Bingo's Run (29 page)

I watched the three police cars pull away and looked about me. Nairobi went on with its business. The construction noise went on. It never shut up. I ran.

I ran fast up Taifa and along Moi. I got to the crossing at Kenyatta Avenue. At night the traffic moved fast, and I waited for the lights to turn red. On the other side of the street was the Livingstone. I was close.

The lights went red and the traffic stopped. In the far lane, a matatu scraped still. The matatu was a 16B, heading back to Kibera. It was decorated in green and rust, and on its side was painted a giant chicken—head in the clouds, feet on the ground. Red letters read C
HICKEN
H
EAVEN
—We A
RE
E
VERYWHERE
. The sign reminded me that I had not eaten since breakfast and was starving. But I stopped panting and listened to the music coming out of the matatu speakers. It was not the normal thud but a slow song sung by a man.

The traffic light turned orange and I ran across the street. I could see the entrance to the Livingstone, where a woman paced back and forth outside, nervous style. Her white dress with black polka dots was filthy. Ma Steele was still barefoot.

Ma Steele looked about her as though she knew I was near, and then her eyes caught me. “Bingo!” she cried. I looked back at her as if fine green silk threads connected us, and I ran.

Gone was: Fear of the lion for the mosquito.

Gone was: Fear of the elephant for Tnwanni gnat.

Gone was: Fear of the scorpion for the ichneumon fly.

Gone was: Fear of the eagle for the flycatcher.

Gone was: Fear of Leviathan for the three-spined stickleback.

All fear was gone.

Mrs. Steele knelt, and I held her. Feelings poured out of me like a beer being emptied from a bottle. I emptied into her. Mrs. Steele kissed my face. She held me and I felt her empty into me. Tears, hers and mine, mixed together.

“You's such a hustla,” I said, and kissed her cheek.

Mrs. Steele cut me with her razor-blade green eyes. “Bingo, did you just call me mother?” she asked.

I thought fast. “That's right,” I said, and she held me tight, as if I was nailed to her.

The spider crawled into the crack between heaven and earth. He pulled on his strand of silk and drew himself back up, into the Purple Sap. There Nzame, the Master of Everything, climbed out of his spider suit. The Trickster was waiting for him, still disguised as Beauty and smoking his white clay pipe.

“You are right,” Nzame said to the Trickster. “The Book is false. The children do not sing all day of my might, my greatness, and my magnificence.”

The Trickster said, “You see how Mboya your wife has fooled you. How she has lied. As the Master of All, the Master of Everything, you must punish her.”

From deep inside his cave in the middle of the earth, Fam heard these words. He was joyous. He beat his drums, drank from the Skin of Revenge, and danced. He thought, “Nzame is about to destroy the world, and I will soon be free.”

Nzame, furious, charged into Mboya's bedchamber. Mboya
lay upon her bed made of clouds. Silken threads streamed over her wooden hands—all the colors, all the children. When she saw her angry husband, the bliss on Mboya's face was disturbed. “My master,” she said, “what is your desire?”

“Explain!” Nzame demanded of his wife. “Every day you read to me from the Book about how my children sing of my might, my greatness, and my magnificence. It is false. I have seen it with my own eyes. They kill, they steal, they are selfish.”

Mboya knew this was true. “That is so, my lord,” she said.

Nzame said, “My children are false and they are evil. I shall destroy them.”

Fam cheered from his cave below.

Mboya said, “My lord, come for a moment of time and look upon your children with me.”

Nzame, the Master of Everything, came to Mboya and lay beside his love. Thunder rumbled across the Purple Sap. Mboya whispered, “Look hard.” Her husband, the Master of All Being, stared into the streams of silken threads.

There Nzame saw an old man in a yellow shirt with short sleeves. Old, his hair white from teaching, the man sat before a class of children. The school was just a mabati roof on stilts. The children's hands were black from searching the garbage for food to eat. “All together,” the teacher said. The children's voices sang as one, “The Lord is my Shepherd: I shall not want.”

