My Kids Lead me to Love

Holding my son, six years old by my left hand, and my daughter, three and a half by my right, I came to the main road from the city after the walk from the river. Here I could get a taxi to take us the rest of the way home. I met two people who I knew, going in the direction I had come from, wishing each other a good evening.

Instead of a taxi, a station wagon vehicle stopped. We clambered on, finding one other person inside. He got off at the next stop. Apparently the owner was one of those who took passengers on the way home, which helped pay the fuel bills. When we got to what would have been our stop, I knocked on the body to alert the driver to let us down. Instead of stopping the vehicle turned in to the shopping centre. I was surprised to find the driver was a woman of medium build and dark complexion. In her own way I found her attractive. She did not know how much to charge for such a short distance; she played it safe by asking me for the full fare from town, about four times what I would have expected to pay. I countered with the fare that was fair. Though she agreed to take my money, she did not have enough change. She asked me to follow her to a cybecafe to find the coins she needed. It happened to be the same one that I normally used.

John, give me forty shillings here, handing him the hundred shilling note I had given her. She then started telling me of her studies for a masters degree at Nairobi University, handing me her phone to see what the course was like.

Dismissing John with, you may leave now. I will take over from there, she took hold of my daughters arm as I settled down with my iPad to use the cybers WiFi network. While bent over my work, both looking at the courses she was tackling and my own researches I failed to notice that she had gone, effectively leaving me in charge of her cyber. A dodgy-looking man came in making inane enquiries, to which I could only reply that the owner was not far; she would come back soon. Yet I had no idea where she was. Added to that was a faint worry that my children were with a woman I hardly knew. These two worries were nagging at the back of my mind as I continued with my work, having seen enough of the courses.

Then a woman who was a great friend of my sister's came into the cyber and made straight for a bunch of bananas sitting on the top of a cabinet.

Oooh, she has nice bananas today, she exclaimed excitedly. I had not even seen them myself.

Have you seen her down that way? I asked. It was clear to both of us that we were speaking of the same person.

Yes, she has just gone in through her gate with two children. Which was strange; she does not have any, said Wambuyi with a frown. "Anyway, I will show her how many bananas I have taken.

Tell her to hurry up. Wambuyi left me absorbed in my work.

Yoo-hoo! Daddy, we are back! my son shouted from the door. I looked up to see that they each had a large lollipop in their hands, which they were licking.

Any customers today, she asked me in a jocular tone.

How could you leave all this expensive equipment in the hands of someone you hardly know?

I am a good judge of character. If you had been the bad sort I would not have made the dash home without locking up. I trusted you right away.

That is quite flattering. Anyway my name is Dodge, I held my hand out to her.

Her eyes opened wide. If you don't mind my saying so, you have a dodgy name!

To go with your dodgy behavior, I shot back.

She let loose a loud gust of laughter. Then she said, Mine is Marianne. I spend the early evenings here after a full days work at Ford Motor Company; I work as the chief auditor.

Daddy you must take us to visit Auntie Marianne, my daughter piped up.

Yes of course. But another day, I was intrigued that she had managed in that short time with them to get into their hearts and minds. Not only a good judge of character, apparently, but a good influencer, too.

I logged off the WiFi and put my iPad back in its bag. We then left with many fond farewells from my children. I could see I would not easily escape that visit.

It came to be only a week later, during which time my children bugged me daily. I went by the supermarket to pick up some groceries for her and made my way. I called her as soon as I was near where I imagined her gate might be, and she piloted me in over the phone.

She had made a delicious lunch for the children, which I too, was able to enjoy. While the children went out to play I told her of my situation, and how I had ended up with two children on my hands. My wife had run off with the pastor of a church attached to the school our children went to. Some years earlier his wife had decided to expand the activities of the church by setting up the school. Having been a teacher herself she was able to get it to quite a high standard and we felt that our children would get a good all-round education here. The pastor concentrated on the church, which did not appear to my eyes to be very big, or to have great prospects. Of course I knew nothing of running churches having been an IT consultant almost all my life.

