

V for Visa

Mona Ombogo

V for Visa

© Copyright 2015 Mona Ombogo

ASIN: B010VP1Q42

All rights reserved. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this book may be used, reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission from the publisher, MonArte Ltd P.O. Box 909, 00100, Nairobi, Kenya. Please direct your inquiries to:

mona@monaombogo.com

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Cover Design © 2016 Authentic Branding Ltd. Printed and bound in Kenya.

Table of Contents

Contents

Title Page

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Excerpt from V for Visa Book Two

About the Author

Praise for Mona Ombogo

"V for Visa is a well-written romantic story that captivates its readers. It narrates a combination of different socio-cultural practices and lifestyles in Kenya. The storyline is refreshing, and you will fall in love with the lead characters. In Kenya, getting a visa to travel to the Western world is a no-return scenario that makes or breaks the applicants. It's very interesting following Rain as she lives out her life thereafter. If you like a good romantic story, this will be a page-turner that you will keep you guessing. It is a must-read."

~ Tandy M, Acquisitions Librarian, Library of Congress Office, Nairobi.

"Having read and thoroughly enjoyed V for Visa, I can now add, V is also for voluble, venturesome, veridical, velvety and vivid. A must-read!"

~ Ian Mbugua, Artiste.

To all those who believe, love is love...in whatever form it chooses to express itself.

CHAPTER ONE

If I don't get this visa, my life as I know it will end. I'm not being figurative, I mean it. I'm getting married in a couple of months. Most brides would be thinking of a venue, flowers, cake, guest list...Me? I have to get to my fiancé first.

My life hangs on the balance and the person who will decide which side of fate I fall on is a stranger I've never met...will never meet again. I'm not sure this is a fair system, but that is how it goes.

I'm seated at the British High Commission waiting area. A woman rushes out of Interview Room 3, fighting back tears. It's easy to assume things didn't go well for her. I should sympathize but statistically speaking, the more people who get denied visas before me, the better my chances. I'm not innately selfish, I just really, really need to get this visa.

To put things in context, getting a visa to the U.K when you're from Kenya, or many developing countries really, can be like winning the lottery. Not because you're desperate, but because there are so many hoops to jump through, some that you just don't see coming. I think I've successfully jumped through mine, but I'm still nervous.

"I hope I don't get that room," the girl sitting next to me says. "Interview Room 3 is like the worst room anyone can get. People call it, 'Hell's Kitchen.'"

"How come?" I ask. I haven't heard this before.

"That man...he is bad news. My cousin got him. She was crying the whole day."

I glance in the direction of the room. Against all my logic, trepidation sets in. "All cases are different," I say with authority, a defence mechanism to show I'm not frightened by this process and I'm certainly not frightened of some government worker. He's really just a clerk. Isn't he?

"My cousin said he was so cold, she got goose bumps. He asked her about her finances and she lied. Then he just sat there, looking at her. She was so scared, she found herself telling him the truth. Just like that."

She jerks when a name is called out. Hers, I assume. Interview Room 5. She kisses a rosary and thanks God.

"Good luck," she says.

She gathers her things and leaves to have her life determined by pieces of paper and an opinion. I'll be fine. My case is solid. My case is solid. This is a mantra I've been reciting for the past month.

"Rain Handa."

That's me. That's me. I quickly jump to my feet, start walking, stop, realize I don't even know which room I should go to.

"Rain Handa. Interview Room 3."

Shit.

I am composed when I open the door to the dreaded Interview Room 3. That is until I see the man behind the desk. My heart stops, literally. He can't possibly be a visa officer...they're not supposed to look like this. They're meant to have bad skin, bad hair, mean eyes, tight lips...you get the picture. At least that is what I expected. Especially after I was informed about Hell's Kitchen. He doesn't look like the devil. Unless you're talking about temptation...then maybe. The man is a delicious serving of the most sinful eye-candy.

It's wrong. People who can potentially ruin other people's lives are not meant to look like gods. All tanned, chiselled body, jet-black rugged hair, green eyes of him. Deep green, startlingly so.

My number one weapon of choice, beauty, mine, suddenly goes out the window. I am a strong believer that attack strategy doesn't work if the person you're associating with is, well, more beautiful than you are. And this man...is. How can he possibly be Hell's Kitchen? This unexpected development throws my attention.

I'm not fickle by nature, but this guy...I'm not even sure it's just his looks. It's his...presence. I can't think of another way to put it. I have to force myself to concentrate, refuse to be intimidated. Because he is a very intimidating kind of man.

He's speaking to me. I think he's said his name is Darien. I like it.

"Rain," I say.

"I know," he answers.

Obviously...Nice start, dear, he thinks you're an idiot.

Now at this point, most people would comment on my strange name. Who calls their child "Rain," right? I was sure this was going to be our ice-breaker. Apparently, if you come up with a good one, the rest of the interview goes fairly smoothly. But Hell's Kitchen is not interested in breaking any ice. He goes right for the jugular.

"Your bank statements are worrying."

What?! It shows on my face too.

"Ms. Rain, London is one of the most expensive cities in the world. Three hundred thousand Kenya shillings will hardly last you two months, no matter what shoe box you opt to live in."

Right. Interview Room 3 is not a myth. Screw what he looks like.

"I know what it's like in London."

"Double-decker buses, pretty bridges, and red telephone booths."

He's mocking me. Am I supposed to respond to that? I can't without being rude, and being rude is not in my best interest, so I shut up.

He stares at me for a bit, almost as if he's expecting a response. For the record, the constituents of my island and I have decided his eyes are not that mesmerizing anymore. We want to gouge them out with a blunt spoon.

He glances back at his laptop, where I assume my life is displayed. How much research do they do? Are they friends with the Kenya Police? Because if they are...I might be in trouble. No, I'm not a criminal, though I have been on the wrong side of the law, Kenyan Law, some of which is so archaic you wouldn't believe. Thanks, of course, to the Brits. Yet here I am, begging to be let into their country.

"What are your financial plans?"

"As soon as we get married and my papers come through, I'm going to get a job."

"That's a goal, not a plan."

He's rapidly making it up the ranks of my shit list. In my mind, I spit in his face. His sanctimonious, outrageously gorgeous, I-am-better-than-you-because-I-am-asking-the-questions face.

"I have done my research for available jobs."

"Let's hear it."

"There are PR firms hiring—"

"I want to assume you've studied the British people."

"Excuse me?"

"You can't do PR if you don't understand the public you're relating to."

He can't best me on this one.

"Human beings are inherently the same."

"Culture, tradition—"

"Is icing on the cake. If I can sell the cake, the icing will go with it."

"Good pitch."

"Would you hire me?"

A slow almost begrudging smile crops up on his lips. I was doing so well up until this point. Right now, I'm not sure I'm breathing. In fact, my heart is racing. Theo, Theo, Theo, I chant my fiancé's name and my breathing reverts to normal. Almost.

And as if karma is punishing me for my betraying thoughts, Hell's Kitchen asks, "Where did you meet your fiancé?"

I struggle to maintain an impartial face but I feel like a kid caught with their hand somewhere it shouldn't be. "We grew up together."

"I assume this place you grew up together in has a name?"

"Kisumu."

"So you know his family?"

"That should go without saying."

He types something onto his computer. He hasn't typed anything up until now. What's he writing? Subject is rude and uncooperative? Maybe I shouldn't have given a smart remark, but he's really starting to rub me the wrong way.

"What does your fiancé do for a living?"

The file says what my fiancé does. It says where we met. Did he bother to read it?

"Did I ask you an overly complicated question?"

"Theo is a retail assistant," I grit out.

"His bank statements are worse than yours."

"London is one of the most expensive cities in the world."

This time he controls the smile, but it's lurking in his eyes.

"You just made my point for me. We'll be in touch."

"That's it?"

"That's it."

His answer throws me. He's putting my life away, getting ready to buzz in the next victim. I had answers to countless other questions.

"When will I know your decision?"

"When I make it."

"Can you make it now?"

"Have a good day, Ms. Rain."

*

"He was such an asshole!"

I'm seated in The Hungry Kenyan, bitching about Hell's Kitchen to my friend Tendei. Yes, The Hungry Kenyan was some genius's idea of a name for a restaurant. This is our favourite spot to eat and drink when we're broke because the owner, Amil, is our friend. He calls us PYTs: pretty young things. Men, he insists, will always spend more money when PYTs are around. So we're an investment and it doesn't hurt him to spend on us.

I don't go about thinking I'm super beautiful, though I do all right. Petite. Slender and curvy. So, I get male attention but it hasn't meant anything to me in a while. Theo.

My friends think I'm overly loyal. Admiring a man is harmless, they insist. I don't disagree and have admired my fair share. I just haven't given them much thought after that. Until Hell's Kitchen. But that's only because he was such an asshole.

"I've never hated anyone so much in my life."

"He was just doing his job."

"Oh my God, don't even do your 'glass half full' thing, Tendei."

Sly, my other friend, slides into the booth.

"What is Tendei being positive about this time? That it will rain men tonight?"

"Even I am not that positive."

We laugh.

"How did your interview go?" Sly asks.

"He was an asshole." I wish everyone I meet would ask me this question so that I can say, over and over again to my heart's content how much of an asshole he was.

"Was he cute?" Sly asks

"Are you serious?"

"Better a cute asshole than an ugly one," Tendei says.

"Who's an ugly asshole?" Em, the true mesmerizing beauty of the group asks as she arrives, followed by a waiter carrying drinks.

He gestures to a table of men seated in the far corner. "Compliments," he says.

We glance in their direction, smile as is appropriate, and continue our conversation.

"We're bashing all Embassies and visa section staff members," Sly informs her.

"Not all, just the British High Commission, Interview Room 3 in particular. And I didn't say he was ugly."

I should have kept my mouth shut, really. From this point on, all that matters are the details of the cute Visa Guy. It's not that we're flaky or lack seriousness, it's that...well, life in Nairobi can be complicated and depressing...like life everywhere else. So when we get a window for diversion, we take it.

Also, Em is determined to marry a white man. We don't judge her, United Colours of Benetton and all that.

Naturally Em spearheads this conversation on Hell's Kitchen. She makes me describe him in detail. I'm tempted to say, actually, he had bad hair, bad teeth, bad skin, mean eyes, tight lips...but I'm afraid if I do this Em might decide to camp outside the High Commission and find out for herself. At best she'd get arrested, at worst, shot. And she'd ruin my chances of getting my visa because they'd be sure to trace her back to me. Especially if they're friends with the Kenya Police.

"Yes," I repeat for the hundredth time, "he was hot, if you like that sort of thing."

"That's racist, Rain," Em says.

"It's not. Some people like short men, some tall men, some chocolate, some vanilla. There's nothing racist about it."

"Will you see him again?" she asks.

Where does she imagine I would see him again?

"I mean like, is there a second interview?"

"Why? You want to go for it and pretend you're me? You know he wouldn't notice."

"Oh my God, you're so racist!" Em insists.

I'm not. I'm bitter. I think I mentioned that already. I'm not sure why I'm convinced I'm not getting that visa. It was something in his eyes, the way he looked at me.

The girls realize where my mind must have gone.

"Maybe it wasn't as bad as you think," Tendei says.

"They have two boxes they put passports in, one for the yeses and one for the noes," I say.

Blank expressions.

"They call it 'quality control.' Like they're sorting tomatoes or something."

I'm getting depressed and I don't want to. I pick up a mojito, courtesy of the gentlemen at the corner table and down it.

We don't discuss anything serious after that. And the gentlemen from the corner table come over. They're good company I suppose, if you like that sort of thing. Sly did, she took one home.

I leave The Hungry Kenyan relatively tipsy. I call a cab, roll down the window, and by the time I get home I'm almost sober. It's July and July is cold in Nairobi, at least it is to the warm-blooded Kenyan I like the cold, there is a peace that comes with it, a promise of renewal after the bite of winter. We don't have seasons here so it's not really winter but it comes close-ish. And it allows me to wear my tights and boots, which I love to death.

I make my way to the kitchen, brew myself some tea, grab a tasty slice of chocolate fudge cake, and cuddle into my sofa. Yes, I said tea and cake, like an old woman. That's how I feel, old, as I browse through the channels looking for something to dull my senses.

The phone rings. Theo. I brace myself and pick up, put on my bright and happy voice.

"Hi, babe." Too chirpy.

"How did it go?"

"Oh, you know, okay."

"You're lying."

"You can never tell how it went until you get your passport back."

"Obviously, Rain, but how do you think it went?"

"He didn't like me very much."

"It wasn't a personality test. You had your papers together."

"He said the money wasn't enough."

"Three hundred thousand—"

"Is nothing in London."

"I'm working—"

"He said your bank statements were worse than mine."

I realize after the words slip out that maybe I should have picked them with more care. There is a deathly silence on the other side of the phone. Theo's life in London is a sore spot for him. It isn't what he dreamt it would be.

"He was just an asshole, babe." This time the phrase gives me no joy. Theo is hurting and there's nothing I can do to make him feel better. We've had this discussion before.

"I'm trying my best," he says.

"I know, babe."

"I work a seventy-hour week."

"I know."

"It's hard enough getting a decent job if you're a foreigner, much less if you're black."

"I know."

Silence.

"Well, call me when you hear anything."

"I will...I love you."

There is a pause on the other side. He isn't in the mood to tell me he loves me but he says it and hangs up. Theo hates being helpless. He can't bear for me to witness him like that, even over a telephone conversation. There are parts of me that love him afresh, parts of me that think maybe Theo was right, trying to make our long-distance relationship work was a mistake from the word go.

He'd wanted me to apply to a university in England so we could move out there together. I'd refused because at the time my father was ill, constantly in and out of hospital and I didn't want to leave my mother and sister dealing with the stress of it alone. My father got better but then there were all the bills to pay, slack to pick up, and university in England wasn't an option. I took a diploma and a part-time job in Kenya.

I'm not sure Theo completely understood that. He tried to convince me to go to England and enrol in a college. All I'd need to do was put in the minimal hours required to keep my immigration status legal and then work the rest of the time. Everyone did it, he said, most people didn't even bother going to class, they just turned up for the exams.

And besides, he was going to an actual university on a fully paid scholarship. When he graduated, he'd apply for a work permit, get a good job, take care of both of us and my family. I wouldn't even need to work.

He had it all planned out in his mind and I loved him so much I almost went along with it. But something just refused to gel for me. I couldn't gallivant across the ocean with "I'll live off my man" as a five-year plan. I had goals. Dreams. None of them included being a stay-at-home mum. And if I'm honest, from day one, that's what Theo wanted. It's what his mother had done. It's what he knew.

The most ironical thing is, right now, I don't think it was such a bad idea. Sitting alone in a semi-dark room, the years of youth flashing past, my hope for a solid relationship jumping on the next train out of my station has a way of sobering me up.

I might never get that visa. And if I don't, will Theo wait? Those thoughts are burning through my brain as I drift off at last, into a blissful sleep.
CHAPTER TWO

The next morning I wake in that chair, my back hurting like hell. I curse Hell's Kitchen afresh. All this is his fault. I curse him throughout the week, in- between messing up a big account because I'm not concentrating and shouting at my innocent assistant when she doesn't connect calls quickly enough. I curse him when I'm called in by the boss to find out why I am pissing on everyone. I am close to reading up on voodoo dolls when my car is clamped because I was late to work and forgot to pay the parking charges as I dashed to make my first meeting.

To crown everything nicely, this morning as I stood in the Visa Handling Offices to collect my passport, I convinced myself that there was a possibility the visa would be granted. It wasn't. What I got was a letter explaining why the UK government, (read one Visa Officer) is not convinced I'm a good investment to have on UK soil.

I haven't told anyone. I can't.

I contemplate calling my friends so we can drink ourselves senseless but that's money. Seeing as my bank statement has potentially cost me my future, perhaps I shouldn't be spending cash on anything but the bare essentials.

My mind, desperate to find a solution or lesson or silver lining to this whole scenario, is going back over all my actions. Christmas gift shopping spree: forty-five thousand shillings, trip taken to Mombasa over Valentine's: fifty thousand shillings, new clothes bought for 'spring': twenty thousand shillings, birthday party thrown for Tendei: thirty thousand shillings, new car parts plus digital car stereo: forty-four thousand shillings, new fifty-two-inch digital smart television... I screech to a halt as I get to that one. It's too painful.

If I calibrate all these expenses, I have spent, on unnecessary items, close to two hundred thousand shillings in the past six months. (I refuse to tally the TV which is a staggering amount.)

I know these figures won't break the bank, but to me, it might have been the difference between "worrying bank statements" and just skidding beneath the vault doors as they banged shut.

As I stand at the till processing my shopping, which consists of wine, cheese, ham, and a baguette, it hits me that clearly I haven't learned anything. What I should have in my basket is a packet of milk, the cheapest loaf of bread I can find, and maybe some brawn. It would have cost me a fraction of what I will be paying for these goods.

The cashier tells me the amount and I reach into my—also lavish—handbag to pull out my equally lavish wallet. Nothing. I look again, nothing.

A queue has formed behind me. The cashier is giving me evils.

"I left my wallet at home."

She stares at me blankly.

"I guess I'll just leave these behind, then."

I dart out of the shop, embarrassed. As I walk up to pay my parking fee, I remember—no wallet. Shit. I picture Hell's Kitchen getting run over by a rusty bus. And then I turn and there he is, standing behind me waiting to pay for his parking. There is shock followed closely behind (photo finish) by anger.

"What the hell are you doing here?"

He looks puzzled, glances over his shoulder. No one there, so clearly I'm talking to him.

"You don't remember me, do you? We're all just reference numbers, huh?"

I storm off, my best you-better-recognize-this-is-the-strut-of-success strides in place. Stupid bastard, how dare he shop at my supermarket?

"Rain Handa, right?" he calls from behind me. I turn, startled, first that he's actually remembered my name and second, that he's followed me. The proverbial wind has been knocked out of my proverbial sails. I hate myself for it but I'm tongue-tied. I take in a breath, steadying myself against those green eyes. The man is hot. You-stole-my-life-but-you're-still-hot, hot.

"You forgot your ticket," he says, holding it up.

My brain finally kicks into action. "Why did you deny my visa?"

I don't expect him to give me an answer, but he does. "I was detailed in my response. More detailed than usual, actually."

"Tell me to my face."

"Can't."

"Because it's harder to speak to a human being?"

"Because I can't. Policy."

"Is it your policy to ruin people's lives too?"

That was meant to be biting but my voice cracks because the reality is finally landing. My visa was denied. It isn't a figure of speech; this man has ruined my life. And it isn't anger that is brewing now, it's grief. Loss. Theo. I can't control the tears that spring to my eyes and I'd rather die than have him see them, so I walk off again.

I remember he still has my ticket but there's no way I am facing that bastard with anything short of rage. And rage has abandoned me. I open my car door, slip in, my head drops to my steering wheel, and I bawl. Please don't see me crying.

I don't know how much later it is when I stop crying. I reach into the glove compartment, take out a few tissues, and blow my nose. Drink some water. Wish I had that wine. A distant thought tells me to call Tendei and ask her to come to the rescue, of my unpaid ticket or my heart, I'm not sure. We make fun of her about her glass half full standpoint but the truth is when you're in the doldrums, it's Tendei you want by your side. She is the "chicken soup" for our souls. The good one.

Someone knocks on my window. I glance up terrified that it might be HK coming to give me a final kick of death but it's a security guard. Maybe he thinks I've stuffed the back of the exhaust pipe and left the engine running but he doesn't look concerned. I roll down the window. To my surprise he hands me my ticket.

"A mzungu paid for it, asked me to bring it to your car."

I'm too stunned to say anything so I thank the guard, take the ticket. I notice then that there's another card behind it. It's a business card, "Darien Mitchell." I'm numb as I flip the card around. There's a telephone number scrawled behind it and in smaller writing, "...in case you want to slash my tyres or something."

This is definitely not what I thought would happen when I confronted him...half confronted him. It doesn't really count if you almost break down in tears in the middle of your "give us free" moment.

I am a wreck, too much emotion coursing through me. But this gesture by HK has thrown me so much that I'm half laughing, half crying as I exit the parking lot. This was a week straight from hell, and to crown it, the devil himself decided to pay me a personal visit in the guise of...Darien Mitchell. Now I know his full name, possibly have his private number; in case I want to slash his tyres...or something.

I'm not sure where to go from here. The rug has been pulled from under my feet, my world has been turned upside down, the sun no longer rises from the east...all those clichés, every single one of them, right now they apply to me. I sit curled up on my sofa, lost. Alone.

Sly, Em, and Tendei are giving me worried glances, the same glances they've been giving me since I broke the news to them two weeks ago. They pumped me for details and I told them everything, showed them the official letter from one Darien Mitchell. Then I ran them through, blow by blow, my conversation with Theo. Which basically was us yelling at each other, blaming each other, missing each other, and then growing quiet because neither of us knew what to do next.

"We could appeal."

"I can't go through this whole process again, Rain. It's too much. It was meant to be simple."

"So what do you want to do, give up?"

"I didn't say that."

"Then what are you saying?"

"I don't know. There must be another way."

"You could always come back home."

"To Africa?"

When did he start referring to Kenya as "Africa?"

"You mean Kenya, don't you?"

"What?"

"You said Africa, you mean Kenya."

It was petty but I was making a point. Africans don't generally refer to their individual countries as "Africa." We don't come from one huge indistinguishable place. We come from Kenya or Ghana or Botswana, etc. It's something we take pride in. To Theo, back home has become "Africa." He knew where I was going so I didn't bother to voice it. In so many words, I'd called him a turncoat.

"I don't feel like fighting tonight, Rain, so if it's all the same to you, I'm going to turn in."

Had he always sounded so English?

"Fine. Have a jolly good night."

He went quiet for a moment before he hang up.

The girls, of course, in my hour of tribulation said all the right things. I had every right to call him out on the "Africa" thing. He should have been a man, taken charge of the situation, insisted on appealing. Why was I the one doing all the work? Didn't he have a vested interest in this too? Like that. We talked into the night, mostly thrashing Theo and men in general. There were a few swipes at Hell's Kitchen whose cuteness no longer mattered to the group. He was a bastard, we were all in agreement now, like a happy UN family.

