Scene 1

Pt.1
He stands there, dripping, with his head tipped down just abit.Kiasi tu, but hoping that this slight tilting forward of his eyes will prove that he is sorry. Very sorry. Repentant.
"Nishow tena, " she says, after studying him. Watching.
"What, about before?"
"Yes, that. Please."
"Well, see, we, umm.." He creeps forward cautiously with this next thought.True, she seems less hysterical now, ready to listen, but utajuaje? "....the two of us had met before."
"Before?"
"Azin..before we met." He thinks about this for a moment, about the genesis of the thing. "From before we,you & I, knew one another."
"Eeh???"
"Yeah. We went to Campo pamoja and.."
"Oh, so u were in school together?"
"Zii..zii..not together. It was in Chiromo, but not overlapping or anything.No, actually ran into each other in Main Campus..during this friendly 7's aside game of alumni at the pitch."
"Quaint."
"Which is kind of funny..."
"Why?Why is that funny?"
"Coz, it's u know..UoN."
"Uh-huh."
"And that's where we went to school, too.UoN, I mean.In Chiromo. Because Chiromo is in..."
"Yeah, UoN. Nimeget, " she says, without changing expressions. "Ni vile tu haijanibamba.Ata kiasi."
"Poa," he acknowledges, then moves ahead.
"Anyway, that's where we were, over by the rudge pitch, and, drinks...moja-mbili, u know, and we hung out a few times or whatever."
"I think they still call it 'Dating' in the 254."
"No....it wasn't a 'thing'!!We din't date or anything, we just-..."
"Slept together"
"...something like that." He falters a bit but ploughs on, spitting out the truth.Well, part of it anyway. "Yeah, this one time we did, yes. Do that, I mean. Not sleeping together, though, just some sex stuff. Sort of. But it was nothing..."
"So that makes it all right, then... What I saw."
"No, not all right, i'm not saying that, I just mean..."
He considers where to go next, what minefields to avoid and which to blunder off into. "Hell, I dunno, just that there's some background there. A shared background between us."
"Ooh.Poa." She responds quickly in small staccato bursts of language, rather than thinking through her next sentence. "Nimeget. I do. Really. I do get it."
"So, it's not like, I mean...a 'fling' or anything."
"It isn't?!"
"OK, sawa basi, a fling, but.... A fling with qualifiers. With history." He throws the last part in for a ka-effect, the history bit, but hoping it sticks somehow.
"Haukunishow lakini.About this 'history' of yours, I mean.All this time...natsing."
"No, I didn't do that."
"Why?"
"I thought I wouldn't,you know.."
"Uh-uh, no, I don't know.What?" Then she realises.
"Get caught?"
"Zii.." He stutters twice before saying, "B-b-be understood."
"You're damn right.U wouldn't b-b-be," she says obvoiusly mocking him.
"Unaona?"
"But that shouldn't have stopped u from telling me!Ai!"
She says this louder than she means to, but it's out now. Hangs in the air kidogo, her dark cloud of disbelief, then drifts off.
"What was I gonna say?"
"I don't know, it's not really my moral dilemma is it?
"It's not a..." He thinks carefully now, a misstep here could be hula.There's definitely some sort of morality involved in having sex with your neighbours, he muses. "...OK,yeah, it is, like a moral thing, but I think we can still.."
"Still what? What?!" She stops for a moment, stops loading clothes into her Kiko Romeo bag and turns to him. Faces him directly. "I'd love to hear how that sentence ends. Tell me."
"...work something out? Or.." He tries to hold her gaze but can't. If he wasn't wearing swim trunks he might have had a fighting chance, but standing there in a moist orange suit..it's just not Safaricom(the Better Option)lol
He looks away and out a window, catching a hint of the dinner next door.Their place. The neighbours'.
"You think we should work it out,eh? That's what u think?"
"I think tunaeza try."
"Try what, talking? Just like talking, you and me?
"Eeeh.Io inaweza kuwa.."
"Na therapy?" she challenges back."Or how about sharing, the two of us and the two of them? The four of us could swing on various nights, try new stingoz. How's that sound?" She studies him kidogo but can't meet his eyes. "Noma sana...ama? I mean, if you're not too possessive, that is. Then once tumegawana watoi we'll all be one big, happy family!!"
"If we can't talk about this like adults, then afadhali.."
"Adults? Oh,you wanna talk like AD-ULTS, that's what u want?"
"It's why I came back here, yes."
"No. U came back coz this is your house, OK, this is your home. Where you LIVE!!" She throws a handful of perfumes in ontop of her blouses, the bottles clinking dully together in the sea of fabric. The sound isn't very impressive, not as resounding as she'd hoped for, but she'd needed to pack them anyway.
"What'd you think, you could just live in the pool house there, set up a little place for yourselves or something?" "No. Of course not."
"Then what?"
