What Tears Us Apart

by Deborah Cloyed

  Chege frowns and Ita knows he realizes the error of their position, too. But since Chege always acts as leader, he wants to be the one to decide.

  Kioni starts to weep. Silently, but Ita can feel it eclipse her shivering.

  They sit like this for some time before Chege starts to sing. It is a folk song, but Chege always sings it like a nursery rhyme.

  Hakuna matata, Kenya nchi nzuri, nchi ya maajabu, nchi ya kupendeza, hakuna matata...

  The lyrics would be funny enough in their situation—no worries, Kenya is beautiful and peaceful, there is no cause for worries—but then Chege would always break off into his own lyrics, whatever fit. This time, shit running between our toes and Kioni shivering like a wet cat.

  For once, however, Kioni doesn’t smile at Chege’s off-key singing. She lifts her chin off Ita’s arm and stares at Chege, dead-on.

  “I can do it. That girl Maryham, she told me how. She made it sound nice. A meal first and a dry room. I can help us—”

  Chege cuts her off with a grunt and a wave of his fist. Then his fist becomes a pointed finger and he angles it straight at her. “Listen to me, little sister. You will never do those things.”

  “I can change all of this,” she says in a firm voice that falters with the dawning realization that she is defying him. But she finishes by sweeping her arm over them—their ragged clothes and the filthy ground.

  Chege leans into their makeshift shelter, close enough that Ita can feel his breath hot on his arm. “But you will kill us all with your shame.”

  Ita looks up, surprised. They do twenty things a day to be ashamed of—stealing, begging, dodging police. Ita knows Chege sniffs glue, too, although he tries to hide that from them.

  Watching Chege take heaving breaths, Ita thinks he is thinking the same thing, his faraway look watching a movie of the bad things he’s done.

  “We are a family,” Chege says. “Hustling, stealing—these things you will pay back when you get out of Kibera, go to school and work. But you, Kioni, your body, your soul, we cannot get back. And Ita’s heart would turn black along with yours. It would be better to die right now, in a river of shit, than to send you to hell for us. You understand?”

  Kioni nods with a whimper and burrows her chin into Ita’s arm for comfort. When Chege turns to him, Ita nods, too. Then he finds Kioni’s big brown eyes carrying the weight of the world like a sack of coal with no way to burn it.

  January 2, 2008, Kibera—Ita

  “Chege, it’s okay. Come here.” Kioni opens her arms to him, but they stick out like bare branches. Chege paces just outside her reach.

  “They’re coming. They’re coming for me.” He crouches down on his haunches and rocks himself.

  Ita can’t move. It’s all he can do to stay upright in the waves of feeling crashing over him. His blood still boils, but it isn’t as simple as fury. He loathes Chege, he loves him, he yearns to see him beg, cry, grovel...so that what? He can forgive him? How could he ever forgive him?

  Ita looks to the door, up to the night sky. When the police come, can he really turn Chege in? Let them lock him away? Isn’t that everything Chege deserves and more?

  Chege looks up from the ground. “Ita. Listen to me—”

  “No!” Ita shouts, finally finding his voice. “You listen. Always, I have acted like I owe you my life. But you—you ruined my life.” He points at Kioni. “You ruined all of us. Kioni. And Leda—” He looks away before Chege can see the tears welling.

  It’s then that he hears his name whispered in the distance. He turns and Michael’s head hangs out of the boys’ room.

  “Go back inside!” Ita shouts. What is he thinking, letting Chege in here like this? He has to leave.

  Ita turns back to Chege, heaped in the dirt. This is where loyalty ends.

  “Chege, you owe me no confession. I saw what you did to her—”

  Kioni’s head jerks up.

  “We are done,” Ita says, nailing the coffin. “Anything I owed you is paid.”

  Like God echoing Ita’s words, whispers ripple through the night. A legion of boots shuffles in the dirt outside, surrounding the orphanage.

  Kioni’s wide eyes register the foreboding sounds.

  But Chege has eyes only for Ita. A look oozes down his face like acid melting iron. A noise utters from his throat—a whimper of pain.

  “Go,” Ita says.

