Haven’t you seen the signs?

You look at those two girls who are in their 30’s and seem smart enough and you wonder how the hell they can’t figure out between the two of them (and a packet of cigarettes) that the man is either married or committed somewhere! It beats me. PHOTO | NATION

What you need to know:

  • He never really picks my calls at night, he will return them after 20 minutes when I ask him why he says that when he gets home he throws his phone away…” The other one with the tattooed eyebrows says, “Kwani his phone doesn’t have a ringtone? He is strange.”
  • While quashing her cigarette in the ashtray: “Yesterday I heard a baby cry in the background and when I asked he said, ‘What baby?’ He said there was no baby, he made me feel like I was going crazy. I swear! Now I’m hearing babies in my head.” I small smile escapes my lips.
  • You look at those two girls who are in their 30’s and seem smart enough and you wonder how the hell they can’t figure out between the two of them (and a packet of cigarettes) that the man is either married or committed somewhere! It beats me.

This girl sighs, rummages in her bag, extracts a packet of cigarettes, puts one in her mouth and lights it up.

She’s wearing purple lipstick. She says something like, “Ati he said that his phone was in the bedroom charging.” Her girlfriend, a thick girl with tattooed eyebrows and a brazenly short dress showing about three acres of her thighs, studies her nails for a moment then asks, “I thought you guys were chatting at that time?” “Yes, we were,” the other girl remarks, smoke coming out of her ears.

She looks like a burning granary with this big afro-like wig. “But he said that he has WhatsApp on his Airtel line, and gets calls on his Safaricom line which was charging in the bedroom.” 

We are in a pub. I’m eavesdropping because I seem to be the only idiot in this whole goddamn town who, when you agree with someone to meet at 6pm, I actually show up at 5:48pm. The rest just want to make an entrance and blame traffic and show up late. So what’s a man to do except find his own amusement?

“I don’t know why he behaves like that...” the smoking lady says. “He’s so odd. He never really picks my calls at night, he will return them after 20 minutes when I ask him why he says that when he gets home he throws his phone away…” The other one with the tattooed eyebrows says, “Kwani his phone doesn’t have a ringtone? He is strange.” I want to join in at this point and say, “Or maybe he’s married, ladies!” But instead I figured that if someone can tattoo their own eyebrows they can certainly do worse things to me – an eavesdropper.

LIVING IN DENIAL

While quashing her cigarette in the ashtray: “Yesterday I heard a baby cry in the background and when I asked he said, ‘What baby?’ He said there was no baby, he made me feel like I was going crazy. I swear! Now I’m hearing babies in my head.” I small smile escapes my lips. In my head I can see the guy stuffing a worn sock in the infant’s mouth to stop the crying. She sighs wearily and lights another cigarette. Her friend orders another drink and a bottle of sparkling water and then asks to see the bitings menu. She says, “Me I think this guy is hiding something.”  I want to shout, “Yes! A wife! Ladies this is not molecular science, damn it!”

They sit there, moaning about all these things that are ‘odd’ about this character – how he never spends the night at hers, or when he stays over he leaves at 3am. How she once saw an insurance card for a child in his wallet when he was asleep. (She must have been looking for her eyeliner in his wallet.) Or how he has never invited her to his house, always making excuses about it.

Then they deviate and talk about who is selling what shoes, then talk a bit about some girl called Wangari who apparently brings in fake products from Turkey, then they go back to this guy and his disappearing act. Even after the person I am meeting arrives, I can’t focus on the conversation; I’m more interested in what those two girls are saying.

You look at those two girls who are in their 30’s and seem smart enough and you wonder how the hell they can’t figure out between the two of them (and a packet of cigarettes) that the man is either married or committed somewhere! It beats me. Then it occurs to me that she knew all along, she has known from the beginning that there is someone else but she somehow, bafflingly, refuses to believe or acknowledge it. Her head remains in the sand.

Then this guy is some piece of work; do people still lie to girls they aren’t married to anymore? Wasn’t that a thing men did in the 70’s and 80’s when there was no social media and a man could have two families and neither of them would know? To reach him when he was away from you would have required you to write him a telegram or tie a note to a pigeon’s foot.  All a woman has to do now is log onto social media then it’s a wrap. But no, they still want to discuss it over a drink; is he seeing someone else or not? Did I hear a baby or was I going mad?

I sat there in that bar and thought; “If this is how it is, God, please don’t let me come back as a woman. Please, Lord.” They say women are great at picking up subtle signs. Which is perfect. But why see the signs and look the other way?