My trumpet friend is shining golden like the evening sun. He looks expensive. Perhaps Mother has sent him to pick me up. Showing off, trying to make me feel inferior?

The road show people are passing again. I wonder why they always have to disturb the peace of the neighbourhood this early in the morning, when I’m still asleep. My left leg bumps into the bed’s back frame as I kick the blanket away, and I wince in pain. I know Father will be standing by the door, face wrinkled like a guard. He will not ask me why I haven’t taken tea.

I’m not as tall as Father. Thank God I’m as handsome as him. Perhaps I inherited my wide ears from Mother. I know I will never keep long hair as my trumpet friend.

Our single room is almost half-full. I scamper past sacks of clothes as I head towards the door. When Father’s construction job pays badly, the little cash I get from selling the clothes help in feeding me, feeding him, and paying for my school fees.

Listen, I would have been Father’s loving boy if his heart was as handsome as his face. His thick beard is always trimmed at the edges, like a Muslim. He speaks with this sweet tenor voice. His drinking of chang’aa always retains his slender shape. And he walks in this cool swagger, a feigned straightness to avoid staggering.

Now, my friend plays the trumpet again. My lungs jump in excitement. I know I will be late for school. I will skip the morning preps. The principal will later tell Father how he thinks I may fail in class. How he thinks I may score a straight ‘E’ in the oncoming KCSE examinations.

Listen, my friend would have been as handsome as Father had he shaved or combed his thick mass of hair. But his voice is fine than Father’s – a strong soprano like the trumpet’s. I like that he doesn’t touch alcohol.

I wonder what happened to Mother. I came from school one day to find her gone. That meant she would no longer pamper me. That she won’t be bringing me chicken in school during visiting days. She wouldn’t be sneaking me out of the house to attend trumpet lessons from my road show friend.

Dad is a strong man. Too strong to love me, his only child. He keeps telling me that it’s only studies that will make our family better. That I should avoid hanging out with spoilt Kariobangi boys. When he sees me going out this early, he will suspect me and warn me again that Kariobangi is no holy place – you may even get shot by a stray bullet.

Coming from the bathroom a blue towel draped around my waist, I step on a cockroach. The poor thing’s body farts some colourless substance. I wonder whether my death would be accidental as the roach’s. Maybe Father will one day kill me for being disobedient? For refusing to become a Babadogo Catholic Church faithful because the choir sings in a boring tone, than my beloved Redeemed. For refusing to see the doctor when Father said I had breathing problems.

I know my breathing is not that good. My trumpet friend once told me that my lungs were almost shutting because I had not cried much as a kid. That Mother used to always breastfeed and lull me to sleep in my cot every time I caught a tantrum. But I didn’t believe him because he wasn’t present when I was born; wasn’t a doctor even. If Father told me such a thing, I would believe; half-half.

I put on my grey trousers, and tie it around my waist with a leather belt. When I pass my hands over my ears, a splitting sound of the trumpet comes again. I slip my white shirt on, and peep through the open window. Streaks of sunlight hit my eyes and I blink rapidly like a drunkard. From a distance, my trumpet friend is standing atop the road show bus, shirt unbuttoned – traces of hair strands visible from his chest. His fingers are holding tight onto the trumpet protruding from his mouth, small dimples gracing the sides of his mouth as he blows.

The bus must be going round and round the village. I really can’t tell you what they are advertising. Obama is not coming here. Even if our President was around, the trumpet man would have played the National Anthem, with the President’s voice on the background.

I met my trumpet friend while coming from school last week. My face resembled a crumpled note. I had collapsed during PE in school and woken up near a hospital-smiling nurse with clean teeth, clean like Mother’s, bending over me. Father was phoned and the nurse confirmed I had breathing problems; that my lungs would soon kill me if I continued resisting medication. Just after turning into the Kasabuni corner, my school bus dropped me. The driver said he couldn’t take me any further. I was sad.

Wiping dust off my ankles, a man joined me. He had this well-trimmed beard that I wished to have in future. Holding his shining trumpet on his lap like it were a baby, he asked me why I was angry. I felt like kicking him, and my breathing intensified. Then a Gor Mahia fan passed by – decked all green and this wonderful green feather cap – and he blew into his green vuvuzela. I grabbed the vuvuzela and blew into it, blew until I felt air escaping my body. My breath lightened, and I felt heaven in my chest. I kicked in the air. Hurrah! I shouted.