He became a regular customer of my wifes peanut butter business. She would sometimes leave home on a Saturday to make deliveries to the pastor and other customers nearby. I only noticed that something was a bit off when she stayed away until late when it was those customers she was serving. Whenever there was a school function that we would need to attend, I noticed that the pastor would be in attendance as patron of the school. He treated me with a very slight distaste that I did not at first pick up on.

At that point in my story Marianne gave me a look that seemed to ask me if I had not smelt a rat by this time.

Don't look at me like that. One trusts a pastor instinctively and it takes a fairly major event to make one look at him with worldly eyes.

So something did happen to make you sit up.

Yes. Overnight prayer meetings that my wife started to become a fan of. I discovered that she was making contributions to the church in support of the churchs expansion programmes and counted as a partner. These activities did not cause me undue concern, until there was a retreat that was to be held in Mombasa. As with the overnights the church made a smart brochure of this event, which she brought to me.

Why do you want to join in with this retreat when you are not even a member of that church, I queried. We belonged to a Presbyterian one.

She answered that it was not restricted, and anyway she was a partner. Slightly suspicious I decided to probe into this. Surprisingly the whole church was involved in the organisation of this event, even though not everyone could go along. Quite a large group did actually leave on the SGR train to the coast on a Friday. So it was a legitimate affair; my suspicions were quietened.

I was waiting eagerly for their return on the Sunday, but they did not arrive. My wife got home on the Monday evening looking excited by something. She told me they were not able to return from the coast the previous evening as the pastor had requested a small group to stay behind until the next day and that they would fly back instead of taking the train. I did not know whether to trust this story but I had no way of checking it out, since I did not know any of the people on that retreat, besides the pastor and my wife.

The dam burst that evening when my wife's phone beeped loudly while she had gone to the bathroom, leaving it lying on the stool beside her seat. I snatched it up just in time to see notification of a WhatsApp message from the pastor asking how she had arrived, ending in calling her 'sweetheart'. I took her to task about that message immediately she got back. Her stammered answer encouraged me to ask to read that message in full.

The shock I suffered was more than I can tell you. There were numerous messages from the said pastor, as I scrolled backwards. I got to the dates just before they had left for the retreat.

"What did you find," asked Marianne.

"The pastor was telling her how he wanted her to stay behind when everyone had left so that they could enjoy each other in full. He referred to their Saturdays which had been rushed every single time."

So I accused her of adultery right there at our dining table before the dishes were cleared away. She tried to defend herself, then tried to beg for understanding and forgiveness. I would hear none of it. She threatened to leave me and the kids which I said was quite fine with me. I taunted her about which songs or choruses they had been singing in their room after the retreat group had left, as he ploughed his cock into her. She said I was being indecent.

Believe it or not she packed a small suitcase and called an Uber taxi. I had never seen her again. Reports reached me that the pastor was no longer patron of the school, while the church had gone with the wind. Some said they had spotted my ex-wife with the pastor somewhere in Kileleshwa.

"Oh, that is outrageous!" Marianne ground her teeth. "I can bet your wife was not the first woman he had been unfaithful with. No wonder his church was lukewarm."

At once I recognised that was the quality I had picked up about that church. It must having been faltering on accusations of the 'sexual sin' of their pastor.

Then Marianne shocked me by asking, "Did you take your revenge by fucking that pastor's wife?"

"I had never thought of her as appealing. She was very highhanded in manner and tended to lord it over everyone around her."

"So you were scared of her," said Marianne flatly.

"I had no commerce with her since I never attended their church, and kept my concourse with the school at a minimum. I attended only a single end term event or two."

I stared hard at her. "Are you a 'strong' woman?" I had found that those who trumpeted about being that kind of woman were the most scared and needed to ram it down everyone's throat how strong they were.

She readily picked up on my quotation marks. "No, I am an ordinary single woman. I have never been married or had children of my own. I like staying with my sister's kids from time to time." I liked her independent spirit very much, though that habit of pinching every penny bothered me a little bit.

When we parted that afternoon, I knew with the same certainty as that day at the cybercafe that I would be coming back to see her without the kids. We had found kindred spirits in each other.