B.N Wendo
We always joked about dying before our twenty-seventh birthdays. The disillusion haunted us. The five of us. We always did what typical campus students did. Wake up late. Scroll through the class whatsapp group to find out whether the scruffy middle-aged lecturer would make it to class. And decide how the day shall turn out.
Life in campus was suspended in limbo. We were not idealistic high-school students. And certainly not immersed in the realistic mire of graduates. But we were not insensate to the whiff of hardship out there. Unemployment. Unbearable costs of living. Crime. Death. Terrible death. We were already experiencing hardship. Most of us. But there was still hope lingering within us. That maybe we shall get lucky. Maybe, just maybe, we won’t tarmack long enough to the fringe of despair. But there was a wicked poltergeist at the back of our minds that reminded us that the chances were grimly low. We would suffer like the rest, alright.
It was then we began venting out our anxiety about the future. Evenings. Each of us contributed fifty shillings to buy liquor. White Pearl. Chrome gin. Sometimes we found the cheapest vodka we could get. If there was enough money, we would get a weed dealer from somewhere around Ruiru. And pass it around like an oath. We would then congregate at a nearby house belonging to one of us. Play some loud music. Take shots. Laugh away the creeping realities of hardship and independence. There are a thousand stories hidden in liquor. And when steamed by a few puffs of psychedelic inhalations, the wilder they became.
“I don’t know what I am doing here. I should have asked my father to divert the university money to some enterprise like business. Maybe I would have fared well. Became a millionaire. But alas!” Alecko said visibly distraught. His jovial state was now shadowed by gnawing regret. We all felt him. But I sought out to deflate that regret.
“Don’t be so positive,” I said. “Look around. Businesses are falling. Old businesses. Everything is crumbling. Life would still have been harder even if you had a business. Possibly worse.”
Voke and Stevo agreed with my Panglossian optimism. We all felt that joining campus was an inutile decision. Yet dwelling on it was being narrow. Everywhere things were bad. There was no consolation anywhere.
“I wish I won’t live long to see my 30th birthday!” Stevo said.
Everyone is silent. Everyone pretty much feels that way. But Aleko is positive. He always is.
“Don’t say that buana!” He chastises Stevo. “I have many things to do in life. Like get married to three wives and have many children. Be a great someone in film and theatre. We must make It!”
I wish I had the same spirit. I always had it before. But now it was gone. And I was interred in this bog of nihilism. I could not move. I could not see yonder. The others felt that way too. But they had something I did not have. Something that prevented them to ponder upon such abominable thoughts that proceed nihilism. Something called God! I did not own that thing.
The rest of the session was dedicated to thinking deeply upon our lives. The alcohol had taken effect and was already dissipating from the system. And someone would break the silence.
“Let us contribute another round!” He would say. But we would disagree. Let us instead head to the pub near campus and flood the evening with cheaper keg. It was slower to get inebriated. And there are girls there. Some would not like the idea. And would choose to abscond the trip. I did that mostly. I was too tipsy. And I hated myself for being too tipsy. So I went home and locked the door. Fell on the bed like a dead log. Wake up miserably at 3 am in the morning.
Morning. I would make coffee and sit at the balcony gazing at the sprawling roofs of Wendani. Sometimes smoke a cigarette. I would then dwell on the prospect of dying before 30. I would smile. 27 most probably would be a good age. Otherwise, what need was there to knock on your thirties with nothing productive in your life.
But I knew I was not in the most precarious position. All my other friends had babies. And baby mamas. In campus! But they also had richer parents. And they were not very unsociable as me. They would make It, I assured myself. They were normal human beings. And they had God. They would surely make it to their fifties and eighties. They were just bluffing. For me, I was not sure. I had attempted suicide twice. And every call back home affirmed my need to die quick. Tomorrow. The weekend. Sunday especially. I had to die.
But I never died. I never graduated. The others did. I saw their statuses while stuck in the village. God! I was broken. But why was I not dying. Where was my will to die? I had even found God again. Became religious. Not even spiritual as most religious people like to defuse. Strictly religious. Daily mass. Regular penance. Read the bible like a theologian. Received communion every fucking day. And believed in all the three fates of afterlife ingrained in the Catholic doctrine. And still, I was not ready to die.
At 24, I joined the seminary. And decided that maybe this was bound to be my mission on earth. One of my friends, Stevo, died of cancer. It was shocking news. I did not attend the funeral. I was still avoiding them. I saw the rest of my friends post it on their whatsapp status.
