Mteja.

 

8:23 am. 

It's a few days after Christmas, unajua hizo siku zenye uko autopilot tu, waiting for 31st, upige nduru yako safi, or light up fireworks? It's the 30th, you would think nimetulia, at peace ju niko home, wrong! My mum ananipigia msomo on and on. I want to tell her, it's too early for this bana, chill! Najua nikiongea tu hivi, itakuwa a full blown argument, so I let her be. She is talking about stuff like mbona hauna bibi na watoto sahii? 

She goes, nini unangoja? Angalia fulani, si mko age moja? Watu age yako wako na boma already! Tangu umalize campus, sijaona pahali hio masomo imekusaidia… She goes on and on chewing me off. In my head niko zile za Get back get back, you don't know me like that, talking a whole lotta shit I ain't trying to hear. 

At that point, I even started regretting mbona nilishow up at home, at all, ningekaa kwangu tu. I'm getting pissed with each minute that passes from my mum chewing me off, mara comparing me to my cousins, mara to her when she was my age, to her friends' children. I want to get up and leave, then she starts on again about how I'm being disrespectful and shit. 

I'm about to lose it completely, say fuck it, blow up, not even burn, that bridge like a jihad that has been promised 7 virgins then my phone suddenly starts ringing. It's Ed, one of the guys from a certain group I'm in. Finally I get to excuse myself, niondokee hii msomo. I pick the call, and he's like

“We mzee, 

you up for an errand run?”

I'm like 

“Yes. 

Talk to me.”

He goes on to tell me there's someone, a lady anataka mtu wa kumpigia errands, alafu ananiuliza if it's ok if he shares my number with her, I tell him that it's very much ok, and I appreciate the referral. 

The lady texts me and says that she wanted me to do the errand today, but kunanyesha, so atanistua kesho, I tell her it's ok, I have no issue with that. I don't do the errand the following day, but the following year is when she texts me to do the errand for her. It's life, things happen

Nairobi, 2:43 PM. 

The skies hang low like they know something I don’t. I’m standing outside a hardware shop in Ngara, surrounded by shouting fundis, clanking metal, and that familiar Nairobi chaos. My phone is glued to my ear.

“Mteja wa nambari uliyopiga hapatikani…”