Now, I kick in the air. Kick at the door’s lower frame as I go out and shout “ouch!” I have been too anxious to see my trumpet friend. It’s now the second week since I began my lessons, and I’m happy with the progress. No wonder my fellow classmates call me Gen, as in genius.  I’m also the best in Biology all over Ruaraka. My trumpet friend taught me everything about the lungs, about the human body and the environment. And I was mesmerized as he had earlier confessed he had never been past class eight. Perhaps he came from a wealthy family?

I know Father will slap me. He will insist bad company is spoiling me. He will maintain he knows about my relationship with the trumpet guy. That if I don’t cut off the whole shet, he will be teaching me from the house. He will remind me that he is my mother and father. He will remind me that I should obey him.

I’m in the truck now. The truck opened on one side. My friend and I are standing there. He is playing a low tune from the trumpet, his face bright; his mouth going up and down and sideways with the tune’s rhythm. I am carefully observing his slowly-moving fingers. Diamond is singing on the background, straight from the driver’s booth. The morning sun has become angrier, burning fiercer. I smell of sweat and I feel like bathing a second time. My friend’s exposed armpits are also sweating, young sweat. He seems unbothered. Knocks me in the head with his knuckles, and I concentrate back.

If only I could substitute Father with my trumpet friend! The latter’s facial expression is now brighter. He catches me when I’m about to trip over the truck. He is my peace. Father is always angry at me, seems he doesn’t recognize me as his child, he keeps telling me to stop the trumpet thing – that it will only kill my lungs. I don’t care how he knew about my trumpet lessons. He obviously wants me to die.

At Riverside Stage, the long truck turns towards Babadogo. I marvel at how it stops other vehicles coming from town. My friend hands over the trumpet to me. I smile as I blow into it with all my energy. My lungs smile as they lift up and down, as the tunes seeps in and out. As the tunes give me a peace Father will never give me. Looking up, I see my friend grinning. I’m sure he is happy I’m learning pretty fast. He wipes his sweaty face with a brown towel. The writing on his blue shirt; this boy will go far.

I’m too busy with the trumpet to wonder whether this boy could be me, the trumpet held steadfast into my lips, my body rocking with the direction of the tune. I know Father hates me too much to realize I can change his life for good. That if he bought me a trumpet, I would blow my lungs into fitness. But he thinks I’m a crazy adolescent. That his doctors know everything.

The day drags to the end. Getting back to the house, it’s five in the evening. I wash my clothes, cook rice with cabbages. By the time I finish mopping the house, the rice on the previously cooking stove has gone cold. I warm it and eat it, and drown it down the stomach with a cup of water. Crickets colour the night with their beautiful melodies. Father is yet to come home. Perhaps he is somewhere drinking, or even caressing the waitress’s breasts at Silent Bar. He will never know that my friend gave me a hundred bob to buy supper.

He will come back home perhaps while I’m on my second dream, tonight.

Three weeks later, I can almost play the trumpet on my own. My friend now wears this expensive-expensive suits and shoes. And I start wondering whether he had been send by Mother’s people to take me home. With his shaven hair, he looks almost as handsome as Father and me. He tells me that God or Christ or the angels visits us through people and things. I don’t ask him to explain all that shit. Keep quiet.

Father is no longer monitoring my moves. But he keeps warning me about bad company. I wonder whether he will ever see anything good in me. He will shout at me as usual. But I will simply keep quiet, and perhaps nod to satisfy him. Talking back at him will only hurt my lungs more. I may even perhaps laugh like a madman. Laughter combined with more trumpet-playing would perhaps further strengthen my lungs.

I have this crazy feeling. I will never stop playing the trumpet. Since my friend began teaching me, my lugs have been quietly joining into the music, slowly coming back to life. I will become a great trumpet player. And I will start a school for other youth and children with breathing problems like mine. Will start a trumpet school for anyone looking for fun.

The following day, my friend comes to me smiling. He is dressed in a more expensive suit, a silver lace hanging down from his neck. In the evening, he takes me to Silent Bar. Sitting on a tall stool, the sweet smell of chapatti being baked at the corner hitting my nose. The smell of beer is intoxicating, and I salivate at a waitress’s exposed red thighs as she passes by our table, as her voluptuous ass bubbles towards the counter. My friend nudges me at the elbow. I focus on the Sony Television fixed on the wall. Practically gaze at it, since I never watch TV.

Then during the nine pm news, there I am! A thin chap dressed in school uniform and a rucksack strapped to my back. Blowing into the trumpet, my cheeks full of air like a balloon. In the truck with my giggling friend sitting beside me, like an expert. Then the Health Minister in this dazzling suit announces I will be The Teens’ Health Ambassador. He congratulates my trumpet friend for following his orders. A clink sound hits my ears when I discover everybody in the club is toasting for me.

