No More Tears Read online

  "But I have papers." I told him.

  "Don't you remember I invited you to my graduation for my Masters?"

  "Oh, yeah I know you graduated and all that, but Atieno, that's not what I am talking about! To do any work here, to get any employment even if it is cleaning bathrooms, you need papers. I am talking about gaining citizenship or resident status!"

  "Really?" I asked. "And how do I go about that? Is there an office that you need to take me to tomorrow so I can apply for these "papers'"?

  "Eh..." he hesitated a bit. And suddenly my discomfort was growing.

  "Edu, is there something you are not telling me?"

  He breathed deeply and then said...

  "Atieno, you have to get married quickly and that's the only way this thing is going to work!"

  "Married to whom? I haven't even met anybody! I have only been here a month!"

  "I know that." Edu said. "But you know what, you are lucky I am a very chap chap guy! In fact I have been thinking about how to sort this and I spoke with a lady colleague yesterday and lemme tell you, cousin Atieno, God is really on your side! There's a bachelor that I want to introduce you to! And we are going to meet him today!"

  To say the truth I hadn't thought of marriage. When I was back home, it had seemed that with my advanced age of thirty, I mean I came from a country where if marriage had passed you in the twenties you were kind of hanging on the shelf and could perhaps only satisfy yourself with another's husband or just sit in your house and watch Alejandro on Mexican soaps, the thought that somebody might actually want to marry me and that it was necessary for life to continue was both a shock and a surprise.

  I hadn't been dating for a long time so I didn't even know where I would begin. But Edward immediately took charge and took me shopping and bought me some clothes. On the day he brought me to his house, he had walked into my room as I unpacked and shook his head as I arranged the clothes in my closet. I had brought with me my favorite skirt suits, most of them in drab grey and dreary navy blue in colour and to spice it up, I had my two favourite jeans which at the time were a wee bit out of fashion.

  Also I had never really exercised and I had fat in the wrong places. I wasn't like girls of today who talk about squats for their butts and breast firming lotions. My sex life had consisted of furtive touches here and there. Those were the days, females had not embraced their sexuality and if they did, they were considered very bad girls. He shook his head at my skirt suits and said sadly

  "Girl, we are going to upgrade you first!"

  That evening, I went for my very first shopping at J C Penney's.

  We then went to Walgreens and I got me some makeup. If we were going to do this thing right, we had to go full blast, Edward insisted.

  “You have to dress nice and you have to do your makeup nice. These white people like ladies in makeup.”

  "Oh, I am going to meet a white man?" I asked.

  "Ya duh! There are like twenty black people in this town! You need to open yourself up to all the possibilities.!”

  Open myself up to possibilities? Whoa! I said to myself. What if people back home knew I was going out with a white man? I knew my mother would faint on hearing the news. Back in those days, the only white people I had seen walking arm in arm with black girls were those who were said to have come with their pension so that they could stay on the beach for some days and hook up with prostitutes and I remembered the story which had recently been trending of some girls who at the instigation of white guys had had sex with dogs.

  My oh my what would people think of me? I felt myself go cold and hot and then I remembered that I was being asked to send money for drugs and my house rent hadn't been paid in four months and the next week the landlord was going to come and carry away the household goods. At the time I had left, I had retained the house thinking I could continue paying rent for the house and eventually my baby would return to Nairobi and go to a school in the leafy suburbs like The Makini School.

  I sighed...I would have to do what must be done...I would go out for a date with my first white man. Hopefully he didn't own a dog or some such shit. At this point, I had learnt that dogs stayed indoors and I had seen plenty of them riding around in their owners’ cars.

  Edwards' wife helped me put on my makeup and if I say so myself, I looked rather glamorous. It was the first time I was trying eye shadow, having only used lipstick before this moment. Indeed it was an epic moment for me, girl gone gotten rid of skirt suits, wearing a clingy top and walking like a giraffe in high heels. I had practiced the whole afternoon but I was still stumbling. So that evening we set off at around quarter to five. I was going to meet Maurice, that was his name, in Edward's colleague's house.

  I was delaying the moment as I was super nervous but when Edward yelled at me that white people didn't like to be kept waiting

  "We are not operating on Kenyan time here! You gotta learn to be on time, even a minute late or too early is bad!"

  I had to step out and jump into the car and keep telling myself to calm down as my hands were sweating profusely and my armpits too were getting soaked. I remembered with great distress that the shampoos and the conditioners and deodorants I had sneaked out of the two hotels in Doha and Washington DC where I spent two nights had been confiscated somewhere along my journey. Anyway, it would just be fine, I tried to soothe myself. I was on my way to meet my first white man and I was nervous as hell.

  Oh yeah, before I forget , Edward and I had passed through a Wine and Smoke shop where we had bought some beer, a carton of 24 beer cans and I had asked why we were buying beer and bringing with us and he had said, just wait, you will see. When we got to Nancy's house, she warmly welcomed us in and said to us to feel at home. We went into the living room and we had with us our beer and I was raising my eyebrows because where I came from, visitors didn't carry their own drinks. Nancy had said to feel at home but she didn’t offer us anything to drink. She came into the living room asking Edward how work had been that day because she hadn’t been able to come in, and then she walked to the fridge and took out a can of beer and popped it open and she started drinking, without offering us any. Strange, I thought.

