Love Patterns

by Michael B. Malone

  “What have you been up to?” she’d said, smiling into my eyes.

  “Up to?” I’d tried to look surprised. “Nothing.”

  She’d rolled her eyes and looked back at the television.

  “All ready for tomorrow?”

  “Yes, all set.”

  “Maybe I should check your case?”

  ‘God she’s psychic,’ he thought.

  “No, I’ve checked it, I can buy anything that I need.”

  “I’ll come and see you off at the station.”

  “That would be great Kathleen.”

  “I’ve made your favourite, for dinner.”

  “Steak pie?”

  “Yes, and I bought a bottle of wine.”

  “That’s great, thanks love.”

  “I’ll go and put the oven on and set the table. You have a rest, you have to conserve your energy.”

  “Conserve my energy?”

  “For all the travelling you’ll be doing,” she’d smiled at him as she left.

  He’d felt dazed. Does she know? But, how could she?

  They’d arrived at the railway station the next morning in plenty of time for the train and stood with their arms around each other, while they listened to the announcements. When it came time to board she’d wrapped her arms around his neck for a long kiss and pressed her body close to him.

  “Come back to me safe William,” she’d whispered.

  “I’ll only be gone two or three weeks.”

  After a last kiss, she’d gazed into my eyes.

  “I’m sorry William,” she’d whispered with tears hovering in her eyes. Feeling an absolute cad, I boarded the train. We waved to each other as the train moved off.

  I stowed my luggage in the rack above me and sat brooding. I’d had a sudden revelation. Kathleen wasn’t rejecting me by refusing to sleep with me. She was afraid that my nearness would arouse her.

  Chapter 2

  I staggered off the plane at Nairobi airport, hardly daring to believe that the noise had stopped. My ears hurt despite the earplugs I’d been issued with, and although I’d slept, I was bone weary and felt dirty and sticky. It was two o’clock in the morning. Once I got through customs and collected my luggage, I pushed through the hordes of youngsters begging or offering to carry my luggage, and hailed a taxi. After a twenty-minute journey I arrived at the bungalow. It was in darkness. I banged on the front door and after a while a light went on. A voice shouted through the door.

  “Who is it?”

  I shouted back. “William Munro!”

  A face leered out of the partly opened door then it opened wide and I could see a young black man, wearing what looked like a night shirt, looking me up and down.

  “I’ve rented the bungalow for three weeks I’ve just arrived.”

  The young man bobbed his head.

  “Welcome Bwana. I sorry I sleep.” He lifted my case. “In here please.” The young man led the way into the house, switching the lights on as he went. “This lounge,” he said, stopping in a large room.

  I didn’t even look around.

  “Just show me to the bedroom, I’ll have a shower and go straight to bed.”

  I was led to the bedroom and shown the bathroom.

  “Shower not hot.” I was told.

  “I don’t care,” I replied, starting to strip off my clothes.

  You want tea, coffee?” the houseboy asked.

  “A cup of tea please,” I replied. “What is your name?”

  “Kabero,” the young man replied. “I make tea.”

  “Thank you Kabero.”

  I stripped off the rest of my clothes, found a towel, figured out how to work the shower and stepped into the lukewarm spray. I washed my hair and every part of my body, then dried myself, rubbing until my skin was red, then on hearing Kabero’s knock, wrapped the towel round my middle and opened the door to find the houseboy holding a tray.

  “Where you want your tea Bwana?” he asked.

  “In the bedroom.”

  “What time I wake you?”

  “I’m tired, just let me sleep.” I eyed Kabero, still hovering. “Don’t worry about breakfast, I’ll make myself something”

  “Thank you Bwana.” Kabero bobbed his head and left.

  I drank down the tea, then too exhausted to even open my suitcase, clambered into bed naked, pulled the sheet over myself and immediately fell asleep.