Father will become loving. I will buy him a posh house in Runda.

About the Author

Peter Ngila recently attended the 2016 Short Story Day Africa Migrations Flow workshop in Nairobi, moderated by Muthoni Garland. He graduated from Mount Kenya University last August, where he was studying journalism. Peter’s short fiction has appeared on Jalada Africa (Kenya), Praxis Magazine (Nigeria), Brittle Paper (Nigeria) Lawino Magazine (Uganda), Prachya Review (Bangladesh), Story Zetu (Kenya) and Daily News (a Tanzanian Newspaper). He has attended the Writivism Creative Writing Workshops in Nairobi (2014) and Dar (2015), participated in the Writivism Mentoring Process (2014 and 2015) and attended the 2015 Writivism Festival in Kampala.

The post My Trumpet Is a Doctor by Peter Ngila first appeared on Prachya Review.

“Darling, one day I will build a storey.”

My wife looked at me ridiculously. Looked at my feeble eyes, as if questioning their seeing of ‘one day’; at my feeble muscles. She walked a few steps to the small room’s corner, picked an old broom and began sweeping off the soot. I felt like hitting her; she was too ignorant. Stopping her cleaning, she looked at me again.

“Stop being over-ambitious,” she said, her eyes still fixed on me. I thought: my two school-going children will one day require cash to advance with their education.

“No. You go wrong. God gave me fingers, and I have to make use of them.”

“Your job at the company doesn’t pay much.”

I hated it when one reminded me of what I already knew. What I would sacrifice for even my mother to get away from. Yes, I knew I earned not much, despite operating the deadliest machine at the company. You see, this machine can simply chop your fingers if you are absent-minded on duty. Or it can even kill you. I always find myself sweating while at work, such that when I get at home I just wash and go to bed. And I barely touch my wife.  Furthermore, our two kids are already enough.

Yes, I always have to wake up every day in the morning to go to work. I usually pass through Mathare North, and I barely stay with my phone for thugs rob me on my way to work. Yes, I know the Babadogo path going down to my company is always dusty. I doubt I will never cease sneezing like a Caterpillar tractor while on job. And my Muhindi boss simply doesn’t seem to understand all this!

And yes, it started raining and water filtered in. My wife was about to pick a duster when I called her back. The iron sheets were almost rotting, and the pungent Mathare stink was creeping straight into my nose. I peeped through the small holes on the mabati shelter and saw a kid struggling to shit in a flowing sewage. I wrinkled my face and my wife didn’t understand why. Bad smells were part of our Mathare slum.

I stretched my fingers before me, like a teacher about to cane them.

“These fingers, I have a feeling they will make me rich sooner or later. Then we will build a big house and educate our kids past Cambridge.”

My wife laughed madly, clapped her palms.

“My dreamer husband, may God fulfill your wishes. But be careful not to provoke him.”

“You think my fifty-ish fingers are too crumbled to do that? Wait and see.”

“Besides, don’t you feel bad when the landlord has to disturb our peace every month-end?”

“He comes to get his cash.”

“Then one day I won’t give him a coin; because I will be living in my own house.”

I folded my torn jeans trousers knee-length and walked out of the house.

That night, I dreamt being in a big house. Next, I was a fat landlord, furiously knocking on a tenant’s house. Next, I was supervising the construction of my new building, hands delved into my pockets, ordering the builders around.

Next, I caressed my sleeping wife’s shoulders, and left. Next, I was on my way to work. I crossed Outering Road, made a sign of the cross. I snapped my fingers, just to break the morning loneliness. Kariadudu looked like a den of thieves; hideous images shaped like thieves holding machetes. The same God I had thanked saw me through the seemingly dark Kariadudu. Getting to Babadogo Catholic Church, I went around until I was walking on a small path leading to the industries. I almost felt like closing my ears; the hooting from matatus wriggling from sleep was just too much to bear. The motorbikes were also passing by; and I wondered whether the drivers actually sleep.

The usual dust attacked me. I sneezed as usual. While knocking at the gate, the gateman hastily opened for me. Huge trucks were packed beside the tap, as young men struggled to clean thin pipes. Hands delved into my pockets deep such that my shoulders stood on end like a skeleton’s, I gasped and stopped. I had been about to bump into my Muhindi boss.

