I have heard so many terrifying Stories about night runners. You may doubt everything else but trust me night runners exist. However, I have never understood why they do the things they do. Is it for fun, do they enjoy scaring petrified people or let’s just say it is their thing. I have never heard of a scenario where anyone was harmed by a night runner. Of course unless you hit a stone or an object and hurt yourself while running away from one at night.

Wafula lost one of his parents. He was granted a compassionate leave to mourn and bury the deceased. One  colleague was also sent  to represent the company on the burial day. The colleague arrived on the evening before the day and was received by wafula, shown a place to cool off till the following day.

It was this colleague’s first time in the countryside. His host had to ensure he was well guided lest he leaves with a bad experience. Nobody wants that. We all want our guests to have the best experiences when they visit us for various occasions.

It’s about 11PM. It is very dark. The kind of darkness we used to be told was the devil’s darkness. A time we were told evil spirits, ghosts and all the scary things roamed the earth. Woe unto you if you came across them. I have never known whether those tales were real or imaginary. But I think, they served their purpose. They scared the shit out of us and ensured that as kids we were home early enough before the fall of darkness. By the way as a child there is nothing I dreaded more than darkness. Ask my siblings (if you know them). Those people were mean. I think they must have realised my phobia and decided to enjoy as they subjected me to untold fear. You should have seen how I used to scream when the person I was walking with in the dark deliberately ran and left me behind. That thing was scary like Tala debt collectors.

Brave

This place is poorly lit. The maize farms, bushy surrounding and hilly terrain does not help much to remedy the situation. A very conducive environment for the night runners. One has decided to come and pull his stunts on the mourners outside seated around a fire to mitigate the cold. Some mourners are frightened and run away for safety. However, not everyone was born a coward. Few brave ones lay a trap and catch him. Am told they are always in their birthday suits during their routine night running sessions. I don’t know. He gets a dog’s beating and as punishment, they tie him to a tree so that he can endure the severe cold and get paraded the next morning.

2:00AM

Wafula vehemently apologizes to his colleague and tells him that in the village, they are used to these happenings and he shouldn’t be worried. Everybody goes back to sleep. Others still resume their places around the fire. At around 2 AM, everyone is woken up by loud screams of a grown ass man. It is very evident from the screams that someone is in danger.

The sound is coming from the direction of the tree where the uninvited guest was tied. Some think that he has probably been attacked by a wild animal. They all rush there. Some with clubs, machetes… What they come across shocks everyone. They cannot believe what they are seeing. The nightrunner is still tied to the tree but he is not alone. He found a comrade who decided to stay with him in the cold. But the comrade is not your ordinary saviour. He is there saving himself from a dry spell and his prey is the poor thing tied to a tree. People got guts!

3 cases

And guess who is ‘working’ on the nightrunner? It is the colleague (to Wafula)!

Silence. Two cases to be solved. Actually three. A night runner , a man emptying his balls into  a nightrunner’s ass, and a burial. I have never bothered to ask how it ended!

Ps: (Mashetani yamepanda, kiti kavunja manyanga,

Mgonjwa anatibu mganga, Mwenye nyumba kapanga… Inadondoka!)

Tricky sana!!

Whenever you hear a person mention that they were brought up by an alcoholic parent, you probably only imagine a drunken father. Have you ever stopped to think how life can turn out under the care of an alcoholic mother? I’m writing on behalf of a friend of mine, and of course with his permission. Names have been changed to protect the identity of actual characters. Jack’s father was a teacher and his mother a mtumba (second-hand clothes) dealer. The teacher’s salary, though not that much, assured the family of four children a comfortable lifestyle. Their mother’s business was also not bad in terms of proceeds. Occasionally the family attended church.

Turn of events

Life took a bad turn when Mama Jack took a habit of drinking a little alcohol, say once or twice a week. This caused a ripple in her family, as her husband truly hated the habit. Baba Jack himself had been brought up by an alcoholic father, and had grown great resentment for drunken people. His wife’s new hobby was like a punch on his nose. Unfortunately, Mama Jack’s habit gradually went to full-blown alcoholism. Her business collapsed as she had less time and less money to run it. She even started incurring debts by taking short-term loans from her chamas. Severally, Baba Jack had to intervene and pay off his wife’s debts to avoid the shame of household items being auctioned off. Jack was the firstborn. His three younger sisters were Rose, Ann and Joy. This was a typical day in the lives of these people. Jack wakes up at four in the morning, reads some pages of his Form Two Chemistry book. At five, Baba Jack gets up and prepares breakfast for the family. He then gets himself ready. He’s on duty and has to be in school just before 7 am.

