Gone baby

Five o'clock in the afternoon. And I still had not taken breakfast, neither lunch. I was seated at The Jocham hospital reception lounge. Praying, hopes low and also knowing the worst could also happen. Leila, my sweetheart, was still in the room with doctors and no one else was allowed in. I was called at nine thirty in the morning by Leila's sister, Tatu, when they started suspecting there's a problem with her pregnancy. It didn't take long to arrive. Ratna square was fifteen minutes away from the hospital and it was a Sunday. I saw both Tatu and their mum at the reception.

I met Leila a year ago at Mombasa beach. She and Tatu were eating cassava chips while seated on the white beach sand.. I hadn't even seen them. I was strolling across the beach inhaling the salty humid air while looking at the playful swimmers in the ocean, and occasionally stopping to watch guys playing beach football. “Hey, Hensam boy!” Tatu called me and offered me their snacks. I accepted, then she requested that I sit with them. I asked if her sister talks, and she asked me if I'm attracted to her sister. I smiled, then I steered the conversation to a different direction. She told me they lived in Bakarani, their father died five years ago and their mum and two elder brothers are doing their best to hold the little family together. They, the girls, kept themselves busy in small scale businesses like selling Mabuyu and fried potatoes in their area.

At one o'clock, Tatu and her mum said they are going home to prepare lunch to bring to the patient and clean clothes for changing. They said the will bring me some too. It wasn't so much boring at the hospital lounge. Every ten minutes new patients came in to request to see a doctor. One person was brought by an ambulance then a stretcher was used to hurry him to the intensive care unit. He had blood all over his face. Later I learnt that he was a bodaboda driver and his motorcycle collided with another. I heard loud cries of young boys from the heinjection room and most times doctors and nurses were in a hurry oscillating between their offices and emergency rooms.

At two thirty, a doctor came to the reception area and called out “Leila Yusuf.” I stood up and told him I was her boyfriend. He winced and before he could say anything I added that I was the child's father, the one she is expecting. The doctor allowed and took me to see her. She was in I.C.U, couldn't talk or see me. I stared at her behind the glass window. I asked the doctor what was wrong? He nodded sadly then said: I will explain to you in a language you will understand. There's breathing complications, it seems the Placenta of Leila got an infection which brought about this complication. She passed out and we put her on breathing aid because she is also asthmatic. We have made her sleep sideways by her ribs because that position seems to help the baby's breathing.

I stood there watching at her wishing I could do something to make her stand up and be well instantly. I remembered how Tatu helped me win her. At first I though it was Tatu who had fallen for me but it turned out that she was acting carefree to win a boy for her shy sister. I didn't have a problem with that because when I thought of the tenderness I felt holding her hand while greeting, and the shyness, and the fact that she was built with alluring curves, drew me closer to her. We talked every night over the phone and I we saw each other every weekend. I had to work during weekdays so we couldn't see each other everyday.

Six months after our relationship, she broke the news to me. She was pregnant. I wasn't surprised and I accepted responsibility. We talked about getting married and living together. Having an illegitimate child was frowned upon in both our families. The one thing which we disagreed so much on was that she wanted us to live with her family after marriage. She said she was so attached to them and she doesn't want to be apart from them. I also wanted to take her to live with my family. I had not broken these news to my family and none of them knew of this strawberry affair.

At five forty five, her mum, Tatu, and the two brothers arrived. They all saw Leila through the glass window and Doctor said they could not feed her the rice and beef stew they brought. The doctor assured us that she was not hungry since food was passed on to her by some pipe through her nose. We went to reception area to wait. Everyone's head was down. Thinking and praying for Leila. The baby had another month to be due. The fact that it was hectic and other patients were rushed in and out of emergency rooms did not give me a relief that my girl was in a better condition than them. I dint like hospitals so much. I only came when I'm sick or visiting relatives and friends. There is this distinct smell of medicine in hospitals which makes me feel sick whenever I'm there.

At seven fifteen, she was up. But she was in great pains. The doctor came to tell us that they had transferred her to maternity ward since she was doing better with the breathing. He told us we had only five minutes to see her and get out of the ward for them to proceed with their work. They had given her some medicine to make her deliver early since it was not in the interest of the unborn child to stay in the womb. As she saw her mum and sisters and brothers, tears dripped down from her eyes. Her mum asked her how she was feeling and she only replied, “Pray for me.”

