Form 4 leavers are on the prowl, and they are bold and persistent

Form Four leavers are on the prowl, and they are bold and persistent. One of them, wearing a striped shirt, khaki pants, and loafers, finds me standing outside a clinic, adjusting my bra with one hand and using the other hand to pull out a bit of my underwear. This sight turns him on, so much so that he decides to make the first move.

“Good afternoon!” he greets cheerfully.

“Please, don’t force your opinion about the afternoon on me,” I tell him while trying to remove bean skin from my teeth with my tongue.

“You look familiar,” he lies.

He has lovely dimples and a goatee that he has just started growing, and he smells like bathing soap. He says his name is Zed and asks if I have found my soulmate. He’s talking like a fellow who once fooled me a few weeks after I was done with secondary school. He was decently dressed when I encountered him, most likely because it was a Sunday and he was from church, where he played the keyboard. He was carrying a Bible and a notebook, which he kept shifting from one hand to the other. He told me he was the branch manager of the (only) KCB branch in town, although he wasn’t sure at first.

“Ham the ndailekta,” he begun.

“Ha, no, the supabhaisa,” he quickly corrected.

“Mtsk! Manenja,” he rectified again. “Ham the mblanj menenja.”

Then one morning I met with a tall boy in school uniform. He was in the company of other pupils who were talking animatedly, probably about their weekend’s adventures, while heading to a nearby primary school. This tall boy looked familiar, although at first I couldn’t tell from where I knew him, but when our eyes met and he looked away in obvious embarrassment, I remembered.

I lament that I can’t even find a secure password for my phone, let alone a soulmate. He says he has found his soulmate in me and asks what kind of men I like. I tell him that I like all kinds of men, but I prefer men who are rich and foolish. He says he is a doctor in that clinic and that he’s going to his mechanic to pick up his car. He asks if I have time so that we can talk and get to know each other better. I tell him I would love to but I am busy pondering what to have for dinner.

“Then tomorrow?” the boy asks.

“I will be taking a nap.”

“What time will you wake up?”

“What?”

“What time will you be up?”

“I don’t understand your question.”

“Can I see you tomorrow?”

“I will be taking a nap.”

“Okay, what time will you be up so that we can meet?”

“I don’t get you.”

“At what time will you wake up from your nap?

“What do you mean?”

“I want to see you tomorrow.”

“I will be taking a nap.”

“But you will wake up, right?”

“Huh?”

“You will wake up, won’t you?”

“Wake up from what?”

“The nap.”

“The nap?”

“Yes.”

“What nap?”

“You said you will be taking a nap tomorrow.”

“I have changed my mind.”

“So I will see you tomorrow?”

“I will be taking a nap.”

“But you just said you’ve changed your mind.”

“Yes, but those few seconds ago I was young, foolish, naive and full of hope. Right now I’m older and wiser.”

The visibly irritated lad then shrugs and walks away, possibly to a more agreeable soulmate, or to fill some university applications.

If he doesn’t improve, he might end up like a young man I know, who saw some ladies sitting close by and decided that the best way to catch their attention would be by ‘talking big’. Since the damsels were within earshot, he whipped out his phone and made a fake call to someone at the port, called Boss, and audibly wanted to know why his consignment hadn’t yet been released. Weren’t the fictional millions he paid not enough? He wondered aloud. Do they know they are costing him his business in Rwanda? He threatened Boss, intimidatingly saying something about an imaginary meeting he was going to have with the deputy president and some Cabinet secretaries. After hanging up and clicking his tongue dramatically to express inconvenience, he then ‘called’ his nonexistent driver and asked whether his mythological Range Rover was ready, he was getting late.

He did get the ladies’ attention alright, and also the attention of some thugs, who followed him home and mugged him, almost killed him, somewhere near his residence – a small one-bedroom house that he shared with two cousins. The thugs beat him as if he was a poisonous snake. Probably because they were just disappointed that, contrary to their expectations, his wallet only had his ID card, Sh50, and a condom with a slightly open wrapper.