Judas Kiss PART 2
PART 2
On the armchair by the bedroom window I snapped my fingers back and forth. My soul was lost in a thoughtless melancholy. The bedroom was still a mess; tissues still scattered, empty whiskey bottle toppled over and curtains still drawn and unmade bed. I looked outside through the linear vertical spaces left by my haphazard curtain drawing routine earlier. The air inside in this room was akin to the inside of a distillery. My breadth probably worse. Turu had her fingers slipped in my son’s as they walked to the car. I think I saw Jordan turn to look at my window. Or maybe I imagined it. I wanted to open the windows, call him and kiss him goodbye and that I loved him, yet I didn’t know if the timing would be right.
I had never been the overly cuddly and expressive mom anyway. He had stopped me about a year ago. One morning, he wiped his cheek with the back of his hand after a kiss, looked me in the eye, and told me never to kiss him again. We were outside the school gate and some of his classmates were standing by waiting for him. He never told me why, but I suspected that he wanted to prove that he was not a baby anymore. Of course the next day he pulled away, and the next and the next. Soon enough I got the idea. He would just jump out of the car, wave off and jog into the school compound. Was it weird that I was relieved when the little routines stopped? One day, he was my little baby, the next, a man demanding the privileges that came with being one.
As I watched the car disappear through the jacaranda trees lining on the sides of the winding tarmac, to church, part of me was relieved that Jordan was who he was; a person evolving. But still I feared that he would grow up like that; a man who locks his emotions inside and locks everyone else out. This morning even his demeanor was different; his all charged up and fireworks style was gone. He sat at his spot at the back of the car without protesting. Turu sat beside him and Ken started the engine. Their faces looked gloomy, an aftermath of watching a dramatic scene from a real life movie last night. It would probably form a juicy gossip moment when they were alone. Maybe they would pray for their master to come home and bring some light in this home because he had stifled everything with his departure.
Back in the kitchen, with my back was facing the backyard and eyes fixated on the orange tree on the front yard, and its shadow underneath where the dogs rested. Then I poured some tea in a cup. I drank tea to treat my hangover. I drank tea to elevate my mood. I drank tea because tea was there to be drank. I came from a place where people drank tea to treat all kinds of illnesses. Then I warmed last night’s mashed bananas and beef stew and ate; I ate with anger.
Here, my vision was fixed on the wide-canopied fruiting orange tree at the front yard. I could see the well-manicured yard clearly from corner to corner thanks to the large living room windows that had taken up large chunks of the walls. Some yellow birds were flying all over the place. I remembered the cold humid day we planted the orange tree it like it was yesterday. It was the same day we learned that I was pregnant. I had rid myself of the coil after the wedding but I never conceived. We tried for quite a while but nothing. Then we stopped trying. We just relaxed into that laissez-faire mode. With both our careers on an upward trajectory at the Ministry of Justice, and our debts piling from the rising expenses and investments, it never felt like the right time to bring another person into our lives. I was winding up my doctorate just as Eric was starting his. The absence of a baby seemed like a blessing in disguise. Then one day, puff! Baby!
“Stay there!” I screamed on phone when Eric told me where he was. He was at home.
“Someone. Seems. To. Be. in. a. good. Mood. today.” he said.
“I am.” I was out of breadth. “Are you ok?” I asked and even before he could respond, “I have fantastic news for you honey! For us!” I said. “Just stay there.”
“Okay. You’ll just find me here.”
Eric had just bought the seedlings earlier at Dagoretti Corner on his way home. Oranges, paw paws and mangoes. When I gave him the good news, he was pressing the side soil back to the seedling with his long fingers, a hosepipe releasing water into the hole. My husband’s hands were filthy with reddish brown mud. He didn’t care about my white trouser suit. He scooped me off the ground and gave me a clean swing. Then he dropped me down, looked and me and picked me up with my armpits. It was impromptu. His hands covered in mud and all. Then he squeezed my shoulders with the same hands and he declared we did it over and over.
Years later, we would joke of how we almost killed that orange tree.
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So it was while staring at the orange tree, as I sliced one orange from the kitchen basket into two, that I remembered that day. I ate the orange gazing outside, recalling the day Jordan came into come into our lives. Some seeds spilled on the plate as I sank my mouth into the fruit. I was pleased with the juice’s mild acidity in my mouth and down my throat. Eric would have loved it. Now he was gone. It was as if every good impulse I was experiencing had to be validated by him. I wondered if he had had any oranges in his hotel or at his mistress’s. And if he did, were they as good as these? I missed him already. Over and over I was tempted to call him, but I imagined him looking at my call dismissively ― probably my name saved as TROUBLE― and embarking on pleasing his mistress with the newness of their sex and the excitement of first times. I imagined both of them laughing and mocking me as they locked in one another.
