Who Will Catch Us As We Fall (39 page)

‘Exactly so. I will give you your fair share, of course.' He was salivating in excitement, felt it wet the corners of his mouth and dabbed there with the heel of his hand. ‘The house is in—'

‘I don't want to know.' The boy held up his handcuffed wrists. ‘An officer of the law who has just arrested me for defacing public property is now asking for my help to steal from someone else.' The boy laughed and it was rude and snide. ‘Put me in a cell or let me go, but I won't help you to rob from my fellow Kenyans.' Then he remarked, ‘It's because of people like you that I'm forced to draw, as you call it, on walls.'

Being reprimanded by someone half his age and in his office!

‘Have it your way.' Jeffery was enraged and grabbed the boy so forcefully that the table was pushed aside. ‘I wanted to give you a chance but if you would rather wait in a jail cell until someone comes looking for you, then please allow me to escort you there.'

Jeffery heaved open the metal doors behind the front desk, the persistent
clang!
of it ringing in his ears, and he shoved the boy hard, sending him stumbling head first into the pitch-black corridor ahead.

Sunday morning stillness filled the Kohlis' house. All Betty could hear as she let herself in was the high
weeho
of the black-pied crows perched on the eaves and a toilet flushing upstairs. She locked the back door behind her and went into the kitchen, staring in annoyance at the pile of dishes waiting by the sink.

The family had eaten dinner late yesterday, after Betty had already left. She saw that no one had bothered to rinse them before stacking them messily and now there was a thick stream of black ants marching from the window frame to the plate rims, picking at crumbs of white rice and goat curry.

She had woken up edgy and irritable; the slight hole in her cardigan kept snagging on her earring and she had tugged until it had finally ripped. Looking up from the ruined sweater to the palatial house, she thought of the Kohlis, snug in their beds while she was forced to rise at seven o'clock to prepare their breakfast and clean the house.

She pushed the dishes into the sink with a forceful swipe of her arm, watched the ants panic at this sudden disturbance. She turned on the tap and let the steady stream of water fall over the plates and experienced a mean thrill at the vicious assault.

Jeffery's voice refused to leave her as she pulled out two pink papayas from the fridge and an apple, skinning them according to Pooja's preference. His words settled heavily in the crook of her brain, spreading like a dull and unforgiving headache. As she went about chopping the fruit, the tightness in her temples grew until she had to pause and cling to the edge of the counter to steady herself.

‘Are you alright?'

Leena was watching her from the doorway.

‘Yes. Everything is okay.' Betty had to put the knife down because it refused to stay still. Then, hating that she felt compelled to ask, she said, ‘Can I make you some tea?'

‘Would you bring it upstairs for me? There's something I want to show you.'

‘Okay.' Betty was curt, turning back to her work. The knife sliced easily through the pulpy flesh of the fruit and she wiped away black seeds and a stringy mess, dividing them into neat cubes. As she went to boil the water for tea, she wondered if it had ever crossed the girl's mind to do it herself.

She found Leena rifling through her closet, her room turned upside down with strewn clothes, old picture albums and high-school love letters, written in blushed secrecy.

‘I have your tea.'

‘Just put it on the table.' Her voice was muffled behind the door.

As Betty placed it down, she took the opportunity to scan her surroundings while the girl was distracted. She noted the abundance of items – a computer open at the desk, a mobile phone occasionally beeping
on the bedside table and a music device, blue and shiny, in Leena's back pocket. Things that were beyond Betty's comprehension and desire – she had never cared about possessing them. But in her present state of mind, she grew resentful once more of everything that came so easily to this young girl and for all the distant dreams she was working toward. ‘Why did you need me?' she asked, trying to keep the hardness from her voice.

Leena came to sit on her bed, a box in her lap. ‘I have some things you might be able to use.' She slid off the cover and tilted it toward Betty. There were necklaces and earrings caught in a heap of multicolored beads, one or two lipsticks and an oblong crimson perfume bottle that had never been touched. To Betty, they seemed sorely precious lying in a cushion of torn blue velvet and she thought that perhaps, after all, her anger had been unjustified.