Then nine months to my 27th birthday, Voke was killed in a scuffle at a bar in Kilimani. Those around him at the time of his death say his eyes darted around as if scouring for salvation. He wanted to say something but never got to say anything. He left behind four children. He was 27 when he died.
Paul would follow a month later. He was working at a steel mill in Mombasa. His death struck the headlines. It was a horrible one. He got incinerated when he fell into a vat of molten iron. Nothing of him was recovered except a few ashes. But he left behind a young family. A widow who knew not how to continue living on alone. Well-wishers came on board, thankfully. But there was no erasing the pain of loss they felt. And the steel mill ran on unabated. The media leapt to other stories like they always did.
The following month, Davie was involved in a fatal road accident around Nanyuki. His car was mangled beyond repair. When it was retrieved from the precipice below, where it had fallen; those who witnessed knew there was no way he could have survived such an impact. They were right. Davie had just celebrated his 27th birthday. He had one child somewhere. But he never cared anyway. He was fairly accomplished. He was the only one among the deceased friends whose life had taken a better trajectory. He had a well-paying county government job. A hefty salary. Fleshy perks. And job security. He had gone to visit his parents’ rural home.
Freddie was just getting recognized in the Kenyan theatre scene. He had even gotten roles on TV acting and adverts. He was not there, but he was getting there. When he called me one evening, two months after we buried Davie, his voice was frantic and agitated,
“Help me Brayo!” I was shaken. I asked him to calm down and explain what had come over him.
“He came to me at night and told me my time was over!” He was definitely trembling. “Just fucking help me man!”
“Who is this who threatened you!” I asked. My heart was pacing. If it was a criminal, I did not think it would be wise for me to get involved.
“The…The…One called the angel of death!” He said in frustration.
“The angel of death?” I asked in confusion. “Is that some code for some criminal?”
“No! Fuck No! I don’t deal with criminals. It is him. An angel. A real angel with a dark gown and a gauze concealing his face. I can just feel the terror behind that figure every time he appears in my dreams.”
I was petrified. An angel. No! I dismissed it as anything serious. It had to be…Oh God! Freddie is suffering from schizophrenia. I advised him to calm down. I sought to find help for him. A renowned psychiatrist in town. I even booked an appointment for him three days after the call. He was not very thankful. He seemed to believe there was a real spiritual element in his story.
“You are the priest,” he said. “Why can’t you believe me?”
“No! I am not a priest yet. And even so, we need to exhaust all possible explanations for your case.”
“Do you believe I am mad? Or I am insane?” He asked me in a tone he has never used before. Low and freezing with horror.
“No! I don’t believe so. That’s why I am intending to help you out!”
He nodded. We prayed together. Then I left him that evening. I would wake up the next morning with the daunting news of his death. Freddie had committed suicide. He wrote a short note tucked under a bible on the table. It said, “I swear I am not mad! Believe me!”
It was heartbreaking. We buried him at his rural home in Chogoria. The fourth friend to die. And it was two days after celebrating his 27th birthday. I zeroed into that pattern. I realized the tapestry was not a coincidence. At 2 am one night, I had a nightmare. I was walking into my rural homestead where relatives were crying and wailing. I was trying to ask them what the matter was but no one could hear me. Until I saw a smooth grey coffin stationed at the main house. And a picture of mine set upon it. I screamed in terror. No! It can’t be. I woke up. And there and then, I knew there was nothing normal about these deaths.
I am writing this account on the 23rd June. I would be turning 27 in 12th July. Fello would also turn 27 in September. The six of us had wished upon ourselves death. And him that slays now pursues us. I have told Fello everything. And he too thinks I am crazy. I have encountered the angel of death. And by the authority of his voice, I doubt there is much I can do but accept my fate.
I have prayed hard. But still, I hear his voice in the distant depth is my mind. “Stop wasting time!” He blares. “Make peace with your God and men. And prepare for your inescapable death!”
It is 24th today. I am praying the 20 decades of the rosary. Repeatedly. I cannot eat. I cannot go outside. They will say I am crazy. I will wait here for death.
“Lord, if it is your will, take away this cup of suffering from me!”
And I can hear a peal of laughter in my head. Scorning me for being scared of death. Like all Christians are.
But no one is not scared of death. It is too incomprehensible a phenomenon. In the pits of life, we may call upon it to find repose. But when it does come, oh…how unready we are.
26th June.
…
BRIGHT NEWS ONLINE. 