  Chege flinches. His moist eyes dig deeper into Ita’s, but not to plead. He is stone crumbling to dust. The wildfire in Chege’s eyes goes out, his twitching ceases, his limbs hang limp at his sides.

  When he finally nods, slowly, Ita feels a twinge in his stomach. Followed by a chill that whips through him like the premonition of a storm.

  Then Chege’s up, springing for the gate. He slides it wide open.

  His sudden appearance catches the police by surprise. Four officers gape as he charges past the muzzles of their guns.

  There is a second where everything slows to the speed of honey and Ita watches with his heart rising into his throat. He sees Chege, the eleven-year-old boy slicing his arm with the machete, smearing his face with his own blood.

  The officers raise their rifles as Chege fumbles with his belt.

  Ita hears the songs Chege sang, his laugh in the night, teasing him, pushing him to study.

  When Chege reaches the dirt road, he thrusts his arms out to either side, Christ on the cross, lit up in the red dust by distant fire.

  In his right hand, glinting in the moonlight, is a gun.

  Ita squeezes shut his eyes. He hears himself and Chege playing kickball in the alley, Chege making jokes to pretend they aren’t starving.

  One shot.

  Chege fires one shot into the night air, inciting the officers to fire at will. They gun him down like a sack of flour, like a paper target.

  So many bullets mow Chege’s back that he flails in the air, suspended like wet, heavy laundry pinned out to dry. But when the shots cease, Chege’s body drops to the dirt.

  And Kioni does the same, falling atop Ita’s feet, dissolving into the cloud of fiery dust that rises around them both. She clamps her hands over her mouth, biting down on her screaming heart.

  Chapter 21

  December 24, 2007, Kibera—Leda

  LEDA AND ITA returned home to the orphanage like two birds swooping in to nest. The taxi dropped them off at the edge of Kibera, and they walked back laden with packages.

  It was Christmas Eve, and Leda wouldn’t want to be anywhere else in the world. She couldn’t wait to see the kids.

  It had taken forever in Nairobi—wrapping up the safari, making sure all the tourists got off on their way safely. Then Ita had had stops to make—paying bills with practically all the money he’d just made on safari, further solidifying Leda’s planned Christmas gift to him and the boys.

  When Ita knocked on the gate, Michael tugged it open not a second later, and the seven boys Leda had been missing so much swarmed around them like they were an ice cream truck.

  “Krismasi Njema! Heri ya krismas, Leda!” they chirped like baby birds at the return of their mother.

  “Merry Christmas!” Leda shouted back, kissing their dusty heads and cheeks. “Oh, we missed you!”

  The children asked what they’d brought them, eyeing all the packages. Ita spread his arms wide and told a story so animated even Leda could follow the Swahili: how all their presents got eaten by hippos, that he tried to fight them off, but it was Leda who banged a hippo on the head (an image that made them grab their bellies with laughter). Then an ostrich came along that was this big and... Leda laughed along with the kids, about the flamingos and the zebra and the monkey that stole the rest of their Christmas presents.

  Watching Ita tweak their cheeks and tug on their ears, Leda was struck by how much he loved them. And vice versa. Each boy strained forward until Ita’s eyes focused on him individually, then they shyly murmured karibu and nakutamani. Welcome home. I missed you. Even Jomo hovered, his eyes down, but hi
s heart open.

  Something about the scene made Leda sad, though. When she was little, she’d always secretly yearned for a Norman Rockwell Christmas—one she’d never had. She’d collected the Realtor Christmas cards that were sent to their house every year. Here she was, past thirty and in Africa, and watching Ita with the orphans was the closest she’d ever come.

  “Okay, little brothers, okay,” Ita said, laughing heartily. “We need to eat before church. Msaada Mary?” Did you help Mary prepare?

  Leda tried to shop for the boys in Nairobi, but Ita had protested that he already had clothes for them—what children got for Christmas in Kenya. He’d flat-out refused her plan to buy toys. Leda respected him for it, but couldn’t help feeling a little judged and reprimanded.

  She consoled herself that she’d loaded up on as much Maasai jewelry, candy, nuts and seeds for them as she could while on safari. But now, looking around the orphanage, all Leda could see were the things they really needed—paper and pencils, medical supplies, cooking utensils, books, blankets. Which made her feel all the better about her plan, which would include all those things, for starters.