‘These are just some old things I don't want any more – if you won't take them, I'll throw them out.'

Insulted, Betty drew her hand back. To think that she was being given things deemed worthless made her feel pitiful. She should have said no but something pulled her to the dark-red bottle, a shimmer of gold coming through and its intricate, twisted top. She had never owned a perfume and found it impossible now to refuse. Clutching the box tightly to her chest, she muttered a ‘Thank you so much,' before fleeing downstairs.

In the concrete dimness, Betty ran her hand over the flat glass pendants of the necklaces, held up beaded earrings to her lobes and let them fall coolly against her neck. She sprayed the perfume on her wrists and the lily scent took over everything in her small room – settled into the few pieces of decor she had – picture frames and a potted plant, a blue-and-white checkered bedspread that acted as her door. The rectangular bottle, with its tremendous, sharp corners, was easily the most expensive thing she owned, besides the old radio that hardly worked any more.

Her throat raw with disappointment, the rims of her eyes burning, she had the sudden desire to sleep – a deep, insensible, week-long hiatus – and she lifted her feet into the tangled sheets, holding her wrist firmly to her nose. And then, her mind and body rapidly gathering self-pity, Betty began to cry.

She remained stony and mute for the rest of the day, even at Esther's table later in the evening. She had gone through her work with such aggrieved distraction that she had broken two plates and a mug, pulling the handle right off as she was washing the dishes.

The Kohlis' house, it seemed to Betty, had kept itself cleverly apart from her, enshrouded in an invisible veil that she hadn't noticed until it was tangled about her, choking and tight. Now she saw the uncouth extravagance, the irrelevance of so many of its spaces. The nooks in the walls, where Pooja insisted on keeping fresh flowers in massive, tubular vases, the ‘mess' room constructed especially to store dirty shoes and clothes and Raj's cricket kit – larger than the one Betty slept in. There were lavish paintings on every blank wall, a small yet impressive chandelier fracturing the dining table into mirrors of light. All these items had always seemed excessive to her, altogether silly, but that day they were terrible, jeering things that hounded her.

‘There's something wrong with Jeffery.' Betty was tugged back to Esther's smiling face – her cheeks ballooning out in a laugh. ‘You should have seen him last night. He pushed the dining table across the door and watched out of the window until morning. I don't know who he was expecting but he was frightened.'

Betty tried to bring her attention back to her cousin. ‘You should be careful.'

‘I'm past the point of worrying in my life. I'm just here to wait for whatever comes.'

‘I'm tired of you talking that way.' Betty's composure finally gave way and Esther was an easy target. ‘Stop squandering your time, gossiping about maids having affairs and complaining about the price of
unga
. You must start living again.'

Esther remained unperturbed. ‘I can't live without David. That's my punishment.'

‘No one is punishing you except yourself.'

‘You're wrong.' Esther cupped a palm around her mouth, as if sharing a secret, though they were alone in the house. ‘Look at Jeffery. Something terrible has happened to him. He can't sit still, can't eat – he won't even drink his whiskey. That's what happens when you do bad things, Betty. Bad things start happening to you.' Esther straightened out her floral-patterned gown, patted down the lace collar in satisfaction. ‘Remember that. The devil will always bite you back.'

There were questions resting between them, impregnating the already overheated spaces of Jeffery's car and Betty had to roll down the window.

‘Esther is safe in the house, isn't she?' She asked because it seemed to be the only concern acceptable to address. She wanted to tell him about her day, how much his words had disrupted her simple world, had altered something inside of her so that she couldn't look at the Kohlis the same way.

Jeffery glanced at her sideways, her profile unclear in the darkness threaded through with dim street lights. There was something he liked very much about this woman. She was modest and didn't carry the burdens he did, or perhaps she only carried them better, but he was finding it difficult to bring up his prospective plan with her. So he was glad she spoke first. ‘Why would you ask that?'