  I woke and sat up, I was drenched in sweat. I looked up at the fan, motionless in the ceiling. I’d forgotten to switch it on. I felt much better, but the glare of the sun hurt my eyes. I rose and shut the curtains. It suddenly sank in, I was in Kenya! My stomach rumbled. I had a quick shower, and dried myself. I unpacked and dressed in my light clothes, I found the kitchen which was well equipped, with a refrigerator, electric cooker, toaster, electric kettle and coffee percolator. A row of gleaming copper pans hung on hooks and dishes and cups were neatly arranged on a shelf. I found cereal in a cupboard and made a pot of tea. After breakfast I explored the house. There was a dining room off the kitchen, with a fair sized, highly polished mahogany table. The lounge was spacious with two large three-seater settees and four armchairs. The master bedroom where I’d slept was large, with a huge bed. The second bedroom was medium size with two single beds. I stepped through the French windows to inspect the garden. It was large and well cared for, with a well-manicured lawn bordered by colourful flowering bushes in bloom. I breathed in the exotic scents with a sudden excitement.

  I thought again, ‘I’m in Kenya.’

  I remembered why I’d come and decided to have a look round Nairobi. I found Kabero in the front garden.

  “You have breakfast Bwana?” he asked.

  “Yes, thank you Kabero. Would you like to show me around Nairobi?”

  “I do that Bwana. How you go?”

  “I’ll take the Land Rover.”

  “I get keys. When you go?”

  “About fifteen minutes.”

  “I be ready.”

  He disappeared into the house then reappeared to open the garage doors and give me the Land Rover keys.

  I climbed into the driving seat, started the engine and reversed out into the road. I drove carefully up and down the road, getting the hang of the gears, then confidently drove back into the drive, found Kabero waiting and set off.

  I found Princess Elizabeth Way and drove down it to the centre of Nairobi, noticing the changes. Some of the smaller roads that were dirt tracks, lined with wooden shacks with corrugated roofs in my boyhood; were now well-paved roads with tall glass and concrete buildings on each side. There were far more cars and buses, and the local taxis, ‘matata’s’ I remembered they were called, were everywhere. I eventually found a parking place. I made arrangements at the bank and drew money out in shillings, the local currency. I gave Kabero some money to buy enough supplies for the next few days. We agreed to meet back at the Land Rover in two hours, time. I then set off on foot to explore the centre of Nairobi.

  There were more cultivated green spaces than I remembered. The gardens and parks were a riot of colours. Jacaranda trees with violet blossoms, purple bougainvillea, white frangipani and bright red hibiscus wafted their fragrances in my direction. Almost as colourful as the flowers, were the men with brightly coloured shirts and the women in bright clothes, some balancing baskets on their heads. Everywhere I saw smiling African faces with shining teeth. I noticed with regret that the women and girls were now covering their upper bodies, but judging by the movement under their thin tops, bras had not caught on yet.

  I remembered why I had come here. It had seemed so easy. Pick up a black girl for a couple of weeks. But how did one go about it? They weren’t going to come knocking at my door asking to come in! I decided to ask Kabero.

  I walked back towards the Land Rover and on the way I found an off-license and bought a couple of bottles of whisky and a crate of beer and had a boy carry them back to the Land Rover and load them in the back. I waited, eyeing up any g
irls who were passing. They walked, heads held high, and swayed as if carrying secret music inside them.

  Kabero arrived carrying some packages. Once we were seated I cleared my throat.

  “I would like a girl to warm my bed for the three weeks I’m here. Can you tell me how to do it?”

  Kabero looked shocked. “What kind of girl Bwana?”

  “A black girl. Not a (I used a Swahili word meaning “professional”), and not fat.” I remembered Peter Wilson’s comments, “and over fifteen,” I added as an afterthought, “I would pay her well.”

  Kabero sat in thought for a while.

  “I know a girl, she works in hotel. We go look now?”

  “How old is she?”

  “She seventeen, she beautiful.”

  I tried not to look too eager.

  “Mm, I suppose so. Tell me where to go.”

