A Woman From the East

When Lisa found out that her husband, Josh, was taking longer at his rural home than was the norm in their 21 years of married life, she embarked on a mission to catch him. However, before she could travel to their rural home, which was about 250 miles away from the city, she was going to attend her daughter’s dowry payment at her maternal home. That morning, she looked herself in the mirror and thought “once I am done with this event, Josh better be back and talking.” She combed her 4C, kinky hair into an Afro and it rested so perfectly over her head like a halo. She put on a red lipstick to match her red heels and touched her eyelids with a blue eye shadow to match her blue dress.

The road to her maternal home, a few kilometers from the city, was full of potholes, but she had to go anyway, because it was mandatory for her to be at the event. “Bananas and oranges from organic farms, naturally ripened bananas, please buy madam. I will give you at a discount,” said the women selling fruits through the window of the matatu. Lisa didn’t like people speaking so close to her face and she angrily asked the driver when the vehicle would leave the stage. She tried to be polite by buying a bunch of bananas from the woman and immediately the woman left, a crowd of sellers, sweaty men and women, surrounded her, showcasing their fruits and vegetables. She kept buying just to get rid of them. She was irritated, but she was also well moneyed. She had taken a loan to upgrade her look for the event, and unlike the past, this time she was certain she would be able to pay it off with the money she would get from her share of her daughter’s dowry payment.

Everyone looked up when she stepped into the compound; she was one of the guests-of-honor. She walked majestically, her backsides swinging to the left and right with every step she took. People were waiting for her arrival. She walked into one of the two reserved seats at the high table. After a few pleasantries with her daughter and her husband-to-be, still the event did not start. “Where is Josh, the ceremony can’t start before his arrival,” the event MC whispered into her ear. “Let us start just the way we are. I am here now. I am the mother,” she said. By this time, the elders had noted that everything was not right. Two elders approached her and asked her where Josh was. The elders were having none of it when she proceeded to tell them that he wouldn’t make it to the event. “This is against our culture! A woman can’t receive the dowry of her daughter!” They scolded her and they attracted a lot of attention from the crowd near them. “Well, she can, if the father of the daughter is dead.” She said, fixing her wig.

Taken aback, the elders started consoling her. “Oh my dear, when did this happen? What happened to Josh? Should we postpone the event? Are you okay?” They went on and on and she couldn’t stand the saliva jumping from their mouths on her face so she screamed at them to be free, “No! Josh is okay, but he is not the father of my only child!” There was a deafening silence as people watched with their mouths wide open, eager to confirm if what she said was true. Her daughter, bothered by the unwillingness of the people to move on, came to the defense of her mother. “Yes, Josh is not my dad. And yes, it is culturally right for the brothers of my mom to receive my dowry on behalf of my male parent,” she said, throwing a glance at her husband-to-be, to signal a quick affirmation that things were under control.

The event proceeded with the new rules in place. However, people were not happy, especially those that considered Josh a friend. “How could this evil woman team up with her people and her daughter and deny Josh the dowry of her daughter?” “He raised her from birth.” “If I were Josh, I could have come here and demanded that everything be postponed until I carry out a DNA!” “I heard Josh run away from this crazy woman. He hasn’t been home for weeks now.” “I knew this would happen. Josh deserves better. This woman is terrible. Can you imagine the level of disrespect she has to tell everyone here that Josh is not the father?” “Well, let me see how it all ends. Like mother like daughter. This girl will surely turn to be like her mom and that is when this man will realize he didn’t win a jackpot.” “If I were him, I would leave immediately after being served all these major red flags in public.” People whispered to each other. Lisa gave them an un-bothered look until one man said, “That is why he married Angelica. Just like her name, she is an angel, barely in her twenties, and so fertile that she is carrying twins for him.” the man told the crowd that had already gathered around him.