  Later on, Edward was to explain to me that white people had the culture of BYOB, bring your own beer. If you visited anyone you had to bring your own beer or just stare at the host and the rest of the guests as they drank and nobody would offer you any. So it was that it this evening it was Nancy, Edward, Maurice and myself.

  Oh Maurice, how can I describe him... His white hair is long and thin and combed over from one ear to the other, if the wind blew just right it would stand up tall, waving like he was surrendering. He had tied it down into a ponytail. Dried sweat stains outlined each crease in his fat rolls, When he moved there was the smell of horse dung. The skin under his eyes had a yellowish tint, and the rest of his face had red veins. His nose was wide and looked misplaced on his face and his eyes were round and beady. When I looked into his ears I could see the hair growing out of them. And his moustache was bushy and matched the hair from the ears and his nose.

  He rose up and offered his hand and said to me that he was really excited to meet me. Then he sat down and opened yet another Busch Light beer and as he took another swig I wondered why he hadn't offered me one..

  .Then Edward said to me,

  “Now you understand why we brought our beer.”

  And Edward took a can from our carton and he handed it to me...and I sat there drinking, wondering what I had gotten myself into.

  Maurice seemed genuinely interested in Africa. He asked questions about Kenya in particular and it’s culture and it’s people and expressed a desire that one day he might not be so busy such that he would find time to travel and see the world. Even though he had only been as far as North Dakota and Minnesota, he seemed aware of world politics and even though he was a Republican as he himself stated, he was still quite fond of Obama who had just taken power. He jokingly referred to him as O-bummer and i
n a self-denigrating fashion spoke of the welfare that he hoped to get alongside with the tax breaks for the poor now that a Democrat was in charge. A very proud man, he had never received any welfare in his life, save for a few years during his teenage years when he had strayed into alcohol binging. This, he told me as he continued to sip from his can of Busch light.

  “I have got things under control now.”

  He said as he opened his fourth can while I was now on my second. I was trying to drink up so that I could master the courage to talk with him and Edward was giving me encouraging looks and whispering that I ought to talk slowly, I was rushing over my words and even he couldn’t understand half of what I was saying. Even though it was rather cold, we moved out to the patio where Nancy had lit a fire and we continued taking more Busch lights as Maurice explained to me that he was wealthy but not secure enough to retire yet and he was working towards that goal so that in a few years’ time, he might spend all his time as he wished.

  Maurice talked about his two sons, one of whom was out in Alabama and had recently been in New York and who was generally moving from State to State as the whim caught him.

  “He will settle down eventually. And I hope he will manage these houses well.”

  “So do you support him now?” I ventured to ask.

  “No, I don’t. I am trying to teach him to make his own money.”

  And I thought of the folly of parents who restrict access to their money and then one day drop dead and their children squander away their wealth.

  “I am going to retire in comfort.” He added. “You should come see my little farm.”

  The next day, Maurice came to pick me up at Edward’s house as we had agreed. He was going to show me his little farmhouse where he had said he lived all alone and where he had ten cats.

  “You are going to love Missy.” He said. “She is very precocious, takes well to strangers. Sometimes she will go away for weeks but she always comes back. Last time she came back, she had ten kittens with her. I guess I have about twenty cats out on the farm.”

  We drove about eight miles out of town through the corn plantations before we finally sighted the farmhouse from about a mile away. Iowa tends to be very flat rolling farmland and one can see for miles on end, before the corn grows. And even when it’s all green and high, it’s a beautiful sight.

  “This here is farmer Bill. That there is farmer Jim.” He waved at houses which were miles apart. “Now this here is a man you don’t want to get involved with. You can’t be friends with his kind. A man up to no good.”

  “Which one?”

  “That white house up there yonder. The man there, Kenneth I believe his name is, it’s rumored that he just came out of the pen for child molestation.”

  I shuddered. Child molesters were the scum of the earth, in my books.

  “Why do you let him live here then?”

  “Ain’t no law against a child molester buying a farm and living peacefully on it. He keeps to himself and we are fine with it. But we are not friends. Everyone around here tracks his movements. We always know where he is.”

  That must be a sad life to lead, I thought to myself. A life where everyone knew what you were up to, where there was no privacy, where everyone was wary of you.

  “Got himself a new wife the other day.” Maurice continued. “Here we are.” He announced as he drove up the long winding drive and finally stopped at a neat but very small house, surrounded by the regular barn buildings that are the landscape of America. To the day I die, that will always be the image I carry of America. Big red barn buildings and little white farmhouses surrounded by a cluster of trees.

  “Step out young lady.” He said.

  We went into the house, whence he finally offered me a Busch light. This became the first of many Busch lights. To this day, every time I see a Busch light, I think nostalgically of Maurice. He showed me around the house, and I noted the venison that was drying out on the patio.

  “Shot that deer just last week. We are allowed by law to hunt one deer every season. Wish I could hunt more. I love venison. I could live on it.”