And like a happy UN family, not all the cards had been put on the table because I neglected to tell them about my chance meeting with HK. I told them everything except that. I'm not sure why.

As the dust settles around Ground Zero, I'm seated behind my desk, staring into space, a new favourite pass time of mine. I'm trying to picture my future life and drawing a serious blank. The deadline for the appeal is quickly approaching. Theo and I have spoken exactly two times since our major "you said Africa" non-argument argument. Neither one of us has mentioned what the next step is.

I glance in the direction of my boss's office. I haven't discussed with him what possibilities there might be of me staying with the company. I think it's denial. As far as the stages of grief go, when it comes to my job, I'm still in denial. Actually, I'm still in denial all round. Otherwise I'd have brokered this conversation with Theo. Because we need to talk about it.

And I need to talk to my boss or I'll be out of a job. I know why I'm dragging my feet. I'm embarrassed. I'm not sure when being denied a visa became something to be ashamed of. But the shame is there, the feeling of not being good enough, rejection, I guess.

If life is a Monopoly board, then getting a visa is like being granted the get out of jail free card. Being denied a visa is like hitting the "go directly to jail, do not pass begin" stop.

I mean, there are times in the game when you're happier sitting in jail because it means you won't land on any exorbitant estates. But most of Kenya isn't an exorbitant estate and Kenyans are generally still trying to land on the blue properties, Mayfair or Park Lane. And you can't do that if you're in jail.

That's where I am right now, sitting in jail watching the gamers go round and snatch up all the prime locations. I'll be stuck with the browns, maybe for the rest of my life.

I peel myself from my seat and walk to my boss's office.

"Do you have a moment?"

He never does, but he waves me in. This man is like a tornado on a roller-coaster, always juggling at least ten different things at the same time. He is in his early forties but his energy is that of a five-year-old who's been drinking sodas and binging on ice-cream all day long. He gives the phrase, men can't multitask an ass-whooping. He is the king of multitasking. He can multitask, multitasking.

"Yes, Rain."

He hits a button on his phone. "Paul, get your ass in here now. What the hell with these figures?"

He glances back at me. I realize all I might have is ten seconds so I jump right in.

"I might not be going to the UK after all."

"Why not? You're not getting cold feet, are you?"

Paul rushes into the office looking like a frazzled rabbit. "Boss" as we refer to him, hates it when you don't get something right the first time.

"We're not going over the budget again, fix these damn figures."

He shoves some files at Paul, who catches them and scurries out.

"No, I'm not getting cold feet."

"Is he?"

His phone rings, he picks up. "Betty, great, thanks for calling back. Are we still on for this evening? Of course I have the proposal ready, what do you take me for? Your firm couldn't be in better hands, in fact, you're lucky to have us." He laughs. "Six o'clock it is, then." Click.

He rises from his desk. Five seconds left.

"I didn't get a visa."

That stops him for a second. "Why not?"

"My bank statements were not good."

"Don't I pay you enough?"

He is now at the door, slinging his jacket on in that over-the-head-through-the-arms way that men do. Why not just put in one arm at a time? There's less risk of breaking something.

"I'm just, terrible with money."

"Too bad. We have an opening in accounts."

At another time, I'd find it funny. Right now, my gut has taken residence in my toes. Boss doesn't waste words. He knows I'm essentially asking for my job back. If there was a position for me, he'd have said so already.

We are walking through the office now. "I'm really sorry, Rain."

"Thanks."

"Let's talk tomorrow."

His PA whispers something in his ear.

"Next week," he corrects and is gone in a flurry of staff members vying for his attention and his telephone going off.

I stand watching my last hopes of livelihood disappearing into the throngs of people and then being swallowed up by the elevator at the end of the hall.

My life is finished. Officially.

CHAPTER THREE

So the madness that consumes me that evening as I sit in my favourite chair is excusable. It really, really is. I'm looking at a business card, "Darien Mitchell...British High Commission...Senior Something Or Other." I flip the card around, stare at his phone number. Flip it back, stare at his email address. I can contact this man, abuse him.

This time I won't freeze and this time I sure as hell won't cry. Neither will I need him to rescue me from being trapped in a supermarket parking lot.

I have an important decision to make: call and abuse or email. But if I call him, I'll have to listen to that snooty accent. It'll throw me off because I'll start thinking of Jane Eyre or The King's Speech, two of my all-time favourite movies. I might be inclined to be nicer to him. And he doesn't deserve it just because he sounds so...snooty. Okay, snooty is not the word I'm looking for. I'm lying. I think the English accent is damn sexy, but right now I'll go to my grave, twice, before ever admitting that to anybody.

Email it is.

I flip open my laptop, fire it up. My wireless Internet whirls to life. Three thousand shillings a month. I should cancel my subscription. I'm jobless. How am I meant to live without unlimited Internet?

I open my generic email account, the one I give every Tom, Dick, and Darien. I won't email him using my more personal account. That's for human beings.

Before I lose my nerve, I quickly click on "Compose"

To: Darien Mitchell

Subject: You Ruined My Life

Dear Visa Guy,

I refuse to refer to you by your given name because only decent people deserve to be called by their names. As we both know, you're neither decent, nor, arguably, are you a person. People have souls.

And before you decide to step in and defend yourself, claim you were just "doing your job," let me jump right in and tell you, even assassins earn a living by assassinating people. I doubt very much, in that case, the phrase "I was just doing my job" would stand in a Court of Law.

But that's beside the point. I'm writing to tell you that I hope your life is treating you kindly. As you continue to do your job, please note that by next month, I won't have one. I guess my bank statements will seriously be "worrying" then.

Thought I'd share as I'm quite positive, I'm not the only person whose life you've ruined.

Sweet dreams,

The Angry Kenyan.

P.S. Out of curiosity, what's your immigration status in my country?

My finger hovers only for a second above the button before I hit send. Let him put that in his English pipe and smoke it.

I sleep like a little child for the first time since my interview. When I wake up, it's Saturday morning. The sun is out, the birds are chirping in the trees. I can smell bacon wafting in through the window. That'll be my neighbour, Al, curing himself from last night's hangover before he goes to work. He's a pilot.

I call him.

"Hey, beautiful," he says, "knocked on your door last night. Needed someone to warm my bed."

I laugh at our long-standing joke. "What's wrong, Al, clipped wings?"

"They're overworking me, no time to hunt, you know? I was hoping for easy prey."

"Save me some bacon and I'll see if I can rock your world."

He is laughing as he hangs up. Al and I are all talk. He's my harmless flirt and sometimes the male shoulder to cry on. Because you can bitch with your girlfriends but every so often, a girl just needs a man's arms around her. And Al's arms are very masculine and very safe. My "Plus One" whenever I need it. I do the same for him because he knows I'm safe too. Attached. Al will use up all his air-miles to get across the universe if anything close to "commitment" comes knocking on his door.

We've spent a few Valentine's days together, curled up on a couch, watching some guy movie, laughing our hearts out. On principle, Al never ever goes out with anyone on Valentine's day. They might get ideas. And I haven't had a Valentine's date since Theo left for the UK.

Al once told me, when I was completely low and needed to bitch but none of my friends were around, "All right, since you're always my wingman, I'll be your girlfriend for tonight but if you tell anyone, I'll deny it till the day I die."

I don't know what he thought girlfriends do, paint each other's toes? I was almost tempted to do it just to get a rise out of him. Al is such a good sport, if that's what I'd needed to feel better, he'd have done it.

My phone buzzes. It's a text from Al.

Your boy gotta fly. Bacon on the counter. Key in the usual place. Hugs and other inappropriate things.

I smile broadly. I love Al.

I take him up on his bacon offer, mostly because if I don't, it'll have grown mould by the time he returns to Kenya. It's the unspoken rule that when he flies out, I empty his kitchen of any perishables. Al is a great cook and is always trying out new things...okay, some of them are complete flops...but I'm always a happy guinea pig.

So I raid his kitchen, lock up behind me, and waddle out with a basket full of food and freshly baked rolls in a polythene bag hanging from my teeth. One pot of tea and a bacon sandwich on fresh rolls later, I power up my laptop. Force of habit during the weekends. Wake up. Shower. Breakfast. See what happened in the world last night. Did anyone important try to get in touch?

Blissfully, I log into my inbox. On a weekday I'd expect up to twenty emails: proposals, budgets, fires to put out, new clients seeking representation... Today, my inbox shows only ONE new message.

I'm still blissful when I click into the inbox. And then I freeze. DARIEN MITCHELL. The name screams out at me. My heart is beating so loudly I think I might lose an eardrum. This was the last thing I expected this morning.

Okay, so yes, I emailed the man. But it was one of those things you delete from your mind the instant you do it. Kinda like the things you say when you're high on weed. No, I don't do weed, I've heard. But I did do mushrooms once and all I remember was a tree became my very best friend.

If I didn't know better, I'd say I was on something last night. I'd like to blame mushrooms or booze but I was stone-cold sober. I can't even afford booze anymore.

Maybe I'm fretting over nothing. Maybe this email is from their security detail asking me to cease and desist any further contact with British High Commission Employee Senior Something Or Other Darien Mitchell, A.K.A.Visa Guy.

A.K.A. Hell's Kitchen. Or maybe it's an out-of-office reply. I convince myself of that when I click the "Open" button.

It's not the security detail. It's not an out-of-office reply. It's Darien. Shit. My heart turns up the volume.

From: Darien Mitchell

Subject: RE: You Ruined My Life.

Dear Angry Kenyan,

Forgive the formality of my address but as it appears we are not on "name" basis, I did not want to presume that I could refer to you by yours. Especially as I am arguably not a human being, let alone one with a soul.

I'd like to imagine, as this email did not come via a mobile device, that you got out of the parking lot safely?

Visa Guy.

I'm stewing. That's all he has to say?

I hit reply.

To: Darien Mitchell

Subject: RE: You Ruined My Life

Dear Visa Guy,

What the hell kind of reply is that? There were far more important things for you to address in that email. If you bothered to reply, why not do a decent job of it? Oh right, you're not decent. Ignore this email completely.

The Angry Kenyan.

I send it. Sit there waiting like a hawk watching innocent revellers in the park who don't know their delicately prepared sandwiches are about to be snatched. Of course it's stupid to sit here and wait. It's Saturday, the man is not at his desk. He's probably at the races wearing a hat and riding boots, toasting sherry as he places a bet on his horse, Sir Brandy.

This is stupid. I've become stupid. The stress in my life has reached my brain and my IQ is slipping below triple digits. I move away from the laptop, mad at myself. I should be looking for a job, trying to sell my expensive TV on eBay, maybe start a boutique to sell off my wardrobe. I'll need the money. With my rent, three hundred thousand isn't going to last me that long in Nairobi either.

I return to the table with a fresh cup of tea. I'm about to shut the laptop when I notice I have a new message. No way. Couldn't be. Probably junk mail.

Darien Mitchell.

Oh my God. I freeze again. Why do I freeze when I deal with this man? Click. The message opens.

From: Darien Mitchell

Subject: RE: You Ruined My Life.

Dear Angry Kenyan,

You really are angry, aren't you?

Visa Guy.

To: Darien Mitchell

Subject: RE: You Ruined My Life

Dear Visa Guy,

In case you missed the subject headline, please reread.

A.K.

From: Darien Mitchell

Subject: RE: You Ruined My Life

A.K.,

I read it. I would apologize but that would be the same as that assassin saying, "Sorry you're dead."

V.G.

I'm floored. I don't even know how to reply. I want to because this is the most therapeutic thing I've done since...since this madness started. Nothing has felt better. Not bitching to my friends, not bawling in the parking lot, not cuddling against my favourite blanket, not getting stupid drunk, not watching re-runs of Criminal Minds (read Shemar Moore).

I haven't felt like I'm breathing...until now. The irony of it shoots through me. How can this man be the one person who has made me feel better by being completely obtuse?

"...in case you want to slash my tyres or something."

He's obtuse, irreverent, the kind of people who say the kind of shit we wish we could say without consequence. I'm envious of that trait, even though my friends think I have it. But mine only comes out in anger, when I feel there is nothing left to lose, ergo these emails. Visa Guy, on the other hand, is he always like this? He's graduated from being Hell's Kitchen to being Visa Guy. Perhaps my bitterness is waning. Unlikely.

I hate him. We hate him. Me and all my constituents living in the little bodily island of Rain Handa. We hate him.

I delete all our emails, delete messages from the "Sent" file too. I shut the laptop then pick up his business card and shred it into little pieces. I don't know what the hell I was thinking opening communication. Now he knows I kept his card. Worse, he knows that last night, after midnight (because that's when I emailed him) I was thinking of him. It doesn't matter what the context was. He was on my mind and I want to pry my skull open and scoop out the part of my brain that was responsible for opening that file.

Visa Guy must die. He must seize to exist for us. His name is mud. Mentally we take good aim, hold steady, and fire. Dead. Let him stay that way.

Boss's schedule is busier than ever. I don't really get another chance to speak with him. There are big client accounts the company is chasing and because he is always hands-on with the big ones, he has no second to spare that isn't work related. And then he's off for a conference in South Africa. I know by the time he's back my notice will have lapsed and I'll be gone.

I give up all hope of salvation when he stops by my desk, a smart, sexy-looking woman beside him. This is "the new me."

"Will you show her the ropes?"

"Sure." Big smile on my face, betraying none of the betrayal I feel. Why should I feel betrayed? I resigned, he asked me to reconsider, bad time for the company and all that. But I was on my way to England to be with the man of my dreams and it couldn't wait. Theo had stressed that. It's different for men...his words.

So I'd picked love after all. My boss picked practicality and replaced me as soon as he could. I'm sure he's going to walk off to his million more important issues but he gestures for me to follow him.

"She'll be back," he tells Replacement Me.

We walk towards the elevators.

"What are your plans?" he asks.

"Oh, I'm looking at a few options."

"PR?"

"Yes."

"Don't steal any of my clients." He smiles at me but there's some seriousness behind that smile.

"I'll do my best."

To my ultimate shock he leans in and kisses me on the cheek. "Good luck, Rain."

"Thank you, sir."

Around me the office has gone deadly silent. No one has ever seen Boss do anything personal. If they didn't know him...or me...better, they'd definitely be rumours flying around.

I'm still paralyzed somewhere near the elevators when the office recovers and a few lucky souls get to ride the elevator down with Boss for some final consultation before he leaves.

The PR world is brutal. You're only as good as your last satisfied client. No one wants to make any mistakes. Clearly, if Boss is letting me go...kiss on my cheek and all...then no one is indispensable.

I still feel betrayed. A deeper part of me thought he'd let me keep my job. But how fair would that have been to the person he'd promised it to? And Boss always keeps his word. That's why his company is thriving. That and because he doesn't waste a shilling that doesn't need to be spent. Another person might have created a new position for me. Not Boss. If it wasn't in the budget, it won't fly...unless maybe the president or some other suchlike important person is involved.

And I'm nobody right now. I don't even have a job.

It's Friday again. I'm sitting at The Hungry Kenyan in the middle of the day trying to sort out my life. Today was my last day at work. In some weird tradition, you always get a half-day on your last day, a sort of thank you. The office did the whole shebang: food, cake, speeches...no booze of course as it's the middle of a workday.

I order a mojito, noting the price: 450 shillings. This is going to be my life until further notice, counting the pennies. But today I allow myself this final indulgence before I become a pauper.

I've brought my newspaper with me and a bright red marker. Why is it that when people are looking for jobs they use a red pen? Or is that just in the movies?

As I sip my drink, I start circling and making notes on my diary. I don't want to blind-call anyone. I want to make a proper execution of this process. I place a number on the scale of one to ten against how much I think I'm suitable for the job and whether or not I'd actually like to do it.

Just the other day I was job hunting but that was for jobs in London, via the Internet. I even called up a few places but honestly, there wasn't much they could tell a foreigner only just hoping to get a visa. Most were very polite, though.

What hits me with irony is that there are far more jobs going with my qualifications in London than there are in Kenya. Actually, I don't see a single PR company advert but I'm circling as close to the job description as I can get. Event Planner. Marketing Executive. Administrator. Personal Assistant. Bus Driver.

All right, the last one I do out of frustration. These are slim pickings. I suppose I could go door to door of the other PR firms and ask if they have openings. But I've already been down that road, calling colleagues who work at those firms. No one is hiring. It's a tough market right now. The only people flourishing are those representing politicians. Maybe I could do that. I'd ask them about tightening immigration laws in Kenya.

I smile at my private jibe at Visa Guy. Visa Guy. Despite deleting his emails and tearing up his card, my brain refused to empty the recycle bin from its database. So I know he's there. Every time I glance at the recycle bin I know there is accessible information just sitting there, waiting for me to retrieve it. Taunting me.

I don't know what it is about him. I know it's not attraction, though the man would stop traffic at a 70 percent off designer sale. It's not attraction, it's something else. Maybe he is the one thing that has stood constant before and after the fact. He is like a campus pointing to where my life as I knew it ended and every time I think of him, hate him, abuse him...it anchors me. It's the only thing that makes sense in my life. The only thing I can quantify with any surety. He is a bastard and I hate him. That's definite, concrete, something I can touch.

So, you know what, I'll allow myself this respite, this fresh air, no matter how toxic it is.

I whip open my laptop and before I know it, I'm composing another email. My traitorous brain memorized his address.

To: Darien Mitchell

Subject: I Hate Your Guts.

Dear Visa Guy,

See above.

The Angry Kenyan.

I hit send and look at my watch. It's after one. I know for a fact the British High Commission closes at noon on Fridays, most foreign missions in Kenya do. I wonder if their tax payers are aware of this. Not to mention all the little perks that come with the job like fuel, housing, medical, and education allowances. How much does it cost to set up their guards at the gates, defending the Homeland from immigrant invasion?

Idly, I wonder what Visa Guy's bank statements look like. What does he do on Friday afternoons? Will he reply to my abusive email again? It's been more than a week since our last communication. Maybe whatever boredom caused him to reply the last time has gone. Maybe he was stuck at his desk on a Saturday and I gave him a few moments of reprieve with my apparent insanity.

I know he was smirking as he replied to my messages. I could see his smirk coursing through the Internet and splattering on my screen. Visa Guy is definitely smug. But if I looked like that, spoke like that, and had wit to go with it, I'd be smug too.

Wit? I ask my traitor mind. We think he's hot, has a sexy accent, and on top of that we're granting him the status of wit? My constituents are rebelling against me one by one. If I'm not careful, I'll be left all alone on my island.

My email page refreshes itself. Message. Visa Guy. Is this man glued to his email account? But that's not my predominant thought. My predominant thought is amazement...he's replied. Again. For the life of me I can't think why. Maybe insanity is contagious. I deny my eagerness when I click open his message.

From: Darien Mitchell

Subject: RE: I Hate Your Guts.

Dear Angry Kenyan,

I'm honoured you still think of me at all.

Visa Guy.

To: Darien Mitchell

Subject: RE: I Hate Your Guts.

Dear Visa Guy,

Don't flatter yourself. There is a lot of idle space on my mind right now. My future has been erased.

Angry Kenyan.

From: Darien Mitchell

Subject: RE: I Hate Your Guts

Dear Angry Kenyan,

I've been told I make for a rather fitting pin cushion.

Visa Guy.

To: Darien Mitchell

Subject: RE: I Hate Your Guts

Dear Visa Guy,

I'll save the pins for your tyres. Slashing is so obvious.

Angry Kenyan.

From: Darien Mitchell

Subject: RE: I Hate Your Guts

A.K.,

My face and I thank you.

V.G.

To: Darien Mitchell

Subject: RE: I Hate Your Guts

V.G.,

I'm sure no one would miss it.

A.K.

From: Darien Mitchell

Subject: RE: I Hate Your Guts

A.K.,

Even monsters are missed by someone.

V.G.

I realize I'm smiling. This is the most preposterous thing that has ever happened to me. It's ridiculous. How am I in communication with the man that denied my visa? And I'm sure he's breaking all sorts of policies replying to my inane emails. Why is he doing it?

"What are you smiling at?" Sly asks.

I look up to see Sly, Em, and Tendei staring down at me.

"Why are you guys off from work so early?"

"We wanted to give you moral support, though" —Sly glances at my laptop— "you don't seem to need it."

I shut the laptop, try to put on my best innocent face.

"Why don't I think that's Theo you're talking to?" Em asks.

"Because Theo and I are not talking."

"Still?" Tendei asks and I want to kiss her. Perfect change of topic and I didn't even have to do it myself.

"I tried calling him yesterday, went to voice mail. I'm sure he's just busy."

Sly signals a waiter as they all take their seats.

"His fiancée was denied a visa, your future is uncertain. If the man was half serious, he'd pick up the damn phone. He'd be on a plane coming to Kenya to fix things—"

"Oh please, Sly, I don't expect him to drop his life and come running here. What good would that do?"

"I knew a girl whose hubbie showed up at the High Commission, from the UK, and gave them hell. She got her visa in two weeks," Tendei says.

"Right. Was he Kenyan or British?"

"British."

"I rest my case."

"It doesn't make a difference, you still have the right to a family life. And they're denying you that."

"You should have appealed," Em says.

"There's no point appealing without a lawyer. And immigration lawyers are expensive. Theo didn't think it was worth it."

"Do I need to comment on that?" Sly says.

"Give him a break, Sly. We'd have spent over one hundred thousand shillings with no guarantees."

"So better you live apart and you possibly die a virgin. I'm sure Theo doesn't plan to."

Silence falls over the table. That shot is below the belt. Yes, I decided I wanted to wait for my true love...husband...whatever. I know I don't come across as traditional and mostly I am not. But there are some things that are still sacred to me. I refuse to be ashamed of it.

"My sex life—"

"Or lack of it—"

"What's your problem, Sly?"

She falters. Sly is used to telling people what she thinks but most times no one challenges her. Being blunt is her thing, confrontation is not. Em, on the other hand, can pick a fight and win without bothering to show up in the arena. She shows up now, more cautious than I'm used to.

"The thing is, Rain, the man just isn't putting in an effort."

"What effort exactly do you think he should be putting in?"

"He's done nothing but send you his bank statements which didn't even help."

I start to protest but Sly, now having backup, joins the fight. "You paid the visa application fee."

"I'd saved for it."

"You bought your own ticket."