‘She told me that you're worried about something. That you stayed up all night with the dining table blocking your door, waiting for someone.'

His jowls loosened, his cheeks relaxing into a downward smile. ‘I didn't know she noticed such things. That she cared.'

A quick correction. ‘Actually she was pleased about it.' Betty was upset that he had caused this permanent shift inside her, this twisting and turning of all evil things such as jealousy and hatred and bitterness.

Hardening, Jeffery glowered. ‘And she wonders why I spend so much time outside of the house.'

‘Perhaps it's because you murdered her husband.'

It came as a swift relief, to hear her say it. Now that his secret was finally exposed, he was glad to have this chance to explain himself to her.

‘Things weren't as straightforward as Esther claims they were. Whatever happened to David is not what I wanted.' His eyes locked on the road, a glittering, tarmac point ahead. ‘I was stupid and greedy. Even now, I can't say that I've learned my lesson. Money is extremely important to me.'

‘It's not everything.'

‘Yet without it, what is the standard of life?'

He wanted to recount to Betty the story of his mother. He felt such an urgent desire to speak about it with her, overcome with the need that she understand what had happened to him. ‘I used to be a good person.'

The grave humiliation in his voice startled her. She said, ‘It's not too late to go back.'

‘There comes a point when change becomes impossible.'

‘Maybe you just don't want to,' she retorted.

The contemplative silence that followed was interrupted by the occasional brushing sound of his tires and the wind knocking tirelessly across the windows. ‘Perhaps you're right.'

He pulled up at the gate, watched her climb out with his fists tightened against the steering wheel. Then, terrified he would lose her, he knocked wildly on the passenger window. When she spun around he waved and, when she returned the gesture, he quickly smiled with what seemed an inkling of his old self.

He drove the twenty minutes home in contemplative leisure, forearm draped over his open window and soft music between his ears, all the while the jasmine-scented breeze filtering through, cool and invigorating, bringing him a much-needed peace.

They cornered him the next day in the Aqua Bar bathroom. He was there to tell Marlyn that he would not be seeing her any more. But as he came through the main door, a spring in his step after so many sluggish years, the two men accosted him, grabbing him by the underarms and dragging him to the toilets.

One stood guard at the door and every time someone tried to enter he shook his head and said, ‘Not working. Come back later.'

The other man stood facing Jeffery, the white daylight streaming through the windows. ‘Do you have it?'

‘It's not yet Wednesday,' he had protested weakly.

‘Wednesday is tomorrow so either you have it or you don't.'

‘Just give me an extra week,' a bursting plea.

‘I need it now.' The man loomed over him, profuse, vine-like muscles traveling out from under the collar of his shirt.

‘I can't get it for you by tomorrow.' The confession came in a flood of terror and then there was nothing but hot, white pain. It was a flash of cold first, the sensation of splashing yourself with icy water but then it stayed too long and began a fire beneath his flesh. Broken bones, a fractured mirror in front of him – he felt something sticky against his gums and worried that he had lost a tooth. The hand on his neck was drawing his head back again.

‘Wait – please,' he said, falling to his knees and clutching the man's trousers. He was dizzy and thought he might vomit onto the cracked floor. ‘No more.'

‘Are you going to get it for me?'

The blood from his forehead seeped into his eyes and everything turned a watery pink. His head drooped forward, so heavy he thought it might explode as he tried to nod a yes. The man caught it in its downward trajectory and forced it upward.

‘You better otherwise I'll be coming to your house.' He dropped Jeffery's chin and with nothing holding him up, he collapsed to the floor, twisted legs beneath him. He struggled to keep his eyes open, his mind understanding. ‘I've seen your wife and the mistress you keep.' A deep belly laugh. ‘Two women in the same house – what a lucky
mzee
you are.'

‘Don't hurt them.' His fingers grappled with the man's shoelaces and he received a swift kick in the abdomen. He doubled over, the breath suspended in his lungs before squeezing forth. ‘I'll get it for you, just don't harm them.'