While in the
search for sweetness of life, I moved in with a group of girlfriends – other
sugar seekers. No doubt the group was God-send. It made it easy for me to land
on a red colour-job without having producing a written CV. My charm did the
entire trick. When I told mum that I was working for a Briton’s company, her
eyes welled up with joy. Any connection with a white man translated to the
multiplication of sugar.
With continued
birth and cycling of one time generation to the next, I transformed to
something else. Studies became my greatest enemy. While in class, I would
fidget with discomfort. Or even would I secretly massage the beads of the
rosary in the pockets of my heart to hasten lecture termination. After class, I
would rush in town to eat out of my brow in the cover of darkness.
Sometimes, I
would spend several days out of the house. Mum had nothing to worry about,
provided sugar came in at the end of the day. My job got better and better, sweeter and
sweeter. My exam results were usually full of red remarks of incompletion. No
longer was I that submissive campus fresher who severally sought the advice of
the counselor. Now, I felt I could lecture the counselor herself. I developed
into a celebrated celebrity. My own naked photos and video clips were uploaded
on you tube, face book and twitter.
Now one weekend
– during Easter holiday, the modern Mary Magdalenes, me included, toured the
beach city. Here, dogs were arranged by our manager to act the role of men in
the impeding drama. “I want to cast some light on the Dark Continent. I
mean…eer…bring new Western civilization to Africa,” the white man had advised. Sugar was bound to come out of the play.
The cast of the
play performed wonders. However, this time, the uploaded clips cause caught
everybody’s attention in the country. The action was dubbed as being not in
line with African morals. ‘Hang those bastards,’ an outrageous outcry spread
across the nation. The law stretched its long arm and cast its net wide. We
were all at last brought to book.
On that black
day of bleakness, all eyes were fixed on the judge as he pronounced our action
criminal. The audience and we in the dock took a deep half breath with the
judge as paused to recover his breath. When he went on, tears began gathering
in my eyes. His voice was like God’s when he had chased man and woman from the Garden
of Eden. “….. I therefore sentence you to……” His final words were strangled by wild
cries. I searched, for the first time in my heart, why I had preferred dogs to
my several sweethearts. But no answers came; only irregular streams of tears.
How would mother
be getting sugar, now that fate has farted into my nose? I wondered. Had mum allowed
me to follow the wrong path? No, she couldn’t be. If no, then why are we locked
in the room, serving the same sentence? I even don’t know why I have bitten
mum’s bleeding right ear.
©2013 Peter Ngila
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