Women of a Different Breed

The following excerpt is from the fictional novel titled ‘Murdering Romance’ by Kendi Karimi.

She was a woman of love that gave and received it, a woman kissing frogs about the world, finding hers.

She wanted to believe that fairytales are not so far-fetched, that there’s some semblance of truth in it, and if she could just find the right knife, she’d be on her merry way for a slice of that cake. It is the feeling that something was amiss that stopped her.

What other foul lies did she have to forgive from the men in her life? Was she meant to look away from all transgressions and be content with her having a big chest to lie on at night? Having a warm bed? Was a warm bed it? And why was it that women tolerated disrespect from their men but could never extend that same level of courtesy in their friendships? Do you ever wonder why a dog biting a man won’t make the news but a man biting a dog fires up the headlines? In this sense, it seemed strong friendships were wrecked by the hope of a happy relationship, and in the end, Mukami wondered, did these people regret it? Biting man’s heart like a rabid dog, did they remember it? She figured that though she really really wanted that warm bed, she would not go barking around looking for it. She would use her head as much as her heart.

When she called herself beautiful and smart and it irked the men around her such that they accused her of being a narcissist, she thought of how they themselves enjoyed throwing the same exact compliments her way with a gratifying self-delusion of charm. Well she was smart, and she was pretty, and if claiming it made her narcissistic, she let those men that thought so lick that narcissism; tip to base and back again. Deal with it.

She was hell bent on breaking that fanatical patriotism men had of the ‘ideal woman’, deciding instead to be a woman that shouts back, a woman that did not wait to be protected, a woman that broke the chain of traditions which had broken many a women, ruined many a lives, made women have abortions when they did not want to simply because they feared they would not get the chance to get married if they came along with a kid, to be found attractive again while breastfeeding. These women knew that a seventeen year old girl who has had five abortions was less likely to be judged compared to a twenty year old that had two kids. Why? The latter’s ‘mistakes’ were visible.

She was growing up in a generation of women who refused to cater to men in the traditional manners the men had grown up seeing in their own households. These women drunk like the men’s fathers, and microwaved diners. They captained large companies and sat at boardrooms one to ten men with their heads held high. They refused to do manual labor and left the men in shock that, truly, they had to clean up after themselves. Love alone was not enough to keep a good home, let alone sex. Women of her time championed change to the extent of becoming it as opposed to just running it by their thoughts or in conversation. And women have died for and because of these changes.

Mukami was tired of the never-ending-ness of these attacks on women; how the openly sexual ones were branded as loose, and yet at the end of the day, for both parties, even though sex was not better than love, an orgasm was better than a heartbreak. Why not love sex? Is a polished woman really one who keeps quiet about such inevitable carnal pleasure or one who is educated by the raw touch of the hip to hip; to be laid down like a bedspread and asked, ‘How does this feel?” To educated her senses; that was wisdom, for, is not a sexually educated woman a splendor to have in your bed? A happy woman is often a sexually satisfied one. If you find that a particular woman is a lot for you to handle, you are at liberty to find who you consider to be the best. Only don’t ask to be begged. If you’re married but still want a hot girl, boil your wife. If you’re going to cheat in another man’s house, carry your own padlock. If you teach your daughter how to love, teach her too how to stop. All these things she thought but did not utter to a soul. She wore her silence like a cloak and found it best to show than tell.

No one was really for one person to keep; it was a community of sharing; notes in classes, bodies in beds. The death of a lover did not mean the death of love, just temporary dread. Maybe that’s why everyone was sleeping with everyone; it was less dreadful the thought of an STI than it was of heartbreak. Maybe people had given up on the idea of true love altogether and found it easier and more convenient to have sex instead. Friends with benefits were all the rage; laying pipe after pipe while pretending you don’t miss each other. In the 21^st century, it was fashionable to be heartless. Every morning, the lady of hope dresses up in a new outfit. Is it still possible for us to get out of our mess? Yes, absolutely.

Buy from paperback from Nuria the Honest Store in Kenya. 🇰🇪