Waiting For September

Berryl was simply put,beautifull. Her soft puffed up cheeks that gave way the two even dimples on both sides and her fluttering eye lashes that were as black as blackjack contrasting beautifully with her very light skin. Her eye brows curved towards the ends, shinning out as if by a beautician’s hand. Pink lips and hair that curled round her head like a wet mop. She kept it short. She dressed in short bright skirts in yellow and cream, and changed her blouse twice a day.
Nyaguthii was the friend she chose for herself. The chosen one was the complete opposite with regard to looks. Dark with bushy eye brows which made one imagine a strange animal peeping out form a hole in the ground. She had long fingers that seemed to move by themselves and the tiny long dark legs that peeped from the flowered dresses were in no way athletic. They could be seen dangling from a rope swing or from a branch in the hours that farmers water their nursery beds. She lived in a house that her grand father built when he married her young, sixteen year old grand mother in `46, dead seven years now.
It was a wooden house with an earthen floor and a roof covered with planks and shingles. Overlooking the Aberdare Ranges. Over the roof, a recent addition had sprouted adding to the interesting design of the entire house.
It looked like an extra chimney but it really was an observatory. From here the entire village was in view. There was no furniture if we over look the rope that Nyaguthii later hang from the roof and tied a piece of wood to its lower end forming a –legs-astride- swing. She positioned it in such a way that it hang in between the two openings on opposite sides of the room. When she swung from the rope, the trip mid-air sent her outside through the two large windows like a very heavy station bell. A risky affair that shoveled out a bark peeling scream from Nyaguthii’s mother who kept the house before she collapsed in a heap, only to wake up and collapse again, when she first saw the lanky girl mid-air. The grandfather saw no danger.
‘In fact it our time, we swung from branch to branch in that forest. One time I dropped right into Honi river, my behind had never been colder.’
He had said laughing, to the very ashen face of his shocked daughter.Nyaguthii lived with her maternal grandfather and her mother.
Berry lived with both her parents and three brothers. One brother already studying an Insurance course in Uganda . Both her parents were insurance brokers. When she finished her schooling , it was planned that she would take a course a long the same lines, to get into the family business and help out a bit.
‘I never want to do that. I’d rather be a model and never have to worry about fires and accidents. Just be photographed in short skirts. Perhaps even get my picture painted.’ Berryl had confided in her friend
‘I could paint your picture, or even draw you.’
‘No you can’t!’
‘Why not. I know how to draw perfectly fine.’
‘Not like that, Berry drew closer and cupped her palms around Nyaguthii’s right ear whispering, ‘when one is drawn they don’t wear any clothes.’
‘What!’ Nyaguthii was appalled.
‘Don’t be so naïve.’
They didn’t raise the topic again. Berryl envied her friend’s spontaneity and guile. She seemed to be always up to something. Yet nothing too serious to cause reprove from her grandfather or her mother. Nyaguthii’s mother was the perfect lady. Smiling, short unhurried steps, never one to run. She made beautiful home stitched dresses and scarves, had beautiful porcelain kitchen things that even her own insurance parents wouldn’t know where to buy.
Nyaguthi mother, known as Rebs, short for Rebecca was an artist. She tailored and sold clothes, wove baskets, crafted mats and wall hangings, and yet had time to keep up with her daughter’s active life and the ‘teenage’ grandfather.
Berryl’s mother wouldn’t sew back a button on. Her father was always studying the classified or watching the financial channel.
The girls shared most of their secrets, yet it never occurred to t hem that they were so different. In college, Nyaguthii changed her name and took to using her first name Elika, spelt Eryka. Berry was sent away to Uganda as the pattern went; three years of Insurance Education.
Eryka wondered had her friend gone soft in the head??
Eryka was involved in her fashion design diploma that she was studying at the polytechnic. She did promotion sales for a cosmetic company during her free time.
Berryl came for her holidays glowing in the face and having lost a few kilos. She looked like the model she had always wished to be. She and Erika spent a few days together, talking of the old times.
“We should keep in torch you know.’Berryl said to Eryka.
‘Yeah I thought so too.’
‘Don’t worry, I wont get foolish with time and be incapable of conversation. I’ve just been a bit silent. High school sort of took up whataever little there was of me. I still get the shivers.’
‘Was it that bad?’
‘I hated being there and being picked on by those stupid girls. Incase you don’t realize, I look like some stupid curly haired/headed Italian.’
‘Tell them your father is’
‘Then what do I do with my surname?’
Eryka had set up a clothe’s shop along with Rebs. Rebska Designs. The residents were excited about having their clothes carry a stitched Rebska label.
Berryl’s father had long left her mother, and rumors had it that the real father to the girl had resurfaced and wanted to publiclly marry the mother of his child. The whole issue caused a stir in the neighbour hood. Adultery was bad enough. Now this? Another marriage. Those who read their bibles said it was against the order of the new testament.
In August Eryka received a letter from Berryl along with pictures of the latter in a cat walks, modeling, and the proud announcement -I made it! I never studied no stupid Insurance Theory, never!’
She was coming home the following month to let her parents know of her life in Uganda. Eryka wondered which parents she meant.
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The scream came from Eryka. The one person who never ever got any rush of adrenaline even when her mother became pregnant after twenty three years. In the observatory, hanging from that old rope swing that had brought of a glee to the two girls years before, hang Berry. She had hanged herself. When Eryka regained consciousness, she read the note that Berry left.
First I am not sorry for this. All my life I never really understood what my purpose was. Five months ago I posed for the years 9th month edition cover photo for Glare Magazine. The photographer was experienced and you’ll see, it came out beautifully. You will get a copy if not, ask my biological father.He must have several. I had no idea he was my father. Until I came back. I was so excited that I’d break the news to my parents with the magazine issue as proof of my good work. You know, I cant believe any of his I’m better of dead. Don’t miss me much I wish you had drawn me instead. Bye
Both fathers attended the funeral. On 5th September. Copies of Glare East Africa September issue were distributed.