“Married with twins?” Lisa muttered as she waited to board a matatu to Busia, where her husband’s home was, because she was the legit wife to Josh. “He will hear from me today! I better not find that woman in my house; otherwise I will slit her stomach open, remove those stupid fetuses and feed them to the dogs!” She said as she paced by the side of the road. “And to make matters worse, mom, she is younger than me! Beat her out of the homestead mom. You can’t be humiliated like that after all these years taking care of that good-for-nothing man! That jobless fellow whose work was just lying on the couch January to January! Thank God he is not my father; I would puke to think I have his genes in me!”  Karen said, pacing behind her mother as they waited for a matatu to arrive. That fool didn’t even have anything to pay my dowry with like your husband-to-be has done today. He is so useless, he makes me sick! He won’t get a dime from the money I collected for your dowry. He has done many things, but to think he will bring another woman into my house, huh, he better think again!” Lisa told her daughter. “Can’t we wait for tomorrow mom? It is very late and I doubt we are going to get a bus at this hour,” Karen said. “I will be damned if I let Josh have his way for another one minute!”

******

“Sweet Josh, I made some yams for breakfast. There is fermented milk with the peppermint scent, just the way you love it,” Angelica said as she carried a tray full of different delicacies into Lisa’s original house. Lisa and Karen looked from the gate and after spotting the threat; Lisa sprinted, just like she had sworn to her daughter she would. She grabbed Angelicas headscarf so violently, jerked her backwards so forcefully that she dropped the tray and all foodstuffs scattered all over the floor. Lisa was very strong; she tangled her rival immediately, positioning her face down on the rough ground, her hands firmly on Angelica’s head and back. “Stop it Lisa. She is pregnant!” Shouted Josh, as he tried to pull her off Angelica. “Don’t you dare touch me you moron! I will cut her stomach open and get rid of those children that have given her the audacity to sleep in my house and cook in my pots!” Lisa shouted as she continued to overpower both her husband and his mistress.  Karen moved past her parents' house and proceeded to her grandmother’s main house, a few meters from where the commotion was taking place. She went there to exchange greetings with the people who were already coming out of their houses to try to locate where the shouting was coming from. Lisa was still on Angelicas back and her husband trying to pull her off, when people came rushing into the house to stop the fight.

********

It was December, and it meant that mangoes were in season. As they sat under a mango tree, benches arranged in a manner that they formed a curve to face the one that was in front, Lisa continued to chew on her mango, with the juices running down her arm. “Lisa, that was totally uncalled for, and being a mother, you should know better on how to handle a pregnant woman,” said one of the elders on the front bench. “There are many issues leading to the current situation right here. Like Josh has pointed out, Karen is not only someone else’s daughter; you have embarrassed him by ‘selling’ her off without him in the picture. As the elders, we find no fault in him looking for a woman who can bare him his own children,” said Josh’s mom, her mother in law. Lisa was sucking on the mango seed to get all the juices when her turn to speak came. “I have no problem, but my house and everything in it is out of bound to another woman. My property should not be touched, let him buy her another piece of land where she can build her own house,” Lisa said, picking a mango that was dangling over her face while giving her side of the argument. She sat down and wiped the fruit with the end of her skirt, before taking a large bite into it, some juices escaping her mouth and running down her arm again.

When the committee meeting resolved the conflict, it was agreed that Josh would find another place near his home to settle his new wife, build her a house and buy her all things she needed to run her home independently from Lisa’s. Lisa was bitter because she didn’t expect the outcome to be in any favor to Angelica. However, she didn’t protest much because according to her “a big-mouthed-idiot had almost broken her marriage by revealing about her daughters dowry event to the villagers and her claim that Josh was not the father.”

*******

“I haven’t seen my twins and it’s about one year now Lisa. Why are you stopping me from going home?” Josh asked, one evening as he took his iced tea with Mandazi.

“Well, no one has stopped you darling. The moment we get some money, we are going to do some shopping and pay them a visit. Besides, if she really misses you, she can bring the children over to meet you,” Lisa said, after pausing the TV program she had been following for some months. It was on repeat during the day in the afternoons, Monday to Saturday, but she re-watched it anyway, every day.

Josh would sell fruits door to door after buying them from the market and they would use the profit to buy food and pay house rent. He was happy that his customer base was increasing and he was not struggling with rent like a few months before the twins came. However, they were still having one meal a day, which was remotely balanced. He hadn’t managed to save enough bus fare for him to travel home to see his children or his wife whom he left still pregnant. Angelica had been threatening to leave him, but she had continued to stay because she did not have anywhere else to go. Besides, she loved her new home because she now had a piece of land and a mud house to call her own. She was rearing some chickens and in a few months, she had started saving to build a brick house. Her mother in law loved her so much because she was a hard worker and she was ‘making’ her home.

