,
he was too handsome that her girlfriend Shonnet, feared this. This was not the
usual fear. This is the typical fear that most girls and boys have. For most
girls moving out with handsome boys are
always afraid of getting married to such cute guys as it would be hell and
hectic to keep away other fellow girlfriends from the boy. Too, many
boys fears getting married to most beautiful chicks as they
would give them hell time in chasing away suitors who pesters around even after
getting married. But all the same, it wasn’t
worth taking an ugly face in sea of beautiful handsome girls and boys.
This is paradoxical. Yak!
Maina loved
metaphysics which is a study of theory of reality. He would wonder whether reality is one or many. He too loved
epistemology which is the theory of knowledge. He would wonder what knowledge
is. He would too wonder how he knew he
knew. Most of all, he cherished an area of philosophy called logic. This is the
reasoned thought about reasoning and argumentation. He would wonder how
fallacies are committed in reasoning. This staggered him when he thought it. He
would therefore criticize small things and make a mountain out of a mole hill.
Most of his friends had come to like his logical way of thinking, anyway they
could not help.
Shonnet had
been travelling from a supermarket when she gave the piece of paper to
Maina’s younger brother. Shonnet had engaged herself to Maina when in form four.
She would die for Maina. Maina on the
other side had loved Shonnet and hated
himself. Though he came from a disadvantaged poverty stricken home, he was
most loved by Shonnet for what he would
give Shonnet not a parent would give. The father to Shonnet had been a lawyer
at Freestyle city while the mother worked as a criminal investgating officer at
the coast far from home. She seldom appeared at home but the father kept an eye
to her daughter. Shonnet had come to hate
the lonely life she had lived over the years. The house help had been so
strict and her driver was not flexible, he would not take her out apart from school. But Shonnet needed
someone, no! not someone but somebody, yah, that sounds better. Somebody to
lean on. Not of her mettle. No, but of different. A boy to rest on from much
desperation and longtime lonliness. It was in that time that all her body organs were screaming
at the sight of a mere boy. They would scream
till the kingdom comes.
Maina had been
attending a few philosophy classes. He still called to remembrance one time when
the lecturer told them, ‘ Everything that happens is governed by reason,
further more, when a need is so much persistent, it has to be satisfied there
and there.’ This was philosophy. It made fun to students. He always felt
grateful for his lecturers. They would spit the oracle with vehemence and
vigour. Even so, Maina had began missing his only girlfriend. It was at the end
of the semester. That was it , that was
it.
It was at the peak
season for both parents to Shonnet. They
were too busy for their kid and the kid waS so idle and desperate for Maina her
hero. One night, Maina had a prolonged chat with Shonnet. The two were invisible
schemers and had the following chat:
‘ hi beb,
du yu still lv me?’
‘yap’
‘bt yu don invt me @ ua om or it
bcoz mah dad hs died a poor man?’
‘ akh beb shun frm syin tht, its
hrd 4u tew cm hr coz cctv r al over, plz ill cm morox 2 shre u mah lv, plz knou I lv
u n cn die 4 u.’
‘bt beb wud u dfend m in a court of lw
if …’ the chat was cut off without a reply from Shonnet.
That was the kind of chat they had. That
was it, that was it.
Maina was comfortably seated on a bed
enjoying reading a novel. The novel was captivating as one boy had to make a
difficult decision after impregnating a high schooler. The boy had been
sponsored to travel to a University abroad to further his studies in political
science. But here was a village girl who had moved in with her belongings.
There was disturbance at the door. Maina got out only to find the nuisance cow
which untethered was now busy munching Maina’s flowerbed. Maina got out and furiously beat the cow very hard. This had in turn reminded him
of the scenario which had taken place in high school during the strike. Maina
and his comrades had chosen to beat up school cows as well as poor pigs. Maina
and his comrades choose to cut all the tails of the school cows. Even this very
day, all the mother cows in Kimondo high school have remained tailless. They
only have coccyx. Coccyx which are almost extinct. So extinct like the nipples
of men’s breasts.
Maina
went back again and sat to enjoy
his novel. There was disturbance at the door again. At first, it seemed like a
person pushing the door and later like a knock. ‘ Yak! Cow! idiot….! What hell
are you giving me you cow?’ Upon opening the door, it was Shonnet.
‘Am sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt
you……..’ Said Maina. ‘But am okey my love.’ Said Shonnet. Those words were
enough to make her fall on his chest. Immediately she fell on his chest, his nuisance
mother called. Yak ! Maina ignored and locked himself in with the girl inside
the cube.
‘ Can you tell me why you came? You
wonna put my little life with my mum in danger. So.. soo tell me why you came
before hell breaks loose? But why did you come without notice? Did you get
permission please ‘coz am not ready to host you in my grass thatched house.’