"I got a discount."

"You were looking for an apartment for the two of you to live in." This is from Tendei. It's not like her to take sides.

"So you guys are here to do what, exactly? Hold an intervention?"

"All we're saying is...you seem to be trying so hard. You've lost your job. You've spent money. What has Theo done?"

"He was busy."

"With what?"

"Work."

"He does a nine-to-five job."

"Eight to seven," I correct. "Retail. He doesn't even get most weekends off."

"It's called living abroad. Most Kenyans I know are doing that. They still have time to put in an effort in their relationships."

I don't have a defence for that. I do, actually, several, but I'm not sure I believe them anymore. I am so uncomfortable with their scrutiny that I almost bring up Visa Guy and our emails. Almost.

And for some reason, guilt takes over. Should I be emailing the man responsible for keeping me from Theo?

"I love Theo," I say, defensive.

"It isn't your love we're questioning," Em says.

"He loves me."

"He should show it," Sly insists.

Another silence falls. They've made their point and we're not the sort to brandish it over the "receiver." We try to fight clean and most times, we succeed.

"Hey, so how about a movie tonight?" Em says.

"Broke," I reply.

"We'll stay in. Pizza and booze."

"I like it," Tendei says, happy the momentary confrontation has passed.

"I'll bring the pizza," Em offers.

"I'll bring the drinks," Tendei adds.

"Great. I'll bring the movie," Sly says.

"Then I guess I'm providing the venue. What movie are we watching?"

"Chick flick. Some easy watching. I was thinking... He's Just Not That Into You."

I said we almost always fight clean. Almost.

But despite Sly's shots, the one thing I have to give her is that she is hardly ever wrong. She has this way of looking at a situation and stripping it down to its barest form. Most times, she's right. Sly has a gift for the bottom line.

So do I believe it? Has time and distance taken its toll on Theo and me? Maybe.

After I say goodnight to the girls, I call Theo again. It goes into voice mail.

"This is Theo. I'm currently unavailable. Leave a message and I'll get back to you."

I hang up without leaving a message. The words, "currently unavailable" suddenly more jarring than they should be. Maybe I'm reading too much into all this. Theo and I were meant to be. We've gone through everything together, from children picking boogers out of our noses to teenagers trying to cope with the changes in our bodies, to young adults trying to navigate life.

He was the first boy whose hand I held, the first (and only) one I've kissed. He was the first person I blued with during a school dance, the first man to spend the night in my bed...we kissed and cuddled but nothing more. Because I wanted to wait. And he loved me enough to wait with me.

This has been my creed, my mantra. That no matter how hard and how long and how far we'd have to go to be together, we would go the distance. We promised each other. When we were kids, we even married each other. I still have the blade of grass that acted as my ring. I know when Theo left Kenya six years ago, he still had his.

My heart is breaking into little pieces and I can't explain it. I can, but I don't want to. I'm not brave enough. I've never known anything else but this man, I've never wanted anyone else but this man. What are the possibilities, that blinded by my fairy tale, I failed to see something more crucial glaring at me.

My phone rings. I scramble to pick it, look at the CALLER ID. "Unknown Number." My heart skips as I answer.

"Theo?"

"Hey, babe."

It feels so good to hear his voice but I can't just pretend things are all right. We need to address the issues on the table. So in my very female way, I dig in.

"Where have you been?"

"Just busy."

"We haven't talked in over a week."

"I know. I needed to...clear my head."

"And I needed you. Things haven't been easy, you know. I lost my job."

He goes quiet.

"Theo?"

"I'm sorry to hear that."

What he sounds is tired.

"Are you okay?"

"No, I'm not okay. Can we talk about something else...anything else."

"We can't keep avoiding the topic, Theo."

"We've talked it to death. We don't have the money they want. My financial situation hasn't changed. You've lost your job. We're out of options, Rain."

"Tell me what you want."

"I want you."

It's been a while since he said something like that. All the venom and sting vanishes from my voice. He wants me. He wouldn't say it if he didn't mean it. My friends and all the signs of the universe are wrong. We're just going through a rough patch. He wants me.

"I want you too," I all but whisper.

He goes quiet again.

"You can't keep shutting off. I can't see you so I don't know what you're thinking."

"I'm thinking I want you, Rain, but...I want you here in the UK and that doesn't seem like it's going to happen soon."

Skid marks. What's this?

"Well, we've survived for a long time. Maybe we just need another year or something. You could come home for a visit..."

"And spend more money? That would be silly."

"We need to see each other, Theo. It's been like three years."

"That's my point."

"What's your point?"

"We've been in limbo for years. We can't...I can't keep going on like this. It isn't healthy. For either one of us."

"Which means what?"

"I don't know. I'm not sure. I thought this had ended. I thought you'd get the visa. I thought I'd have you in my arms right now. But I don't. That's the reality."

Silence. Suddenly I can hear everything but what he is saying. The cars passing outside, someone's microwave oven beeping, a water pump, a dog, a night jar...crickets. Everything.

Then it starts to rain. Soft drops hitting the roof, mist hitting my window. It's like I have acquired super powers and every sense is cranked up a notch...everything except what I think Theo is trying to tell me.

Without another word, I hang up and switch off my phone.

I'm not a coward usually...or maybe I am. I don't know. Maybe I don't face things that I should face. In my world things are always in colour. The best results are always waiting round the corner.

I had a man who loved me and would lasso the moon on a string, pull it closer to my window. I had a dream of crossing the ocean to be with him, make a life, a family. I saved myself for him...

It was perfect. Everything was perfect.

Until someone pulled one little seemingly insignificant card off my structure and the whole thing has been crumbling around me since. Every time I think this is the worst shockwave a bigger one shows up.

Is it really possible that I could be losing my job and my fiancé on the same day?

I crawl into bed, cover my head. There is a large part of me that wishes the world would end tonight.
CHAPTER FOUR

I am startled awake the next morning by the incessant knocking on my door. Groggy, I look at my clock. 11 a.m. Talk about blacking out completely. I stumble to the door and crack it open. It's Al. He doesn't wait to be invited in but brushes past me. The waft of fresh coffee lingers behind him, the good kind of coffee. By the time I get to the kitchen, he's removed an army of ingredients from a paper bag I hadn't noticed before. Al's brought breakfast.

I smile sleepily at him, pad off to my room to make myself more human friendly. When I get back, eggs are frying in the pan, bacon and sausage grilling in the oven, bread ready to be toasted, and he's making fresh orange juice.

I walk up to him and kiss him smack on his lips. "I love you."

"I know."

"How was Singapore?"

"Thailand," he corrects.

"Same difference."

"Not if you're Singaporean."

"Is that a word? Singaporean?"

"What do you think it is? Singaporese?"

I smile at him, loving the total inanity of our conversation. We talk about everything and nothing. Al is like detox from all the serious things in my life.

"I think Theo and I are breaking up." It bursts out of me, perhaps the thought feels safe with Al because he is my "talk about everything and nothing" guy. I can pretend afterwards that we never had the conversation.

His reaction is not what I expected.

"Oh?"

"That's it? Oh?"

"I can do shock if you want shock, Rain."

"I don't."

End of conversation. I help him set up our little breakfast corner, which is a tiny table by the window that overlooks a communal garden. We all chip in to pay a gardener, electricity, and for the water used to keep the grass green. It's a beautiful little nest. There's even a fountain, seasonal, we like to call it, depending on whether or not Nairobi Water Company feels like gifting us with water.

Al and I actually met in that garden. He was, believe it or not, planting herbs. I was sipping wine and eating chocolate and getting my last doze of vitamin D before the cold season set in.

We struck up conversation, mainly me laughing at him for planting herbs. He invited me over for lunch and told me if I tasted what those herbs could do, I wouldn't laugh at him again. I've never laughed since.

We talk about Singapore, he gives me stories that the airlines would cringe at if they ever got out. Forget what we see in the movies or on reality shows. Airline crew can define the words debauchery without any effort whatsoever... Al gives me no names, of course, just generic scenarios of his downtime. It's meant to be a PG13 version because despite the fact that I'm his wingman, I still don't have the right anatomy. I wonder what version of the stories his male friends would get.

"Could you live without it, Al?"

"Sex?"

"Yeah."

"Not for a million dollars. US."

I smile. "What about for love?"

He pauses, because he knows me. This isn't an innocent question. It's laced with all the wrong things he could say.

"I don't know. I've never been in love."

"Diplomatic answer."

"You want a blunt version?"

"Please."

"I'd die twice as much if I loved a woman and couldn't be with her. For whatever reason. I don't think I could do it, indefinitely."

There we have it. Theo. Dying. That's if he loves me. And if he does, then he's likely reached the end of his "indefinitely." Al is watching me, wondering whether I want to venture further into this topic. I know I resemble the little deer in the headlights. I know something is going to hit me, hard, but I can't move.

"Do you want more coffee?"

That's my evasive line as I rise from the table and head to the kitchen. I'm standing at the sink, looking out at our garden whose beauty cannot patch me up today. I feel like shit. And I don't see a bright light in the horizon.

Al touches my shoulder. I turn around and bury myself in his arms. I'm crying as he soothingly rocks me. He doesn't say anything. He doesn't need to.

I spend most of the morning with Al, first at my place, then his where I help him sort out the gifts he's brought for his sisters and his mother. Al became the man of his house at the age of sixteen after his father died in a plane crash. He was a pilot too but hadn't been flying that day. He was travelling back from training in the UK. No one survived the crash.

It defies logic that Al got the courage to do what he does, embrace the profession that practically killed his father. I asked him about it one day.

"I feel closer to him up in the air. He loved it. It was all he knew."

It's all Al knows too. And every time he does an international flight, without fail, he brings back things for the women in his life. His dad, he told me, always brought them something, even if it was as simple as a Toblerone bar from the duty-free shop.

Al offers that I can come with him to see his family but I decline. I don't think I'd survive a happy family atmosphere right now. I've met them several times, of course. His sisters are convinced Al and I will one day be an item. They simply love me. Probably because I don't resemble any of the café latte, large sunglasses, tequila shot girls they're used to seeing on Al's arm. I am those girls, I just hide it better. And all right, I have a brain. Yes, I said it.

So, sans Al and sans my well-meaning girlfriends who I can't see today because they're certain to see through me, I find myself, again, at The Hungry Kenyan. It's too early for a drink, that's what I tell myself though the truth is I'm reluctant to fork out the money. So I order a cold coke with lemon and ice.

I'm armed with the day's newspaper, my red marker and my notebook. My search for livelihood continues. I pick my drink from the bar counter and walk outside to find some sun. But it's Saturday lunch time and the place is packed. No free tables. I should have stayed home and sat in my garden.

As I turn to go inside, Amil, the owner, walks out the door.

"Hey, Rain."

"Hey, Amil."

He glances down at my hand. "Coke?"

"I'm here for serious business, need to keep sober."

He smiles. "If you say so."

"You should buy the property next door, Amil, expand. What are your customers who can't get a table outside supposed to do?"

He glances at the seats. "You're right. I should kick out the bakery. Who needs cake?"

"Yeah, who needs cake."

"We'll look into it but right now, let's get you a table."

He leads me back towards the table.

"You can't throw a customer out, Amil, even for me."

But I see where he's going. There is a sole man sitting at a corner table. His back is to us so I can't see his face. He has his laptop open, some books spread out. I can tell he's Caucasian, though. Nicely tanned by the look of his very muscular arms. I always notice arms. Sucker for them.

"You're going to make the poor man share his table?"

"He's a friend. He won't mind."

We reach the table.

"Brits," Amil says, "give them an inch and they throw you out of your own house. Stop hogging all the space."

The man laughs, turns...and I freeze. Visa Guy. He is clearly just as surprised to see me because we're staring.

"You two know each other?" Amil asks.

"No," I say, ready to spin on my heels and leave.

"In a manner of speaking," he says at the same time.

Amil glances from me to Visa Guy, back, those sharp eyes taking in details and information that isn't being shared.

"I'll get you a real drink, Rain."

He smiles that all-knowing smile of his and leaves.

Blinking cursor. Blinking cursor. Scanning for courage and a steady heart rhythm. Found.

"What are you doing at my restaurant?" I ask.

"As charming in person as you are in emails. Consistency is an admirable trait, if a little predictable."

I smirk. Then I hover. The votes are coming in, we're divided exactly in half. One half of me wants to bolt, cursing His Bastardness in very colourful language. A more honest part accepts that I'm intrigued by the dysfunctional nature of our...I won't go so far as to call it relationship...correspondence.

I hover.

He notices. There is something in his eyes as he looks at me, a subtle curiosity. I think we're reflecting back at each other what's going on inside. Visa Guy quietly moves his paraphernalia over to one side to make room for me on the table. He returns to his reading.

I hover. Hover. Hover. Sit.

We're officially under siege.

A waiter arrives with a drink for me from Amil. It's coke and rum. "On the house," the waiter says and leaves.

I stare at Visa Guy as I attack my drink. He is still buried in his book so it's safe to check him out. Here, in daylight, without the nerves of Interview Room 3 or the irritation of an unpaid parking ticket, the man looks more beautiful than I remembered.

There is an easiness about him, confidence. The kind of confidence that comes with a man who knows who he is. He is like a classical painting, every single detail painstakingly etched into perfect place. He is almost too perfect but then there's his hair, dark with streaks of sun-kissed gold. It looks like it hasn't been combed for days; that rugged, just tumbled out of bed, flopping over his forehead, bushy look.

I can't see his eyes because he's staring down at his book, but I don't need a reminder of what his eyes look like. The most haunting green, piercing, brutally so. He is the perfect balance of maleness and grace.

He looks up and this time our gaze meets.

"Are you done?" he asks.

I flush. He knows I've been staring.

"Just seeing what the devil looks like up close and personal."

"Are you tempted?" he asks with a glint in his eyes, skirting around the boundaries of sensual. Is he flirting with me? I flush again.

"Yes, I'm tempted."

His lips curve, because he knows there is nothing complimentary that will come out of mine. "Let me guess, to slit my throat?"

"No, that would mess up my nails and currently I can't afford a manicure."

He chuckles, goes back to reading his book. Just like that. I guess I don't throw him the same way he throws me. I'll have to work on that. Completely conscious of the man across from me and trying my best to revert all my faculties to normal, I spread my newspaper on my side of the table, open my notebook, and start jotting down random jobs that have nothing to do with my qualifications. Headmistress. Accountant. Receptionist. Construction worker. It's still a part of my denial.

Another waiter shows up with a plate of food for Visa Guy. It's chicken strips and masala chips. This is my favourite meal at The Hungry Kenyan. What are the odds? Suddenly, I'm hungry. Comfort food, that's what it is. I'm craving comfort food.

Visa Guy slides the plate across to the middle of the table. He places the fork on the plate angled towards me. Since he's given me his fork, he uses a toothpick to spear the chips and chicken and digs in.

"Everyone dreads Interview Room 3," I say.

Amusement lighting his eyes. "Really?"

"There's a nickname for it."

"Hell?"

"Hell's Kitchen. The show. Not the place."

He chuckles. "I figured."

I almost smile at him and to kill the compulsion, I spear some chips and chicken and eat. Something softens in his eyes, as if he's glad that I'm sharing his food. I want to spit it out but the food is good...and yeah, all right, I don't mind sharing a plate of food with him. Today. Because I'm intrigued and I need to figure out what this thing is. It isn't normal. At all.

We're quiet again as we read/type/write/eat...

A waiter arrives with a cold beer for him and a top-up for me. I don't remember him making the order.

"Thanks," I say.

"You're welcome," he answers.

The traitors have now overrun my island and I know I'm not going anywhere. I stay. And the drinks keep coming.

It's been almost two hours. We've spoken maybe ten lines to each other but it feels like I've been in conversation with him nonstop. It feels...easy...effortless just sitting here. No expectations. No pressure. We can talk or not. Stay or not.

This isn't about a bigger plan up ahead or a goal to be met or a problem to be solved. He is a stranger and we don't have to do anything but sit here, if we want. It's about now. And it's completely therapeutic. Another set of drinks arrives. I've now switched to wine. He's still drinking beer. He shuts his book and his laptop. I tacitly question.

"Need to rest my eyes," he explains. "I go through the week staring at a screen."

"Do you like what you do?" It's an accusation more than a question, the first direct hit at our history.

He takes my question in stride, as he always does. "I look at the facts laid before me and I make an assessment."

"What happens if you make a mistake?"

"Then I make a mistake. I'm not infallible."

"Too bad for the lives that are screwed."

"The system caters for that."

Arguably it does. That's what appeals are for.

"Why didn't you appeal?" he asks. I realize, he's never once mentioned my case directly apart from to tell me he gave his reasons for denying my visa.

"We couldn't afford it."

"It's free."

"And to make a difference you need a lawyer. Ergo, we couldn't afford it."

He starts to say something but I think he realizes he can't...policy rearing its head again. He falls silent. But there's no book or laptop to return to so he just stares at me, those intense eyes taking me in. If I was any lighter in complexion, I'd be beet red by now. I'm fairly certain my breathing has intensified as I try my best not to squirm under his scrutiny.

When I glare at his intrusive gaze he says, "It's only fair."

And this time I can't help it. I smile. Broadly. He smiles back. We hold gaze for what can only be a few seconds but it feels as if he looked right into me, seen me. As if something has just clicked. I look away, shy. He disconcerts me in ways I hate to admit.

I realize what kind of slippery slope I'm standing on when I can't get myself to meet his gaze again, afraid of the effect it will have on me. Without a word I'm picking my things off the table as quickly as I can and stashing my quest for the future into a tote bag. An expensive one. I might sell it.

I glance at him, wondering if he'll protest, ask me to stay longer, ask me why I'm suddenly rushing off. But I think he knows. As warped or unbelievable or wrong as it might be...we've just had a moment. My heart is racing. There are undoubtedly butterflies in my stomach. Shit. What the hell?

"Well, thanks again. For lunch, drinks, you know. But I probably shouldn't thank you that much. You kinda owe me."

I'm blabbling, attempting to return the scales to where they should be. Me, hating his guts. Him, indulging me out of what I've decided is boredom and/or guilt. Not that he exhibits any signs of guilt. Or boredom.

Subtly I wait for his response.

"Have a good evening, Rain," he says. He's back to being the man in Interview Room 3...Distant. It startles me a little bit as I search his eyes. They're still mesmerizing, but they're shielded now. I wonder if he's making his own kind of retreat or if he's simply allowing me mine.

"Have a good evening, Darien."

Our eyes lock again at my use of his name. Then I bolt.

I want to talk to somebody, but this is something I can't tell even Al. I'm not sure there is anything to tell. I had lunch and drinks with the man that denied my visa, we didn't really talk but I immensely enjoyed his presence, more than I've enjoyed anyone's presence in a while. I left my house this morning feeling like crap because I think I'm losing my fiancé...but I've come back home thinking of someone else.

I can't tell anyone this. I can barely admit it to myself. This isn't the type of thing I do. By nature, I am a good girl. I wasn't your standard teenager. I never did the rebellion, club till dawn, steal the folks' car, fake ID gig. It just never appealed to me or maybe it was the abject fear I had of my mother. I always knew whatever I tried to hide, she'd find out about it just by looking at me. My mother should have been employed by the Central Intelligence Department. Her skills of getting the truth out of people were wasted on us.

If my mother were here right now, would she take one look at me and see through me? There is a man I can't get out of my head and he isn't my fiancé. Visa Guy, right now, is like that Trojan living within the walls of my operating system. I keep seeing glimpses of its effect but I can't zero down on where it's imbedded or when it made the entry. Or what that means...to me.

My mind is screaming again...my fingers itching to open my laptop and email him. Maybe he's emailed me. But he's never taken initiative with us... well, he did give me his number and he did make the first move today with the space on the table, lunch...drinks. What I mean is, every time he's opened communication, it's because I've been there already. He's never gone out of his way to seek me out. So of course, he wouldn't email.

I push my laptop away, distancing myself from the temptation. I send urgent messages to my brain to please, kindly, if it has any love for me at all... delete all things Darien from my database. Just delete him. I don't even want to be angry at him anymore. I want him gone. There is nothing good that can come out of this. Nothing has.

It's end month on Monday and I'm paying my bills. The trepidation I get is nothing to sneeze at. I have my last paycheque and of course I have the savings. But my brain is projecting itself to months from now when I run out. If I haven't gotten another job by then, I am in serious trouble.

All my jokes about cutting down on booze and cheese are not jokes anymore. This is real. I have about three months to live. I shouldn't panic, panic won't help me. What I need is an action plan. Isn't that what the gurus say? Decide on a vision and a mission...map it out.

I start jotting things down:

  1. Get a Job.

  2. Make a six-month financial plan.

  3. Solve my relationship with Theo.

My relationship. That is the one thing I can deal with right now. No more denial. Without giving myself time to think about it, I pick up my phone and call Theo. Voice mail. I'm beginning to wonder if he's screening my calls. This time I leave a message, something he will definitely be inclined to respond to.

"Hi, babe. I need to know where we stand. Are you prepared to wait or not?"

That's succinct. There is no mistaking what I mean.

I tick that off the list. I wish I had the motivation to do numbers one and two, but I don't. I'm tired right now. Drained and tired. But I've made the first step in the right direction, so for the rest of the morning at least, all I plan to do...is breathe.

I take out my Blackberry Playbook and look for a good story. Lately, I've been drawn to paranormal romances, angels and vampires in particular. Immortality has a certain appeal. Imagine if you had over a thousand years to figure out who you are. Let's even bring it down to five hundred. If you didn't have to worry about your body giving out, your vibrance fading...if you had all the time in the world, what would you do now?

I'm daydreaming about all the options I'd have for life if I was an immortal. The buzzing of my phone startles me. It's a text from Theo. I stare down at the phone for a long time before I actually pick it up. I'm not sure what he will say, truth is, I'm not sure what I want him to say. A part of me wants to remain in limbo, another just wants the truth, right now, so that we can move on in a definite direction. I open the message.

I can't do this babe. I need to think. Let's take a break.

Wow. Quietly, I put the phone aside and continue reading about an air hostess being mesmerized by a billionaire passenger. I should have picked a career where you can escape to another country when your own reality gets a little bit too real. My reality is real but I'm stuck. No other country will have me.
CHAPTER FIVE

I walk into The Hungry Kenyan armed with my newspaper, books, red marker, and laptop in my soon-to-be sold tote bag. Amil waves happily at me from behind the counter. There is an unusual glint in his eye and I know instinctively that Visa Guy is here.