“Angelica is going to send me money. She has some money saved up and she really needs me to be there for our children’s first birthday. Can you imagine not having seen my children until now? What is my excuse for doing that when there is nothing I am doing in the city?”

“Can you listen to yourself? What man waits for a woman to send him bus fare to go see his children he hasn’t seen for a year? You should be ashamed of yourself. Find some money and go there like a man. Have some dignity!” Lisa responded.

“Every coin I make from my fruit business has been spent by you Lisa! When will I make enough money to keep aside when you ask for all the profit and allocate it to all the expenses in this house? You keep making your hair and buying clothes and stuff you don’t need, like that slimming belt that you only used for a month and gave up when you realized you were only getting fatter. You should also find something to do. Many women work to fund their hair and clothing expenses.”

“Don’t you dare raise your voice to me! Is is my fault that you went to impregnate another woman and now you can’t seem to meet your financial responsibilities? Josh, eh? I will not change my lifestyle because you decided to add some people into our family.”

“They are not some people; they are my children. My only biological children.”

Lisa increased the volume of the TV to drown down Josh’s voice and she continued watching as though Josh was not in the house talking to her.

*******

Lisa spent the entire morning in a salon getting her hair done. She hadn’t done anything in the house despite knowing very well Josh went to pick Angelica from the bus station. The children would be hungry the moment they would get to the city. When she finally got home, she ate some of the fruits Josh had brought back home because he had to close his ‘business’ earlier than usual to rush to the bus stop.  

“How was your journey?” Lisa asked immediately Angelica and her children entered the house.

“The journey is long and tiring. The children are so thirsty and hungry. Besides that, everything else was okay.

Lisa welcomed them and gave them some fruits from a cupboard in the sitting room. They talked more about the hardships in the city as they ate the fruits and drank some ‘strong tea’ with mandazis.

“Mhh, hopefully you have carried their food or some money to buy because here in the city we buy everything even the water we drink. And as you can tell by the period Josh has taken without any bus fare to come see the children, he hasn’t been making enough money that could have been saved for this day. I am hungry too, just ate a fruit from his stock.”

“Don’t worry about that. I have some savings from my chicken business. I can support our stay here for at lease a month. I want the children to bond with their dad.”

“A month? What do you mean a month? Where will you be sleeping in this one bedroom house? I am sorry but one month is just too much. Josh will look for money and come visit you at home for that month.”

Than night, after they ate the chicken that Angelica bought and prepared for dinner, Lisa gave them an extra mattress to sleep on at the table-room floor. In the morning, Lisa woke up so early and prepared breakfast.

“Hey, I need to remove this mattress here and place the table back; it is time for breakfast. Josh will escort you to the bus stop after breakfast.” Lisa said after she woke Angelica up.

“What do you mean? He hasn’t bonded with his children and I haven’t had any time with my husband. I can’t go back just yet.” Angelica said as she placed her still asleep children on the couch, while Lisa removed the mattress off the floor.

“You are funny. Do you seriously want to have some time with my husband in my house? I thought they were joking when they said you were a teenager. Your mindset is, but your body is not. You can’t fool me, so snap out of it and just do what a grown woman should have done.”

“And what is that?”

“Know her lane and when to stop pushing.”

After breakfast, they all left the house to see Angelica and her children off. Lisa wanted to make sure that they didn’t divert at any place nor had some quality time alone. Angelica gave Josh some money and he agreed to go home the next weekend to spend some time with the children.

*******

“I have studied that woman and I tell you she is not young as you people think. She is only short, plump and with good skin. That woman is hiding something while at the same time playing all innocent and naïve.” Lisa told Josh the day before her scheduled travel to see his children.

“You are just jealous because you are old and you fooled me for years, making me raise a child that wasn’t mine. A customer of mine asked me why I am still with you when you lied to me for years about your daughter being mine yet I have my children now. Don’t you think it is not adding up? What am I doing in the city when my family is in the countryside? He mentioned that the only thing to explain it is witchcraft power over me. Have you performed any witchcraft on me, Lisa?”

“Who told you that? What is the name of that customer?”

“Does it really matter? I have never ‘risen to the occasion’ to make love to Angelica since you knew about her. Have you interfered with my biological functioning in any way?”