Ten minutes were gone and the doctor and two nurses told us to get out. Leila held my hand firmly and I looked at her, then at the doctor. The Doctor nodded that I could stay. The nurses asked her to keep her legs wide open and they coached her to breath in a special pattern. I remained on the head side of the bed and I must say some fear embarked inside me. I could somehow feel the pain that she felt. The doctor kept asking her to push and she seemed very tired and sweat was dripping down her face like she was from taking a bath. Now she was crying saying she couldn't do it any longer. There was a machine that started beeping which changed the nurses' faces. But the doctor cried “one last push, one last push.” and it made me drowsy and hate him.

At the blink of an eye, I saw the doctor carrying out a baby. One of the nurses cut the umbilical cord and the doctor put the baby in a mobile cot and was taken away. He told me the baby girl was taken to a nursery and she will be safe there. I kept holding Leila's hand who had passed out in the process. The doctors and nurses looked at me sadly, then turned their attention to the machine. The machine that was blinking had stopped. It gave out a flat continuous sound. I looked at Leila's face and found out she was not breathing. The doctor told me to let go off her hand so that they can rush her to ICU and try to save her. I went to tell Leila's family about the good news and bad news. And we could do nothing other than wait at the nursery looking at the baby girl.

She was a cute girl. She had stopped crying and was silently asleep. At about half past eight, the doctor came and gave us piercing painful news. They had pronounced Leila dead at 8:23pm. Tatu and her mum broke into an emotional cry. I couldn't believe it. I was left staring at the hospital clock hanging up on the wall. Leila was no more. My heart was broken at her departure. After half an hour the cries cooled down. The brothers decided Leila will be buried tomorrow after noon prayers. The doctor said after three days the baby will not be in danger and she could be taken. We discussed and agreed that Tatu will take care of the baby girl, and raise her. I would be helping financially.

I started for home after hospital administrative procedures and payments were done. Reached Ratna square at a quarter past ten at night. My family was watching a soap opera on TV. and I joined them. After some minutes they asked why I was so quiet and seemed lost? For some seconds, i thought of telling them. But then I decided to keep it to myself. It was better this way, that they don't know I have a child somewhere.

Catfish

I have been in relationships which my partner refused me to even touch her phone. But those were the days that you could only peep at text messages, call log and contact list. Nowadays we have smart phones. With the security combinations these gadget offer, you are free to only touch and admire the phone. One would not even suggest to her partner to give out pin number or pattern code. One, because they might ask for the same from us. And two, a “trust” war might come up.

If you remember my story “Dirty Dancing”, the one where my friend was invited to Florida 2000, something surprising happened that day. But I did not mention it then because it was not related to the theme. Well, We saw Pauline dancing with another guy. She was my best friend's girlfriend. He met her while she was on her way back from St. Charles Lwanga Secondary school in Changamwe. He stopped her, greetings, and tried some dull start up lines obviously because he wasn't good with the words. But to my surprise, he managed to attract the attention of the girl. We were done with high school, but the girl was still on her last year. They met for the second time, on the way of course. And by the third time, he was escorting her to school and back home everyday.

I know my friend, He loves deeply. He loves in excess. He loves foolishly. And after seeing Pauline on the night club that day, he was broken a bit. I knew the guy Pauline was dancing with, Khamso. we were in high school together but he was a class below me. He was so popular with girls and had the gift of the tongue too. I went to say Hi to Khamso and my friend Sebastian got to say Hi to Pauline too, to send a confusing message I think. Then he couldn't stay any longer and said we should leave.

I said my friend loves foolishly. Well, when we talked about it at home, he said maybe Pauline met Khamso at the disco and they were just dancing. He was throwing benefits of doubt at her. They met the second day and he apologized for the way he reacted. He didn't tell me he would do that. The girl had it easy, I thought. I told my friend I cannot watch another girl playing him, and I would do something.

My friend asked me of ways we use to make sure our women don't cheat. I will start with why? We love those women, and we want them to be exclusive to us. We are men, we have much higher ego. The idea of another man stealing your woman is hateful and unwelcome. That action taints our pride. And if news like those come out, even our friends will laugh at us although not to our faces. It could be our woman's fault, but we sometimes translate it to our own fault of not being able to satisfy her in one way or another. Despite our shortcomings, we still want to keep them. We know there are better guys than us out there, and that scares us. There is also the matter of damages. Not only emotional, but financial. Imagine all the dinners and gifts you have bought. Expensive escapades. Maybe you have been paying her rent. They all amount to loss if your love runs away with another man. Our obsessive nature sometimes forces us to take measures that this loss doesn't occur.