The truth is I'd known that when I left my house in the morning and told the girls that I couldn't go to Naivasha with them. It's a trip we've been planning for a while. I used being broke as an excuse and when they offered to pay, I used being depressed, and when they coaxed that Naivasha would make me feel better, I lied. I had a potential meeting with a potential employer at 1 p.m.

Of course they wondered why I hadn't mentioned this. I'm in PR, I'm used to thinking on my feet. I told them I didn't want to jinx it. They got that and wished me luck.

I'm riddled with guilt at my sort of lie. I mean, I will be spending the day in potential interviews with potential employers in the newspaper and online. I will make sure, whatever else, I accomplish that at least. But I know deep down why I blew off my friends. Some of it is about the pressure. When I'm with them I feel pressure because I know how worried they are for me. They want me to fix things with Theo, one way or the other. "Break up or make it work," Sly said in a phone conversation last night.

When we're not talking about Theo, we're talking about the jobs they've heard about, ideas on how to make money. They mean well, but they're suffocating me. I need this one day with them out of town to just...not suffocate.

So here I am at The Hungry Kenyan...not suffocating as I walk out into the garden sitting area, and turn automatically to the corner table I know he'll be occupying. I silently watch him.

He has his back to me but his face is embedded in my mind. Green eyes sometimes streaked with silver, holding my gaze so softly I'd had to steady my breath.

I should leave. Flee now. I am the master of disguises and whatever I'm feeling is still masquerading as curiosity. I approach, my eyes roving over his arms, his back clearly toned even under the loose-fitting shirt he wears, sleeves rolled up. Jeans, sneakers...I like his casual look. So very unlike Interview Room 3.

He hasn't turned to look at me, but he's moving his things to his side of the table. My heart catapults when I realize he's clearing it for me. How did he know I was here? Silently, without greeting, I slide in. I don't even pretend to hover today. There'd be no point. We hardly look at each other as I spread my paraphernalia.

Less than a minute later a waiter arrives with a bottle of wine for me, beer for him. I glance at him, part amused, part rebellious.

"Maybe I wanted something else."

"Do you?" he asks.

"No."

"Case closed."

"Is it always that simple?"

We're not talking about drinks anymore, obviously.

"Almost always."

"Does it bother you?"

I think he'll say no, he's just doing his job. But he takes a moment, sips his beer, his eyes studying me. "It hasn't in a while."

I blink away my vulnerability and focus on an imaginary ad in the paper. I take my marker and circle around it.

"Lonely hearts?" he asks, amusement in his voice.

I only notice then that I'm on the wrong page and what I've circled is truly a lonely hearts ad. "50-year-old man looking for caring wife."

"My otherwise well-laid plans changed unexpectedly," I say, straight- faced.

"I admire your ability to adjust," he answers, equally straight-faced.

"Exactly. Getting back on that horse, riding for all I'm worth."

"That could be misconstrued in oh, so many ways, Rain."

"For the perverted mind, maybe."

He chuckles. "Are you hungry?"

I'm not sure whether there's a double entendre in that statement or not. "No," I say.

"Too bad, I ordered a platter of Ethiopian enough for two."

"On the offhand chance that some hungry damsel would happen by?"

"If this is bait, are you going to bite?"

My mouth goes dry. I can't get myself to look at him. That was definitely a double entendre. Thump. Thump. I know he's looking at me, I know those eyes are alight with amusement. I should meet his gaze, say something witty but wit has deserted me.

I'm only saved by the arrival of the Ethiopian platter. He really must have ordered it before I got here. A waiter places two finger bowls on the table, one for him, the other for me. I watch as he rinses off his fingers and digs in. He has long fingers, beautiful fingers. A rebel on my island whispers completely inappropriate thoughts to me. I flush when he raises his eyes.

"You have to save me from myself or I'm seriously going to eat all this food alone."

Where does it go? He is muscle, all muscle. Things about Visa Guy don't add up. How is he tanned when he spends most of his time seated behind a desk? How is he so bloody toned? He comes off as this clipped, aristocratic Englishman in that room, but out here, he eats chicken and chips with a toothpick, injera as it's meant to be eaten, with his hands. His hair is sun-kissed, his eyes too deep, too wild.

There is something I'm missing. Something is definitely off. He doesn't strike me as a docile person, he doesn't even strike me as someone who plays by the rules he instils when he does his job.

"You probably know things about me that I'd never tell a stranger but I don't know anything about you," this is almost a thought but I say it out loud.

He looks at me and I try to recollect everything that I sent in with my application, assess what he does know about me. There were pictures of Theo and me, growing up, grown up...there is one where I'm in a swimming suit on a very bad hair day, with my baby tummy still sticking out, my head still too big for my body. I cringe when I think he's seen that picture of me.

What bothers me more than the pictures are the letters, correspondence between Theo and me. Some of them are fact-file, us talking about school and work. Others are deeply personal. Theo saying he misses me, loves me, can't wait to be with me. Me, telling him how I cried myself to sleep thinking about him, wanting his arms around me.

I'm bristling with embarrassment. When I sent those very intimate letters to a complete stranger I never imagined I would encounter him anywhere outside of a professional setting.

I wanted things to look authentic so I chronologically mapped out my life history with Theo. This man knows when my relationship started...he knows most of its hallmarks. Did he catch, in that detailed depiction, that Theo and I haven't slept together?

"The information you send to us is confidential," he says.

"That doesn't mean you can delete it from your brain once you're done." I should know. I've tried to delete him several times.

"Okay. Let's even out the playing field a little."

"I get to ask twenty questions."

"I was thinking more like five."

"Twenty. The application was long enough. At least you know I'm not a terrorist."

"It's highly unlikely someone would list that, if they were."

"Then why is the question there?"

"Because later you can catch them in the lie."

"And of course that would be a bigger crime than the actual act of terrorism they committed. They lied to the British High Commission. God forbid!"

He laughs. "Ten questions, final offer."

"Fifteen, counteroffer."

"You just want to win."

"It's my turn."

There is that light in his eyes again, the veiled amusement that one might get when dealing with an irrational child. "We'll be here awhile," he concedes.

I don't mind.

"Question number one," he prompts.

"Why do you reply to my emails?"

"Why do you email me?"

"That's answering a question with a question. It's against the rules."

"Whose?"

"Mine. And I have the power right now. I am Interview Room 3."

Slow smile. Pause. He's weighing his answer.

"A)," I say, deciding to help him out, "I was bored. B) I have a compulsive disorder to reply to emails. C) I was feeling guilty. D)..."

"D) You're one of the most intriguing people I've ever met," he says, "and I've met a lot of intriguing."

His answer throws me for a second. I want to ask him what he means, intriguing good or intriguing bad or intriguing as in, someone should be putting me on medication, intriguing. But that would be too obvious, placing my heart on a platter at his feet and he already holds most of the cards.

He can see the thoughts ticking through my mind.

"Don't waste your questions, Rain. Fourteen left."

He's right. I'll keep the opinion of me questions on another shelf. This experiment is about me finding out about him.

"How long have you lived in my country?"

He doesn't miss the overly emphasized, "my country."

"This time round or in total?"

"You've been here before?"

"Does that qualify as question number three?"

"Of course not. I'm seeking clarification."

"So it's 2A and 2B?"

"Yes," I snarl, then smile because our conversation is reminding me of one I'd have with Al. Silly at its very best attempt.

"2A," he says, "this time round I've been here six months. 2B, I've been in and out of Kenya all my life."

"How come?"

"Family. Work. Not necessarily in that order."

My mind is ticking. Family? I glance surreptitiously at his left hand...no ring. Which doesn't mean anything. Why do I care what his marital or relationship status is anyway? I don't. LIAR...this chorused by all the inhabitants of my island. I'll have to bring this disorder under wraps soon.

"You have twelve more questions," he says. "So you could speculate or you could ask me what you want to ask me."

My stomach flips. I think he caught the glance. I could pretend I don't understand what he means and ask him something inane like what kind of car he drives, but that would only amuse him. He sees through me. I still can't figure out why or how. I need a minute to regroup and since I'm a girl, I have the perfect excuse.

"Excuse me," I say and push back my seat, "bathroom break."

He rises, he actually rises as I rise. Who does that anymore? He looks early-thirties tops. Maybe he's a vampire.

"It's good breeding, Rain," he says.

"It's 1849."

"Interestingly enough, 1849 is the year the first woman in the US earned a medical degree and became a physician. Elizabeth Blackwell."

"Who knows stuff like that?"

"Good education."

I almost sit back down because the moment I wanted to escape from has been turned back to nonsensical conversation. Though I'm impressed that he knows when the US got its first female physician.

"UK?" I ask, just to test him.

"Margaret Ann Bulkley. 1812. Though she disguised herself as a man."

"Kenya?" I'm pretty sure he doesn't know this one.

"Florence Ng'endo Mwangi. 1961."

Wow.

"Seriously, why do you know all this?"

"My brain stores information."

"As in you've got a photographic memory?"

He stalls, when he answers there's almost a hint of an apology in there somewhere. "Something like that."

I'm almost hyperventilating when I cower in the bathroom a few seconds later. I am now a 100 percent sure he didn't just skim through my file. He read it because it would have been very simple for him to do so. Photographic memories are like cameras. Click once and that picture is stored. At least I read that somewhere.

Every single detail that I sent with my application is imbedded in his brain, forever. Everything he might have looked up on me after that...it's in his head. I don't mind the life facts...but I mind the pictures and most of all, I mind the letters. I feel exposed and completely disadvantaged. Like going to battle without your weapons. I wish I could turn back time for many reasons. I wish I could reverse being at that supermarket.

Then now I'd just be lost and broken because I've lost my fiancé and my job. I wouldn't, on top of that, be confused by green dazzling eyes. Green...I test the name on my lips. I've gone through Hell's Kitchen...to Visa Guy...is he going to become Green?

As I walk out of the bathroom, despite my mini-nervous attack, I admit that I'm on this bus and I'm not sure where the next stop is...when the next stop is. I don't even recognize this route and because of that I have to stay, find out.

Life is made of those moments. The moments when you end up at Gate 5 instead of 3 and miss your flight, Valley Arcade instead of Adam's Arcade and miss your date, when you randomly pop into a restaurant and meet your potential destiny.

I'm too scared to contemplate anything past this lunch/drinks/whatever thing going on with...Green. I have more than twelve questions to ask him. So I need to pick them carefully. This is my carte blanche and I won't waste it.

When I return to the table our meal has been cleared. He is dipping those elegant fingers into a fresh lemon-scented bowl. He rises again, waits for me to sit.

"Thank you, kind sir," I mock in an affected English accent.

He grins. Sits. "That wasn't bad."

"I practiced. From the same place I learned about double-decker buses, pretty bridges, and red phone booths."

"You're going to use that interview against me for all it's worth, aren't you?"

"That's the plan. For starters, the fact that you have a photographic memory should earn me a bonus question."

He wipes his hands on a serviette and pushes a dessert menu across to me.

"I will not be side-tracked," I say, but I open the menu.

"Trust me, if I wanted to side-track you, I could get you to talk about something as random as the fishing habits in Kisumu."

The confidence and authority in the way he makes that statement reasserts my suspicion that there is more to him than meets the eye.

"Do you often get people to tell you exactly what you want to know?"

"Yes," he says and doesn't elaborate. "That was the bonus question."

I know he isn't talking about Interview Room 3. My curiosity and imagination are at an all-time high. What is he? Some sort of British government interrogator?

"What are you having?" he asks.

"Ice-cream."

My courage to delve further into my line of questioning vanishes. He wouldn't answer anyway, there's some sort of wall that's come up, a version of Hell's Kitchen. I'm intimidated all over again.

He takes over the conversation, convinces me that we should order a sundae, those ridiculously huge ones that come with all the flavours, nuts, chocolate sauce, hot fudge cake...the works. It's decadent and I love it. Frivolity...something that might be out of my league in a very short while.

Grasping onto the spirit of frivolity, I blindly launch into my next question.

"Are you single?"

Pause.

"Yes."

It's how he says it. Quiet. Loaded. Directed straight at me. I try to look away but I can't. It's like I'm transfixed to that endless green, drawn in by those subtle streaks of silver. I'm in trouble.

I'm practically engaged...ex-engaged. Whatever. It doesn't matter. I'm with someone, even if that person isn't precisely sure he wants to be with me. I made a commitment...I can't just walk away without a fight. Do I want to fight for Theo?

"What has he done, Rain?" I hear Sly's voice in my head. "You've made all the effort. When was the last time he did anything for you?"

I can't remember and I feel like I'm hyperventilating all over again. I don't even know it but I must be putting my things into my bag because Darien says,

"Don't run."

It brings me crashing back to earth as I focus on this man, this beautiful man sitting across from me. Unlike me, he's composed. He doesn't look like Pandora's box has been opened, doesn't look like a war has been declared over the status quo. He's still. Like that horse whisperer, silently assuring the wild trapped filly that everything will be okay. It calms me down. I take a breath, I breathe.

"Am I going to be stuck eating a triple ice-cream sundae on my own?" he asks, clarifying my intention to stay.

After a moment, I shake my head. I don't trust my voice.

But he knows I'm still skittish because for the first time today, he glances down at his book. He's giving me space, time to recollect, decide what I've taken his being single, that potent look, to mean.

The sundae arrives, two long spoons. Quietly, we start eating. I'm casting glances at him, glances which I know he's aware of. He has this sixth sense it seems. Vampire. I'm convinced.

"I wasn't running," I blurt out.

"You were running, Rain. And you don't need to. Think of this as just two people, one sane," —teasing smile— "one not so sane...sharing an afternoon."

I'm definitely the insane one in that equation. I've got to be if I'm still sitting here. I try for a smile but it's weak, nervous.

"Where's my witty comeback?" he asks.

This time my smile is real and calmness returns, that same quiet we first had when we sat for hours not talking. I like it. It's like a healing balm over my very bruised soul. It's me, not suffocating.

We're halfway through our sundae. I want it to last longer, this moment here with him. I don't know if that's what prompts me to pick up my phone and scroll down to a certain message.

He's watching me, without watching me. I debate, if I do this...everything will change. Do I want it to?

My heart is thumping as my constituents take another vote. Half of them want to stay in limbo, waiting for that definite answer from Theo. The other half want to take that break he asked for too. We need to think. We need to be pushed out of this nest of comfort we've been perched on for far too long.

"Make it work or break up with him, Rain." Sly...my internal not so moral campus...my true north.

I think it's her hand that takes over mine and slides the phone across to Green...yes, we're calling him Green. He glances at the phone, then at me. I don't say anything. This is the moment where he chooses to take what's handed to him or not.

It's the text from Theo telling me he wants to take a break. I'm watching for signs as Darien reads it but there's nothing. He's blank. He pushes the phone back to me. I'm not sure what I expected. Funnily enough it wasn't shock, but it wasn't this.

This time, I run.
CHAPTER SIX

I run as far as Kisumu, an impromptu trip on a night bus. No, I've not totally gone off the bend, my parents and younger sister live in Kisumu. My mum and dad, wait for it...fish. I'm laughing as I think about it because when Darien mentioned fishing in Kisumu, I'm now certain it wasn't a random analogy. Consciously or not, he was recalling in that photographic mind of his, what my family does for a living.

Now, my folks are not rich by a long shot, but we never wanted for anything. They sacrificed, they planned ahead, they made good business decisions...including, but not restricted to, planting sugarcane and cedars. It's amazing how much this can bring in. So we had money, enough for a good education and good foundation for my sister and me.

Sunshine, yes, they called her Sunshine, and I are about as different as our names. She was the steady one, constant, like the sun. She knew what she wanted from life before she hit puberty. I used to laugh when she'd tell me she was going to marry a nice farmer, live on a nice farm and raise children. This was especially so when she got introduced to the night life, parties, and booze.

Sunshine was no Sunday-school girl, that's for sure. But even then, as she danced into my room the next morning, she'd tell me she was "sowing her wild oats" so that when she met her man, she'd know he was the right guy.

I'd tease her that she'd end up picking up her future husband in a bar. And she kinda did. It was an office party and he was one of the guests, but as I continued to remind her over the years...she'd still met her future husband in a bar.

And yes, he was a farmer...except large scale. He owns one of the biggest rice plantations in Kisumu. Unlike Theo and me, they didn't drag out their engagement. They were married within the same year. He was much older than her, ten years, which worried my folks a lot.

"Sometimes you just know, Mama," Sunshine assured her.

Sunshine and Ogonda have been married for four years now. No kids yet because Ogonda insisted Sunshine must live for herself first. I always thought that would be a sore spot for them but I think the first few trips they took to South Africa and then the Seychelles, just the two of them, sold Sunshine over. Not that she was easily bought. But she once told me, being alone with him—just him—was more than having her wildest dreams come true.

Ogonda spoils her rotten. I don't think I've ever seen a man who worships more the ground his woman walks on. Oh, my dad loves my mum, no question there. But theirs is more a union and respect of two practical souls choosing to spend a lifetime together. With Ogonda and Sunshine, it's like Romeo and Juliet, Tristan and Isolde, without the tragic endings.

I don't know what it was between Theo and me. Friendship. Comfort. Function. He was there and he was all I'd ever known. I realize I'm referring to him in the past tense, like this thing between us is over. How do you just end a relationship that goes as far back as scraped knees and grass-stained jeans?

I look out the window as the bus rolls towards Kisumu. It's dawn, the sun is rising over the rice fields of Ahero. This little town just on the outskirts of Kisumu is coming to life. I'm a city girl and yet seeing these classic upcountry sights moves something in me: several men on bicycles calling out to each other as they ride to work, little children walking in groups to school, books tied in make-shift bags, women balancing baskets of fresh produce on their heads as they make their way to the market. Shop fronts are opening, milkmen, vans, newspapers vendors making their deliveries.

I take in a deep breath of fresh air...I'm home.

My folks are excited to see me, if a little surprised. My mother wants me to sleep as soon as she opens the door for me, declaring I couldn't possibly have gotten any rest on the bus. I didn't. But I'm afraid if I sleep right now, I'll be haunted by green eyes, carefully reading a message and giving nothing away.

"Don't run."

My heart constricts, from the anxious anticipation of what might be and the painful dread of what might have lived in my head. I distract myself by giving my mother my full attention. She's filling me in on stories of the farm. Who's doing what. Whose daughter flew out to where, whose son proposed to whose cousin. I'd forgotten how much of a close-knit community this is.

My parents live on the borders of Kisumu, so while this is upcountry, it isn't quite rural. But modernization hasn't changed it enough to remove that blissful peace and earthiness you can only get from the countryside.

A lot of my childhood was spent here. We didn't always live in this house. This house came up right before Sunshine was born. I remember my dad stressing because he wanted us moved in before the new baby arrived.

In those last weeks, his fellow colleagues, men who owned fishing boats and sugarcane plantations, would show up after work to help the contractors. They put in the finishing touches, the paint, the garden, the doors to cupboards, wardrobes, the tiles in the bathroom.

Whenever my mum allowed me, I would accompany my dad, insisting on helping out. At four years old, an environment like this was a serious hazard for a little girl. My dad would place me in the corner, give me a canvas and paint brushes and ask me to paint pictures for the house. I did, with all my four-year-old gusto.

Those pictures are framed in the living room to date. Sunshine did her own pictures too when she was old enough because my parents did not want her to feel left out. So our framed paintings decorate our house.

I love my family with a fierce possession. No matter what Theo had said, there was no way I'd have left my mum and sister when my dad was sick.

As he walks into the kitchen and I leap up to hug him, it hits me, totally from left field that a part of me is relieved that I won't be leaving, even now.

My dad has recovered but he isn't the strong vibrant man he once was. I live in secret fear of the day I get a call that his cancer has returned. I cannot imagine life without my dad, my mum...my sister. I'm not sure Theo ever got that.

"So what is this that's making you jump on a night bus without warning?" my dad asks. He isn't the kind to indulge in the small talk my mum has been indulging in since I got here. He attacks, goes for the jugular, kinda like me when caught in a corner.

As my mum flips fresh chapatis on the cooker and I inhale the deep soothing scents of innocent childhood, I tell them about my visa and Theo and my job. Somewhere in the middle of this story Sunshine arrives. She gets the gist of it. My visa was denied and Theo broke up with me then I lost my job.

My mum's first reaction is sympathy. Sunshine's is anger. She can't believe I waited this long to tell them. They knew I had gone to the High Commission but the results can take anywhere from a week to two months to come in, depending on the background check needed. I'd told them this going in, so they were assuming the results were not back yet.

"Are you looking for a job?" my mum asks.

"Yes, Mama. I'm going to have to live somehow."

"You can move back here, go into the family business."

I give her a look that tells her there is no way in hell I'd ever consider that.

"You've never tried it," she insists, "but every time something happens and you need escape, where do you come?"

"I come home."

"To Kisumu. Fishing. Farming. It's what your grandparents did, their grandparents. This is where your blood runs."

I politely listen to my mother...we all do...as she maps out the family tree for me. It's what she does when she's stressed and trying to figure out an answer. Her default position is always "going back to what you know." Like she mentioned, the fact that I run home when things are extra difficult only solidifies her standpoint.

Basically my mum is telling me I have a place to return to. As out of the world as that theory is...latte drinking, large sunglasses, tequila shot girl, remember...there is a comfort in knowing no matter how wild the currents become, there is safe harbour. Kisumu, my parents' farm, is that harbour for me.

My dad goes off into the sitting room to read his newspaper as breakfast brews. My mum, in a tradition I'm glad hasn't died, gives me a hot chapati to take to him, "while he waits."

I place the plate on a stool beside him. He nods at the opposite chair, his way of telling me to sit. I do. There is a respect, a cultural honouring of my parents that will never leave me.

"Yes, Baba?"

"How are you?"

I think he's the first person to ask me that, everyone else has been too busy reacting...except Green, who didn't react at all. I swallow the lump in my throat, not sure whether it's because of my dad's question or Green's apparent lack of interest.

"I'm okay."

"You loved this boy."

"Yes."

