Dignity My Foot! by Titus Kaloki

The phone rang, a famous local tune as its ring tone betrayed the owner’s sophistication and it’s above average features. It was so hard to ignore it even in a loud and crowded place as it were.

“Shit!” she exclaimed barely loud enough for anyone to hear. She looked at her buddy as if to ask, “Should I?”

“Hallo, I am in a mat” she answered after rushing to the balcony in pretense of the loud music not allowing her to hear clearly.

“Are you still kamin?” the caller asked trying to hide anxiety. “I am sorry, my cuzo is feeling unwell so I have to go look after her, in fact am on my way there!”

A reluctant agreement came from the other side, “It’s O.K, how about kesho morning?”

She thought of the hangover and complications of waking up early while a guest of someone and then replied, “Sidhani, you see I don’t know when my auntie is kujaing, so I will have to wait with my cuzo. I will make it up to you don’t worry.”

“Sawa, hope she gets well soon.” The other side resigned with a defeated spirit.

She strode back to the table guys ogling her tall full figure with only one word written in their eyes; lust. When she reached the table, the guy seated next to her groped her ass and calling her baby asked, “Can we club hop? This place is getting boring.”

How could she disagree, he was the one. I mean he had paid for her. Her hairstyle, food, drinks, clothes, bus fare to school and even that little money she bought presents for her nephews. He had every right to dictate and she had every reason to agree lest she lost favor with him. Her two ‘girls’ looking delighted agreed in chorus. As long as they got to have expensive fun for free, well not really free, they just didn’t care.

As they walked to the car, he held her by the waist. She tried to put an odd step between them as if to signify he didn’t own her but the drunken fellow couldn’t care less.

“Hey you guys are you going to eat something?” Before she could answer, her ‘girls’ asked for chicken and burgers.

As they sped towards the affluent Westlands she got lost in her own world. She remembered how Steve had first approached her in their first year in campus. His innocent love had seen them spend happy nights together and she felt lucky to have a guy who truly appreciated her. She remembered the day he declined to watch the UEFA finals just to be with her, much to the derision of his friends. Why has she lied to him?

After a year, he still could not afford her hairdos, they never went out partying and she needed some extra pocket money. Her buddies started telling her to stop being stupid. They showed her how to hook a Mr. Money bag, whetted her appetite with expensive tastes and taught her how to make the man not last in bed. The Classic F.M favorite jam

“No romance without finance” made complete sense whenever she woke up on a man’s bed in the mornings.

The laughter and dangerous swerves could not make her forget how many times she had wanted to break it off with Steve although lately she only went to see him when suffering from mood swings and in need of being treated like a queen. Anyway, the guy she had now would do.

“Baby, you are quiet tonight what’s wrong?” the guy driving asked. She composed  herself and put a plastic smile managing a forced, “Nothing, lets party tonight!”

Delighted the guy squeezed her thigh as he changed gears.

A few more clubs, a few more drinks, a few more indecent fondling of her ‘pretty’ used body and the guy demanded they go home. They sped so fast escaping a few accidents here and there as the guy kept on talking on the phone while driving. He seemed to be resisting another girl’s attempt to trace him throwing caution to the wind and dismissing her with his drunken arrogance. The girls in the car ignored that. How could they accuse him of having another lest they be left stranded at two in the night?

They reached home, the guys being outnumbered had no choice but to leave one girl sleeping by herself on the couch downstairs. She went upstairs with her guy, her buddy to the guest room with her guy. The drinks helped add some fun to the raunchy acts but after they were done and fast asleep, he woke up to drink some juice downstairs. He owned the house after all. However she could sense something wrong when he stayed for too long. When he came back he smelt different but chillingly familiar.

“How could he?” was the question running in her mind. “Really, did he just….aaargh!” She didn’t get any. She couldn’t ask him. “Why? Men are dogs!” she nearly muttered out loud.

The early morning sun rays found her awake but only served to remind the guy it was time for his morning glory. He didn’t care that she wasn’t wet. He just wanted to spend the rest of the Sunday snoring so he placed a thousand shillings on the table after satisfaction.

They exchanged uneasy looks, speaking little but munching a lot of the bacon. “Did you get fare?” they asked her almost in unison. They decided to leave but as she was waiting for her traitor friend to shower the guilt away she put on the T.V. “Sunday morning is always boring, nothing on T.V” her other ‘girl’ said.

The preacher on the morning show was talking about being proud, principled and putting one’s faith in Jesus.

“Ladies of today need to recover their dignity and pride which can only be found in Jesus! Someone say Amen.” The preacher proclaimed.

Her ‘girls’ pretended not to hear. She could only manage a pretentious don’t care remark,

“Dignity my foot!”

© Titus Kaloki 2009


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