From School to home Pauline was safe, so the weekends were what I should watch. I got up early every Saturday and Sunday to have my breakfast at a cafe nearPauline's home so that I could watch her door. When she got out, I trailed her. Sometimes it was brief to the shop and back. Sunday it was to the church. But one Sunday afternoon after a fortnight, I followed her to Pirates beach, and my suspicions were confirmed. Four photographs of Khamso and her holding intimately in the waters and two kissing on the shore were all I needed to save my friend. And I did, but he barely came out for three weeks and when he did, he had lost an alarming amount of weight.

Yeah, Bi Rachel that's one way of protecting our interests. Another is to hold the girl inside, permit her not to go outside unless its with you or an escort you trust. We use unpleasant ways sometimes. Like threatening to kill her and her lover if you ever find out she is cheating. Are we proud of it? Yeah if we get good results. Lets not kid ourselves, unfaithfulness occurs. You give money to your girlfriend and she goes to buy a phone for some jobless handsome guy. You are out with your gang and she goes kissing the single village doctor. They always jump at “Don't you trust me?” Many of us argue and believe trust is automatic in a marriage. We go on threatening that if there's no trust, this marriage has no use and it should be dissolved. But fact of the matter, Cases have come out of women playing with the neighbor while the man of the house was at work. Cases came out in the open where men were raising kids that were not theirs. Silly explanations come out like, he or she resembles maternal uncle. Funny, but cruel and sad. It is stupid to make trust a guardian of our relationships yet we see people using the same trust awarded to enjoy immorality in secret. Trust should not come automatic, trust should be earned.

Technology brought good news to insecure boyfriends and husbands. Nowadays we can install soft-ware secretly to your spouse's phone, or wife, and the GPS will tell you wherever she is. We have another thing, its called Cat-fishing.

I once had this gorgeous secretary for a girlfriend. She used to lecture me on morality and the trust issues so that I would feel guilty of even thinking about them. I liked her, and I think too much because I didn't want to share her with another man. Even secretly. Her name was Mariam and I first met her when I took our family's house rent collection business to their office. Her family was in Malindi and when she was done with college, she was lucky to get a job as soon as she got her diploma in Mombasa. She had to find an apartment in Mombasa because that's where the job was. And one weekend every month she would go visit her folks in Malindi. I wondered why she would not want to spend the rest of the weekends with me while she was not working. If she just wanted to rest, I could rest right beside her on her apartment.

It was hard to keep a watch because her apartment was in town center. Security guards of some buildings will start harassing if they see you loitering on their pavement for hours. That's when I came up with a brilliant idea of a new email address and Facebook account. We did chat and have fun for over four months over the internet. I wanted to burst her after two weeks but she might give a clever alibi that she knew it was me and she was playing too. Plus, I kind of had fun doing it because she was naughty and vulgar on my secret account. I never saw this reality in her for the ten months we had dated.

We sent each other pictures. I just Googled handsome Africans and chose some pictures to send her. She sent pictures that were not of her too and I laughed. Time was going, and we had to arrange a meeting. Two passionate e-lovers could not have stayed in one town without meeting for that long. We agreed on The Sapphire hotel and I made the reservations to have an upper hand on the room. Cat-fishing was finally paying off. Is it moral? No. is it reasonable? Yes. There's nothing strange. Many others do it. We do it to play pranks on our friends, siblings, cousins or cruel teachers in college. Its only weird and sad if you catfish your ex. But its sick to catfish your parent or child.

It was Sunday, 22 April 2001. I got into the hotel suit at eight in the morning. Two hours earlier from the appointment. This was the day I was going to prove Mariam's unfaithfulness and hypocrisy over the trust issues. She sent a message over Facebook to assure me she was on her way. And at ten thirty, the door was knocked. I opened and asked the guy standing at the door whats up? And he replied “I'm your date,” while he forced himself into the room. He was big and muscular, but not handsome. I asked him if this was a joke and he replied that he was the one chatting with me all the time. I called Mariam's number, but it rang in his pocket. “Oh, and by the way, Mariam gave me your message. Don't look for her, don't find communication to her, Ever.” he said. My brains started spinning, the buster had been busted. I asked myself how she could have found out? Did she have computer hacker friends? And the guy interrupted by complimenting the comfort in the hotel bed and asked if I could rest on the bed with him. He sounded disgusting, and he was having his fun. I got out of the room and he followed me. At the lounge, he put his hand on my shoulder and people were looking at us. I pushed him away but he pretended to be cool and gave a sexual smile and look. I was very mad. Then the hotel receptionist came forward to announce to us that the hotel barred us from using the rented suite and we should not come again because the hotel policy does not allow gays.