  Ita took Leda by the hand, as the boys dispersed to clean up, and pulled her into his arms. They stood nestled against each other, united, absorbing the excitement of the boys’ chattering as they walked off.

  When Mary stepped from the shadows and saw their embrace, Leda thought she detected a frown, but the older woman beamed as she got closer.

  Ita and Mary conversed in Swahili in an ebullient tone, far too rapid for Leda to follow, but she imagined that Ita, with his hand gestures and smile, was regaling Mary with tales of their safari.

  “Yes, it was magical! Truly,” Leda chimed in.

  They both stopped mid-sentence and turned to her in confusion.

  “What?” Leda asked lightly.

  “We were talking about the elections,” Ita said. “Sorry. The election is in three days. At dawn. I’m taking Mary to the polls with her friends. They are very excited.” He smiled at Mary, then turned to watch two of the orphans scampering in the courtyard. “Mary is Luo. She thinks Raila is what he claims—hope for her, and—” Ita nodded at the boys “—for them.”

  * * *

  Mary left for Grace’s house in a different part of Kibera. They would all meet later at church. That gave Leda and Ita a few precious hours alone with the boys, eating the meal Mary left for them and drinking steaming hot tea while telling safari stories. The boys must have heard the same tales from Ita a dozen times, but still they listened, rapt. It was probably very different, Leda realized, to hear her rendition of the baboons and the baby elephants and the hippos. Leda told them she had a surprise for them on Christmas. Intrigued, they swam around her like a school of nibbling fish. Leda looked up and caught Ita watching her with the same warm look she’d given him earlier as he greeted the boys.

  Before long, it was time for church. Ita lined the boys up near the front door. Leda’s heart sang, seeing the little angels arranging themselves by height, Michael taking his guard post at the back of the line.

  Leda slipped off to change into the dress she’d chosen for church—an intentionally long one that brushed the dirt. A matching navy shawl added even more modesty. But when she came outside, the boys hooted and clapped in appreciation, as if she’d donned a sequined gown. Leda played the part, catwalking down the line, waving and blowing them kisses like Marilyn Monroe. At the front, by Ita, she made a curtsy and everyone laughed aloud.

  It was time to head out; Ita opened the door and the night loomed before them. Leda was nervous about going out in Kibera after dark. Ita had always warned against it. But the boys pranced out the door in single file, and plenty of neighbors moved through the streets, their silhouettes sporting the same sprightly gait. No streetlamps and no one carried flashlights—Leda wondered how anyone could find their way in the dark. She suddenly felt sure she would arrive at church splattered in mud and sewage.

  But in she plunged, and Ita locked the gate behind her. They walked slower than usual, winding through the rows of mud houses, radios blaring reggae music and BBC and Christmas songs and what sounded like a Bruce Lee movie. They passed so close to homes, Leda felt as though she was walking through someone’s backyard, which they were. She could hear conversations perfectly, if only she understood Swahili better.

  Farther ahead, the road opened up and a few scattered electric bulbs illuminated storefronts. First, they passed a butcher with meat strung in the air, flies buzzing about. Then they passed cart after cart loaded with fruits and vegetables, dried fish, soap, batteries, phone cards, charcoal—many of the stands lit by flickering candles in each corner or a liquor bottle with a burning wick.

  They passed the movie theater, a show flickering to a packed crowd inside. Leda inquired about the carts men clustered around. Bars, Ita told her in a tone that sounded like duh.

  One section of the road was lined with what looked like hot dog stands—which, as Leda got closer, she saw was exactly what they were. Steaming skewers of meat and seafood were set out for sale.

  The next strip held no more carts, just rows of women, shoulder to shoulder, bent over charcoal fires and sizzling pots. Everything it was possible to fry in Kibera seemed to be bubbling away in their kettles.

  The children piled up in their line, swelling into more of a mob, and tugged at Ita’s shirt. They’d stopped before a woman frying potato dumplings and sugared rolls. Ita gave in and bought them the treats. Here the crowd was the thickest, and Leda bounced off people as though she’d been dropped into a pinball machine. Many people called out greetings to Ita and the boys, all of whom looked at her in surprise, especially when she offered them a smile.