Hangovers

Mama Jack is nursing a bad hangover, she cannot get up that early. Rose, Ann and Joy are up by 6am. They all learn in the Primary school where their father teaches. Rose irons her father’s clothes while Ann packs up their lunch. By six- forty, they are all out of the house, leaving Mama Jack in bed. Once out of school, everyone rushes home. The house is a mess. The dirty utensils they left on the table are still there, fruit flies playing in them. The girls’ beds are unmade, as they had to leave hurriedly because their father was on duty and they could not drag him. He usually walked to school with them. Cat litter still in the carton box where the cat relieves herself. Chicken droppings all over the compound, and the chicken house not swept. The children quickly get to work, cleaning here and organising there, under Jack’s instructions. Mama Jack is nowhere to be seen. She must be in one of her favorite joints, drinking herself silly and laughing disgustingly with her drunken friends, or worse still, exchanging insults with bartenders. The latter often earned her a black eye. Baba Jack finishes marking some books he carried home with him, then rises to prepare dinner for the family. Meanwhile, Jack helps his sisters with their homework. By 8: 30 pm, the girls are in bed, and Jack grabs his books and retreats to his bedroom to study. His dad is left in the living room, pretending to watch a movie. The truth is, he’s waiting for the children to sleep so he can go out and look for his wife. Unknown to him, Jack is aware and really never falls asleep until his mother is safely in the house.

Losing my baby boy brought me crashing down. He had fought for his life for five hours. 960 grams, that’s what he weighed at birth. Slightly less than a kilo of sugar or a kilo of bar soap, or a kilo of meat. Whatever you would like to compare with.
My husband and I made a firm decision not to try to conceive again. Time is what we needed. Time to accept. Time to heal. Time to recover. Time to forget the trauma and drama of Matthew’s birthday.

Time heals

Time heals many wounds, but child grief is a wound any parent carries to her grave. Though mothers seem to be the ones most affected, fathers too grieve. Society does not give much room for a man to express grief, especially here in Kenya of Africa. My husband was wounded, but there were not many listening ears inclined to him. He bore it like a soldier, balancing his weight and mine on his feet. I salute you my husband. Forgive me for neglecting you during that dark season. God sent us another baby when we least expected ( read wanted). I questioned God. ” So, why now God?” I would ask Him. ” Why do you torture me? How strong do you think I am? Why are you giving me hope, when You know very well you’ll take away again?”
With every trip to the toilet, I would wipe myself and inspect the tissue for blood spots. I knew ( or thought) it was only a matter of days and my bundle of hope would be gone.
Days turned to weeks, weeks to months. Everything was blurry. I did not give much attention to my pregnancy, until I was 12 weeks along. When it hit me that I was actually 12 weeks, love melted my heart. That rich attachment to my child happened. That great determination to protect and carry him/her safely to term filled me. Love. Maternal love.

Joy comes with the morning

I prayed everyday. I was thankful for each day that I completed with the baby in my womb. My friends pampered me. My husband motivated me. When labor came, I was 36 weeks pregnant. I got admitted at Kenyatta National Hospital (KNH), where I delivered a live baby boy. This time they did not take him to resuscitation room, they gave him to me. Tears of joy trickled down my cheeks as I held my healthy bundle of joy. I fell in love with him instantly. I took my phone and sent my husband a text message. ” Congratulations baba Nathan!” So when he called back, he was screaming in jubilation. You can imagine our joy when we were discharged and went home with our son! It was nothing short of a miracle.

Happy mother of three

Today, I am a blessed mother of three boys. I do not take them for granted, they are veeeeery precious gifts to us.My Alpha and Matthew are resting in peace, knowing that they can never be forgotten. I wrote a book in their memory, Empty Crib: Poems for Grieving Parents.

Salomary Simiyu is the author of the book Empty Crib:

You can find this book on amazon.com

Sometimes I absolutely understand when a woman vents and rants about her man neglecting her and her family and decides to waste away with slay queens. A family that she started together with the run away husband. I understand when this woman goes ahead to do crazy things that qualify as whatsapp statuses or trending clips pale insta, FB and Twitter. You know those things a woman scorned does? Ranging from undressing, storming a guest house where her man is being entertained by damsels wearing handkerchiefs as skirts so that every time they slightly bend, her Kata kundu gets exposed. The adage hell hath no fury like a woman scorned fully describes these scenarios. From smashing windscreens, cat-fights, and in extreme cases violent assaults which sometimes turn fatal.