"Look, enyewe seriously, I don't know what you think you saw . . ."
"Nkt!Oh, please, come on . . ."
"No, seriously, what? We weren't ..." "Your trunks were down, all right?" "They weren't . . ." He doesn't finish this because she moves toward him now. Quickly across the room to challenge what he'll say next.
"Sawa, whatever. You know what you know."
"Nooo...not whatever. I saw you...azin so clearly, your trunks around your knees and your bony black ass pointed right at me. Your back was toward the door and your thingy was . . . do you really wanna hear more?"
". . . no."
"I saw it out. I did."
"Not out, no, it was just caught in my . . ." He tries to mime an explanation but a wagging finger from her stops him cold.
"When you turned, surprised by the door and turning quickly, I know I saw your . . . thing . . . dangling. It got tangled in your mesh, there in the white mesh when you tried to hide it away. I know what I'm saying . . ." "But . . .we knew each other in Campo . . .!"
"What does that mean?! You keep saying that but it doesn't seem to mean anything. Lots of people know each other around, but that doesn't mean they're all doing it. Does it?" "No, but, see . . .we went to the same Uni and we got talking one time, we had a lot to drink and we just . . . it wasn't like this big thing."
"Ulinshow hivyo?"
"No."
"They've been moved in there, next door, in their time-share for three weeks. A month maybe. Since . . .nini...Labour day.."
"I was going to say something . . ." "But you decided to keep it all to yourself, huh?"
"No! God, you're so . . .we were both nervous about it. I mean, embarrassed."
"Obviously . . ."
"We were! When they introduced themselves that first day, out there by the pavement, I could hardly look up.."
"Or just now . . ."
"That's what I'm saying . . ."
". . . of course, you were a little busy."
"Stop! Jesus, let me at least tell my side of it."
"Please . . . go ahead."
"So, you know . . .if you don't take that moment, I mean, that first moment there and tell the truth, basi you're stuck. You are."
"Like your thing in the mesh . . ."
"Eeeh...A little, yes . . ." He wants to smile, since that was pretty funny, especially for her, but he can't risk it. Not right now. It might not have been a joke. Instead, he offers, "Kind of like that. Uh- huh."
"And since you didn't tell me that day, you just figured this tiny detail was no big thing. I mean, not a real problem for us . . .is that kind of what you're saying?"
"Sort of . . ."
"Huh."
"What's that mean?"
"Just 'huh,' no other real meaning to it . . ." Her head cocks a touch now, slightly to one side as she studies him. Glancing at his eyes but then down, to settle at crotch level. Holding this look for quite some time. He shifts from one bare foot to the other.
"What're you doing?"
"Nothing."
"No, seriously, what?"
"Just imagining . . ."
"Imagining?" He waits for her next volley, stepping off the wet spot he's created and involuntarily moving away from her. She takes her time. "Imagining what it'd be like for your son to walk into that shed. Looking for, oh, I dunno, some diving goggles or an inner tube or who knows what, and see that. What I saw . . ."
"What? We knew each other in Chiromo . . ."
"Stop saying that! " She glares at him, obviously conjuring up a picture. "How would it be for him to see your . . .cock —there, do you like that better? You're always wanting me to talk dirty, does that sound better?—to see his daddy's cock out and . . ."
"We were just talking . . ."
"Please don't do that! Usi-assume I've been nearsighted all these years on top of being a dwanzi. . ."
". . . it was this boys versus girls touch...err..touch rugby..game we were in, that's where we first . . ."
"Would you like it, if he saw that?" "No."
"You wouldn't?"
"Of course not. . ."
"Well, that's something . . ."
"But I wouldn't . . . and I'm not trying to start anything here . . .no offense, but I wouldn't want him to see it in anyone's mouth. I mean, ata yako" He almost grimaces after that one, not sure he didn't just step into some abyss.
"Then perhaps you should stop sticking it in people's mouths . . . shouldn't you?"
". . . yeah. I mean, yes, you're right." That's the least he can say. She does have a point there, albeit a fairly simple mathematical one.
"So, it was in, then?" She waits.
". . . what?"
"You had your thing out and in . . ." "Yes." Better to cut his losses now, mercy of the court and all that. "I did, yes, for just, like, a second. A moment is all. Honestly."
"Oh."
"Aki . . ."
"Because I couldn't really see . . .my eyes hadn't adjusted. I was pretty sure that's what was happening there, with the two of you, but I wasn't completely. Certain, I mean. Because of the dark. But, hey, now I know . . ." She smiles weakly, finally matching one of his more pathetic grins at the same instant. "I only went in there looking for their tiki torches. They told me we could use them for the barbecue on Saturday. That's why I . . .anyway . . ."
"Listen, we were just . . ."
"Right."
"You know?"
"Yeah, UoN, I know . . ."
"Exactly."
"The big game and all."