I stared at the orange tree nostalgic. It had been like a symbol of our love. Now there were constant reminders were all over the place. This home, the trees, the photographs on the walls, the invisible memories floating in my mind etc. They all were real evidence that we had played on one team.
Tears began to flow uncontrollably from my eyes again.
Weeks of great pain turned to months. Then a year.
A year of running into Eric in the elevators and corridors and boardrooms and cafeterias and keeping distance while murmuring that awkward “hallo”. Sometimes we would be alone, other times we would be with our colleagues. But the far worst times would be with Hellen, his mistress, the woman with skin the color of chocolate and long black dreadlocks. She was my age and worked in finance. I had hired her a year and a half before after her sister begged me to, but her credentials overrode all that. She had a PhD in public finance. Bam! What we were looking for! The decision to settle on her was a walk in the park for the board and ultimately for me.
So here I am alone in the elevator and they both step in, fingers slipped in each other’s. Nervously, they untwine and say a nervous “hallo” keeping their distance from me. You should have seen the tension, oh my god! Solid enough to be sliced with a knife. At least we arrived on our respective floors without slicing each other’s throats.
So this was a year of feeling a murderous rage towards a man that I would have protected with my life. A year of endless manipulations and countless sessions with my part accountant, part spy, part attack dog, overzealous hell of a divorce lawyer called Philip. Philip was truly a master of the game. My brother had recommended him.
Sometimes when alone in my office or at home I would think of my past. I would think of our smiling faces on the sunny wedding day repeating the priest’s words though the microphone without thinking through. The sounds of cheering witnesses. Or maybe we did think through. Now we were just two different people. It is easier to consider a past as a “real” past when you can’t see it, but what happens when the past is constantly there in your face? What happens when the past is with its “new future”? That’s a whole other level of psychological torture.
The judge at the divorce court wanted us to work things out. He called us “two reasonable people”. I wish he knew. Reasonable? I wanted to tell him: “see you in hell buddy!” He gave us six more months to go think things through. I did want that too, even though I now saw things more clearly now. We wouldn’t be happy. Not after seeing the fire in Eric’s eyes as he starred at Hellen in the conference room and how their forks and spoons were in sync from plate to mouth like some musical at the cafeteria. Their demeanor towards each other was love. Most of the people we both knew had shifted their allegiance too.
But still….still I wanted this man back in my life just to prove a point. Maybe I had been so accustomed to bending life to my will since I was a young girl that I didn’t realize that this was not one of those situations.
My desire was more about scoring points that real happiness, but I didn’t care. If a point was what I had to prove to the world, then I would prove.
It would have been easier if Eric would have gone for someone younger, I would have dismissed him as chasing youth. It would have been easier if it would have been a less educated woman, probably some secretary, I would have dismissed it as power play; a quest for control. It would have been easier if Hellen was working elsewhere, I would have said he wanted a change. In many ways, Hellen was like me. She was me. Feisty and driven at work. She had that me-ness in her, yet so wholesomely agreeable. I hated losing to her. I wished she were mean!
I thought of creative ways of killing her; thoughts I’d never had before. Hiring armed thugs to get rid of her or pouring some poison her coffee during a meeting. Though these methods seemed too cliché and stupid. I would be the primary suspect in such a murder investigation. Then I thought of maybe tampering with her car breaks. Other times I thought of buying a gun and finishing her myself without leaving any evidence, but then the thought of Eric’s pain and how crushed he would be snapped me out of my uncanny thoughts. Even a trip to a Tanzanian mganga crossed my mind time and again.
After that last session, with the judge having given us six more months to “try and work things out”, Philip insisted that we begin the process of splitting assets because the war was just getting started. Hadn’t we fought enough? I was tired. He spoke of “this war” like it was a superior version of World War II. Did Philip want a replica of the 1930’s Germany between me and my husband to believe that enough grass had suffered too much already? He would simply shrug and mutter an insouciant “maybe” whenever opposed his dirty tricks.
“Do you realize that I owe it to my son to be civilized in all these proceedings?” I would ask and he always had a ready answer, “Do you realize that I owe it to you to make you a filthy rich divorcee?” he would speak like divorcee was a title to aspire to.
“You made this man. All this wealth you’re fighting over is all thanks to your efforts. Eric isn’t putting your feelings into consideration Dr Vitute. You might as well do the same.” it was like a well-rehearsed line and I could imagine him repeating it to all his clients whenever they had second thoughts about his tricks.