  The church was a concrete structure at the end of the road. She and Ita and the boys filed inside along with everybody else. Nobody stopped her, which Leda suddenly realized she’d been half-expecting.

  Sandals were deposited around the edge of the room, as people stepped barefoot onto straw mats. Mary was there, with Grace and her husband and children in tow. Leda was happy to meet Paul and the little ones; together they made quite a crowd.

  Once everyone arranged themselves on the mat, the preacher began shouting, urging everyone to sing. Leda looked around for any sign of hymnals, but everyone just threw their head back and belted out songs like a theatre troupe who’d been rehearsing for months.

  She closed her eyes and let the sheer volume of it wash over her. Then she tried picking out single voices—Ntimi, the loudest, alongside Michael’s more somber tone. But eventually she resumed blanket appreciation of the harmony created by men and women, young and old.

  Ita didn’t nudge her to sing, and she loved that about him, that he didn’t push her, seemed to understand her.

  So Leda allowed herself to let go, get lost in the spectacle. The singing and sermons continued for many hours and left everyone sweaty, winded and divinely happy.

  December 24, 2007, Kibera—Ita

  Ita couldn’t believe how late it was when they finally made it back to the orphanage. He felt as carefree and light as he’d ever been in his life, truly believing things were going to get brighter finally, easier. As he watched the boys file through the door, barely able to keep their eyes open, he remembered the prayers he’d said in church. Please, God, watch over these boys. Help them grow strong and good.

  He decided to let them go off to bed without washing, even as he saw their sticky mandazi fingers and powdered sugar lips. Mary was spending the night with her family, and Ita wanted as much alone time with Leda as possible.

  Leda escorted the sleepwalking children to their room and Ita remembered his prayer for her—Let her heal and be free.

  He’d prayed for Mary, too, of course, and his neighbors, and the doctors at the clinic.

  And he’d prayed for Chege, as always. Ita prayed that Chege would find the strength to believe in the good in himself, believe in the good in others and the world, so that he could pull himself
off his dark path and remember the true self that Ita loved, that was still there, buried inside him.

  “Did you have fun?” Ita asked as Leda returned from the boys’ room.

  “Are you kidding? This is the best Christmas Eve I’ve ever had,” she said. “Thank you.”

  They stood in the courtyard, under the stars, her skin glowing like the moon.

  “I—” He took a step closer. “The truth is—” But Ita stopped himself before saying it. In his experience, wanting something too much, out loud—it only let the devil know what to take away.

  “Me, too,” she said. She took one step closer and held out her hand.

  Ita’s heart soared. He interlaced his fingers with hers, all the whispers they’d shared through the late nights of safari rushing through his mind. Would Leda really stay? Would she return? She had admitted she didn’t have a job at home. And yet she’d spent the money to come here to help, to volunteer. It meant she cared, she was compassionate. Ita had dreams, for the orphanage, for Kibera. And dreams for himself he’d locked away. But if she came back, they could do it together. It was crazy, he knew, but this was the fire she’d lit in him, one he was unaccustomed to, one he never let himself feel. Because it was dangerous—this burning feeling, the very emotion Ita decried in Raila’s supporters. Hope. Fiery hope that things could be different. Better. Hopes let the devil know what to take away.

  Leda took his hand. She was strong, but at the seams she was fragile. Ita yearned to take care of her, protect her. He would happily spend the rest of his days trying to make her smile.

  He clenched her pale fingers in his. He took one step and she took another and then they surged together, kissing, their mouths open and sucking, bent on swallowing each other whole.

  Ita knew how a rocket must feel, lit and ready to fly. They ran their hands over each other’s hot skin and panted and slurped so loudly he had to pull away. He gasped for air, stared into her hungry eyes. With a moan, he spun her around, bent her over and lifted her dress. One hand undid his pants while the other moved her panties to the side and gripped her hip. He grabbed hold of her shoulder for balance and entered her, all the way to the hilt, which sent lightening shooting through his body. The way he fit inside her, the way her body responded, it made Ita want to do this forever.