"Then you can't be okay."

I don't say anything...I don't need to.

"It's better it happened now," he says. "You will heal."

That's it. End of conversation and yet maybe more potent than anything I've shared with anyone up until now. The things said and not said in those few short sentences are astounding. While my father acknowledges that I loved Theo and we had a relationship and plans to get married, his easy acceptance of this breakup tells me he'd seen it coming. "Better it happened now."

I want to ask him why he never said anything, warned me, told me going to England to get married was a bad idea. I want to ask him why he never demanded a bride price be paid before his daughter jetted off to a foreign land, why the families hadn't yet started talking about traditional meetings to solidify the union... I know sometimes these things happen at the very last moment but my father hadn't even hinted at it. Neither...had Theo.

As far as traditions go, we aren't sticklers but there are some things most of our parents would expect. This would have been one of them. I'd once tried to bring it up with my dad but he dismissed me, telling me it wasn't my place to talk about my own bride price or the families "officially" meeting. This was the parents' job and this could only be done once the groom had made his official declaration.

The fact that nothing like this had been done now made it clear to me that Theo had never officially made his intentions known to my parents. My father would never have stood in our way, regardless. But I think a part of him might have written Theo off, or seen beyond the veil of my childhood fairy tale, when Theo hadn't thought it important to go through the honourable channels and include my parents (and his) in the journey to our marriage.

It said a lot to my father. I'm not sure what it says to me.

I rise, kiss him on the cheek. "I love you, Baba."

He doesn't say it back but I hadn't expected him to. My dad has never been verbally affectionate yet never once have I doubted his love for me. He squeezes my hand, reassuring me in his quiet strength that everything will really, really be okay.

My conversation with Sunshine is different, more open...and less.

"Do you want me to bash him or be understanding?" she asks.

"Actually, I'd like to talk about anything else. Babies on the way?"

So we talk love and life and dreams...and we remember our childhoods and all the times I got her in trouble, because it was always me and my bright ideas that got us in trouble. We talk about Kisumu and our childhood friends, where they are...how surprising some turned out to be.

She tells me a few things about her and Ogonda. Her conclusion is that marriage isn't always easy but when you wake up in the morning, and most mornings, your heart is sore with the love you hold for that annoying, irritating and sometimes magical man...you know you got it right.

She hugs me, tells me anything I need...anything...even a place to stay, their doors are open.

I know. Ogonda had offered to give me his bank statements but I hadn't thought I'd need them. It's a common practice, to use someone else's statement and have them write a letter saying they are willing to support you. To some extent, Ogonda would have. But I wanted everything above board... "It's not the innocent people who get denied visas," I'd said. "It's the people trying to hide something."

Shows what I know. Still, I'm glad I told the truth...not only because I'd have felt guilty as crazy, but because somehow...somehow...Visa Guy would have seen through me.

By the time I get to bed, it's well past noon and I'm so exhausted that I black out. I dream of silver-green eyes, laughing into mine.

I wake up at five, refreshed. After a shower, I put on a pair of cut-off jeans and a spaghetti top, grab my faithful tote bag and laptop and head off to one of the piers.

On my way out I ask my mum if she'd like help with dinner but she declines, telling me I'm here to rest. She's sure when I get back to Nairobi it will be stress, all over again. Clearly, my mother and Nairobi do not have a good relationship.

I greet enough people on my way to the pier. Most of them are my parents' age, the young are across the country and the world, making new histories and living in new cultures. I wonder how many of them will be back, if ever.

But enough of them must return because if they didn't, these towns would wither and die and Kisumu, though nothing like Nairobi, is vibrant in its own way.

I sit at the pier, which has bleachers at one end. These bleachers were built for the crowds to watch the fishermen challenging each other to boat races once a month. Some businessman thought it would be good advertising for him if his logo was splashed across the terraces. I know those races still happen but the crowds watching them have changed.

Once, everyone came out here, now the "townies," "poshies" have more extravagant ways of entertaining themselves, least of which is watching fishermen manoeuvre through shallow waves on a hot Sunday afternoon.

I am a creature of habit, so I sit in a spot I've sat in since I started coming here. There is a stick picture curved into the side of two little girls holding hands, the sun shining above them, the rain falling around them. Beneath the picture are the words, "Sunny Rain." Sunshine had been six when we drew that, me ten. We thought it was funny and cute.

My dad hadn't, explaining to us that we had vandalized someone else's property...but we noted, after a while, that he never did anything about it and neither did the businessman who was a friend of my dad's. So I guess they must have found it cute too.

I gaze at some boats setting out into the lake, hoping to make an evening catch. The sun will be setting soon and the view when that happens, is to die for. I'm home...sitting nestled in the comforts of the things that change while remaining the same. For most of us, childhood is that special place, those memories of when there was someone to take care of us, protect us against the harshness of life while introducing us to its joys.

I think many, after the escape brought on by rebellion and quest for adventure, would like from time to time, to have this safe space to return to. I wonder now, if Theo and I were truly living in the present or simply trying to hold on to some of the magic that had been us, two very loved children, growing up.

The past few years haven't been easy...so maybe this was our last anchor to that comfort of unconditional protection. If we were more than this, if we were love...even when the anchor was pulled...shouldn't our ship have floated?

The wreckage isn't washing up yet. I don't know how deep it has sunk but sooner than later those planks will start arriving at shore, because the sea isn't designed to hold the dead. I don't know if I'm dealing right now or if I'm just sitting here...waiting...for the death of my relationship to wash up on the sandy beaches. Maybe then I'll be able to deal. I'll be forced to.

I open my laptop and as if it's the most natural thing in the world, I click "Compose."

TO: Darien Mitchell

SUBJECT: Fishing in Kisumu

Hey. Are you there?

A.K.

No reply comes. I sincerely regret ripping his business card apart now. What I really want to do is call him...hear his voice, snobbish and earthy all at the same time. I want to hear him laugh...at me, with me. Most of all, I want to see his smile, that slow smile that curves over his very kissable lips when I've said something inane. I now know I say those things to see his reaction. It's a game we started playing as early as Interview Room 3.

I click refresh again. Still nothing. I guess he's busy... I know he isn't with a girlfriend or partner because he is single. Which doesn't mean he isn't with a random chick. He wouldn't have trouble finding someone to take to his bed, that's for sure. He's gorgeous. He's confident. And yes, though I hate to admit it, the reality is that he's white. White men in Nairobi are a catch.

But that is a whole other topic.

As I get ready for bed well after midnight, I can't help checking my email again. This is the longest I've waited for a reply. I've almost convinced myself that he decided this strange relationship is not worth the effort.

"Don't run."

I ran. Did he decide to walk away too?

One new message. The noise in my chest is suppressing all other impulses. I literally have to concentrate to click on the "Inbox" button.

DARIEN MITCHELL.

There is relief and joy and anxiety and butterflies rushing through me as I stare at his name, unwilling just yet to see what his reply is. Something serious? Witty? Teasing?

I click it open.

From: Darien Mitchell

RE: Fishing In Kisumu

It appears I've underestimated my powers...you went to Kisumu?

V.G.

p.s. yes...I'm here.

Breathe, Rain, breathe. I read the lines over and over again. It's classic Darien, simple sentences veiled with double meanings. He could be teasing me about his earlier claim that he could get me to talk about anything he wanted...or he could be saying the more obvious thing...the more accurate one...that I ran all the way to Kisumu.

What gets me in the gut, is the last sentence. "I'm here." I check the time code. He sent it about half an hour ago. He might still be awake.

To: Darien Mitchell

RE: Fishing in Kisumu

Since you asked, the fishing this time of year is very good. Watched said fishermen bringing in a healthy catch this evening.

A.K.

I don't address his last sentence because I don't know how to. Will he notice? Yes. My last reply, unlike all my other emails, isn't really open ended. Where will he pick up things after my flight yesterday? Will he pick them up?

Be awake. Please be awake.

From: Darien Mitchell

SUBJECT: Text Message

How are you?

V.G.

I freeze because I don't know how to respond. We've crossed into personal territory. I'm staring down at a time bomb ticking in my hand. There is no question about it, an explosion will happen. The only undetermined factor is where, when, and how. I should run to some corner of the earth where they don't have the Internet or any means of communication with the outside world. This is dangerous. I know in the depth of my gut that this is dangerous. But I can't seem to walk away.

I unfreeze myself enough to hit the reply button.

To: Darien Mitchell

RE: Text Message

I'm okay. I think. Maybe. I don't know.

A.K.

From: Darien Mitchell

RE: Text Message

That's the worst answer I've ever heard.

V.G.

To: Darien Mitchell

RE: Text Message

(Insert witty reply)

A.K.

From: Darien Mitchell

RE: Text Message

(Insert wittier comeback)

V.G.

I smile broadly. Liking him. A lot. Then my inbox blinks with another message.

From: Darien Mitchell

RE: Text Message

Can we finish this fascinating conversation over dinner?

V.G.

To: Darien Mitchell

RE: Text Message

Yes.

A.K.

From: Darien Mitchell

RE: Text Message

Wear flat shoes.

V.G.

I laugh out loud as I shut my laptop because I want to hold on to this...this lightness in my heart that he somehow always manages to bring out. He thinks, he knows, before that dinner is out, I'll be running again.

Earthquake averted in Nairobi, I only spend Sunday night in Kisumu and catch a ride with one of my dad's friends on Monday. Needless to say, I'm laden with food enough to feed an army for two months and despite my greatest protests, pocket money. Yes, my mother actually called it pocket money when she slipped it into my purse this morning.

It's substantial. I'm shocked they offered it given that it's clear my mother's greatest desire is that I return home. The quickest way to do that would be to starve me out of Nairobi. My mother never knew how to play dirty.

On Tuesday, I clean out my house, top to bottom. I don't just mean with water and a rug, I mean I throw away every single scrap of clutter I've accumulated since I moved in four years ago. To my shock, I've filled four large bin bags with receipts, junk mail, proposals, event schedules, documents I don't even recognize.

When I'm done I feel replete, like I'm on the right track. The things I don't throw I put in separate boxes, marked clearly... Memories, Current, Work, Bio...etc. My study looks like a sane place, but more than that, I feel I've therapeutically created room in my life for new things. Except there is a box labelled "Theo" sitting in the centre of everything else.

My phone rings. I don't recognize the number. It could be a potential interview...yes, I've actually made real applications too.

"Hello."

"Ms. Rain."

It's him. I sit because I'm not sure my knees will hold. This is ridiculous, me reacting to him like this. It's never just a normal emotion for me. Extreme anger, extreme snarliness, extreme...nerves.

He doesn't introduce himself...so he knows I know his voice. Thump. Thump. Thump.

"How do you know my number?" I ask, to give my island time to regroup despite the fact that I've been waiting for him to get in touch since Sunday morning.

"How do you think?"

"You're not meant to use that information for personal ventures."

"In all fairness, you initiated communication."

"I didn't," I protest. "You gave me your card, remember? Which I tore, by the way."

"I know."

"How?"

"Because if you still had my number your emails would have escalated to abusive texts."

I giggle...giggle? "Well, now you've just reloaded my ammunition, haven't you?"

"Maybe that's the plan."

Butterflies.

"What are you doing Friday night?" he asks.

Friday?? It's Tuesday. What's he doing tomorrow or the day after that?

"Uhm...can I check my calendar and get back to you?"

I feel him smiling...seeing through me. "You have my number...call, text...whichever."

"I will."

"Goodnight, Rain."

"Goodnight, Darien."

He clicks off before I do. I want to kick myself. Never let him click off before you do. First one who hangs up has the power.

But nothing can dampen my spirits...I have a dinner date with Darien. I've decided I'm not going to stop to think this through. I thought every little detail of my relationship through. Maybe I thought it, literally, to death.

So no more thinking. I'm doing. Being. I'll just have to see where the chips fall.

I can't explain to my friends why I can't see them on Friday. Visa Guy is still a secret, one I'm guarding with my life. I think I know for a fact, the moment this becomes an issue for "the girls," he'll stop being mine. My thoughts slam to a halt...mine? Do I think of him as mine? Not in the sense of possession or anything like that. But Visa Guy...Green...Darien...in some crazy confused way is a boat I'm steering. Rephrase, it's a boat he's allowing me to steer...for now.

I stare at my phone and debate whether to call him, email, or text. I'm chicken, I've decided I'm going to own it. A coward. That little dog barking in the compound until someone approaches it, then it dashes for cover in the living room.

I email.

TO: Darien Mitchell

SUBJECT: Squeezed in a few hours.

Turns out, I'm free Friday.

A.K.

A few minutes later my phone beeps. It's a text message from Darien. I have him saved as H (Hell's Kitchen)...in case my phone falls into the wrong hands (meddling friends).

Please tell me you didn't lose my number...

again.

TO: Darien Mitchell

SUBJECT: Saving the Pennies

It's cheaper to email...unlimited bundle. Besides, someone as old- fashioned as you (1849) should be more accustomed to emails than texts. I'm surprised you know how.

A.K.

My phone rings. I startle, stare at the ID. "H Calling." I grin, heat in my cheeks, and pick up, using the professional "I have no idea who I'm talking to voice."

"Rain's phone, how may I help you?"

He chuckles. "I'll pick you up at seven."

Click. He's gone. I don't bother to ask him how he knows where I live. His answer would be "how do you think?"

I suddenly have the inkling that I'm playing well out of my league, punching above my weight. He's been indulging me, like the hunter, patiently waiting for the deer to grow accustomed to him before he moves in for the kill. The option to hit the "no thank you" button expired. I'm too mesmerized by him to pretend that I'm not. I haven't responded to another man like this, ever. Not even Theo. It's a glaring fact that frightens me as much as it enthrals me. Butterflies have a permanent address in my stomach.
CHAPTER SEVEN

I knock on Al's door on Friday evening, having taken three hours to get ready. I don't know where Darien's taking me and I'm too proud to ask. Asking would make it seem like I'm thinking too much about it. I am. I have been for two days straight. But he doesn't need to know that.

I pick an outfit that can be both extremely classy and casual. The minute I see how he's dressed I'll know whether to ditch the bright red silk scarf with sequins at the edges or not. My outfit is the proverbial small black dress. It's fitting, crocheted, and completely transparent. I have a silk slip underneath, which just about covers the necessary bits. The dress is thigh-high, made more conservative by my black tights but they're a mere whisper on my skin.

My look is completed by red accessories: a delicate pendent, bungles, and butterfly earrings. I didn't wear flats shoes. I'm in high-heeled boots coming all the way to just below my knees.

The three hours have paid off.

Al opens the door and his mouth all but drops open. "Whose mind are you trying to scramble tonight?"

I smile nervously, too nervously.

"Rain?" he asks in his "what are you up to" voice.

"I'm going out with you tonight," I say, "to a family party that your mum is hosting."

"Ah, I see. Clandestine affairs."

"It's not like that."

He casts a pointed look at my outfit.

"Too obvious?" I ask.

"No, darling, you'll blow his mind."

"Will he know I'm trying to blow his mind?"

He grins. "Absolutely."

I start to hyperventilate again.

Al softly kisses the top of my head. "He'll like it, Rain."

"It doesn't say, 'here I am on a platter?'"

"Are you on a platter?"

I want to say no...but I'm not so sure. Al and I operate a "do not judge" policy. It's the wingman code. I'm wondering when he'll address the elephant in the room.

"You're not just going to come out and say it, are you?" he asks.

I shake my head, no.

"It's someone new, someone you just met. After this thing with Theo."

Ish.

"There's only one guy you've gone on about...after this thing with Theo."

Yes. He squints at me. Silence hangs heavy in the air.

I hear a car sliding into the parking lot. It could be the neighbour, but I know it's not. I quickly kiss Al on the cheek...not the lips, which is something we do a lot. Is that significant?

"Do something for me, Al?"

"Anything, precious."

"Don't look out the window."

I've just confirmed his suspicions to him and instead of feeling exposed, I feel better for it. If there is anyone I'd trust this information with, it's Al.

Al is the last thing I'm thinking about when I step out of his apartment and glance below at the parking lot. Darien is stepping out of a Range Rover Sport. Of course. Power, grace, class, and the subtle rebellion against the status quo. The car is perfect for him. Expensive. Hmm.

He sees me and leans against the Range. He's wearing easy dark trousers and a shirt that brings out his build. I realize I haven't truly appreciated it till now. Darien is tall, six foot three, I assume, and etched with athletic muscles. He must have a six pack...I idly wonder if I'll ever experience it first-hand.

The thought jolts me, sends my cheeks blazing with heat. I'm still blushing when I reach him, more so when I catch the very, very male appreciation in his eyes as he takes in my outfit. I falter in my stride. Breathe, Rain, breathe.

"Hey."

"Hey."

"You look beautiful."

Thank you? Nod? Curtsy? Run?

I'm blank, like that naïve teenager dancing with a boy for the first time. He smiles at me, amusement and something else in his eyes, and then he places his hand on the small of my back and leads me to the passenger side of the car. Because he was born in 1849, he opens my door, waits till I'm settled, then closes it.

I take in several deep breaths as he walks to the driver's seat. I refuse to be a blabbering idiot tonight. I'm sure he's used to girls tripping over themselves to get to him. I won't be served on a dish.

As soon as he shuts the door, I've rallied the last remaining sane people on my island and we're taking a protest walk down the streets against shy, wide-eyed Rain. It's working. I glance at him as the car revs in that totally sexy Range Rover way.

"I take it your bank statements are not worrying?"

He grins at me and just like that, we're back, irreverence taking the place of all else.

"Is that question number four at last?"

"Will you answer if it is?"

"A deal is a deal."

"Okay, it's question number four."

"No, my bank statements are not worrying."

"What are we talking? We are convinced you will not 'recourse to public funds' or we are really pleased to have you and your bank account within our shores?"

He smiles, says nothing.

"That's not an answer."

"We are really pleased to have you and your bank account within our shores," he says.

"So not tax payers' money?"

"Some of it is. The next question counts as number five," he warns and somehow I think he wants to skirt around what else he does for a living. He isn't just an immigration officer, that's for sure. I'm not letting him off the hook.

"Question number five, what do you really do for a living?"

He manoeuvres around a bend and we're on a fairly deserted road. He takes curves with a speed and smoothness that is exhilarating. Precision and finesse...butterflies, butterflies.

"Did I ask a particularly complex question, Mr. Darien?"

He gets that twinkle in his eyes. I'm the master at word games, all be warned.

"I'm a consultant," he says.

It's a broad answer but there is a firmness in his voice that tells me he won't divulge more and to probe would be to waste a question...and time. I turn in my seat and openly watch him, my imagination whirling to life.

"Question number six," he says, bringing a definite end to that topic.

"Have you ever dated a black girl?"

He smiles as he pulls up into what looks like a house. There are many cars in the parking lot. House party?

I've already climbed out of the car by the time he gets to my door. He shuts the door, stands directly in front of me, essentially trapping me between him and the car.

"Not yet," he says, in answer to my question.

"Allergic to chocolate?"

He tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. "I like chocolate just fine."

I think several people on my island faint. I'm not far behind.

You're playing a dangerous game, Rain, and you're going to lose, the only wise member of my island tells me. I know. The problem right now is that I don't care. What I need is to feel alive and he makes me feel more alive than I've ever felt with anyone else. I refuse to analyse that statement.

"Where are we?"

"Indigo Blue. Best Italian food in the country, I promise."

"I've never heard of it."

"It's one of those places..."

"You either know about or you don't," I finish. "Exclusive?"

"Kinda."

He leads me into the restaurant, that firm hand on the small of my back doing things to me I'm trying to ignore.

Walking into Indigo Blue is like walking through a portal that transports us straight to Italy. It's magical and I'm completely enraptured. Warm earth colours, cobbled pathways, large trees surrounding a garden dotted with candlelit tables. There are lanterns and fairy lights strewn through the branches. In the corner, a man plays a mandolin.

I turn to Darien and beam like a child in a candy store.

"You like it?" he asks.

I nod.

A Chef, dark curly hair, big muscular build, boisterous, calls out to Darien. He goes into a string of Italian as he approaches, gestures et al.

"Hello, Guiseppe," Darien says, smiling.

Guiseppe glances down at me, takes my hand, and kisses the back. "Bellissima," he says to Darien, as if I'm not standing right there. I understand "bellissima."

"She is," he replies, except Darien is looking at me. I blush and thank God, not for the first time, for my very chocolate skin.

"Rain...meet Guiseppe, Italy's biggest mistake. They never should have let him out of their borders. Guiseppe...Rain."

"Kenya isn't letting me out of hers," I say. Darien smiles at our private joke. Guiseppe looks at both of us, knows he's missed something but he isn't to be daunted.

"Rain, huh? I wouldn't let you leave either. Drought is not good for any country."

I grin at him. I like Guiseppe.

"Tavolo per due?" he asks Darien.

"Per favore."

I figure he's asking if we want a table for two especially because of the questioning gaze he shoots my way as if he's trying to pick up on what the nuances between Darien and me are. He must have decided because he takes us to a secluded table, encased in an alcove surrounded by vine. Like the rest of the restaurant, fairy lights, candles, and lanterns are alive around the table. In the corner is a little bucket seat...for two.

Guiseppe is gone, promising to send a waiter. I barely hear him because my eyes are locked on the bucket seat. This is a couple's table, a lover's table. I turn to find Darien studying me. I turn on my flippant switch because otherwise, I'm not sure I'm going to survive this night.

"Are you trying to seduce me, English?" I tease.

He gently caresses my cheek with the back of his hand. "Not yet."

Racing heartbeat—me.

Sensual smile—him.

Mayday, mayday, we're going down.

He pulls my seat out for me before taking his own. I instantly open my menu and concentrate on it like it's the most interesting thing since sliced bread.

"I pride myself in being able to read people, Rain. I must admit, I didn't realize that you're...shy."

"I'm not shy."

"Then look at me."

I glance up, can't hold that intensive knowing gaze, glance back down. He chuckles.

"Who knew the very Angry Kenyan was just a Shy Kenyan."

Angry Kenyan comes charging back in, looking him square in the eye.

"There she is," he teases.

But she can't last against the onslaught that is Darien: masculine, sensual...totally focused on me.

"The menu is in Italian," I say to distract myself.

"There are English translations underneath."

Of course there are. "Oh."

