"Stop, alright?" I scream at my dad and everyone comes rushing.
Great!
What is the use for soundproof walls if they are only in the bedrooms and people are hardly there? That was the least of my concerns at the moment.
"You want to be a father? Why not try sticking around for more than two days and not hiding in Mason's room the whole time while you at it." I protest.
I can see mason clench his fists beside him. This is not the time for step bro drama. I needed my dad to be my dad just once.
"There are so many things you wouldn't understand son." He says still staring at mason.
"Maybe because you don't ever have any real conversations with me. Do I need to be five to get your attention now?" I cant believe he is still staring at mason when I am trying to have a conversation.
"Is that the son you want nowadays?" I say after a moment of silence.
I'm not thinking and honestly, maybe I don't really mean what I am saying right now but if I have to get mason thrown out to get the life I deserve, that is exactly what I am going to do.
"Well guess what, he already managed to make my life miserable in ways even you haven't succeeded. Maybe he is your son after all." Dad goes silent and mason looks like he could use a punch but I'm not really in the mood it's a school day and being late is not an option now that I have to prove that I don't get privileges because my dad owns the school.
"You are being a child right now." Finally dad says as I pick up my bag to leave.
"Yeah? Because that is the one thing I have never been dad. Maybe I should try it some more."
I slam the door behind me, fire up the engine, and drive away.
As usual, Blake and Rick are loitering by the school entrance, buzzing with something that clearly excites them. They don't even notice me as I walk past, so I say nothing and head straight for my locker.
Some guy is passing by and I hold his collars for making too much noise with his feet. It catches their attention when I slam his back against the lockers and he holds up his hands.
"Dude, let him go!" Blake shouts. Rick steps forward, grabbing my hand.
"Don't touch me!" I yell, ripping free and watching the guy scramble away.
I look around and my eyes soften when I see pony stare at me from a distance. Fuck! She must think I am broken. I am behaving like the entitled freak everyone thinks I am.
"Logan."I hear a soft voice call out to me and my head stops spinning.
Pony.
She has never said my name, damn I didn't even think she knew it but with everything that's going on, I wouldn't think there's one student that doesn't know the psycho guy.
"Are you okay?" she asks, her voice calm and her eyes searching.
I shrug. "Honestly? I think I'm losing it."
She watches me for a moment.
"How do you do it?" I blurt out.
"Do what?"
"Be kind. To people. To those little kids. Bringing donuts, laughing with them. How do you manage to be that person?"
She lets out a sarcastic laugh and leans closer to my face.
"Have you been stalking me Mr. Smith?" I grin at how she uses my last name like it's a game.
"Go out with me." The words just slip out before I can stop them. Her eyes widen like I've just pulled a wild stunt.
"What?" she whispers, barely audible.
I quickly backtrack with a smile. "I mean… out of this hallway. Because honestly, I can't figure this place out."
Her expression shifts for a split second. Is that disappointment in her eyes? Before I can dwell on it, she recovers quickly and offers me a small, genuine smile as she falls into step beside me.
It's not exactly what I wanted, but it's progress.
"How do you know about those kids and the doughnuts?" she asks, catching me completely off guard. I hadn't thought about how to answer that.
"Uh…" I rack my brain, struggling for something to say. Nothing comes out right.
She just grins and takes my hand, pulling me along. "I know a place."
"What?" I ask, still trying to catch up, both to her and whatever this is.
"Just, shhh." She holds me against the wall and places a hand on my mouth.
We are looking into each others eyes and I know it is the wrong time for this but I ache to feel her lips and the way she parts them just enough to make me want her, I know she wants this as much as I do.
She pulls me out just as I begin to imagine my lips on her and if they are softer than this palm I so want to nibble at right now.
"comeon." I follow quietly and she leads me off the school compound through the auditorium. I didn't even know one can access the outside here.
"I'm supposed to be the cool one." I whine.
"Just watch and learn boy." She smiles back and runs to the pathwalk in the outskirts of the school.
Boy? A smile forms on my face and I don't think I mind following her through the pathway to a playground adjacent to a dirt pile. Kids seem happy, playing basketball, volleyball, some are just happy dancing or something. I didn't even now these places exist. How did she?
"I grew up here. This right here is my family." She answers that question for me.
"I grew up here," she says, reading my mind. "This right here? This is my family."
I frown, confused. "I don't understand."
She shrugs, walking backward as we stroll across the field. "You wouldn't. You're the cool kids. The ones we used to talk about growing up."
I blink, still trying to process it when she suddenly calls out, stopping me in my tracks. A kid comes running toward her.
They switch to Swahili — I assume Pony is introducing me and trying to break the awkwardness. Desperate, I blurt out the only word I know.
"Jambo?"
The kid freezes mid-sentence and just stares. Damn, did I just screw that up? I glance at Pony, hoping for backup, but she's giving me zero help. Great.
"Did I say it wrong?" I ask, voice cracking a little. No response. Just more staring.
"Shit… I said it wrong, didn't I? Jambo? Ja-mbo?" I try again, shifting through every accent I can manage, but they all sound the same, and just as wrong.
"Relax." Well finally, someone speaks.
"it's okay, they are just more used to 'sasa' or 'mambo' it's a bit more casual.