He was ruthless, a trait that made him very, very attractive.
Later that day, I mentioned Philip’s conversation to my twin brother over dinner. I’d offered to cook. My son was visiting my parents in Kakamega for the holidays. The aroma of fish and organic spices and herbs saturated the brightly lit kitchen as did the simmering sound. Michael Jackson’s Billie Jean was playing in the background as we both sang along, remembering how we would dance to Michael Jackson as kids. Now headed to forty, our bones were too stiff to even move.
“I never liked that man anyway.” Francis said, uncorking his beer. This was after I told him about Philip’s idea of hiding money and property. But something was strange, he hadn’t called Eric Mulamwa like he always did. He said “that man” like he was referring to a stranger on the street. The intimacy had vanished.
I opened the cooking pot and stirred a little before tasting some soup.
“Wefwe, did you want to be the one to marry your own twin?” I said, teasingly, knocking him with my elbow as I licked my lips, enjoying the taste of the fish stew.
I knew he was talking like that to protect my feelings. There was no way he would elevate Eric, especially in my presence at this time. Eric had provided the capital for his business and he owed him some unspoken loyalty. But still, “that man” didn’t sound like Francis. But anyway, who knew what emotive issues like a looming divorce of a sibling would do to someone? Battle lines had long been established; Francis was on my side. It is the natural order of things; an enemy of your friend is your enemy too.
“Ah….gross!” he grinned, then sipped his beer. His Adam’s apple would be seen dangling up and down with subsequent sips. He shook his bottle from side to side with his eyes fixated on it, watching the beer form-up. Then he placed it down with a pleasant “aaaahhhh!!!” “Wefwe, I told you Philip is the best divorce lawyer in this city. I hope you have proven that. About Jordan’s father, let me just say, the less I speak of him, the better.”
“And I’m only learning about this supposed dislike of your Mulamwa now?” my fingers put supposed dislike in air quotes.
“I’m surprised you stayed for that long Wefwe.” He said, breathing deeply. Wefwe was a name coined when we were young, to symbolize our bond of twin-ship. We had fallen on the extreme edge of fraternal twin-ship. Nothing about us said brother and sister, let alone twins. Our appearance and behavior were worlds apart. Francis’s color was bordering that of honey while mine was similar to that of people from the south of Sudan. Francis stood at a whooping six three while I was a five six. I loved books, while it would be a miracle to say Francis and books in one sentence. Francis was the entrepreneurial mind while I hid in books. So we were different, but a special bond always been well-grounded between us. Wefwe was coined to remind us of that intimacy of a shared space out of this world for nine months. We had been calling each other Wefwe for many years and even now at thirty nine, it felt like it did at two. It symbolized our shared intimacy.
“Stayed that long? What do you mean by that?”
“It is not my place to say anything.”
“You knew about the affair?”
“What? No! Not this one.” He said shaking his head, sipping more beer and looking down.
“There were others? I know you and my husband have always been close. You must have known something.”
“No.”
“There were others.” I said, nodding. Feeling stupid for even admitting this. His short answers made him guilty. Guilty of knowing something. He didn’t want to implicate himself. “Of course there were. And you knew about them all.” I accused. Then I paused. “How could you do this to me Francis?”
“Why blame me?” he said. “Don’t make this about me Vitute.” He said, pointing at me with his the tip of the beer bottle. I was afraid that the poor beer would pour out. “You knew that bastard better than I did. You were the one who married him for ten years, not me!”
“Get out! Now!” I spat those words like fire. Not sure whether they were for calling Eric a bastard of for being his accomplice.
“Why? Because I’m telling you the truth? I’m not the enemy here!” he placed the beer down angrily and our eyes locked.
“You should have said something when you found out! Just leave!”
“Said what? That your husband deserves an Oscar for being the biggest dog in this city? No way! Don’t make this about me!” he rose up and un-creased his khakis.
“Get out! Now!” I said pointing to the door.
I sank on the seat wondering where the rain started beating me. I wondered how long Francis had known about my husband’s affairs and I hated him for it. I felt like he had become complicit in my husband’s mistakes. Even more, I hated him for tearing off Eric’s good memory and revealing the lying wolf underneath. Staying mad was a luxury I could afford.
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………………TO BE CONTINUED…………….
PS: The above piece is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are a work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
Catherine Amayi is a Scientist and an Author
I invite you to follow me on Twitter @catherine_amayi or write to me at ccamayi@yahoo.com