Her heart told her to

Who wouldn’t understand such a woman? A woman that loved a man when he was not even worth a man? When he had one pair of ” fathers union (lol , I just thought that since we have a mother’s union, there definitely is a father’s union). A woman that chose to love a man with one pair of trousers , probably a bell bottom, two shirts, and an oversize coat for special and serious occasions like interviews?  A woman that sneaked out of her parents home, against their wish and settled for a man with nothing to his name? But she stuck because her heart told her to.

Some even had to be forcefully taken out of their husband’s homes by unsatisfied and sceptical parents and folks who couldn’t allow their daughter to settle for a man without the things his peers boasted of back then. But she stood her ground like Miguna and never boarded. She ran away from her home severally to her love’s home until they gave up albeit reluctantly. This was after she dared and told them it was either suicide or her man. They gave in.

Some of these women were left alone to raise families when their husband’s were away in the city trying to earn a living. All the woman was left with was a grass-thatched house, a sizeable piece of land (for the lucky ones) and in-laws that only God’s grace could help you cope with. I know ladies that were left at home bringing up children when their husbands were in college. Yes. It used to happen those days. It is still there.

Optimistic

This woman was patient and hopeful. The kind of hope the Holy Books ask of us. She knew that someday, things were to be good for her family after her husband becomes stable. Then she would be regarded as someone’s wife or Mwalimus wife. Then she would dress well and cease being an object of ridicule from her people first and her man’s people. Her children would then join good schools befitting their father’s status, she would have a decent house and all the trappings that come with people living a comfortable life.

Her man finally stabilizes and moves his wife and kids to  Nairobi, where he works. He is doing well. He has friends who are like him. They are the definition of success and ambition. She can’t help but wonder if their stories are like that of her man. She will get to ask someday. Meanwhile she has to cope really fast into this new life. Her prayers to join her husband in Nairobi have finally been answered and it is her turn to learn quickly, fit in and enjoy the life she initially used to experience once or twice (at most) a year during those oil-changing visits.

Kill them with kindness

She is happy, she is thankful. She is at peace. Her mother now visits and brings her Kuku kienyeji and stays for a couple of days. Remember this is the same mother that never wanted her to settle for the man she is with. A mother that threatened to curse her or even never step at her daughter’s home if she couldn’t change her choice of husband. But msichana alikaa ngumu. But that doesn’t bother her. She already forgave them and forgot. After all she understands that they wanted the best for her. Only that they never knew that nobody knows another’s tomorrow. And as it was, always kill them with kindness.

Everything seems to be flowing gently, they are the perfect family, an envy of the neighborhood. Matching outfits, family outings, birthdays… gifts. The ideal family.

Suddenly, the man begins coming home late. He says it is work. Sometimes studies, chasing a masters or a doctorate. She understands him like she has always done. Sometimes it is business. He runs some side hustles to support his salary. She has no problem. She has never had. She encourages him because anything for the betterment of her family’s welfare is welcome.

His behaviour is  however not what she expects. There is little affection. He seldom eats with the kids. Sometimes he never eats the food kept for him because it was 11Pm and they couldn’t wait for him. He is lately very sensitive with his phone, it has a password. A password so long from here to Timbuktu. He no longer freely allows Tiana, his lastborn daughter in PP2(CBC manenos) to play games and watch cartoons on his phone. He recently harshly replied that kila mtu achunge simu yake. From common passwords between them to kila mtu akae na simu yake. Such a drastic change.

The writing is on the wall. She now knows her man is hiding something. She is not the only visitor in Jerusalem who doesn’t know the happenings of recent days. Her instincts tell her she is sharing her man with someone. Instincts rarely lie. She confronts him. He is arrogant and unapologetic. He tells her as a man he can do what he wishes. This hurts her. She can’t believe this is the man she stood with, supported and saw grow. A man who slept on a bed she bought from her savings from growing vegetables back in the village because when she came to live with him, he didn’t have one. She is going crazy.

