The one who got away

The other day, I ran into this lady called Sue who is now about 40.

She is Kenyan but now lives in South Africa, and always stops in the country to see her kid sisters after finishing her business in Turkey, en route back to South Africa.

Anyway, there I am, in this mildly high end hotel lobby (I was waiting to see 'Black Mass' at Anga Sky cinema in Panari) when in breezes Sue. I have not seen her this century, but I know her story.

Sue moved to SA in the twilight of 1999 and married this dude called Hugh.

She was also my first heartbreak.

Nobody forgets the girl who first crushes that bloody pumping organ in your chest, hidden beneath an armory of bones called your ribcage. There is a reason the Lord chose to hide that heart there.

It is for your own protection.

Anyway, when I was very young and fresh out of high school, I was madly 'into' (as we used to say, back in the day) Sue. She liked me and, being a couple of years older than me, found me very sweet and amusing.

Now, boys, being called 'sweet' when you are trying to seduce the lady is the Kiss of Death. Ask any woman. You may as well cash in your love chips right there and take your lumps and losses before you take a battering like the TKO the dollar has dealt our poor shilling, pardon the pun.

I did not, and after leading me on for only-the-Lord-knows-how-long, Sue sailed off into the sunset, or South Africa, with Hugh on board, and I was left bruised and stranded on these 'el Nino' shores.

Now here she was in the flesh, sixteen years later and seventeen kilos heavier, Sue.

Over a black mamba (not the deadly snake, the vodka cocktail) at the Anga lounge, Sue filled me in on her life. She and Hugh had divorced in early 2008 (round about the time Kenyans were going at each other, hammer and tongs, 'tongwesa, Awilo Longomba').

"But at least I have a lovely daughter and son," she said chirpily.

Why do people from failed marriages always say that, like a downsized employee who tells you his story, then adds, 'but at least they gave me a wrist watch, and a wheelbarrow with side mirrors.'?

Sue was in the company of a lady called Josephine or Jocelyn, I will never know, because she just called her 'Josie.'

'Josie,' said Sue, slurping her Halloween cocktail noisily, playfully, which was kinda cute in the late 1990s, now, not so much, because playing at being coy is a young lady's game, 'I bet if I had stayed in Kenya, Tony would have proposed to me.'

Sue shot me a sly look from under her long eyelashes (which were as fake as her weave, but at least that was quality horsetail).

'Who knows?' she was now addressing me, 'I might even have said 'yes'.'

Mercifully, at that very moment, my date arrived albeit a bit late, I hurriedly settled the tab, hugs all around, made the false promises to 'keep in touch' (I seldom bother to stay in any communication with 'blasts from the past' because, you see, the past is a buried country) and went in for 'Black Mass.'

Sue was my bachelor's degree in the University of 'Love' and turned me from that dumb love-struck youth into a man who knows that, in the country of the heart, anything can go wrong.

For that, I will always be grateful to Sue. As for that other thing about 'we could have got married,' looking at Sue, I suddenly felt a deep flush of gratitude towards that gentleman called Hugh.