I don't dare look up because I know those eyes will be laughing at me. Yes, I'm shy. With him. Today. He keeps throwing my concentration. The difference between this and all the other times we've met is that back then he was the enemy. I knew what weapons to use against him. Right now...I am a hundred percent sure that I'm the prey. And when he decides to make his move, I won't see him coming.

"Are you trying to seduce me, English?"

"Not yet."

No, Darien won't be obvious. I don't know that I can defend against him, worse yet, I don't know that I want to.

Theo. Theo is all I've experienced and Theo never made me feel like this. It has to do with childhood and knowing someone inside out...We had sparks, sure, but it was comfortable sparks, sparks that I recognized, understood.

This is alien. And I'm afraid. I shouldn't even be here. It's too soon. Yet I feel a deep sense of injustice. Like life has passed me by and I didn't even realize it because I was too busy trying to live. I'm twenty-seven years old. I'm not supposed to be terrified of the emotions coursing through me. I'm supposed to be a woman, well conversant with my body, its demands. I never felt inadequate with Theo, but with Darien...I am like that Britney Spears song, "Not Yet A Woman."

"Why did you wait?" Darien quietly asks.

I'm so startled by where he's gone that I don't immediately answer. How the hell does he always seem to read my mind? I'm mortified. So the letters did imply that Theo and I hadn't slept together. Shit.

The starters arrive and save me. It's bruschetta with tomatoes and basil. Delicious.

He doesn't push further on the question that I haven't answered. He tells me about another restaurant like this in Italy, run by Guiseppe's mother, everything grown fresh in a garden adjacent to the property. He's even picked up the tomatoes he's going to eat before she made him the most heavenly Bolognese...

"You travel a lot," I say.

"Yeah."

"Do you ever just wish you could stay put?"

"Sometimes. But I like the adventure, the uncertainty. I'm not sure I'm cut out to stick to one place."

"Have you ever been in a steady relationship?"

"Question number seven?" he asks.

I nod.

"Not really."

"Never?"

"It's the travelling."

"Many people travel and have relationships, family."

"I don't do long-distance relationships. They're messy."

I know.

The main course arrives.

"Do you think it's silly?"

We've come back to his question. I don't have to elaborate, I know he gets what I'm asking. My heart is in my throat as I watch him, waiting for his answer. Why does it matter what he thinks? It's never bothered me before what anyone thought.

"I think it's 1849 cute."

I grin at him. "Touché."

"Do you regret it?"

"I haven't really had a reason to. It was part of the plan, you know? The grand white wedding-and-flowers plan."

My voice catches so I fall silent, concentrating too hard on my pasta as I reel in emotions.

"It's his loss, Rain. It really is his loss. He'll figure that out very soon."

"Then what?"

"Then you decide what you want."

"And I get my visa like it's Christmas morning?"

Small smile. "With any luck."

"I told all my friends what an asshole you were in Interview Room 3. Would you be nicer to me this time?"

"I couldn't be the visa officer on your case now."

My heart is thudding again.

"If you were?"

"The same principles would apply."

"Just the facts, the bottom line."

"Yes."

"Is it always about the bottom line with you?"

"Inside those walls, yes."

"And outside?"

I've taken us back onto my slippery slope. Him. Me. This thing we haven't defined. What am I doing?

He takes his time before he answers, "It depends."

"On?"

"What the rules of engagement are."

I shrink. I've spent my entire life saving myself for my husband. Outside of that, I don't know what my rules are. This is a milestone for me. I look up at him and he's watching me with that look that tells me he can track my thoughts loudly and clearly.

"Question number eight. What are your rules of engagement?" I timidly ask him.

"With you?"

I can barely form words. I don't want to say me, though that's the question I'm asking. I'm too vulnerable to admit it.

"In general."

"No attachment. We enjoy the ride and when it's over, it's over."

My heart is crashing against my chest though it isn't an answer that surprises me. He already said he's never had a serious relationship. "Is that enough for you?"

"It's had to be."

"Why?"

"We had this conversation already, Rain."

"I don't buy it. No one locks themselves out of love just because they travel."

He isn't going to answer unless I push further. Do I want to?

"Question number nine. Did someone break your heart?"

He laughs. "No. There isn't a story of an eighteen-year-old boy whose advances are shunned by his one and only true love."

"Cynics aren't born."

"I'm not a cynic. I'm a realist."

"You don't believe in love?"

"I don't believe in forever."

I'm beginning to see another part of him. A part I hadn't noticed in my wild ride of exhilaration. I don't know him. At all. I'm more puzzled about him now than I was before this dinner. None of his actions make sense. Unless I am just a potential conquest.

I realize perhaps he is that house in the woods made of candy luring in unsuspecting prey. But he hasn't used any cloak and dagger with me. This man seemingly immune to love...Hell's Kitchen... he hasn't just sprung up on me. He's been here all along. It isn't as if he has ever tried to hide who and what he is. It's that I've chosen to ignore it...be enticed by it. It was the only thing visceral enough to overshadow my pain from the wreck of Theo.

I swallow hard before I ask my next question. "What are your rules of engagement with me?"

A slice of hardness drops from his eyes...and for a second he is Green. Warm, inviting...though the mystery doesn't leave him.

"What are your rules, Rain?"

"I asked you first."

"My answer is a simple one. I'd rather hear yours."

His answer is "no attachments, no strings, when it's over, it's over." Why am I getting gutted by this? When did my lines between idle curiosity and vested interest merge?

"I'm not looking for a relationship," I manage to mutter.

"But?"

"I'm not...I can't...I don't know if...it means something to me. Being with someone. Sex. It would mean something to me."

He doesn't react in the cynical way I expect him to. He reaches across the table and takes my hand in his. His thumb caresses my knuckles in a touch that's more affection than sensual. It still lights up the pit of my stomach. Shit. Shit. Shit. There isn't anywhere far enough that I can run to silence what I'm feeling.

I glance at him uncertainly, positive my reaction is splattered on my face.

"You...still haven't answered my question," I say.

"I don't know how to be anything else but what I am, Rain. Which is why...we would be a bad idea."

My heart breaks into a thousand pieces.

It breaks for the rest of the evening, despite our greatest attempts to revert to irreverent snarky conversation...it breaks as the sleek Range Rover whizzes me back home, it breaks as he walks me to my door.

It is shattered on the floor as we stand there, second time tonight, my back against the door, the perfection of Darien Mitchell in front of me. This time the moment isn't electrifying. I feel like the bottom of a very old shoe.

"Thank you," I say. "I had a good time."

"Me too."

Politeness has nothing on us. I kick politeness in the gut, Angry Snarky Kenyan taking over.

"Too bad you're not attracted to inexperienced wide-eyed girls, huh? I promise we don't all end up crying on your doorstep begging you to love us."

What the fuck was that?? In a hurry to escape now, I spin to unlock my door. As I push it open, he cups his hand over mine and pulls the door closed. Shit. Playing with fire...not a good idea. I should have embraced the politeness, crawled disappointed but safely into my house. I stand there, my back to him, frozen.

"You think I'm not attracted to you?" he asks against my ear.

One of his hands comes to rest near my head, the other slowly curls around my waist, spreads over my midriff and pulls me back against him. I gasp and brace myself against the door for support as electricity ripples through me.

"Darien..."

"Do you think I'm not attracted to you?" he asks again. I want to answer him but my mouth has gone dry. His lips go to my neck, he nibbles, kisses, bites. I whimper. I'm done. My whole body is alive, cylinders I didn't know existed are firing into action. When I feel his growing arousal behind me, I want to die. My body, in age-old longing, involuntarily grinds against him. He groans.

My knees literally buckle and his hold tightens, keeping me steady. I want him. God, I want him. At that moment nothing matters except the promise of knowing what it feels like to be with him. Woman is awakening in me and she's demanding to be heard. I'm throbbing everywhere. He subtly presses me tighter to him before he slowly puts distance between us.

"Goodnight, Rain."

He's gone. I'm reeling. What just happened? My body is burning, my mind is confused, my heart is racing... Darien is gone. He walked away. The cold air, taking place of his warm heat, shoots reality through me. He walked away.

I escape into my living room and shut the door. Shame washes over me as I sink to the floor. I hate myself...for being so vulnerable to him so quickly. I hate myself for being obvious, for the truth that if he had wanted to, Darien could have seduced me into bed tonight. That precious thing I was saving would mean nothing by morning. To him.

I hate myself. This is why he doesn't get involved with girls like me. Good girls. Too easily snared, too easily broken.

I realize I'm crying...painful jerky tears. I'm tired, so tired of feeling as if I'm on the other end of the equation...reacting to everything. I'm tired of my life not being my own. I'm tired of waiting for someone else to make the call that will determine my future.

I need to get a grip. Now. Sitting here crying, again, is not going to help me. I force my tears to stop. Just stop. Enough. Everything inside of me, everything around me goes quiet.

I sit there for a while. I decide I'm really truly going to take whatever little bit of my life that I can back from fate. I pick up my phone and dial. I don't care whether he answers or not...and of course, this is the one time he'd choose to pick up my call.

"Hey, Rain," Theo says. I can sense his guardedness from here.

"Hi."

"I thought we agreed we'd give each other space."

"We didn't agree to anything, Theo, you sent me a text. So I'm calling to say I've taken all the time I need to take and...I'm done."

He is quiet on the other end. "What do you mean?"

"I mean you're free. Go and live your life. Shag a doll, I don't care. I'm done."

I hang up. I'm angrier at him than I should be. He's taking the brunt of everything that's happened since that visa was denied, every decision we made for our lives together before he left...including the fact that I'm a virgin. A naïve girl masquerading as a woman.

If Theo had ever made me feel half of what Darien made me feel tonight...we would have crossed that line a long time ago. I'm guilty. I'm wanting. I'm confused. I don't know who I am anymore.

With that stark reality, comes the stark admittance, I've let too much fall out of my control. I have a life to pick up. I start by rising from the floor. I ignore my ringing phone. +44. London is calling, but I'm not picking up.
CHAPTER EIGHT

The next morning I'm woken up by my phone ringing. Without checking the caller ID I grab it. I refuse to admit it's because I think it's him.

"Hello?"

"Come over, mrembo."

"Oh, Al," I say. "Okay."

"Wow, you know how to stroke a man's ego."

I smile as I hang up.

Ten minutes later I walk into Al's apartment still in my PJs. He's made breakfast. Bacon and pancakes.

He plants a small kiss on my lips as he hands me a mug of coffee, then proceeds to serve me a very generous portion of bacon. After he's served he sits next to me. It's too quiet so I know he's searching for a way to bring up the subject in the most inoffensive way. I sorta look like a wreck, eye bags, bloodshot eyes. No, I didn't get a good night's rest, even after my decision to take my life back into my hands.

I guess the decision was my great achievement for the day. To get more would have been asking too much. More. I shut my eyes as pictures of the night before flash through my mind; his lips against my neck, my back against him...feeling him.

"So that was Visa Guy."

My eyes fly open, having been caught in my daydream. Heat fills my cheeks.

"I'm confused, Rain," he says.

"About?" I hedge.

"Why do you look like a girl who can't get a magical night out of her mind and at the same time wishes she could forget about it?"

"You mean I look like a crossover of heaven and hell?"

"Who's winning?"

"Hell."

"Because?"

"I'm a good girl and he doesn't do good girls, pun intended."

Al chuckles, despite the gravity of my mood. "So he knows about the virgin thing?"

"Yes."

"You told him?"

"Kinda. It was implied in my application."

"You put that in your application?" he asks in horror laced with amusement.

"Implied," I repeat. "In my letters with Theo."

Al just stares at me, like I'm some sort of idiot.

"You weren't supposed to look out the window," I say to distract him.

"You were going somewhere with a strange man. I had to get his number plate. Diplomatic plates. Impressive."

I want to be mad at him but at that moment, I love him. To have someone watching out for me seems like a strange and distant thing. I lean my head on his shoulder.

"What happened?" Al asks, as he opens his arms and I nestle against his chest. I give him the bullet points...from the supermarket meeting to "Good night, Rain." Al is quiet for a moment.

"He means something to you," he says.

I shrug. "I hardly know him."

"He means something. Or you would have subjected him to the lynch mob by now."

"Lynch mob?"

"Your friends."

I laugh. On so many levels Al is right. I've kept Darien away from them because I don't want him assessed, dissected, labelled...not yet. Not until I can make up my own mind about him. And that will be a while, because for the life of me, I can't figure him out.

"I don't think he's going to call or anything. And it's better that way, isn't it?"

"You know what your problem is, Rain? You give too much of a fuck. Seriously."

"It's who I am." Darien's words.

"Then change it. For once get out of your comfort zone. Try living."

"Just because I don't want to sleep around doesn't mean I'm not living."

"No one is talking about you jumping into bed with him tomorrow. All I'm saying is, cutting something off before it starts because you're afraid of where it'll end is stupid."

"Tell that to Darien."

Al laughs. "You think he gives a shit about where this thing you guys have will end?"

That one cuts me in two, right where it hurts.

"I'm sorry, sweets," Al says, retracting. "What I meant was...if he is walking away, it isn't for him. It's for you. Because you care. He gave you a free pass."

My heart is pounding as I try to understand what Al is telling me. Even if he's right, what does that mean? His goodnight sounded so final. He isn't going to call. I just know it. And I'm too scared, too proud...too everything to make the first move. I'm stuck.

Which is good. Because the truth is I need the space. My head has been filled with men for way too long. Okay, with one man, Theo, all my life. Then with Darien, which also feels like it's been all my life.

As I return to my apartment I can see him, feel him everywhere. My dress from last night smells of him. I see the letter he wrote about my visa, still on my counter. Impersonal. Fact-file.

"I am not convinced that you would be able to live without recourse to public funds. Your sponsor has not demonstrated any additional measures he plans to make to better the situation...he appears to be living beyond his means. And while he can survive on his own, I'm not convinced that he would be able to financially cater for another...this way leads to unhappiness.

"You have demonstrated, satisfactorily, the existence and on-going correspondence between you and your fiancé. However, it comes to note, that he has made no attempts to return to Kenya in the last three years for visitation. Nor have any previous visit visas been applied for by you. No explanation was provided for this. As such, I am convinced, that the denial of this visa does not constituent infringement on the rights to family as such rights have not voluntarily been exercised by either party...

"I am satisfied, given the documentation presented before me, that my decision to deny this visa is within grounds.

"...should there be any further evidence you believe was overlooked in reaching this decision, you have the rights to appeal within 14 working days..."

I fold the letter and put it away. I haven't read it since the first few days after the denial...since Darien became personal. I'm not sure if his words now hurt more...or less.

In retrospect, he really, really, was just doing his job. He was witty, glib, and full of presence in Interview Room 3 but this letter could have been drafted by a bank denying a loan.

The two faces of Darien Mitchell...steel and fire. He can make me feel alive with wanton desire in one second and coolly retract the next.

If I do decide to jump out of my comfort nest, I know he will catch me but what happens when "it's over." Darien would walk away as smoothly as he walked away from me last night. I would be the wreck that wept on the cold hard floor. I want to lie to myself and say I'm wiser, won't wear my heart on my sleeve, will put up my shields. I really want to tell myself this lie so that I can email Darien and tell him...what...something...to show him I'm willing to discuss a compromise of some sort on our rules of engagement.

But if he was that interested, if he is that interested...he should be the one to initiate that conversation. Right?

Al thinks I give too much of a fuck. Maybe I do. That's only because I know what heartache feels like. It isn't something I wish to discover again. Better now. When we're not that vested in each other. Better to pull out of the deal before the final signatures are made.

I tell myself this for a week even as I literally pounce every time the phone rings...quickly glancing at the caller ID. Of course I don't admit why I jump when my phone rings. The resident lie is that I'm waiting for responses from potential employers. I do get a few. I even go for an interview, which I think went well. They'll let me know in a few weeks' time if I get shortlisted.

Progress. I should be elated. But there is only one phone call I really wish would come through. Does that make me foolish?

Another week goes by. I finally, painfully admit, he meant it when he said, "Goodnight, Rain." I don't accept this easily and battle with myself, constantly about emailing him something snarky, something to goad him. At least this time, sanity wins.

It's Saturday. I'm scouring through the weekday papers trying to ensure I didn't miss any opportunity. My red marker is still my trusted friend, so is my laptop. Pathetically, they remind me of The Hungry Kenyan, sitting across from green eyes, laughing into mine.

Stop it, Rain. Just stop it. If only it could be that simple. I jump again when my phone rings. Like a conditioned response my heart pumps at twice the speed in anticipation. It isn't a number I recognize and a huge part of me is hoping it's him, calling from a different number.

"Hello?"

"Hello, can I speak to Miss Rain?"

It's not Darien but I know this voice.

"Speaking."

"Miss Rain, I am very sorry for imposing on you. I got your number from our visitors' book."

The voice clicks. A smile slowly forms across my lips. "Guiseppe?"

"You remember me. You've given this man a new reason to live."

I laugh. Guiseppe is everything Italian, flirting going right up there. "Any woman worth her salt would remember you, Guiseppe."

"Careful, bellissima, my heart is not as strong as it used to be."

I'm laughing again, his boisterous nature leaping through the phone. Only now does my mind start swimming. What does Guiseppe want? Does it have to do with Darien?

"Listen, my dear, I need your help. Darien tells me you're in PR, yes?"

"Yes..."

"How busy are you at the moment? Can you take an additional client?"

My brain is rapidly trying to correlate all this information. Guiseppe needs PR representation? For what? Didn't Darien say his place is one of those restaurants you either know about or you don't?

"Are you still there? Don't tell me you're too busy...did I mention I have a fragile heart?"

"Uhmm...I'm not busy. But—"

"No buts. Can you meet me? Today? An hour? Enough time, yes?"

"Uhmm..."

"I'll have lunch ready. See you, bellissima."

He hangs up. I stare at the phone in shock. Guiseppe just offered me a job. I've never handled clients outside of an office setting before. I've considered it since losing my job, but I've not given it serious thought till now. Suddenly I'm nervous. I'm not even sure I have the capability to pull off a job on my own.

As I make my way to my bedroom, so many thoughts are rushing through my mind, so many others being deleted as soon as they try to make an appearance. Darien. This reeks of Darien...there is no way this is a coincidence.

I stand rooted in front of my closet as I try to decide what I'll wear. I'm going, no question about that...but how? Do I dress formal because I'm meeting a client? Do I spice it up in case...Darien is there?

I kill that foolish thought instantly. I'm a professional. So I pick a pair of beige dress-pants and a nice blouse. Minimal makeup, hair pulled back into a ponytail. High heels, large handbag.

I make it in under an hour. If Darien was driving me, we'd have been there with twenty minutes to spare. Flashes of a Range Rover speeding round a bend, long fingers relaxed around a steering wheel, muscles defined under his shirt, wind in his hair...Darien on my mind. How do I get rid of him?

It's relatively quiet at Indigo Blue today. Guiseppe ushers me to a table in the corner. Waiters are setting other tables, readying for lunch.

"You don't do breakfast?"

"Who wants to get up that early in the morning?"

"Someone who wants to make lots of money."

He laughs. "He said you have a mouth on you."

I blush...because Darien has been talking about me. Was that before or after our dinner date?

"Did he ask you to call me?"

"Me, I like my restaurant how it is. Quiet. People they come, they eat, they're happy, they go. Like family. I don't believe in all this advertising, begging people to come to your table. People should come because they want."

He has completely evaded my question but he's a client now. I'm forced to let it go.

"Now Darien...Darien, he thinks I'm basing my success on too small a market. It's all word of mouth. And many are expats, tourists. They come and go, yes? Darien asks what happens if say, tourism and trade go down in the country? What happens in low seasons? We have many empty tables. Just sitting doing nothing. And more important, he thinks it's a shame more people don't know about my food. So we fight...to make public or not."

"Why would you care what he thinks?"

"He is a friend."

"You don't strike me as a man to be bullied by a mere friend."

Guiseppe studies me, as if wondering if he should venture further.

"All right, when Darien meet me in Italy, I work at my mother's restaurant. Also small. Like this. Family, you know. People have eaten there for years and years. My great-grandpapi, he own it. Passed it down the family."

"Okay."

"Now me, I am last born. So restaurant go to my eldest brother. Darien tells me, why not start my own place. Why not come to Kenya. Kenyans love good food."

"That we do."

"I research, I consider Malindi because—"

"There are many Italians in Malindi."

"And Darien tells me there are also many Italian restaurants in Malindi. Why not start one in Nairobi...Eventually, here I am."

"So you feel you owe him?"

"Something like that."

I know he hasn't told me the full story. I can't really pry, I don't have a "fifteen questions" privilege with him.

"All right. So what are you thinking? You want to expand?"

He looks horrified. "No, no, no. That would spoil it. But Darien says, if we build our client base, we'll be busy all the time. If Kenyans like a place, they always come. Rain. Sun. No matter."

"So you want to build your local clientele?"

"Exactly. I am...ashamed that I wait this long, you know? But I always said, word of mouth only. Word of mouth only brought me mainly one type of customer. You understand, yes?"

In his roundabout way, Guiseppe is trying to tell me he isn't racist. The serious bias towards a certain clientele was coincidental. I get it. This is Kenya. Though the colours happily coexist, it isn't very often that they merge.

"I understand. Do you have any ideas about what you would like to do? An open house day? Adverts? Exhibit at a food expo?"

"I want something natural. I don't want to be dancing on TV asking people to come and eat here. It must feel like...community."

"I agree. We keep it simple. I know just the people to invite. Based on your prices and your setting, we'd be targeting a particular age group. People with some expendable cash. People who like class without the stuffiness."

I'm just getting warmed up. There is so much we can do to draw in more clientele. I'm on a roll as Guiseppe and I go through ideas. Most he likes, some seem to frighten him. Guiseppe would desperately like to hold on to the quiet serene homely atmosphere. He has no problem expanding, as long as he doesn't start making food like a "fast food corner shop." His words. I'm totally with him. This place must maintain its magic or it would lose its selling point.

We have just finished dessert when we reach the end of our discussion. Guiseppe grabs a pen from his pocket, scribbles a number on a napkin, and slides it across to me. I glance at it in confusion.

"What's this? The budget for the rollout plan?"

