After dropping out of campus, I briefly worked as a security guard in an apartment somewhere in Ruaka. I would perhaps be a security guard right now had I not quit because of what I witnessed or what the tenants made me do. One of the things that tenants turned me into was an errand boy. Some of the works I was asked to do were outrageous, some were flat-out criminal, and some were raunchy.
Initially, I loved partaking in such small errands because of the tokens I received from them. A generous tenant would pay me one or two hundred shillings for washing his/her car or refilling their gas. I loved doing them because it was from these payments that I afforded my fare and lunch or supper.
Some tenants paid me using food, fruits, or drinks. One or two tenants had unrestrained tendencies of paying me using unconventional means. One such tendency started with the D1 lady. Her sink blocked. She invited me to help her unblock it. When I walked into her house, I ended up playing a role that mirrored the title of a video on a website that you love visiting; “A plumber helps the housewife to unblock the sink. Or “The lawnmower trims the housewife’s outgrown hair.”
Most of the tenants were very generous when it came to compensating me for service or work tat I had done. Apart from one mean lady. She used to live in the house on the second floor. I had a huge crush on this babe. She was in her mid-twenties, or early twenties, or thereabouts.
She was plump, with a round face and a sizeable but. She rarely came out of the house. Unless she was picking up a delivery from her boda boda delivery guy. She loved wearing loose brief shorts and busters that enhanced the shape of her bre+sts every time she came down to pick the deliveries.
She lived alone most of the time. Occasionally, her father visited, but only over the weekend. She barely gave me attention, as other tenants did. For a very long time, I wished she did. One day, she did.
I remember the first time she invited me into her house, I was listening to my favorite radio show, Patanisho. I received a call from a strange number. The call invited me into house B3. Right away, it clicked in my mind that my crush had invited me into her house.
On my way to her house, I imagined all the possible reasons why she had invited me to her house. And none was as appealing as the thought of the title “The lonely busty tenant gets company from the security guard.”
Lewd thoughts went through my mind. They excited me. She opened her door in a bralette and a ragged booty-short. My mind went wild. The first thing that I spotted was a large wall picture of a five-star general framed on the wall. It was her father’s picture. It was so large and conspicuously mounted opposite the door for anyone entering the house to view it. In the photo, the general was holding a gun.
Once I was standing in the sitting room, she handed me one thousand, one hundred and fifty shillings to pick up a parcel from a place called Denderu. The one fifty was my boda boda fare, while the one thousand was the payment for the parcel that she didn’t name. She had not mentioned any form of payment. I knew and prayed that the payment would be in the form of your favorite website’s video title.
At the pickup point, a guy in dreadlocks came out of an old bedsitter apartment and handed me a mid-sized pharmacy tablet dispensing envelope.
I did not check what was inside the envelope. Once I was back in her house, shockingly, she opened the parcel, pulled out two sticks of weed, and stretched her hands to hand them to me. I declined her offer and said, “Huwa sichomi.”. My revelation that I don’t smoke seemed to disgust her. She frowned. I kept on standing there waiting for payment.
“How am I supposed to pay you then? I don’t have money with me.” I wondered how the daughter of a general could lack money to pay me. She didn’t have the money. She promised to send me money as soon as she had some. I left her house disappointed. In my mind, I blacklisted her from the list of tenants that were eligible for my help.
A week later, she called my phone again. She had not paid me yet. But as a security guard, I always heeded all the calls from tenants. It was a rule. I entered the house and found her holding the same amount as before. She extended her hand, as before, and said, “as before.”
I protested and reminded her that she had not paid me for my previous job. She looked at me with a grimace, with violent sadness and disgust, as if she did not believe that I could turn her request down. She turned her face and stared at the photo of the general. I followed her eyes. The general’s photo was staring at me, menacingly. It always did stare at me regardless of the position I was standing at.
“My father will not be happy that you have been selling me weed,” she blackmailed. She shifted her eyes to a different location. With that threat, I picked the money and left to pick her weed. This became a routine. She sent me to pick up her drugs and paid me with threats. I was the poorest peddler in the history of peddlers.
Sometimes I wonder if there is a heaven for Nairobi Weemen.
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