“I want the name of the customer!”

“Josh. The customer’s name is Josh. It is me. I have been thinking about those things in my head. Do you want to hurt me more than you already have?”

“Do you love me?” Lisa asked and touched his chin.

“Yes, I do.”

“Good. That is all that matters. It is me and you against the world, just like you promised me when we got married.”

“Okay.”

A few months passed and Lisa insisted that she was going to accompany her husband home, since he was adamant about going. When they got home, Angelica welcomed them in her house and roasted a free-range chicken for them. After enjoying the meal and spending some time with Angelica, Josh and Lisa had to give Lisa some room to bond with her nieces and nephews, who had visited earlier that day.  

“Why aren’t you spending the night with me and you are finally here at home?” Angelica asked Josh in a whisper after learning that he was going to spend the night in Lisa’s house.

“You have so many visitors and this house is not enough to accommodate more than it has already.”

“They are leaving tomorrow morning. Please be here by breakfast.”

When morning came, Angelica’s guests left and she prepared breakfast before Josh and Lisa were up. She waited for Josh to show up and when he didn’t, she went over to Lisa’s house with breakfast in her hands. At the doorstep, she remembered how Lisa clobbered her when she was pregnant and almost went back. However, she went ahead and knocked the door.

“It is still dark, Angelica. Do you prepare breakfast this early?” Josh asked, surprised when he opened the door. Lisa was still in bed, but when she heard Angelica speaking to Josh, she woke up fast and joined them.

Josh’s stay at home was totally guarded by Lisa, but he had a quality time with his twins. He did not spend any private time with Angelica or his mother. There was no time for his mother to tell him that Angelica was the perfect wife that he could have in his lifetime, or his brother to tell him he was lucky to get a teenage girl that could bear him many children, or the neighbors to praise him for having such an entrepreneurial minded girl to double up as a perfect homely woman. Lisa was with her husband everywhere, every time until it was their time to return to the city.

*******

“I have made enough money to build my brick house now. However, if I can’t have my husband with me, I don’t think I want to continue staying here. I want to move to Busia town and start my own small business.” Angelica told Josh’s Mom.

“My daughter, don’t go, please. I will talk to my son and he will spend time with you too. He is not doing anything in the city. The two of you can put up a business with the money you have saved up.”

“You don’t understand. My daughter, I mean my niece is already pregnant for Josh’s brother Sam. It is not good in the eyes of the community and family. I have tried to convince her to get rid of it, but she is having none of it.”

“What are you saying? You and your niece are both getting involved with brothers from one womb?”

“Exactly, that is why you should let me go because this is about to be more embarrassing and confrontational than we think, because they are already talking about marriage.”

“What niece, mom? I am not your niece! I am your daughter stop this nonsense already. Is that what you tell people, that I and my siblings are your nephews and nieces? Wow, all the seven of us should now continue calling you aunt?” Eve asked, coming down from the mango tree, where she had been hiding to eavesdrop.

“Eve, Angelica is your mother?”

“Yes, she is. Dad is still looking for her.”

“Jesus Christ!” Josh’s mom exclaimed and sat on the ground holding her head.

Angelica held her eldest daughter by her braided hair and tackled her to the ground. She threw blows to her head and her back, calling her names for exposing her.

“You think you are woman enough because you can carry a child in your womb, eh Eve?” She shouted.

“You already have a husband back home and he has been looking for you since you ran away. If you spoil this for me, I will let him know where you are and tell him you have two children by another man. I got nothing to lose, mom. You have everything to lose, so play your cards right!” Eve shouted back after freeing herself from her mother’s tight grip.

Josh’s mom made a call to the city immediately to call his son home. She said he was needed home urgently. That same day, because Lisa and Josh thought something had happened to the twins, they boarded a night bus and by the following morning, they were home. Angelica was nowhere to be found, neither was Josh’s brother Sam. People checked in the neighborhood, they checked with the relatives and when they couldn’t find Angelica and Sam, they called off a committee meeting scheduled to cleanse then off the taboo.

“Something told me this woman was hiding something. Hahaha and everyone said she was a teenager. You people are so naïve. Now, we just need to prove those are your children and then I will have my last laugh.”

“Are you mocking me? What did I ever do to you?”