  And then he took me out to the garden. The snow had melted. He said that he liked to grow his own vegetables and this season had harvested enough squash to last him for months and months before the next harvest.

  “Stash away some cash, I always tell everyone. Live simply and stash away money for retirement. I do all the gardening myself. Think you could manage that? You look a little delicate. My wife will definitely have to get down and do some gardening.” He added.

  I smiled to myself. I hadn’t come all the way to America to plant squash and eat venison and avoid going to the grocery stores because I was squirreling away for retirement. That dream for his wife would have to be shot down soon in the most gentle manner, I thought. A man is how you make him. You have to make the rules from the first day. Lay down the expectations so that nobody is disappointed. Let him know how far he can push you. Know how far you have to bend. And you all get along fine.

  Maurice and I continued to see each other almost on a daily basis. When I was not babysitting Edward’s baby, I was hanging out with Maurice and we had become fast friends as we swirled away the Busch lights. I was walking around in a drunken stupor from drinking away half the day and Maurice had mellowed to the extent that even though we hadn’t become intimate, we were talking hesitantly about marriage.

  As we went around collecting rent from his many tenants, drinking the Busch lights, fixing the plumbing and electrical stuff for the close to twenty houses that he owned, I came to learn that he had three grandchildren that he adored and wanted to give them the houses upon his death but he had indicated he would gift me five of them if we got married. The thought that I might marry rich, even though I wouldn’t be able to spend the money in his lifetime was making me mellow but still not ready to commit myself completely.

  Edward kept tabs on me and I had to fill him in every day on how far I had progressed in leading Maurice towards the altar. I had expressed the fear that perhaps Maurice wasn’t quite right for me. I didn’t love him with the abandon that I should have loved someone that I would spend the next twenty years with, and Edward had lectured me that I needed to get a grip on reality and know that I was in this for only two years. Being reminded of my situation had brought me back to the ground fast and hard and I had now set about deliberately enticing Maurice to fall in love with me. And I do believe that he was in love with me, or at least very fond of me at this point.

  Maurice and I had been dating for about three weeks before the moment came that every woman who is dating an ugly ass man and eating the fruits of his sweat must face. The excuses had run out and anyway if we were going to get married or if I was going to drag him to the altar I would have to let him sample the goods. I was thoroughly drunk. Beer has a way of preparing the mind to do what must be done.

  Maurice was a large guy and I had often heard the myth that large guys are small because their fat has been distributed elsewhere. Oh boy was I in for a shock. As Bruce dropped his pants and his schlong popped out, my eyes widened. I wasn't sure whether to be excited or shocked or both. So I stood there staring. "Come on girl, don't just stand there! He said as he made space on the bed. Maurice's penis was enormous, it kind of reminded me of an incident in the village when I had seen a donkey suddenly pop a long black one and hold down a female donkey and in one swift move had pushed it all in and the crowd at the market had gasped and mama had yelled at my sisters what were we waiting for it was about to rain and we hadn't gathered the firewood. So anyway here I was gasping and then thinking oh this might be fun after all. Most times a big dick makes up for lack of skill and finesse in making love.

  Having noted how sloppily he had kissed me, I hoped that once we got down to it I would help him into some sort of rhythm, this large bull standing before me so that if things weren't too bad, I might have some halfway decent sex and therefore know that I could tolerate marriage to him. I co
uld feel myself getting ready. My muscles were twitching involuntarily and I couldn't wait. I have dated both ugly and handsome men in my life and I always try to look for a redeeming factor in each of them, something that I can focus on and love so that all other inadequacies are obscured. Aha, I smiled. I might learn to love him after all and survive two years with him.

  “Okay honey, get down to it. Bring your pretty mouth and put it to use. I need some help getting hard."

  “Ehh.. you look fine to me.” I said.

  "Ah no honey, I need help to stay hard and it's gonna take some work to get this just right. "

  I looked at him, standing there...

  "Honey, get off the bed and get on your knees. Work that mouth honey."

  I sighed. Best get over it. So I moved to the edge of the bed and he was standing in my face with his big penis in my face.

  "You haven't done this before? Not to worry honey. I will teach you."

  Before I could respond I felt the penis shoved into my mouth and he was holding me by my hair such that I couldn't breath as he started ramming my mouth in rapid fire movements.

  He was hitting the back of my throat and my mouth was clamping down on him and I felt my teeth scraping him and he stopped for a moment and said I needed to open my mouth wider.

  I was choking and gagging and about to throw up. God please help me, I cried out, I can't afford to fail at this, you know how much I need this to work, I thought. Maurice really is serious and he does need a wife and I do need a husband.

  " How do I do it without gagging? Please help!"

  I didn't realize I had spoken out loud until Maurice spoke up saying I should try to relax and everything would be just fine.

  “Let's try something else." he said.

  At which I heaved a sigh of relief thinking we had come to the end of the torture and he could put the enormous penis where it rightly belonged. My legs were beginning to part willingly to let him in, in all his majestic glory.

  "Honey, I am going to lie down on my back and then you can do your thing. This is really important to me."