Hurt

Then someday, by luck, she happens to see what she has always suspected. His chats with Cate. She cries. So Cate is responsible for the late coming and alien sprays he comes home smelling. She now understands why he recently says he has no money when his children ask  for the things they used to enjoy before (Cate). From the chats he pays Cate’s rent for a one bedroom house in South B. The one thing that hurts her most is where he tells her ” I wish I met you before I met my wife”. She wants to die. Does this Cate know how this man was some years ago? She laughs softly and sarcastically because she is 100 % sure that Cate wouldn’t have loved him in his raw form. She is right. The slay queen is only enjoying a finished product whose journey and process she is oblivious to. Today she will confront him. Liwalo na liwe. Kama mbaya, mbaya. She will face him mundu khumundu. Kuome! She will not watch her family get scuttled by Cate. Not when she is alive. She won’t watch her many years of patience, resilience and hope be robbed by a slay queen. Her children won’t beg to see their father. She will show him and Cate she is a lioness, a fierce one from Africa. One that will protect her cubs against any danger. Any.

I will totally understand this woman. Who wouldn’t?

………..Sometimes I write, Sometimes am shit. Today am…eeh, I don’t know.

A GRIEVING PARENT

(Based on a TRUE STORY)

What is the name given to a person whose child dies?

A child whose parents are dead is called an orphan. A person whose spouse is dead is called a widow or a widower. What do we call a person whose child dies? There is no name for them. For us. For me.

I first encountered child grief when I lost my first pregnancy. My child’s life was cut short at the 6th gestational week. I had only heard about miscarriages, but my encounter with one was a near death experience. What started as a tiny spot of blood on my underwear gradually escalated to heavy bleeding, excruciating abdominal pain and severe weakness. I did not go for manual vacuum aspiration (MVA) popularly known as Dilatation and Curetage (D and C procedure). This is a procedure done in a hospital to manually clean up the uterus after a miscarriage. This involves opening up of the cervix using a special tool called a speculum. The remains of the foetus, placenta, blood clots and any other unwanted tissue inside the uterus are removed.

Pain

I missed that procedure because I thought or still had hope that my baby was still there unscathed, and could perhaps survive all the drama and develop to term. That was not to be!
I bled heavily for seven days. The pain was out of this world. I did not take a single painkiller. I endured the whole ordeal like a lost soldier. What hurt most, however, was the pain in my heart. The pain of loss. The disappointment. The shock of a mother robbed of it’s offspring. The emptiness that overshadowed me. For days I cried and cried.

Mother-Child Bond

I missed my child. Mother-child bond is a very amazing chemistry. No matter how far gone a pregnancy is, that special attachment has already happened. I grieved my baby and named it Alpha, for it was the first fruit of my womb. I longed for him and often wondered what I had done wrong that could have caused his demise. I had questions, I longed for answers. Why me? Why mine?

whyyyyyyyy…

(Part 2 loading….)

(The writer is the author of ” EMPTY CRIB: POEMS FOR GRIEVING PARENTS” amazon.com)

Uncle Makori and I learnt a long time ago that karma is a bitch. A merciless one for that case. Actually, I learnt this the hard way. This is what happened. It was in 2009. I can vividly recall the events of that day as it began on high note. In the morning, we took our cows for grazing. I was very excited as I remembered that the ‘matoke’, commonly known as ‘pogo-pogo’ in my native language, which we had harvested and kept in a hole underground for ripening could now probably have ripened. True to my guess, they were ripe. ‘Tulizichangamkia sawasawa’.

Escort

I remember it was on a Friday evening. We had supper. I can’t recall what we exactly took, and we left to our usual place of sleep. At around 11:06pm, Uncle woke me up to ‘escort’ him to the toilet. For those of us who grew up in the village, you are in a better position to relate with this, the toilet is some 100m away from the house. Kindly don’t ask why.  We used to share a bed with him. I was a heavy sleeper then. He shook me frantically but in vain. I must have heard him but I chose to continue with my sweet sleep. That was around midnight. Seeing i

Outside Toilet

wasn’t ready to escort him, he went to the toilet outside all by himself and resumed his sleep. I had barely slept for three hours when I also felt the urge to offload.

Sweet revenge

It was my turn now to wake him up so that he could escort me. Your guess is as good as mine, he refused. I wasn’t surprised because it was a sweet revenge on me. And those days I was so scared of darkness, plus the usual Kisii witchcraft shenanigans. I had to go out alone. By the time I got to the loo half of the ‘pupu’ had come out my friend. I tell you I had a terrible diarrhoea.

Secret

Next morning I woke up earlier than everybody, washed the toilet and my shorts and successfully erased all evidence. I think the dogs licked whatever dropped on the way. Nobody ever knew about this apart from uncle Makori and I. And he always feels guilty for revenging. We always laugh about it . What goes around comes around. I learnt my lesson the hard way!