  Following Kabero’s instructions, I arrived at a rundown hotel in the back streets. Kabero went in at a side door and a short time later, he appeared with a woman. I eyed her as she approached. She certainly wasn’t slim, and she certainly wasn’t seventeen. Kabero opened the door.

  “This girl, Bwana, she beautiful.”

  He muttered in some native language. The woman took her top off and posed for me, her breasts wobbling as she moved.

  She smiled at me. “You like?”

  There was a hardness in her eyes.

  I called, “Kabero, get in.” I fumbled in my wallet and extracted a note “Give her this.” I drove off, leaving the woman, still standing bare breasted, looking at the note in her hand.

  “You no like?” Kabero sounded disappointed.

  “No, she’s too old.”

  Kabero looked thoughtful. “I know other girl, she my sister.”

  “How old is she?”

  Kabero hesitated. “She fifteen.”

  “When can I see her?”

  “I go now.”

  “Can I come?”

  Kabero shook his head.

  “Maybe Baba (father) not like.”

  “Can I drop you anywhere?”

  “Yes Bwana, I show.”

  With Kabero’s guidance I drove to what looked like a huge scrapyard.

  “How long will you be?” I asked.

  “You go home Bwana. I see you tonight.”

  After taking some wrong turns. I eventually found my way back to the bungalow in the darkness. I’d forgotten how the sun went down quickly in Kenya. I unloaded, put the car in the garage and locked up, then sat with a whisky and a bottle of beer to wait for Kabero. At about ten o’clock that night, I heard the door open, then Kabero knocked at my door.

  “Come in,” I called.

  Kabero entered with a big grin on his face.

  “Baba say you get girl.”

  “Good! thank you Kabero. Did you bring her?”

  Kabero bobbed his head.

  “We get her tomorrow.”

  I felt anticipation rise. “What is she like Kabero?”

  “She young.”

  “How young?”

  Kabero moved his weight from one leg to the other. “She fifteen.”

  “What else?”

  “She small and thin, her name Jerie.”

  “When will we go?”

  “Baba says in afternoon.”

  “What will she eat? Should we go shopping?”

  “She eats anything Bwana.”

  “Well thank you Kabero. I’m off to bed.”

  I remembered to switch the fan on, then lay under the single sheet with the moonlight through the curtains silvering the room. I repeated “Jerie”, “Jerie” to myself. A strange excitement stirred deep inside me.

  Chapter 3

  I awoke feeling refreshed. I remembered that I was to collect Kabero’s sister in the afternoon and thought.

  ‘Tonight, you’ll be sleeping with a woman again.’ I became aroused at the thought, jumped out of bed, found fresh sheets and pillowslips and remade the bed.

  After breakfast, I took the Land Rover into Nairobi and bought scented bath soap and shampoo.

  I drove around the city, remembering places I’d known as a boy. When I returned I collected Kabero and set off for the place I’d dropped him off the night before and was directed to a dirt track. I began to have second thoughts when I was guided into what looked like a huge rubbish dump. The stench was overpowering. I drove slowly between rows of ramshackle huts made from beaten out cans and oil drums patched together with whitened cardboard. I could almost taste the sewage and excrement in the steam boiling up from the mud and grimaced in disgust at the bare breasted women with suckling babies at their breasts, looking up listlessly, with hopeless eyes, disturbing the flies swarming round their nipples.

  Groups of squealing children swarmed around the vehicle, despite the shouts and threats from Kabero and persistent hoots of the horn. After several left and right turns which left me hopelessly lost, Kabero, signalled for me to stop outside a haphazard erection of tin and cardboard. He went inside, to reappear moments later with two youngsters, who, after shouting directions from the mob of children, set off at a run. The heat inside the Land Rover was becoming unbearable. I tried to appear unconcerned as hordes of naked black children gathered round shouting to me and to each other in a language which I couldn’t understand a single word. The smell and the way the natives lived nauseated me. How could they live like this? I was tempted, despite the risks, to try to find my own way out, when the two youngsters returned with a teenage girl, dressed in a ragged shift, in tow. After giving the Land Rover a curious glance she stepped warily to the entrance of the hut, peeped in cautiously, as if ready to flee, then disappeared inside. Kabero appeared a short time later, shooing the youngsters out and motioned me into the hut.