"No, no. no. That's what I want to pay you."

My brain screeches to a halt. It's an obscene amount for the job he is asking. It's almost an entire marketing budget...not a commission. Is he mad? He isn't. He didn't pull that number out of a hat. I know who did. There's no mistake in my mind.

Every moment of elation and excitement that I felt discussing this project with Guiseppe vanishes. This isn't a real job. I should have known. I push my chair back and rise. Guiseppe looks at me in confusion.

"Tell Darien I'm not a charity case."

I match out, fresh anger brewing. The part of my mind that is geared towards survival is telling me how much of an idiot I am. Pride is telling me to look at the facts; Guiseppe does not have that much vested interest in this project. He doesn't even know me. Didn't look at my CV. Didn't bother to ask how I'd operate now that I'm freelance. Doesn't even know if I have the capacity to pull this off on my own. No way in hell, would he risk that amount of money on a virtual stranger. As commission.

I'm stewing by the time I get back to my apartment. I shaved off those twenty minutes...though I wouldn't recommend anyone try it at home. I almost peed on myself twice. Curves and speed—not a good idea. Not to mention how much fuel I've just blown for nothing.

A defiant voice tells me I can afford it...if I accept that payment. Pride doesn't even entertain that thought. I debate calling him, telling him off. Who does he think he is? I don't hear from him in two weeks then he pulls this crap?

My phone rings. "H Calling." Guiseppe's told on me. Clearly. There is an unhealthy mixture of anger and electricity as I stare, debate on whether or not to pick up. I've been waiting for this call for two weeks! It stings a little that it took me rejecting his foolish blood money for him to call me. What am I exactly to this man? Just to prove a point, I reject his call.

I expect him to call again, like any normal person. But nothing comes. Five minutes. Ten minutes. An hour. Nothing.

I'm angry again but for a different reason. So much for effort. I guess it didn't matter that much to him.

"Who does that?" I yell at poor Al, who's getting ready to leave for the airport.

"Who twists his friend's arm to give you a job or doesn't call back when you ignore his call?"

"Both. If he's interested enough to get Guiseppe to give me a job, shouldn't he be interested enough to try and call me back?"

Al doesn't say anything.

"A little bit of help here, Al!"

"Wait it out. Obviously this man has a plan."

"I'm not going to be some game he's playing."

Al gives me an indulgent smile. "I wish I could be of more help, mrembo, but I think we've reached a point in the conversation where oestrogen is needed to proceed."

He kisses my forehead, grabs his First Officer hat.

"That's it? You're abandoning me?"

"Two hundred odd people will appreciate me getting to my flight in time. Later. Text me."

He's gone, leaving me in his apartment. Al is right. This is a girlfriend conversation so we can bitch and re-enact, analyse, reanalyse, and catalogue what every single detail means. For the first time since Visa Guy...I miss my girlfriends weighing in on this. I need a woman's opinion of what I should do. I come close to calling them as I make my way back to my apartment.

Al's take is too...straightforward. And nothing about Visa Guy is straightforward. I realize he's slipped back into Visa Guy. Enemy territory.

I miss the banality of my life, when it was nine-to-five Monday to Friday. No surprises. Unless Theo called me without me prompting him to. It never struck me as something to be concerned about then. Now it glares as such an obvious sign that things were not okay.

I don't want to think of Theo. I don't want to think of work...lack of it...potential for it. What if Guiseppe was really, really in need of a PR person? What if he just didn't know what to pay me so he offered his most generous figure? What if I've gotten this all wrong and I'm pissing away an opportunity?

A knock sounds on my door. Al must have forgotten something and needs his key.

"Those passengers are going to hate your guts, Al," I say as I fling open the door. My heart and insides screech to a halt, ricochet back and forth in my stomach.

It's Darien. Jeans. T-shirt. Light leather jacket. God, he looks good. I have to remind myself that I'm mad at him, that he hasn't bothered to call me in two weeks. I rally my troops, bolster my defences.

"What are you doing here? How did you even get past the gate?"

"I'm convincing."

"We should fire the guard."

"Not his fault. He didn't stand a chance."

"Do you have a gun?"

"On me?"

I stare at him, temporarily lost for words. Does he have a gun elsewhere? But I won't be derailed. I make a point to block even more of the doorway. Consciously, I try to remember what I'm wearing: shorts, a vest, makeup from this morning. My braids are still in a ponytail but strands fall around my face, escaping the band. I look okay. I think. I hope.

"What do you want, Darien?"

"Why did you turn down Guiseppe's offer?"

"Did you give him the money to pay me?"

"Yes."

I didn't think he'd admit that. It annoys me more than anything else. "So guilt finally caught up with you? Was that figure what you thought my ruined life was worth?"

"It's what I think your services are worth."

"My services?!" I snap. "I was taking a job with Guiseppe. Not you. Why were you paying for my services?"

"I own half of Indigo Blue."

That knocks the wind out of my sails.

"You own Indigo Blue?"

"Half of it. I'm a financial partner."

"You gave him the money to start it?"

"It was a good investment."

"And now that you've met me you want to diversify your clientele? Make it just a few shades darker?"

He doesn't answer that. He just stares at me. His voice hasn't risen even a fraction during this whole fight. I can't even quantify it as a fight. I was yelling. He was talking. He's so infuriating.

"Let me in," he says.

"Why?"

"So we can have this conversation inside like civilized people."

"There's nothing civilized about you."

"Let me in, Rain."

I'm exhausted so I step aside. He walks in, I shut the door behind him. Silence.

I watch him as he takes in my apartment. There's a couch made of bamboo and raw wood, stuffed to the nines with cushions, sitting by the window. My enormous TV takes centre stage, complete with surround sound. I have a deck of CDs, stacks and stacks lining one of the walls. It's a quirk I've refused to let go of despite my equally healthy collection of iTunes. Answering their challenge is a healthier stack of books, floor to ceiling, wall to wall.

Al and my girls helped me put up the shelves. We had so much fun...bruised fingers, knees, and toes ten hours later. This bookshelf has sentimental attachment. One of my biggest fears of losing my apartment comes from the fear of losing this bookshelf. I'd wanted it so badly that I convinced the landlord I'd leave it behind when I left. Of course then, I thought I'd be going to England. I wonder how much longer I can afford this place, my little corner of me.

Darien is standing in the middle of it. The room seems smaller than usual. Darien has presence. I'm trying very hard not to be overtaken by it. What I really want to ask as I stare at him is why he hasn't called me in two weeks. Two weeks. I'm chicken and there's always that pride so I decide to address the current matter at hand.

"Why did you tell Guiseppe to hire me?"

"Because I think you're good at what you do."

"Anyone can fake a CV."

"I did my research."

He's been checking up on me. Should I be flattered? Scared? Annoyed?

"Did Guiseppe give you my message?"

"I never thought you were a charity case."

"A month ago you wouldn't have hired me. Not for that amount. You would have gone to some big firm."

"A month ago I didn't know you."

"What's in it for you?"

"Good PR for the restaurant. Growth."

"Is that it? Or are you subtly paying for something else? What is this 'job' really going to cost me?"

Instant anger flashes in his eyes. I've never seen him angry. Cold. Cocky. Smug. But not angry. It's a scary look.

"What are you asking me, Rain?"

"I'm just trying to be clear what services you think you're paying for."

Without warning, he reaches out and hauls me against him. We are pressed limb to limb. His body is rock solid, my hand resting against his chiselled chest. Despite my greatest efforts my body kicks to life, reacting to him like clockwork. My breathing is laboured. Our lips are inches apart.

For a moment, he looks affected, then his eyes coolly retract and he releases me. "I think we both know I wouldn't have to pay for it."

Rage and humiliation hit me at once. "You asshole!" I scream at him. I'm reeling. Seething. So confused.

Darien doesn't react to my insult. In fact, he looks like nothing has happened. He removes an envelope and places it on a nearby stool.

"Guiseppe needs the help," he repeats. "Have a lawyer look at the contract. I'll revise whatever you want."

He leaves. Just like that. Have I mentioned lately how much I hate him?

I sink to the couch, regaining my equilibrium. Eventually, my breathing reverts to normal. But when I rise to retrieve the envelope my legs are still shaking. I'm mad as hell, horny as hell. God Almighty, why haven't I ever felt these things before?

I read the contract in some sort of daze and realize it outlines most of what Guiseppe and I talked about. How quickly did Darien get this done? I guess his lawyers are on retainer and presumably, they work on weekends on short notice.

Who is Darien Mitchell? I remember vaguely him casually alluding to owning a gun. That isn't common place in Kenya.

I'm still shaken when I reach for a smaller envelope. It's a cheque. Same amount Guiseppe offered. One million Kenyan shillings. It hits me, painfully, that if I cash this cheque, my bank statements would be good enough for me to go to the UK. Darien knows this.

I curl up on my couch and all I want to do, is bawl.

CHAPTER NINE

That night, I coerce my girlfriends to go clubbing. I need to just not think about Darien. Good booze, good music, dancing till our feet hurt seems like the perfect way to forget about him. As we walk into our final destination, The Hungry Kenyan, I realize I haven't been fooling them.

"Out with it, Rain," Sly says.

"Out with what?"

"Your mind hasn't been here at all. And you've been avoiding us for the past few weeks."

"I haven't been avoiding you. I've been...busy."

"Doing what?" Em asks.

"Looking for a job."

"Oh please. No one looks for a job twenty-four seven," Em says.

"And you don't even let us know how that's going. Any interviews? Prospects?" Tendei asks.

Yes, Visa Guy wants to pay me a million shillings, blood money.

"Can I ask you guys something? What if I had enough money to go to the UK?"

"To be with Theo?" Tendei asks in surprise.

"Well, maybe to use the six months to see if we can fix things between us."

"You're an idiot," Sly says.

"Why?" Tendei asks. "Their relationship wasn't working because of the distance. If she has a chance to give it a shot, she should."

"You're such an idiot," Sly repeats.

I look at Em, trying to gauge her thoughts.

"Did you win the lottery?" Em quips.

"Of course not. If I did I'd be in Hawaii by now. I could do with the peace."

"Then we're speculating about nothing," she concludes.

"It's not about nothing," Tendei insists. "She needs closure."

"She needs to delete every single memory of that prick from her database. And then reformat her computer."

We all turn to look at Sly, thrown by her vehemence.

"What? Personally I'm glad he sent you that 'let's take a break' text. I thought I was being too hard on him but he proved my point very nicely for me. Absolute bloody prick. Twenty years of friendship summed up in a text? Show me a cliff and I'll push him off it."

"Whoa, Sly, don't hold your punches."

She's completely unapologetic.

"You'll be happy to know I officially broke it off with him. I mean like, we're not taking a break. I told him to go shag a doll."

There's momentary silence before they all burst out laughing, good girl Tendei included.

"So what are we still talking about?" Sly asks.

"I was just...trying to see if I would do it, I guess."

"Run. Don't look back," she says.

It isn't that I have feelings for Theo. At least, not, "I'm pinning for you feelings." But when you've been with someone for so long, when you've pictured them in your life forever, you let go of them in stages. It takes a while before you can finally, finally snap that last thread. I don't think I'm there yet with Theo. I still go through the "what if" lapses.

It would be poetic justice, however, if everything came full circle and I used Darien's payment to get my visa, go to Theo, and we made up. The prospects of it are not enticing. Something else is. Someone else...is.

"You better not be thinking of Theo with that expression on your face," Sly says.

I snap out of it but I'm blushing. Furiously. Caught.

"Oh. My. God," Em exclaims. "Rain Handa...there is a man on your mind."

"No, there isn't." My protest comes too fast. They know me. They're all shrieking with glee. Why glee? What kind of friends are these? Shouldn't they be admonishing me with concern?

"Spill those beans...now!" Sly exclaims.

"I swear there's no man in my life."

"We will stalk you, we will camp outside your house, we will steal your laptop and your phone. In fact..."

Sly grabs my phone before I can stop her. I'm desperately trying to get it back, but they start passing it between themselves. As I wrestle Tendei, she tosses the phone back to Sly. I'm in a panic now, my mind trying to think if there are any incriminating texts between Darien and me. What have we said that would give his identity away?

"Who's H?" Sly asks, looking down my call list.

Blood rushes to my face and my renewed panic gives her the answer she's looking for.

"H? That's him, isn't it?"

"Give me back my phone, Sly."

"Tell us who he is."

"Give me back my phone."

"Last chance, Rain," she warns.

"Or you'll what? Beat it out of me?"

She hits the "redial" button. Oh my God! Why didn't I see that coming?

Everything goes into slow motion as the phone starts to ring on the other side. I'm trying desperately to get to Sly but Tendei and Em have tag-teamed, holding me back.

I frantically glance at my watch. It's 2 a.m. Please be asleep. Just when I think I'm home free, he picks up. My world stops.

"Rain? Are you okay?"

Distinctive British accent. How I wish right now he had any other accent...American. Mexican. Singaporean.

Sly gapes at the phone. They're all gaping. What's going through their minds? Have they put two and two together?

"Rain?" Darien asks again, worry clear in his voice.

I'm frozen. Sly recovers before I do.

"Hi, this is Sly, Rain's friend."

"Is she okay?"

"Uhm...yes, I was just...uhm...she's fine."

Slight pause on the other side, probably him trying to determine what's going on.

"Is she with you? Can you put her on the phone?"

"Sure."

Sly hands me the phone. Numb, I take it.

"Hi."

"Are you okay?" Third time he's asked. For some reason it moves me...despite how very angry I should be at the smug, conceited bastard right now.

"Yeah, I'm fine," I say, feeling foolish.

"Want to tell me what's going on?"

"Nothing."

"Where are you?"

He doesn't believe everything is okay. I'm not sure I can blame him. Who has her friend call you at two in the morning for no reason? Especially after how we parted. Either I'm psycho or I'm in some sort of trouble.

"At The Hungry Kenyan."

"Are you drunk?"

"No."

I think my indignation makes him smile. I feel him relaxing. "So you're not drunk dialling me?"

"You're the last person I'd drunk dial. People drunk dial people who are on their mind."

He chuckles again. "To what do I owe this honour, then? I refuse to think there was a clause so pressing you couldn't wait till sunrise to discuss it."

"I didn't call you. My friend did."

"Why? Are they finally putting out a hit on me?"

Then I remember Sly had put the phone on speaker. They're listening in, so quietly that in my frazzled state, I forgot they were there. I quickly move away from the table, struggle to find the speaker button to deactivate it. I avoid their gazes though I can see out of the corner of my eye that their jaws are practically on the floor. That last sentence...I think it clicked. I think they know who I'm talking to.

I settle at a nearby table. It's quiet at The Hungry Kenyan this time of night. Unlike other pubs and clubs, everything here is muted, especially designed for those who want a quiet drink in the middle of the night. I suddenly feel completely exposed.

"Are you still there?" Darien asks.

"Yes. I should be sorry she called you but I'm not. I hope I woke you up."

"You're mad at me."

"When I hang up, I'll delete your number."

"You probably should," he says.

I wonder if it's some kind of warning. Al said he gave me a free pass. "You really think I should delete your number?"

"Yes. But I still need you to do that project with Guiseppe."

"Will you stop being a bastard if I say yes?"

"Afraid not. Some of it is genetic."

Against my explicit instructions to myself, I smile. "That I can believe."

We both fall silent.

"Why did your friend call me?" he asks.

"I was..." Daydreaming about you, doesn't sound like quite the thing to say. "We were talking about Theo and...they kinda found out about you. Grabbed my phone. Called you."

"Were you keeping me your dirty little secret?" he asks, amusement in his tone. "I feel so belittled."

He's laughing at me. I want to throttle him but his reaction makes me feel better, somehow.

"Why are you awake?" I ask him.

"Business call."

"At 2 a.m.?"

"It's not 2 a.m. everywhere in the world, you know."

"What are you doing? Acquiring another Italian restaurant?"

"Phoenician."

"Are you serious?"

"We're in talks."

"Good luck."

"Come over for breakfast tomorrow."

It's totally left field. I falter as the images of our encounter earlier flash through my mind. There is nothing about us that is normal. I insulted him, and myself, by insinuating he was paying me for sex. He quickly and accurately proved his point that when he wanted me, he'd need very little effort to have me.

And then he gave me a cheque that could get me back with my fiancé...ex-fiancé. He was giving me another out. I don't know what to do. I'm so lost around him.

"You were totally a prick to me today." There's a lump in my throat when I say this. I know I started everything earlier. Still.

He's quiet before he answers.

"I was."

"Why?"

"I'm not a nice guy, Rain. Which is actually why I should un-invite you for breakfast."

"You're warning me off you."

"Yes."

"What time did you say breakfast was? Eleven?"

He chuckles. "Last chance," he tells me.

"What are the directions?"

I feel him smiling. "Meet me at Indigo, we can drive to my place from there."

"Okay."

"I hope you have a designated driver tonight?"

"I'm pretty sober." I'm oddly touched again that he cares...after all.

"If anything changes call me."

"Thanks. I...will."

"Goodnight, Rain."

His "goodnight" today is not the final "I'm not sure I'll see you again." It's warm...filled with promise. Butterflies are alive and well on my island.

"Goodnight."

I hang up. My friends, in typical stubborn fashion, have joined me on the table, all our drinks relocated. They're staring at me. Waiting.

"I really don't want to talk about it."

"Is that who we think it is?" Sly asks.

"Who do you think it is?"

"Visa Guy," Tendei says. The disapproval...shock...uncertainty is alive and well in her expression. Even Em...the card carrier of the "White Men's Wives Club" does not look ecstatic. She looks concerned.

"Well, is it?" Sly asks.

"No," I lie, bold-faced. I'm not sure why.

"Who else could it be?" Sly challenges.

"Visa Guy isn't the only British male living in Kenya, you know."

"So it's just a coincidence?" Em asks, clearly incredulous.

"Okay. I did meet him when I went to the High Commission. He was... renewing his passport. We hit it off in the waiting room."

Who is this smooth liar? And why am I so committed to keeping Darien away from them?

"Why didn't you ever mention this other dude?" Sly questions.

"It wasn't a big deal. We exchanged numbers because he's a fan of...Game of Thrones."

"And one thing led to another," Em says, clearly oscillating between dubiousness and believing me.

"Yeah. Kinda. I guess—"

"Rebound?"

"Not really. I don't know. He...I'm happy when I'm with him. He makes me laugh. He's totally inappropriate and he just...knows how to make things seem like they're going to be okay."

"What's his name?" Em asks.

I could make up another lie but what harm will knowing his name do? They think he's a random guy I met at the High Commission. We've never referred to Darien as anything other than "Visa Guy."

"Darien."

"What does H stand for?" Tendei asks.

"High Commission."

I'm really good at this. PR.

"Why didn't you want us to know about him?" Sly asks. I know she doesn't believe my story.

"Because I didn't want to be judged."

"Do we judge?" Tendei asks, sounding wounded.

"All the time. Me being right up there. I just needed to have him without dissecting how wrong or screwed up it was. He really helped me with the Theo thing. Made me feel less...rejected."

They're recovering, doing what girls do when their friend meets a potential knight in shining armour and all that. Em and Tendei are hooked. It's only Sly who still exudes scepticism but for now it seems she's going to give me the benefit of the doubt.

"Is he hot?" Em asks.

"He fries my brains without even trying."

That gets them. We order another set of drinks. They pump me for information...exactly what I'd originally been avoiding but because I'm not talking about Darien...my Darien...I feel safe. The more we talk the more I realize how much I've missed this. It's like breathing again...speaking "Girl."

I love my Al to death but he was right. There are points of the conversation only a girl can get; the added benefit of gashing at the appropriate points, being scandalized at others.

Al is perfect when I want the straight and narrow, no camouflage. The girls are perfect when I want to swoon and pretend practicality doesn't exist.

Of course there is a lot I can't tell them and I fill in many gaps using my true feelings and situation scenarios, which are close enough. Like him knowing I was "saving myself" and the caution I think it's causing on his end. The biggest crux of that matter, that I give them, is that he will be leaving Kenya soon. It's the closest thing to the conflict I am feeling. He isn't available. Not long term. I'm not sure I even want long term. But I'm alien to "fling."

"What do you want to do?" Tendei asks. "I mean...will you...do you want to..."

"Are you going to have sex with him?" Sly asks, showing none of Tendei's prudence.

I don't know. That's the truth.

"I doubt he's looking for a pen pal," Sly says when I don't reply. "He doesn't sound like the picnics in the park, ribbons in your hair type of guy."

"In other words?" I ask, hating what I know she'll tell me.

"If he's investing his time, he'll be expecting something in return. Either that or he'll jump ship. That's what men do."

That's why I never wanted to talk about him. Reality. It spoils something. When he existed in my fantasy I could see this ending in whatever way I convinced myself of. Now Al and the girls are chiming in my head. Darien isn't in this to innocently hold hands and sing "Kumbaya" at a camp fire.

He's showed me that twice. He's walked away twice. He's warning me. And I keep going back. Yes, going to see Guiseppe at Indigo, no matter what I told myself, was me hoping to see Darien. Of course he was involved. I knew that from the second I heard Guiseppe on the other side of the phone.

Giving Guiseppe that message about not being a charity case was another attempt to reach out to Darien. Of course he would respond to that personally.

I'm not sure who's baiting who here. One thing is for certain...I want him. I've been too much of a coward to give my girlfriends the true scenario because we judge. They're not Al. They'll tell me how sick this really is. He stood in the way of my freedom...and I'm falling for him. I don't want to go where my mind wants to go. But there's a name for this sort of thing. Isn't there?

After there's nothing more to say about "Darien" we move on to the next victim. Tendei apparently has met a man, but he's six years younger than her. So we give her hell...because we can. Em, on the other hand, is considering accepting advances from a sixty-year-old man. She says he looks forty. Of course we're not buying that. So we give her hell...because we can.

Sly...is Sly. She doesn't get involved in silly romances. Sly has her eyes on becoming the first female president of the company she works for. She's a chartered surveyor, a junior but rapidly making her way to the top. Once she's there, she will think about the little minions we call men. We give her hell...because we can.

Before we know it, we're all just a little bit happy...all right, a lot happy, reminiscing about our past exploits and solving all the world's problems.