"Relax." Finally, someone speaks.
"It's okay. They're just more used to 'sasa' or 'mambo' — it's a bit more casual," she explains, nodding toward the kids doing the happy dance. "I was asking if we could join in the fun."
"I don't even know what they're doing!" I want to protest.
"That's why you have me, isn't it? Aren't you the cool one?" she smiles and hops into the group.
"Ah, apparently not," I mutter, sure she won't hear me.
"I need a partner. Come on!" she calls over the noise.
"I can't," I shout back.
There's no way I'm embarrassing myself in front of those kids.
I cant happy dance.
"I'll teach you!" she calls, running toward me, and suddenly I want to sink into the ground.
"come ooon! Mr. Smith. Theee Mr.Smith." she teases, rolling her eyes when I try to hold my ground, then pulling me harder.
Defeated, I follow. The kids all stop to watch as I miserably try to tap Pony's foot with mine and fail spectacularly.
"Come look at us." A young boy from the aligned kids calls out for me and pony cheers me on.
"Go." She says with a wicked smile on her face.
"Okay, lets miss school and kick some feet. What can possibly go wrong?" I say more to myself, rub my hands together and approach the kid, stealing glances at pony as I do.
The dance involves kicking feet, at first the left feet kick together then the right then a turn. Damn I wouldn't explain it myself how can people enjoy kicking each others feet in a systematic way?
After a series of pony laughing and crying from pain I get the hang of it. I can't help but laugh at how crazy the idea was.
We wander off to the streets to an environment full of hawkers and street food. How is this place so close to where I live. Since my dad literary dragged my mom and I from New York I had never imagined a place like new york streets. The environment is always quiet, just like he said, school was calm and I assume it was also convenient for the meetings in mombasa.
I love that I have seen a place that is a bit different. Full of life, happy people who don't just wake up and the first thing they think about is some green smoothie. Fathers are actually playing soccer with their children. I am the one that should be feeling privileged. Uh, the irony.
Maybe that is the reason she finds some time to come here. But she said grew up here. What could she have possibly meant by that? I am pulled out of my thoughts by a group of people standing to stare.
"Should we break into this song too?" I ask, glancing at Pony with a smirk.
"Like musicals, right?" she replies with a smile.
I grin back.
"Ugh. You're so white. No, dummy," she laughs. "They're saying 'white man.' They're excited. Not many of you come out to play in these parts. You know like how y'all call us monkeys?" She teases.
"monkeys? What? Why would…"
" Im kidding!" she keenly surveys my face that is already flushed. Damn her sense of sarcasm.
"Right." I bite my cheek and follow.
Some swahili spoken and a kind of food with chapati and beef sausage that has been split and filled with salad? I guess? Is handed over to me. It looks like a hot dog with a short sausage, if that makes any sense. She gets some coins to pay and I stop her.
"Let me." I smile and she smiles back.
"For once in your life, don't play boss." There she goes again with her sarcastic tone.
I thought she was gonna let me pay. Far from it, she hands the lady some coins and wraps her arm around mine, just like she did the first time we met.
"You said this is your home?" I ask
"Mhmmh." She replies unbothered.
"How is that?"
"There is so much you gotta learn white boy, starting by you watch where you are going on a kenyan street." She says just as she lets go of my arm and I step into a pile of poop.
Trying to undo my leg and evade the whole ordeal, I step into a puddle of wastewater. She wants to laugh. I can see it in her eyes. But for the sake of my ego — and to avoid joining the locals already cracking up — she holds her tongue and steadies me, keeping me from falling face-first into the puddle.
"Shit!" I compose myself, take turns to look down at my legs then at her.
"Trust me, no one cares." I look around, let out a sigh and continue to walk, this time not letting my eyes off the ground.
Finally we are at a lawn with tall trees that provide shades, a bunch of people strewn all over but no one is looking up.
"It's a general area in the city, I come here when I want to relax. The breeze is amazing." She explains.
"Won't argue with thaat." I say already taking my place on the calming grass.
"That monument is from when we got independence."
"You mean when Kenyatta negotiated your freedom?" she stares at me blankly.
"Right," I say, proud I can take a hint.
"That tree," she continues without missing a beat, "is called a mugumo tree. The Kikuyu community believes it's sacred."
I don't protest. It looks like a fig tree to me—how a tree Jesus cursed could be sacred, I'll never understand. Don't look at me like that, I know my religion.
Still, it's easier to let her enjoy her heritage. I love how proud she looks right now. Probably nothing, but I want to kiss her this very moment.
My mind drifts as she explains the structures, the stories, and why this place means so much. I'm not big on history, but somehow, right now, I'm really liking her.
Watching how her lips move, how beautiful her smile is. Does she feel it too? The heat that builds inside me when she looks at me? She must have felt it that day at the dance. She had this chemistry I cannot ignore. I swallow as my thoughts go back to that day. How she raised every last strand of my hair and I swallow.
"Down to earth white boy!" She snaps her fingers at me and I am back from wherever I had gone running to, noticing a tattoo I had never seen on her when she jots up.
A mocking Bird tattoo right on her side from when her top flares.
Something turns in me. Mason has the same tattoo. Are they in that deep?