Nzame and Mboya listened to the song of the children. It was exceedingly beautiful.

Nzame looked at his wife. “How can they sing for me when they are hungry and they search the garbage for food?”

Mboya smiled, and the Master of Everything understood.

Nzame then called aloud, “The Assembly must come! They must understand as I do!”

The Assembly rushed one after another into their master's bedchamber. First came Justice. She ran like a cheetah; her shining black-dot eyes never stopped their search for wrongdoing. Le-Le entered gripping his bone-handled brush. His face bore the color of joy; he had painted much life that day. Awuretete came next, the guardian of knowledge; as always, he was the finest dressed of all the forms. Then came Apaoriawo, the diviner of Egba; his right fist held the sixteen beans of destiny. Last slithered in Gihilihili, the serpent guard to the gate of paradise. He understood how to strip man of folly. None of them noticed the entry of the Thaatima. The Thaatima was devoid of all form—not man, not woman—but from the snail shell that was its mouth hung a white clay pipe. Together, at the feet of Nzame and the Queen of Queens, the Asssembly listened to the song of the children. “Listen to how they praise me!” commanded Nazame, the Lord of Lords and Master of Everything. “They call me Shepherd.”

The schoolchildren finished their song. Mboya spoke, “Master, look there.” She guided her master's gaze away from the makeshift school with the mabati roof to the hill behind. On the hill lay a small man and a large man. They drank beer, smoked, and listened to the children. Mboya reached down to where Bingo lay beside Slo-George and, between her twig fingers, took the crimson thread that was Bingo's. Mboya, the Mother of Mothers, traced her son's silken thread from here to there, wherever the runner ran. Bingo's thread tied this to that, him to her to them. It was a complicated thread, knotted and tangled. Eventually, the thread ended at the present moment, and Mboya said, “My master, I beg that you watch.”

The Assembly crowded around their heavenly master and queen in order to see. There was hush across the Purple Sap. All stared down. There they saw Mrs. Steele barefoot in the street in front of the Livingstone Hotel. Her golden hair was wild and her feet were blackened. They saw Bingo run to her and watched the woman fold onto her knees before the runner. She grasped him as if her life was his. The woman cried tears that were mixed, in equal measure, from the goblets of desire, emptiness, and love. Her tears ran over the boy and dripped down through the cracks in the road. Beneath the road, under the earth, the tears of Mrs. Steele joined with the tears of all mothers in the Ocean of Boundless Love.

Mboya smiled at the scene. Mrs. Steele had chosen this destiny over that; her son over all others. Mboya, then, before all, knotted the red silken thread of Bingo to the green thread of Mrs. Steele.

Mboya dismissed the Assembly. When they had gone, she reached down and raised all of the silken threads as one. There were many knots that connected him to her and to them; the threads had become a blanket. Mboya drew her master close to her and laid the silken blanket over them. In the soft orange peace that followed, leaves sprinkled down on earth.

Mrs. Steele stepped away from me and headed toward the hotel entrance. She stopped and turned around. “Bingo, are you coming?” she asked.

I looked at her and we did not speak. Every second runners think, This way or that. If they go this way, they meet Destiny No. 1; that way, Destiny No. 2. Mrs. Steele was Destiny No. 1: America, high school, trucks, and free food. Destiny No. 2 was Kibera, the scam, and the run. I knew that I would be crazy not to go to America, but Nairobi was my place; here were my people. In Kibera, I was the greatest runner, and I was famous. Also, I had $100,000 hidden on Never-Tell-You Street!

As Ma Steele watched me think, her face turned sad. Her body turned toward me but stopped. She shrugged. “Okay, Bingo, come in when you're ready. We're in the same rooms as before; you know where I am.” Her words sounded like fish swimming against a river of Missing.

I looked back at Ma Steele and nodded. “Ya,” I said. “I jus' stan' here a bit.” Mr. Edward opened the door and through the glass I
watched Ma Steele, barefoot, cross the lobby. She stopped just before the elevators and looked back at me, just a glance, and then she was gone.