CHAPTER TEN

Sunrise finds us at The Hungry Kenyan and none of us can drive. Sly calls our designated cab company. Our cabs arrive. Sly, Em, and Tendei pile into one. I live in the other direction.

"Call me when you get home," Sly calls.

"You too, chicas."

I just barely make it into my cab. The driver doesn't bat an eyelid at my state. This is Nairobi. One thing we're known for is drinking the night away. Right now, there are hundreds more people just like me still ordering more drinks as they declare "the night is young."

"Where to?" the cabbie asks.

For some reason, the only thing on my mind is my date later on with Darien. My brain, which is functioning at half-mast, decides there's no point going home. I hear my mouth forming the words,

"Indigo Blue."

That the cabbie knows exactly where it is, solidifies to my mind that we're making the right choice. I'm humming happily in the back of the cab. Breath-mint, my mind instructs. Yes. Good idea. I pop one of those. Makeup? Yes. Good idea. I make an effort of doing that too.

Singing my happy song...life is so good right now. I'm brilliant. Einstein. What a fabulous idea to come here right away. Some coffee. I wonder if Guiseppe would make me breakfast? Maybe I'll call Darien and ask him to meet me early.

La-la-la-la-la.

The cabbie stops outside the gates of Indigo Blue. They're closed. Bummer. He hoots and a guard opens the gate. He peers at the car and comes round to the driver's side.

"We're closed," he says. "We don't open till eleven."

"Darien. Darien Mitchell," I say and grin. To me, that's a full explanation.

"He isn't here."

"I know. I'm meeting him."

He debates, studies me for a second, decides I don't look like a threat and perhaps, him sending me away might cost him his job. He walks back to the gate and opens it.

La-la-la-la-la.

I hop out of the cab and pay the driver. "Keep the change."

I think I just tipped him five hundred shillings, same amount as the fare. But life is good and I'm such a brilliant person. What's five hundred shillings to me? Maybe I will cash that obscene cheque that Darien gave me.

La-la-la-la-la.

Guiseppe isn't here. So much for breakfast. He must have meant it when he said he couldn't be bothered to be up this early. The Head Waiter explains to me that Guiseppe will not arrive for another hour or so. It's Sunday, so maybe more. I thank him, insist I'll wait. For Darien and/or Guiseppe...whoever shows up first. I ask them for coffee.

Two other waiters have gathered, not crowding me but in the periphery of my vision. It's obvious I'm drunk. But I clearly know both owners so they're not entirely sure how to deal with me. I get my answer when the Head Waiter hands me a phone.

"Darien," he says, looking uneasy.

I clap my hands in glee and take the phone.

"Hi. Guess where I am?" I giggle, hiccup. Apparently this doesn't only happen in cartoons and bad plays from the sixties.

"What are you doing at Indigo, Rain?"

"Waiting. For you."

"It's 7 a.m."

He sounds a little irritated. Hmm. Maybe not such a good idea. I already called him at two this morning. Then again, I didn't make that call. I didn't make this one either.

"Are you mad?"

Pause. "Tell me you didn't drive there."

"Took a cab. Like a very responsible drunk person."

"I'll be there in a few minutes."

I blow him a kiss over the phone.

"Rain."

"Yes?"

"Don't do anything stupid, okay?"

"I'll try."

"Give the phone back to Lopo."

I assume that's the Head Waiter. I hold out the phone to him. He walks away, nodding at something Darien is saying. A few minutes later he is back with sliced bananas and a jug of water.

"I asked for coffee. Please."

"Darien's orders."

"Darien's orders?" I scoff. "Listen here, he might be your boss, but he isn't mine."

Lopo gives me a polite smile, crosses his arms. I suppose he's used to dealing with stroppy customers. Besides, he isn't going to get me coffee if Darien has told him not to. This isn't a fight I will win so I give in.

"Bananas. Been craving one all night. Yum."

I can't begin to explain the full derision on Lopo's face. It makes me laugh.

Darien arrives in under ten minutes. He looks delicious. I grin at him.

"I ate the banana. I drank the water," I report as I clamber to my feet, swaying as blood rushes to my head. Darien is instantly by my side, wrapping his arm around me.

He looks stern. He's Interview Room 3, Darien. "Where are your friends?"

"Home, probably."

"They left you alone? In this state?"

"No. We all took cabs. I didn't want to go home, sleep for just like two hours, drag myself back to The Hungry Kenyan to get my car, and drive all this way. I killed two chickens with one stone. See?"

Despite his clear irritation, Darien's lips curl. I suppose I'm a funny drunk. He gets me into his car and goes over to the driver's side. He leans across and secures my seatbelt. I find that very...sexy. I turn and smile at him, groggy, happy. He came for me. I reach out and brush my hand through his hair.

"I've wanted to touch your hair since Interview Room 3. It's beautiful. Like you. You're beautiful."

He rewards me with another smile.

"Just what were you drinking?"

"Uhm...I think it was the shots. I had four times four shots."

"I'm going to pretend I know what that means."

I giggle as he pulls out of the parking lot.

I must have blacked out because the next thing I know he is opening the passenger door, undoing my seatbelt. Fuzzy, I feel him helping me out of the car, then my feet are off the ground. He's carrying me. How cool is that?

I black out again. Then, he's placing me on a bed. It isn't my bed, I know that for sure.

"Are we at your place?"

"Yes."

"Yay. We're on time for our breakfast date."

"You score full points for punctuality."

I'm surprised "wit" is not one of the functions that my brain has shut down. We should be operating under "essential functions" only. I feel like I'm swimming in mud...no, chocolate. This is nice, this fuzz...this place where nothing matters.

I shut my eyes. Feel Darien sitting on the bed.

"Sit up for a second, angel."

Angel? Did he just call me angel? He helps me up.

"Lift your arms."

I do. He's taking off my dress. Wait...wait...he's undressing me? Somewhere panic buttons should be sounding but he slips what feels like a T-shirt over my head and helps me into it. It smells of him. Sexy, masculine Darien.

"I'm going to remove your bra, all right?"

"Sounds promising," I murmur.

He chuckles as his hand goes under the T-shirt. One second later my bra is undone. He slips it over my arms and pulls it free.

I slip between the sheets. Wow...what are these sheets made of? They feel like clouds caressing my body. Like the warm hand that was just removing my bra. Where did it go? Where did he go?

"Darien?"

"Sleep."

"Will you hold me?"

There's a pause, then I feel his hand against my cheek. The gentleness with which he touches me fills my heart. I lift my hand and wrap it around his, not wanting him to let go.

I haven't recognized myself for the last couple of months. I recognize this girl even less. But I want his hands around me, his warmth against me. It's been long...so long since I felt the security a woman feels in bed with a man she loves.

Loves? Even in my drunken state I know it isn't love...yet. But it's that very nice thing...the flowers and rainbows...the rapidly beating heart...the magic fairies...chocolate...ice-cream-flavoured candy...the strong arms circling around me as Darien joins me in bed. I rest my head on his firm chest. I've died and gone to heaven.

"Darien?" I sleepily murmur.

"Hmm?"

"Do you want to know my new nickname for you? When I'm not mad at you?"

I feel his lips curving against my hair. "Please."

"Greenie."

"You couldn't pick something less emasculating? What happened to the good solid Hell's Kitchen or Visa Guy?"

"Those are reserved for when you're being an asshole."

"Ah...in that case."

I giggle at his dry tone. "Do you want to know why I call you Greenie?"

"I'm afraid to guess."

"Your eyes. You have the most amazing eyes in the world."

My eyes slowly shut. Bliss.

Hell. That's what I wake up to. Shit. Shit. Bloody shit. I wish I was suffering from alcohol-induced amnesia. I'm not. I remember everything. Sly calling Darien at 2 a.m., me ending up at Indigo Blue and making a fool of myself in front of the waiters. Darien coming to my rescue. Me ending up in his bed, asking him to hold me.

I hear something whirling in the distance. Darien. Shit. Maybe I can slink away, put some distance between me and last night before I see him again. I could make sure it was an entirely professional setting with Guiseppe present. Guiseppe...he'll definitely hear about this from the waiters. That embarrasses me even more. What if he thinks I'm just one of Darien's floozies? Does Darien have floozies?

Flight. We've decided.

With painful determination, I sit up, sending commands to my brain one by one. Lift leg off bed. Now the other one. Pause to allow blood vessels to acclimatize. I don't have a puke-your-guts-out hangover, thanks to "Darien's orders" of bananas and water. But my body still feels like hell.

Slowly I rise out of bed. Hang on...get your balance...don't fall over. Breathe. I tither there for a second waiting for my body to catch up with my brain. As I wait, I take in the room. The curtains are closed so it's dark. All I can make out are shelves in one corner. The room isn't large. The bed is though, it occupies most of the room.

My dress has been laid out on a chair near the bed. Beside that is a stool with my handbag and my phone on it. I try to calculate the amount of energy it will take for me to reach my phone and check for the time.

"Morning."

I startle and turn towards the door. Darien is leaning against it, watching me. Heat fills my cheeks at the sight of him. He's wearing jeans and an England rugby top. Barefoot. I love the sight of him comfortable in his own surroundings.

Unlike me, who feels like a deer caught in the headlights. But I can't pretend to be invisible.

"Hi."

I notice he's carrying a glass as he walks up to me.

"What's this?"

"Banana shake."

"Thanks."

Great. As if I needed a reminder of my escapades. I down the shake, more to buy time than anything else. Clarity is descending faster than I'd like. Humiliation is better when you're not quite so sure why you should be humiliated.

Light floods the room as Darien opens the curtains. I have to squint until my eyes acclimatize. It looks like evening outside.

"What time is it?"

"Four."

"P.m.??"

"Yup."

I turn to look at him in shock. He's smiling, laughing at me.

"Why did you let me sleep so long?"

"Your body clearly needed it. Since it was me you were standing up...I decided to let you have it."

I sink onto the bed then notice how the T-shirt rides up my thighs. I'm only wearing a T-shirt. In his room. On his bed. I'm practically naked. He's only standing a few feet away, leaning against the wall near the windows. The rays of evening light shining through cast shadows around him. He looks mysterious, dangerous. His warnings are alive in my mind but my body feels something else completely.

I feel my nipples harden and I know they're showing. Mortified, I cross my arms over my chest and steal a glance to see if he noticed. Shy, I bite my lower lip and glance at him through my lashes.

Darien pushes off the wall, approaches me. He leans down, places his hands on either side of me. We're face to face. I smell his cologne, his shampoo; pure man. He reaches out and frees my lower lip from my teeth. "Don't do that," he says, "or my very noble intentions will fly out the window right now."

I send rapid instructions to my brain to breathe.

He runs his thumb against my lip before he straightens and continues with normal conversation as if we're counting blue cars passing down the road. "I'll let you get dressed. Bathroom is through there—" He gestures behind him to the en suite bathroom. "It has everything you need. There's also a fresh T-shirt and a pair of tights on the couch."

I glance towards the couch. I hadn't noticed those before. The tights are brand new, still in their box. Multi-coloured and very retro. I force myself to speak, though the members of my island haven't quite yet managed to untie my tongue.

"Should I ask why you have tights in your house?"

"My sister has this thing about leaving a pair of tights in every house she frequents. Something about a rainy day."

"I guess it's raining."

He gives me an easy smile, kisses the top of my head and leaves.

"I'll be in the kitchen."

I have to count to ten, slowly. Before Darien came in, my plan was to flee. Now, there is only one place I want to flee to... him. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I'm walking down heartbreak lane. I want to turn back but with every step I take forward, the path seems to crumble into nothingness behind me. There is no exit strategy. I'm in trouble.

I join him there half an hour later. I feel like more of myself though not all my nerves are gone. We're in new territory where both of us probably know something will happen tonight.

"How's the hangover?" he asks.

"Not bad. Banana power, huh?"

"Saved me a few times."

"You? Drunk?"

"I've had my share of memorable nights."

I'd love to see him drunk. "What are you like when you're drunk?"

"Brutally honest."

"Isn't that you on a normal day?"

"You haven't seen me drunk."

I chuckle.

"Hungry?"

I nod.

The breakfast meal he prepares isn't grease induced as it would be at Al's. It's fresh fruit, bagels, and poached eggs. I didn't know eggs were poached in the modern world.

He's made fresh tea...complete with ginger and rosemary. My mum makes her tea like this. The smell of it reminds me of home...that kitchen full of comfort. Belonging.

The thought of my extreme lack of it kicks me in the gut. This was my dream...belonging. I'm not sure I do anymore. Anywhere. But, seated side-by-side with him on this kitchen island, a large part of me acknowledges this would be a nice place to belong.

"I'm sorry," I mutter, "for this morning. It seemed like a good idea."

His eyes glint. "Your reasoning had merit."

"Please, please don't remind me."

"I've been playing this difficult choice over in my head."

"What choice?" I ask, suddenly wary.

"Angry Kenyan, Shy Kenyan, or Drunk Kenyan. There's a valiant battle for first place going on in my mind right now. Abusive emails. Cute glances. Or early morning rescues and drunken confessions. Tough one."

I hit him and he laughs. He places his chin in the palm of his hand and watches me. There's definite warmth in his eyes, like he's fond of me. Like he wants me here and I'm not just imposing. My heart stops.

The mood subtly shifts and I think he's asking himself the same questions I'm asking myself. What are we doing?

"Do you want to go for a walk?'

"Where?"

"On the grounds."

Grounds?? His house has grounds?

"Okay. Does your sister also have shoes stored for rainy days?"

She actually does. We're the same size. Well, maybe her shoe size is slightly bigger than mine, but these are sneakers. Converse. So the size difference isn't uncomfortable.

"Will she mind?"

"She'll probably be ecstatic."

I look at him with a question in my eyes.

"I don't really bring people here."

He means women.

"Why not?"

"I'm stingy with my personal space."

What does he do? Rent a room in a motel?

His lips curve, clearly reading the question in my eyes. "I have an apartment I usually stay in during the week. Closer to town."

It occurs to me I don't even know where we are. What's wrong with me? "Where are we?"

"Manzoni."

"Where?"

"Just after Athi River."

"Wow!"

It makes sense when we step out of the house. This is semi-wilderness. A little bushier and it could be classed as a game reserve. But I love it. It's so...Darien.

"So you own this land?"

"Yeah. Want to see where I'm building the main house?"

Which explains the medium-sized cabin we're in now.

"I'd like that."

We spend another hour walking to the building site and seeing the house. Darien shows me the different rooms. He glows like a little boy proudly showing off something he made from scratch. It moves something in me. Dear God, Rain...stop falling for this man.

He has the usual boy plans: gaming room, pool room, mini-theatre (all right, not typical, but still a boy toy). Then he has other quirky rooms like a "sun room," which I rib him about.

"How so very English of you, English."

He explains it will have a balcony. He makes me stand right below the spot and take in the view. It's breathtaking. We can see the National Park in the distance, its hills and valleys. Nairobi city is sprawled a distance further. With a view like that, I'd have a sun room too.

Of course there are provisions for a pool, a tennis court, a gym. The man even has a camping site. He confesses he originally wanted to have a nature trail, which would lead to the National Park, but he sold that part of the land.

"Why?"

"Long story."

Which he drops. I don't think I can invoke the "fifteen questions" privilege.

By the time we get back to the cabin it's almost sunset. We sit outside, on a loveseat much like the ones at Indigo Blue. The view from here is not as spectacular as the one from the main house, but it isn't shabby either. This is beautiful.

"Why are you building if you never stay here for very long?" I ask. It's kind of a loaded question.

"A man can dream."

My heart picks up speed. "Would you really...settle?"

He shrugs. "I don't know. But it would make for a great holiday home. Maybe I'd rent it out in-between visits. To tourists. Weekend getaways. I'll see."

Just like that my hopes are dashed. What hopes? I must still be drunk. Just because he's showing me around his home means nothing. In fairness, I ambushed him this morning.

But I've been here all day, sunset is falling and neither one of us has discussed me leaving.

"I should call Amil and ask him to take care of my car."

"Sly handled that."

I look at him in shock.

"She called. She was worried."

"Oh my God, I was meant to call her soon as I got home."

"I figured. That's why I picked the call."

I'm panicking again. "What...what did she say?"

He glances at me, that teasing glint in his eye. "She wanted to know if my passport came through okay."

I shrink into the seat. Darien grins.

"I told her it did. Then we went on to discuss the general incompetence of government agencies worldwide. Visa Offices in particular."

If I could turn crimson, I'd be crimson right now. What I manage is a darker tint of brown around my cheeks.

Darien turns fully to face me, his knee brushes mine on the couch. The heat that continues to build has nothing to do with embarrassment.

He reaches out, slides his fingers around the nape of my neck, into my hair. My breathing intensifies.

"Am I still your dirty little secret, Rain?"

My mouth becomes dry...somewhere else...becomes wet. It isn't just what he's doing. It's his eyes. How he's looking at me. It's a deliberate appraisal...sensual promise.

I've been playing this game with him...doing this dance. And now, he's calling my card. He pulls me towards him as if I weigh nothing. My body is in riot.

Our lips are inches apart. I am gazing up at him in anticipation. Apprehension.

He kisses me. My world stops. Literally.

It starts off gentle, teasing...nibbles on my lips. But it does things to me and I respond with much more fervour than his initiated. Darien seems to hesitate for a second before he intensifies the kiss, meeting my hunger. My world slips into oblivion as I respond even more.

Before I know it I'm on his lap, one of his hands is on my thigh, keeping me balanced, the other is cupping my face. Our lips are locked together. He's gently teasing mine open and I oblige. When his tongue touches mine my world explodes.

I moan and try to inch closer to him, my hands wrapped around his neck. Darien intensifies our kiss. His hand is now on my back, caressing me. It slips under my T-shirt and I arch my back, involuntarily grinding against him. He groans.

Instinctively, I manoeuvre and reposition myself, straddling him. Darien pulls me closer. A part of my heart catapults as I feel his erection. I'm part arousal, part fear.

This is the first time another man is touching me like this, igniting me like this. But I can't stop or control my reaction to him. I give in to everything, his kiss, his hands...chaste still in where he chooses to touch me but I feel like they're everywhere. My thighs, my back, my hair, my neck, my arms...all at once.

I don't know when I start moving against him, wanting nothing more but to remove whatever obstructions are keeping me from...all of him. I'm moaning outrightly now, returning his kiss with feverish need. I don't know where I end...where he starts.

It's like a perfect dance, getting more and more frantic... more and more desperate. I need him. Now.

Darien suddenly pulls away. I try to move towards him, close the gap he's created between us but he cups my face in his hands, holding me in place.

His breathing is heavy...his eyes are silver. His eyes are silver? Is that because of me? Because of us right now? I want more, I try to move closer again. But he won't let me.

He stares, quietly, passing me a message that the more self-preservative part of my mind has been trying to send. If we go down this road I'll end up sleeping with him. Tonight. I know that deep down in my gut. And deep down in my gut I want it. Badly.

Thing is, I'm not sure why. Rebound? Hunger born of several years of starvation? Curiosity? The simple craving for contact. Being wanted. Changing the colour of a man's eyes...Fear that he won't want me any other way?

These are not questions someone my age should be asking. But he's making me think about them, because he knows, they matter to me.

He pulls me against his chest and vulnerability washes over me. I bury my head against his neck, snuggle as far as I can into the comfort of him.

I feel naked, not my body. My soul. I'm oscillating between shame and justification. I'm no longer sure who or what I'm saving myself for.

But one thing is clear, if I'm going to do this, I should do it with conviction. If I'm going to leave, I should leave...now. With conviction. Oscillating between two standpoints never ends well. No one wins. I know this. It's PR 101.

His hands soothingly rub my back, bringing me down from my spiralling arousal. I hover at some in-between place, where my body still tingles but is not at risk of combustion. I know he's hovering somewhere too...I can still feel him beneath me. I shut my eyes, wanting to exist here...limbo.

Movement is overrated. Sometimes what you really need...is limbo.

Silence. Sunset. Birds calling out as they fly home. Gentle breeze of the African savannah sweeping across our faces.

Heartbeats. Slow breaths. Silence. Limbo.

...the story continues...

The Visa Series

Excerpt from D for Darien

She spent the night but I behaved myself for the rest of it. It took every single ounce of control I had; holding her in my bed, watching her take delicate sips of coffee in my kitchen this morning, dropping her off at her house...remembering the last time we stood at her door and how soft her ass felt against me. I settled for chaste touches then. This morning I settled for what to her must have been a scotching kiss, to me came far, far short of what I really, really want to do to her. I look at her and I want her. Badly.

For me, that's irrational behaviour. Don't get me wrong, I'm as hot-blooded as the next guy but I've been trained to keep that in check. All of it, not just the physical, my heart, my soul, my feelings, my thoughts. You are only as good as the emotion you're capable of hiding.

With Rain, I've failed. Dismally. She doesn't think so. She thinks I'm in total control and I let her think it because it works for me.

I don't know what it is about her. I've lived around the world, I've met some of its most decadent creatures...many who have been more than happy to play adult games. Rain is an innocent by many standards, inexperienced, shielded and restrained by years of conditioning. Yes, she's beautiful, though again, it isn't the beauty you put on a mantelpiece. I've met many of those too.

Rain is real. Maybe that is what draws me to her. She doesn't know the coy games played in political circles, she doesn't know the seductive dances used to lure a man to his doom.

...COMING SOON...

Dear Reader,

Thank you for taking the time to read V for Visa. I hope you enjoyed it. Please consider leaving a review at your place of purchase so others can discover the book; it would be greatly appreciated. Stay tuned for part two D for Darien. Coming 2016.

Regards,

Mona Ombogo.

About the Author

Mona Ombogo is a Writer/Director who has been in the Kenyan Film Industry since August 2007. Born in Kenya, raised in Swaziland, educated in Kenya, the US and the UK, Mona has been exposed to several cultures which has in turn enriched her expression as an artist and has given her a broad outlook on the world which she borrows from to enhance her creations.

Mona's greatest aspiration is to continue telling and sharing stories that touch on life as a whole and to be a part of the growth of the Kenyan Film and Entertainment Industry.

You can contact Mona through her website, www.monaombogo.com, or visit her on Twitter at www.twitter.com/ monaombogo, her Facebook page, www.facebook.com/ rainhanda/?fref=ts, or email her at mona @monaombogo.com

