We said mass for her; in a little chapel run by a community sworn to benevolent isolation. A life of solitude and servitude; and flaky hosts served up with cheap wine. A living dedicated to faith and sacrament. Her mother sat in the front row while I hid in a dusty pew tinted green and red from pellucid stained glass. They sang, voices thick with texture, songs that rebuked the somber mood as un-African; misplaced notes running up and down;

   Blee-sed ah-sur-ancce, Jay-sus is mai-nne.

                                   Ohhhh wh-att a fourr-tes

                                  Of gloo-ray de-vine.

Antithetical angels proclaiming the end of a story. I got up to walk out, wishing I'd worn my sneakers instead of those slippers that make a clapping noise on the marble floor tiles. At the door wise hands roughly handled my back and turning me around gave a little shove so that on my own momentum I found myself walking towards the alter and with a leftward turn I was on my knees pressing my cheek against one so hot it burned me for hours after I had left it. I smiled a condolence at her mother and backtracked into a night as cool and dark as only Nairobi can offer. 

Night time on Jogoo Road: polite as can be dodging the Mama Mbogas who shove battered bananas in my face and jumping over muddy puddles (but it hasn't rained in months), a dash across the dual carriageway, shoving my glasses up into my hair because I can't see anyway for all the bright lights; every shape and colour of ma-three zooming past: two-three, No. 4, three-three, five-8, No.10: where am I going again? Something that looks like cotton candy with fangs pulls over and I'm dragged away from my silence; Si siri ninampenda, Binti Kiziwi. Da da da da da da da, Binti Kiziwi... and deposited somewhere near the clock by the station where it takes a minute for me to realize that the buzzing in my head is from the noise but the one at my hip is my phone ringing: ‘Vipi dada, nifurahiday, tunabanjuka?' What's she saying? ‘Zi girlie, I'm knackered, I've just...' ‘Poa!' and I'm alone again. Okay.

It's a hot night. I lie on my back playing pocket Sudoku on my phone and idiotically wishing time away. I should really get up and do something constructive but if I don't at least pretend to be asleep my brain will cop out and shut down in the middle of the afternoon shift tomorrow. I think we're out of coffee too. I take out my 2B and sketch out the creation story, remixed: "In the beginning god created the heavens and the earth, then he created the coffee bean and expresso machine and he looked down on his creation and saw that it was good. And I was pleased." I don't expect that I am any different from her; lying here on my back staring into the dark with my arms crossed over my chest as though in some childish demonstration of a pathological defiance. Or maybe it's just what habit I've made of boredom because I haven't the balls to face the demons that lie behind my eyelids. I fall asleep twenty minutes before my alarm is due and tumble out of bed to the sound of Dylan's lethargic rhythms. He can't have slept much either: Hey Mr. Tambourine man play a song for me, I can't sleep and... I know he's right though; I'll be needing a fix before my own ‘jingle-jangle' sets in. The kettle's on for coffee though the switch is busted and I have to watch it as it boils. And I do; I watch it. Fifteen minutes, half-an-hour, forty five minutes...until the water's all gone and the smell of burning fur fills the room. I wonder if it will blow. I keep watching. Smoke fills the air and flows freely, up towards the ceiling, light like hot air and misery. I speed dial the ex.

Just as I though it might, work went slow today and I wobble into the pub looking a mite rabid, only to be met by a stony glare and a cold proffered cheek. Yeah, nice to see you too. A casual rundown of personal 411 and we're back in our comfort zone. ‘So we dancing or what?' ‘I think I'll write you a cheque first so you can buy the rest of that skirt. Otherwise I don't think you should stand up.' He must not know that I graduated with honors from the University of Eye Rolling and Big City Attitude. I take the umbrella out of my drink to tap out a rhythm against the glass: You don't own me, don't say I can't go with other boys. You don't own me I'm not just one of your little toys...do don't tell me what to do... and slipping out of my seat saunter across the empty dance floor in the direction of the DJ's box. ‘I don't take requests.' he says before I even open my mouth. Okay. I cross my arms below my bust and plunk what little breast god gave up onto his turntable. He smiles, ‘Sema' Tequila Makes Her Clothes Come Off? ‘No problem, chica.' Wicked! That was mad easy, only as soon as I turn around I feel a cold wind blow my way that has nothing to do with my three inches of skirt. Mr. PastTense grabs me by the wrist and drags me away from my new found friend and a song I could make a story of. In the car the child lock is on and as we pull onto Wacky way I'm feeling very subjugated. ‘Let me out.' No. ‘Please!' No. ‘It's three am where are you going?' I grab the gear stick and set us into reverse at 50. He curses at me and as he floors the well greased breaks, reaches across to send the door flying open and me out of it. I hit the ground barefooted and start to run. Fast: past the church, under the bridge and down to the mosque. I rip my sole on a bit of gravel so I arrange myself to sit along the gutter. He pulls up alongside and gets out. ‘Come on lets go, you're bleeding all over the place.' ‘It doesn't matter anymore.' ‘It does to me.' I'm cold now, for real. ‘Will you make me a Milo?' ‘Forever and for always.' I hold out my hand. Back in the car I turn up the radio: She's taking her time making up the reasons, to justify all the hurt inside... It's a class acoustic on an electric bass. The nights seem to be getting longer.

For sanity's sake I spend my days following the painfully slow and determinedly boring progression of a story too dainty too have been spun in a mind less than malignantly optimistic. Sounds like life: a world of pathetic mis-coloured rainbows and a million superfluous, superficial details that beyond their existence, their recognized position as having form and space within the universe, are of absolutely no consequence. Things and people and places that war daily to maintain their relevance in this vast and temporal space.

Darkness. I'm on the run again: cross-legged in a dynamo-powered tin can. I read by the dimming yellow light of my torch as we roll into the valley, violating plateaus as still and dead as dreams, in dark tunnels turned inside out by muffled sounds. I cross the stations off my map as we go along, putting deliberate distance between crime and punishment-Kibera, Dagoretti, Kikuyu, Limuru...I doze off and wake up in Morendati to find nose frozen solid and petitioning for independence from my face...Elburgon...Maji Mazuri...sunrise at Fort Ternan...hopping off finally in the mid-morning to a heat that soothes the high price of thrifty adventuring as the fluid in my knees unfreezes.

It's 1903 all over again: I duck around the stationmaster and run down to the pier to find it deserted except from the usual rust buckets; sunk into the sand and abandoned by a receding host. My anticipation of claustrophobia fades slightly as under the blanket of sunrise I reflect on a history of inspired but dictatorial leadership- brilliant! In a panic suddenly my hand flies up to my face in defense of my teeth: time to move on. I donate my personal catalogue of "African" diseases to a pair of distressed looking Japanese tourists- endemic sleeping sickness, bilharzias, malaria and blackwater fever, ummm...dysmenorea and hypochondria- and give them a brief lecture of the dangers of a sweltering climate and primitive municipal hygiene before I leave them flipping through flight schedules to make a beeline for the bus stop, pausing only to contemplate blowing sixty dollars on a hot shower at the Imperial as opposed to risking life threatening foot-fungus at the Y.M.C.A but settling finally on a laundry bar and a dribble from a broken tap. I sit on the sink waiting for my glass to fill up. Is it half empty or half full? There's only so far you can go. She's still here with me; lank hair dropping like curtains, making shadows over eyes that open only enough that she can see:  I have fears, you have fears too; I will die, you sef go die too...You suppress all my strategy, You oppress every part of me, What you don't know, you're a victim too Mr. Jailer. Let's go.

Renee Mboya writes for KenyaImagine and for her soul, this article is not to be reproduced without permission, write the editors at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it