I looked out onto Kenyatta Avenue. The night air was warm. Across the road, a water pipe had burst and water shot up like a fountain. Two little boys wearing shorts and T-shirts splashed and laughed. They were soaked. The traffic was mad. People walked by, scammers looked for tourists, and hookers hunted. “Crazy, crazy,” I said to Nairobi. Nairobi answered back with construction thud.

I had been Senior Father's runner before Wolf's. “Bingo!” Senior Father would shout across the field, and from under the tree's shade I would run the water skin to him. His smile, after he drank, made his eyes sparkle like stars. I looked at the happy children across the road playing in the water and I remembered the smiles of my clients when I arrived with their packets of white or dagga. God, love, art, happiness, and lawyers; everything can be real or scam—the only truth is the run.

This run had been my greatest. In one run, I had taught Wolf how to fly and got Slo-George a girlfriend. I had survived Nyayo House and Mr. Edward's philosophy. I had been an art dealer worth millions, hired a legend as a lawyer, and a master as an artist. I had outscammed the Boss of Bosses but was tricked by a cleaner. A lunatic had turned into a prophet and an orphan into a son. There had been as much scam as truth, from beginning to end. It had been the best run ever. I looked up into the stars and smiled. I imagined running from star to star. Easy, I thought.

A full 16B matatu with SWAGGA written on the side and blaring music drove by. Arms hung out where windows once were. I watched the van curve away down Kenyatta Avenue and toward Uhuru Park on its way back to Kibera. I remembered being at Uhuru Park with all the St. Michael's boys, and I thought of
Smoking Boy. He always sat and smoked and watched me, but he never ran. If Smoking Boy had a destiny, he would never reach it.

I felt that I was being watched and looked around. Charity stood behind me, a soft pink smile on her closed lips. “Hello, sir,” she said. “Your American business colleague asked me to come and check up on you.”

In an instant, my body was concrete and my head was filled with construction. A hammer was jammed in my throat. Just a grunt came out of my mouth.

“Sir, how's the business coming along?” she asked. “Have you sold any of those most valuable paintings?” Charity could mock dirt off a beggar. Sense entered my head and I answered her businessman style. “My business is doing jus' fine, ya,” I said.

She went on, “Sir, I thought you went to America.”

The way she said “Sir” was mocking. “I come back to finish a deal,” I told her.

Charity cocked her head. “You mean to see me?”

I did not answer but stared at the string spider around her neck. It looked back at me. “
Answer her
,” it whispered. But before I could speak Mr. Edward shouted from the hotel door, “Miss Charity, you are kindly needed back at work.”

She called back to him, “I am coming, sir. I am just conversing with a guest.”

Every fragment of me wanted her, but my legs were stone and I could not move.

Charity smiled at me. “Sir, I will have to go.” She turned—the spider, too—and began to walk away.

I stepped toward her. “Ya!” I called to her back. “That's right, ya. I come back to see you.” It was as true as anything else.

She turned to me. “Sir, so you came back to see me so that you can leave me again?”

My thinking was all over the place, like a crane turning around
inside my head. “Maybe I stay in Nairobi,” I said. “Maybe I don't go to America.”

Charity's smile dropped. “No, sir. You and your colleague have many deals to do in America. I would not want you to miss that.” She blinked a few times. “Sir, you are a most special businessman. I want the best business for you in the world.” She tried to clean her words of sadness, but I heard it.

Words came out of my mouth like water from a burst water pipe. “But I want you,” I said. “I want to be with you.” Then something else gushed from my mouth.

She frowned. “Sir, you want to shove me?”

I shook my head and looked down at her Maasai sandals. “I want to love you,” I said again. “I stay here,” I said.

Charity said, “No, sir, you must go to America. Your colleague loves you very much, and that is your destiny.” She smiled. “But perhaps you will write to me from there—maybe in between those important business deals.” A water drop inched down her cheek. She did not try to wipe it.