“Are you seriously asking me that? You made me abort my unborn child when I was nineteen!”

“Wow, is this about that? We were so young and I wasn’t ready. I couldn’t become a father then, I needed to figure my life out.”

“Well then, until you figure your life out, you will never become a father. I told you that and I think you are starting to see that you can’t. Ask around, those children are not yours. You ruined my life and now you expect yours to blossom? Never! Never Josh!”

“What do you mean? I haven’t ruined your life.”

“News flash, Mr. Man! I lost my womb from that aborting complication. I can’t have children of my own, neither can you.”

“What about our daughter? The one you married off recently as the mother?”

“That is not my child biologically. My sister gave birth to her and gave her to me as she was still in school. That is why I told you our daughter was a preterm because you came back earlier from your job than expected.”

“Did everybody in your family know about this secret?”

“What does it matter? You killed an innocent child because you wanted to be deployed to Mombasa and what do you have to show for it now? The fruits you peddle door to door? You completely made me barren. However, I can’t blame you fully because I also had a choice to say no. I could have gone with the option of keeping the pregnancy and losing you as my boyfriend. But I didn’t.”

Josh looked at Lisa in shock, holding his chin in disbelief because he had completely forgotten about the abortion he forced her to undergo. He moved closer to Lisa and knelt in front of her.

“Forgive me Lisa. I am so sorry for the pain I have caused you over the years. I have been so insensitive about what I did and the pain that I have unknowingly caused you. Please set me free now, I need to start living.”

“No Josh, get up. There is no need to apologize, we are getting old now and nothing can be redone. I have done my share of wrongs and I have told uncountable lies, such as that of our daughter. I am somehow a devil like you. So, don’t apologize. You have gotten your share of punishment for all the pain that you have caused me. I made sure you lost your stupid job. I also made sure you didn’t look for another woman outside our union and if you did, I made sure you couldn’t impregnate them. That makes us both bad people.”

Josh stood up and moved back to lean against the wall of the house.

“Have you done something unnatural to make my life miserable? Will I die without children? What about my legacy? No. Those twins are my children, Lisa. You will not corrupt my mind again. Those are my children no matter what!”

“If she lied about her age and then seven children resurfaced, what makes you think she can’t lie about just two children? If two children could earn her a home, a piece of land and a new identity away from her abusive husband, why not go with it?”

Josh turned and threw a fist into the wall so hard that his hand bled. Then his brother Sam appeared after almost three weeks of running away.

“I am sorry my brother for what I am about to tell you. Those twins are mine. Please forgive me, brother. I waited for very long for this lie to come out and when I learnt that it was her daughter I was having an affair with and was planning to marry, when all along she told me she was a distant relative, I couldn’t stand it. I ran away because I was afraid you would find out sooner than later, but I just came back to apologize to you. Those evil women have ruined my life.”

Josh turned to his brother when he finished talking. He seemed like he was lost. He moved his lips without making a sound. It was clear he was fighting tears and when he couldn’t confront him, he lowered himself and held on his knees for support. When Sam turned to walk away, he finally garnered some strength and asked him, “Why Sam?” He turned to face the wall behind him, the wall of the dry mad house with its rough unplastered ashy surface glaring into his face. He punched the it so hard that he bled instantly. Lisa did not move an inch to help him with the bleeding fist or to embrace him because of the heart-breaking news he just received. Sam could not stand to watch his brother suffer in the heartbreak he orchestrated; he moved from the scene and disappeared from the compound and went into hiding. 

After some time, after Lisa went back to the city without Josh, she learned that Sam finally returned home to take care of his ailing mother. He had cut ties with Eve. He looked for Angelica to no avail, but later learned that she reunited with her husband and were running a poultry business together.  

After a year, Karen gave birth to a daughter; she visited her mother who had relocated to a better part of the town after Josh went missing. Lisa and her granddaughter were taking Pizza and chicken when her mother called one day. “No, I haven’t seen Josh for months now, mom. He said that he went to figure his life out at the coast and that he will only come back when he feels it is the right thing to do. Occasionally, he sends me some upkeep money.” Lisa said on the phone after pausing her favorite TV program playing on her new flat screen TV which she had bought with some of the dowry money she had hid in her secret bank account. After ending the call, another call came in. It was Josh. She hung up just like she had been doing for months.