“Boss, pole. I hadn’t seen you,” I apologized to him. He had this strong build and very black hair. I noticed a thin liquid flowing easily down on his nostrils; and I knew he won’t be able to talk audibly. He fished a handkerchief from his corduroy trousers’ pocket, wiped the snot and ordered; “Kazi haraka!” He walked away. And I knew there was some deadline he needed his workers to beat. Perhaps that’s why the gateman had opened so quickly for me.

That day my dream came true. As the machine’s teeth chewed my fore-finger’s upper knuckle, I at first couldn’t realize the coming of God.  I screamed so hard everybody came. Even those colleagues whose mouths were full of chapatti madodo lunch. Pain stung my entire body like a hundred needles. I smelt of death, of clotting blood. My boss soon came, half-walking half-running. I saw fear in his eyes, like an Indian actor’s.

He ordered an ambulance and I was quickly taken to Uhai Nehema Hospital. I recovered and made a quiet sign of the cross. Who would believe I would end up being treated in such a high-profile facility?

God came fully the following week. I was still on medical leave when my boss entered in my house. I was glad my wife wasn’t around; she would have scolded him for ‘being out of place.’ For failing to kick his shoes out. I dragged a stool for him from behind the old, wooden table. His huge body swallowed the stool, and he removed his stripped cardigan and placed it on his lap. The afternoon sun was blaring, finding its way into the house.

“Jonte, we have been experiencing huge losses since you went on leave.”

I wanted to laugh and tell him to go to hell. I thought I was of no use to the company. But I kept quiet.

“Why?”

“Nobody can operate the machine as well as you do. Your fingers are simply miraculous,” he explained and gazed at me. I felt as if I was naked and he was seeing through me.

Then he told me that the company’s insurance and he himself had settled my hospital bill. I just eyed him; no ‘thank you, sir’. His company was responsible of my health, especially if an accident happened.

He swallowed a dry lump. His Adam’s apple went up and down. I remembered that was exactly how I had behaved when proposing to my wife.

“I want to compensate your injury.”

“Eh!”

Yes, so that you may resume work.”

He saw my shock and took a deep breath. I didn’t hate myself; my blood was too precious to go uncompensated. But I knew even if I won a case in court, the company would pay me good money and then sack me. You can’t live on a million your entire life.

“I don’t understand.”

“Well, I will pay you two million. And you won’t even think about going to court.”

“Okay,” my voice was calm. But somebody in me wanted to jump up and down, and ask whether two million really had six zeros.

“Resume work on Monday. You will have all this weekend to rest.”

“Thank you, boss.”

I saw him off.

A month later I told my wife that Jack, our youngest child, will be joining The Search Education Center. Her hand went straight to her mouth; like she had just found a bearded man fucking a school girl.

“Where will you get cash to see Jack through Search?”

I just laughed her shock off. Entering into the house, I emerged with Jack, fully decked in The Search’s white shirt and green shorts.

“Did you rob a bank, my husband?”

Laughter.

“No. It’s my fingers’ work.”

“Let me see them again.”

I stretched them out, the half index finger looked odd. I fisted them and punched in the air.

“Power. The other four and the remaining index’s stub combined can build a world.”

My wife nodded.

“Jack will go to school in The Search for this year. I will think of transferring him to a boarding school in January. He will be in class six and big enough.”

“You know Tracy won’t like that.”

“Eeeeh. She will join her brother next year. You can’t climb a mountain in a day, my dear.”

In five years I will have moved from here. My children would be in high school. Every year, I would be cutting a part of one of my fingers and get paid for it. I will have to be wise lest my boss should get suspicious. Besides, he himself can’t handle the machine. Besides, I’m human. The best thing with the machine is that it completely cuts off only your finger’s part, sparing you of much pain. And then the company foots your hospital bill and thereafter compensates you with millions of cash. I bet the thumb will earn much cash for me. And I will start with the left hand. By the time all my fingers are gone; I will be filthy rich and retired, maybe. Ready to die with grandchildren.

My wife will then trust fingers of men.

About the Author

Peter Ngila is a Kenyan bibliophile, reader, lover of humanity and aspiring writer. He graduated from Mount Kenya University in August, 2015, where he was studying journalism. He is currently a correspondent with The Star, a Kenyan daily. He has participated in Writivism literary workshops and mentorship process (2014 and 2015 in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam, respectively); and attended the 2015 Writivism Festival in Kampala. His fiction has appeared on Jalada Africa, HisiaZangu, Muwado, Amka Space Literature Forum, and Daily News – a Tanzanian newspaper. Ngila has finished writing a short story anthology manuscript, and is currently editing his novella.

The post Golden Fingers by Peter Ngila first appeared on Prachya Review.