Sisters before Misters

She always thought his smile was cute. She thought his jokes were funny. She marveled at his style. His physique. His aura. He was her dream man and she was pathetically in love with him. She wished he was hers, all for herself. But he couldn’t be hers and her best friend’s at the same time. Her best friend Kate had been dating Mark for the past half year. It ate her up, seeing them together. This was the longest relationship Kate had been in, in years. Kate had this little habit of finding fault in all her partners. If he didn’t snore too loudly, he had a deep vernacular accent. If he didn’t speak too much, he did not understand her love language. If he wasn’t too hairy, he had ugly toes. Kate would always come up with weird excuses to end the relationship weeks into thinking she had found her soulmate. But Mark was perfect. Too perfect that Kate’s best friend had jokingly warned her that if she let him fly away, she should not be surprised if he wound up in her nest.

At first, it seemed like a far-fetched joke between two friends but the possibility was becoming feasible with each passing day. Kate was gradually slithering into her element and was slowly starting to notice Mark’s little shortcomings. Apparently, Mark had a missing pre-molar that Kate did not know of. His relatives were becoming intrusive and annoying. He was farting a lot in his sleep. And he spent too much time working. Quite understandably, Mark, a civil engineer by profession, had recently acquired a promotion at work. He was now in charge of several high value construction projects across the country. He would be gone for days making video calls the closest they would get to seeing each other. Kate was getting bored. Karen, her best friend would always keep her company but it was still not the same. Something was missing. She wanted to be held. Hugged. Cuddled. She missed being choked, spanked and being turned around. Mark was geographically incapacitated and so Kate opened the pandoras box that turned her life and that of her best friend around. She started an affair with Steve, her gym instructor.

It took weeks for Karen to notice, as Steve and Kate tried to act all professional around each other while at the gym. Karen began being suspicious when occasionally after their work out sessions, Kate would ask her to go ahead and leave her behind as she had some errands to run. The eureka moment came one evening after their gym session when Karen saw Steve dressed in what looked like a very familiar hoodie. A little oversized, white with black sleeves, and with a small black Nike logo right in the middle.

‘Hey Kate, don’t you have a similar hoodie?’ Karen asks, pointing at Steve.

Steve and Kate exchange a guilty look for a second.

‘Uhhm, yeah. Come to think of it, it is pretty similar to the one I have’ Kate stammers avoiding eye contact.

‘Similar, or the same one?’ Karen pesters, looking Kate right in her eyes. Seemingly, she has touched a nerve.

‘What does it matter, Karen?’ Kate demands, facing Karen menacingly, her hands on her waist.

‘Oh My God! I knew it! I have been suspicious for a long time…’ Kate goes beserk before she is cut short.

‘Shut the F up, Karen! How is any of this your business?’ Kate questions, raising her voice.

Karen is enraged. You would think she is the one that has been cheated on. She is breathing heavily, trying hard to control herself. She gathers the words and gives Kate one condition. To end the affair with Steve or Karen will spill the beans. Kate laughs it off. She calls Kate jealous. She terms her entitled. She asks her to focus on her miserable single life and let her be. She says it is her life and she will do whatever she wanted. She reminds Karen that she is the bigger slut who slept with her boss for a promotion. And tells her to get her own man so she can stop thirsting for hers. Karen doesn’t take this very well. Her left palm lands on Kate’s cheek. Kate is astounded. She grabs Karen by her hair and pulls her towards herself. They hold each other by the waist and start wrestling, going round in circles, uttering some not so printable words at each other. Steve tries to separate them and ends getting severely bitten on his arm. He steps aside, reeling in pain. An onlooker pulls out their phone and starts filming. Steve finally manages to end the fight but the damage is already done. The video captures a sizeable moment of the drama. And ends up online.

***

Karen is seated next to the window, scrolling through the dog – eared pages of Msafiri magazine. She is on her way to Mombasa for a work – related conference. She has combined her trip with a whole week leave in order to take some time off work and get some much needed rest. And a break from all the drama in her life. It is about two months since her nasty fallout with her best friend. It was a shameful experience, that one. Nearly all her other friends, colleagues and family saw that video. They did not know that side of her. She tried to explain that she was the victim but no one cared who hurt who. They saw what they saw. So she had decided to quit justifying herself and get on with her life. Kate had recently reached out to her and apologised. She had asked her to bury the hatchet and rekindle their friendship. Karen would hear none of it. After several attempts, Karen had finally agreed on the condition that they enroll to a new gym and Kate breaks up with Steve. It seemed like too much of a sacrifice for Kate now that Mark had dumped her, but she had finally accepted. Chicks before D*cks, they said. Sisters before Misters. They had vowed to never let any other man come between them again. And then the unexpected happened.

Her seatmate arrives and Karen cannot believe it. She is greeted by that cute smile that melts her whole being. Mark’s. Mark is on his way to the coast to supervise one of his construction projects. She is lost for words. They had never met since…you know. The plane takes off and after a cocktail or two, Karen is now at ease. They laugh at the fight between Kate and Karen. Mark expresses his gratitude since were it not for that fight, he probably would not have found out about Kate’s affair. They had broken up immediately after and he was still fearing women. For the next hour, Mark and Kate spoke, laughed and discussed anything and everything under the sun. The conversation flowed so naturally, you would think they have been friends for years. They realised that despite their unique differences, they had so much more in common. They both loved country music, epic movies and world politics. They both loved art, sports and history. They were both obsessed with cars, cats and children. They were two sides of the same coin.

Mark confessed to Karen that he had always felt some chemistry between them even while he was dating her friend. He wondered how two totally different people can such close friends. He said that them meeting on the plane was the universe speaking to them. It was nature’s way of bringing them together. He added that he knew Karen felt the same way. He said he could see it in her eyes. He said he believed in going after what he wanted and that he would like to take the chance with her and see where that road would lead them. Karen was befuddled. This was spiralling too fast. It was exactly what she had yearned for in a long time and now that it was finally happening, she did not know how to react. What would Kate say? She would certainly go rabid. Just when they were on the brink of being besties again. Mark seemed to read her mind. He assured her that she was under no pressure to accept his proposal. He promised her that he would wait for as long as she would take to make her decision. They landed in Mombasa and Mark gave Karen the address and a key to where he was staying. Nyali Heights. She was welcome anytime.

***

The water hit Karen’s head with a mild soothing pressure. The conference was over and she had a whole week of vacation ahead of her. She stood in the shower marveling at her nakedness. She had a beautiful body. She was a beautiful, kind hearted woman. Why was she not happy then? She thought about her life. All the chances she had missed as a little kid because she was too shy. All the opportunities that had passed right above her head but she failed to grab them because of what people would say. She wondered how her life would have turned out if only she had been a little bolder and made decisions that were in her favour. For starters, she would not have gone to nursing school in order to please her mom but would have probably followed her passion of being a chef instead. She would have opened her chain of restaurants and made tons of money doing what she loved. There was no guarantee that it would have worked, but she was denied the satisfaction of finding out.

It was time to do what made her happy, she decided. She got out of the shower, put on a little red dress and some red bottom heels. She typed a long text and sent it to Kate. She hailed a taxi and looked at the mirror. She liked what she saw. Fire in her eyes. An intrepid new self.

The taxi arrived. She walked towards it with the credence of a movie star going home after another successful mission, leaving a trail of destruction behind.

‘Where to?’ The cab driver asks.

‘Nyali Heights’ she says.

And they drive off into the night.