you know this has to stop. What did you think? We would keep doing this for all our lives?’ she was four months pregnant that last afternoon though it didn’t show. Was there a moment she wavered and considered sharing the news of her pregnancy with Macharia? Does it matter anymore?
~
Their daughter, Leslie (Mr. Mathai’s idea), Nyambura Mathai was declared the fattest baby to come out of the Aga Khan Hospital Maternity Ward the day she was born. The nurses had no scruples about nicknaming the baby Kanono. The diminutive stuck long after Kanono and her tired mother (who was now saddled with the equally unfortunate diminutive Mama Kanono), were discharged from the ward.
Mr. Mathai sang Mwanamberi on the drive to the hospital to pick up mother and daughter and he kept up the same song along with the same enthusiasm on the way back to their home. Mama Kanono sat in the back seat, rocking the sleeping Kanono, staring out of her window at April’s torrential rain, wishing Mr. Mathai would not drive so fast or with such little keenness for the road. Every hundred meters, he’d pick up a stale blue rag from the dashboard and wipe the windshield in front of him in vigorous circular motions to clear the mist that kept fogging up the window. Not once did he let up the singing throughout this exercise.
‘She looks just like me!’ Mr. Mathai stood over Mama Kanono watching attentively as she changed Kanono’s nappy. Mr. Mathai was a tall man, Masaai blood ran in his family, he always said whenever people remarked on his height. His forehead was partly obscured by an afro that flopped forwards, his eyes slanted down towards his cheeks that were almost always kicked up in a grin. Mama Kanono said nothing in response to this statement. When Kanono was gently placed in her arms for the first time, she’d expected something of Macharia’s to be present in her daughter. No, it was useless thinking about such frivolous thoughts now. Kanono looked nothing like her father. Very well. These were her cards.
~
On their first Sunday in Malaba, the Mathais were on the way to church when they met the Mutisos. It was a busy morning in the estate. Cars crammed with more people than their size allowed, pulled out of driveways and zipped down the road, shouts of “don’t forget this” and “don’t forget that” ringing all around.
Of the fifty-seven households represented in Malaba Estate, fifty-one had ticked Christian under ‘Religion’ during the 1989 National Census. The hubbub of activity that Sunday was enough to convince anyone that, at least in theory, no one had lied about their religious beliefs.
Mr. Mathai came out of the house first with a cup of tea in hand that he planned to keep drinking on the way to church. Mama Kanono hurriedly passed him with Kanono waddling behind her. Church started promptly at eight a.m. They were thirty minutes late already.
The Mutisos emerged from their home just as the Mathais were getting into their car. The Mutisos had an air of refinement to them. The Patriarch in a fitting dark blue suit with a gold tie, his shoes twinkling in the morning sunlight. Matriarch pumped, stockinged, and in a dress designed to show off all her finer qualities, but still managing to be church appropriate. The dress was a sunflower yellow whose colour so matched her complexion that she appeared to have a halo surrounding her. Her dark skin shown, luminous against this dress. Behind her was a house-help dressed in a chequered white and blue uniform with a matching cap, a child on either side of her. The girls, twins, wore yellow dresses identical to their mother’s, white stockings with lace trimming, and pumps with a slight heel!
The Mutisos looked like those pictures that come in photo frames that you’re supposed to remove and replace with your lacklustre excuse for a happy family photo. Every estate has that one family that is revered for the excellence with which they live their lives, their wealth (both purported and real), and their compounded beauty. The Mutisos were that family for Malaba Estate. They were, to be plain about it, the finest family in Malaba and with an ushago in Karen to top it off!
The families took in each other. The Mutisos saw a dishevelled but handsome Mr. Mathai, a thin Mama Kanono with her braids severely pulled back against her face, a chubby little girl by her side.
Good etiquette recalled, it was Mrs. Mutiso who began the introductions.
‘You’re the family that’s just moved in?’ Mr. Mutiso asked interrupting Mrs. Mutiso.
‘Two days ago in fact––’ Mr. Mathai bounded forward to greet Mr. Mutiso.
‘What a beautiful baby!’ Mrs. Mutiso offered, smiling at Kanono. ‘If only mine could agree to eat as much as her.’
‘But look at yours, they are so well behaved. And the matching dresses…’ Mama Kanono returned.
Their first conversation was a dance of half sentences, polite remarks and appraisal. The basics of each family were gleaned. The Mutisos had moved into Malaba a few years earlier, it could have been six as per Mr. Mutiso’s recollection, but Mrs. Mutiso was adamant it was only five. Where had they come from? Here the details got scarce. Mr. Mutiso mentioned he had grown up right here in Nairobi, Mrs. Mutiso agreed he had grown up in Nairobi but didn’t expound on her background, as if in marriage, she had assumed her husband’s past. The party agreed to organise a Sunday lunch once the Mathais had settled in though neither of its members felt convinced that the lunch would ever materialize and now, come to think of it, the two families never did enjoy a meal together as a complete unit.
~
Mama Kanono could not countenance the embarrassment of walking into church an hour late, as a result, the Mathais got back home at twelve p.m. having waited in the church parking lot for the second service to begin. As Mr. Mathai switched off the engine of their Nissan, he informed Mama Kanono about the lunch party they were to host in a matter of minutes for their friends, who (his words), couldn’t wait another day to see their new house!
‘Nyambura! Please! Enda ucheze mahali pengine. Can’t you see mummy is cooking?’ Mama Kanono and her daughter were standing in the corridor just outside the kitchen, a designated washing area that at present had a jiko boiling over with meat Mama Kanono had fished out of the fridge. They’d be lucky if a guest did not lose a tooth to the beef. There was no way the meat was going to soften before the time the guests arrived. Mr. Mathai had gone to the supermarket to buy what he termed as “provisions”.
Kanono moved closer to her mother her chubby little hands grabbing at Mama Kanono’s wide skirt, a wider comical grin on the baby’s face.
‘Mummy!’ she repeated then gargled in laughter.
‘Yes, mummy is busy.’ Mama Kanono picked up her daughter and walked back into the kitchen. ‘Priscilla! We’ll be late. People are coming and this food won’t cook itself.’
Priscilla, the Mathais’ house-help had disappeared under the pretext of looking for clean tea towels. Now, she was perched on the arm of one of the sofas in the living room watching TV.
From the kitchen window, Mama Kanono saw a commotion taking place outside. Another family was in the process of moving in.
~
Back then, the Karanjas were considered a large family. Having begun a church two years into their marriage, Mr. and Mrs Karanja’s home was occupied by a minimum of ten people at any one time. It was a home for their five children and a refuge for relatives, friends and congregation members.
A pickup laboriously rattled towards their gate, piled high with a brown sofa set, coffee tables, cooker, fridge and so many other pieces of furniture that the back of the pickup looked like an abstract painting of chaos.
Mama Kanono, her daughter on her hip, watched the pandemonium from the solitude of her kitchen.
Mrs. Karanja was the kind of industrious woman born to lead a nation but saddled with a large gregarious family instead. She stood in the middle of the road giving directions to the pickup driver not to back the car up into the wall. It was like a scene out of a rowdy under-budget, but successful film. There were arguments erupting and being foiled every second, people going in and out of the house, children playing on the pavement whilst adults admonished or called out for help or order.
At