  Regretting having ever got myself into this, I resignedly climbed out of the Land Rover, ostentatiously locked the doors, and carefully stepping between piles of excrement, I followed Kabero into the hut. Despite the ramshackle appearance the hut kept out much of the light and it took a few moments for my eyes to adjust to the absence of glare. It did not keep out the heat however and the smell was just as pungent inside as out. An older man who I assumed was the father, was sitting on a wooden box against one wall looking at his feet. A well-built woman was squatting on a dilapidated mattress nursing a baby, and apparently disinterested in what was going on. The girl was standing in the middle of the hut, her rigid back to me, with her fists clenched by her sides. Kabero, also looking tense introduced the girl.

  “This Jerie, she a good clean girl, you want to look at her?”

  On my nod, Kabero spoke sharply to the girl, who replied in a fluid spate of expletives, and when he tried to make her take off her shift, she pushed him away angrily. The father sat ignoring everyone. I cursed to myself.

  “Let’s just go home” Kabero, I don’t want to upset anyone.”

  The girl started at the sound of my voice and turned. I saw the whites of her eyes gleam. It was as if she looked through me and around me. Our eyes met, and I felt a thrill as if something tickled my spine. The rigidity left her body and she grinned showing her white teeth and said something to Kabero who also lost his tenseness.

  He said, “You can have her for thirty shillings a day.”

  I thought that this was shockingly cheap but understood enough about the native mind to know that I would lose face if I agreed right away. I turned to Kabero.

  “Let’s get back.”

  Kabero protested, “But she beautiful, look!”

  After a few brief words to Jerie, she removed her shift and stood naked and unembarrassed before me and on Kabero’s instructions twirled around.

  I felt a tendril of guilt but pushed it away as I looked at her body. She was small and a bit thin but otherwise looked like a typical African girl with her stomach sticking out in front and her bottom sticking out behind, more than in European women. I felt a sexual thrill at the sight of her breasts. They were small and firm and nicely shaped. All th
is time, Jerie was looking intently at me. Some shame inside me wouldn’t let me meet her eyes. I again shook my head at Kabero. After a hurried conversation, during which Jerie stood, seemingly ignoring the negotiations in which she was being bid for like a farm animal.

  Kabero said, “Her father will let you have her for twenty-five shillings a day.”

  I knew that I was going to have her at even a hundred times the price, but still shrugged unconcernedly and started to leave the hut.

  Kabero shouted in a panic-stricken voice. “Wait!”

  After feverish negotiations with the father who glared at me and appeared to be cursing, Kabero pleaded.

  “He says it will break his heart, but he will let you have her for twenty shillings.”

  I agreed with a show of reluctance, and after a discussion with Kabero gave him enough money for two weeks.

  Jerie smiled at me, pulled her shift back over her head, then she padded over to me and smiled into my eyes with her head canted to one side. She took my hand in her own.

  “You like me?” she said in hesitant English.

  When I felt her small warm hand thrust into my own I again felt shame, and when she spoke in English I was shocked, as if her use of my own language attested she was a human being like myself and not a near human I could use for my own pleasure. I cursed inwardly, but rationalized. my feelings. I wasn’t going to hurt her or do anything unnatural to her and she probably went at it like a rabbit anyway.

  “I like you very much,” I said slowly and distinctly.

  She smiled and rubbed her cheek against my bare arm. I ruffled her wiry hair then smiled down at her, shaking my hand behind my back to get rid of any fleas or ticks.

  On Kabero’s suggestion that we leave, I asked if there was anything Jerie wished to take with her. Kabero after a look of puzzlement, replied.