"Yep . . ." He fixates on a framed picture for a moment, drifting. A Dinesh print of someone sitting in a room somewhere. Alone. Lucky bastard, he thinks to himself.
"I see."
". . . I mean, you're in the 254, right? And you run into a bunch of folks from home, you know, men and women out there on the grass having fun, and you just sort of get caught up in the thing . . .few beers . . .I can't really explain it better than that . . ." He tries to, though, for a minute at least, his mouth searching for a more perfect phrase. It doesn't come. "OK."
"Does that make any sense?"
"No, none." She shrugs, unwilling to say more.
"Oh . . ."
"But I understand. I understand that it makes sense to you . . . somehow." "It does. I know it sounds wobbly, but . . .'
"And since it does, make sense, I mean, you'll need to explain it to them . . ."
"Who?"
"The children."
". . . what do you mean?"
"You're going to need to sit them down —they're back from swimming in forty minutes—and you'll need to walk them through this as best you can."
"No, I can't . . .what?"
"Naishia, in short. You'll need to come up with something for that. Tell them the rest if you want to, but you have to explain where I've gone."
"Sa..unaenda wapi . . .?"
"Coasto, I suppose. Meanwhile, anyway. I need to call my sister, and the lawyers, no doubt." She seems to tower over him at this moment, although she is only five feet three and not wearing heels, not even the ones he'd bought her at that Ivory store on the way in.
"I need to handle a few things.
"I can't tell them that! Manzee, they're only . . ."
"What, children?"
"Eeeh."
"Children bounce back. They do, that's their lot in life."
"Wait . . ."
"You explain things and on Saturday we'll get them on a bus,wanifuate, and they'll be out of your hair." She smiles some inner smile at this. "Then you can go back over the fence . . ."
"Siezi."
"Then don't."
"I want to . . .I mean, I'd like to, I'd really like to see if we could . . ." "What?" She waits for him to finish but he only repeats the previous phrases over and over. Trying to jumpstart a solution but never getting past the opening. Finally, she picks up her bag, tests the weight of it, then moves toward the door. He doesn't stop her.
"Do you want me to carry that down or . . .?"
"No, no, it's fine. You've done enough, believe me . . ."
"I love you guys. I do." He didn't want to have to pull that one out, not at this late date but he goes for it. Pitches the love thing out there like a final horseshoe.
"Well, that's something you can hang on to, isn't it? You can tell the kids that, if it helps . . .tell them I love them, too."
"We were just talking . . .we spent time on the same campus, for Chrissakes!"
"Yeah, I caught that part . . ."
"We did . . ."
"Najua."
"And we had some . . ."
"When did you become so pathetic?" This isn't meant to be rhetorical.
". . . I'm not sure."
"Huh." She stands at the door now, flicking the light switch off more from habit than anything. He pulls his arms in and around his exposed upper body now, stands in the semidark staring at his departing wife. She starts down a step then turns back, rotates even, and comes into the room again.
"One more thing.Swali ya last . . ."
"Yes?"
"Just one."
"OK."
"What position did he play?"
"Huh?"
"Our neighbor . . .the guy who was sucking your dick." This is new for her, this strong language thing, and she seems to be enjoying it. "When you met him, what position was he playing?"
"Oh . . . Hooker. He was their Hooker."
". . . I see." A pause, then a slight smile from her in the gloom.
"You do?"
"Nimeget . . ."
"Umeget nini?"
"The significance of it all."
"What do you mean?"
"Come on, he's the Hooker . . .you don't know anyone, you're lonely, it's not ur campo, this guy's kneeling at your feet, you've got your nice, firm hanger there. . .I get it. It's symbolic . . ."
"No, come on . . ." He hesitates now, unsure about her. Is she being ironic? "We were just . . ."
"What? You what?eh?"
"It . . .it was an experiment, that's all. Just . . . guy stuff. Kind of, like, you know . . ."
"No, you're right. It happens. It does. In 'Chiromo,' anyway . . .as u'd say ama?"
"We were only . . .see, I met him before we, I mean, you and me . . ." ". . . I hope you're very happy." Before he can say anything else she is gone, the door clicking shut downstairs a moment later. Normally, he would follow her, do the dramatic run down the stage, but he's got the swimsuit on and it would just look ridiculous now. He's sure of that. No, better to talk tomorrow, let things cool down a bit. Take care of the kids, maybe get a large pizza from Pizza Inn and watch a movie. Face the rest of it in the morning. Yes. That's it. "It's OK, it is, iko Sawaa, this is gonna be . . .anaku Shapre. Things'll be fine. It's . . . OK, this is all S-A-U-W-A-A . . ." He says this aloud but more to himself than anything, a kind of masculine mantra as he strips off his damp trunks. He shivers slightly, then begins to wander around the room naked, hunting down a pair of discarded Levi's in the oncoming twilight.