Maina had began retreating to the bed as she tried pushing away Shonnet. ‘ If
you have nothing good to give me, tell me, but keep in your mind that love
knows no bound, whether you are poor or not, my rich mum wont marry me nor my
rich dad, I needs a man of my choice to marry me and inherit my father’s
property.’ Said Shonnet. ‘ But I cant marry you ‘coz am in school and with my
old mum who is yet to go for an eye operation. Said maina. ‘ But I love you and
will ask dad to take care of her for the whole time she will be bedridden.’
Said Shonnet.
The night was cool and soft, it was
so silent that you would hear the two chaps breathing. The banana leaves were
still listening, they were so still to see whether anything would take place.
The grass too was silent and gave reluctant cold, the kind of cold that would
pull maina close and close to Shonnet. Shonnet by now wasn’t breathing, she lay
there with her long hair soft and tender. At eleven the wall began to smile, at
first it was grinning but later on, it began sniggering.
The following month, Maina had appeared in
court. Her poor mother and relatives had
come to witness her son being
jailed. She had been accused of abducting a school girl and holding her in his
poor room for his own gratifications. It was also alleged that the girl was
pregnant according to the information from her doctor. Shonnet’s mother
appeared with his husband to see the poor boy jailed for life. He had destroyed
their reputation and worse of all, the girl was pregnant bearing a kid from
poor seeds. They would not imagine their blood mingling with another blood
stinking of poverty and commonness.
Everybody seemed excited and you could see
from their look. The parents sat at the middle with the cousins to Shonnet.
They would not stop from wondering why Shonnet had bent so low. Should have
sought for a better boy! They thought. Maina’s mother who by now only saw vague
images, sat at the back where commoners stinking of commonness illiteracy and
poverty sat. Maina swept through the hall to see Shonnet. She was not there or
if she was, she had a veil.
Shonnet’s advocate stood up to face the poor
boy. He accused him of forcefully abducting Shonnet. He was also accused of
raping a school under age girl in his cube. Those two accusations were enough
to send Maina’s mother crying. She wept and wept bitterly. She wished she would
be jailed on his behalf. By now she had sold her one cow to get treatment with
no avail.
Maina stood in a confident
gait and was ready to defend himself. He narrated the small story about their
love affair and their conversation everyday. He said that the girl came on her
own volition and had to send her home. ‘ But she was so stubborn to me, I would
not do otherwise. I allowed her in. She loves me and we plan to get married as
soon as we finish school.’ Said Maina. The judge lowered his sunglasses and
cleared her voice to give verdict. But just before that, Shonnet was brought to
confess her love to this boy. She stood
and said: ‘ Maina is my love, I love him soo much and if he’s jailed, I’ll too
be jailed with him. If you don’t, ill ask my loving dad to collect my dead body
by tomorrow at the same hour as this. For it is with my own limbs did I come to
his home after starvation, desperation and loneliness of living with no
parents. My mum works at the Coast and comes twice in an year. My father has
kept her own mistresses out there and
seldom comes home. Only when he needs to pay our driver, nurse,
househelp and other workers at home. Now tell me judge, who a girl would allow
to seat that lonely when a caring boy is here. See her poor mother, she’s
almost running blind with no one to care for her. She is my mum and her son is
my babbie. His son is the most handsome guy a’ve ever found on earth and in whom I share my monthly periods pains which
are excruciating with. Judge, it’s prudent to jail these two busy hypocritical parents
and release my boy. Am through and find me as good as dead. Am gone’
The judge released her glasses down
and and with her blackish burial gown looked at the parents. She looked too at
the small girl and shook her head. Maina wished Shonnet would yell at the poor
judge asking her to mind about her daughter too.
The judge gave her verdict, she released Maina
and fined both parents a fine of five hundred thousand each for tormenting and
torturing their daughter emotionally.They were too asked to carry the old
mother to her home Upon hearing that, Shonnet rushed to her saviour and gave
her a hug and a kiss. ‘ You are a hero, I love you’ She said. She rushed to her
mother in law to be and gave a hug saying,
‘ This is my mum, if you want me in school, send her school fees and take her
to a better hospital.’ The three walked out of the court leaving Shonnet’s
mother, dad and her cousins. A feeling of heroism crept on Maina’s face. He
opted a new walking gait, he took a presidential gait which he takes after
meeting the press.
Maina walked home with her girlfriend.
Shonnet’s parents promised to send fees
every term to educate Shonnet and support Maina in Campus. They too agreed to
help Maina’s mother seek better health services in India and build her a villa.
Maina, Shonnet and her mother in began stinking rich and lived happily after
that.
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