Nairobi Dreaming - Complete!

Chapter 2: Old friends and old enemies

Like most adventures mine did not begin how I thought it would. I am not sure what I had imagined but the first two hours were incredibly mundane. I got my luggage, went through immigration, got a SIM card for my phone, called an Uber and then got stuck in traffic for over an hour.

The road from Jomo Kenyatta airport to the Fairview hotel was littered with Safaricom billboards with attractive Kenyans hawking data plans and some strip malls. At one point we passed a Nakumatt and my driver pointed out that it was the Kenyan equivalent of Walmart.

"You can get anything there," He said, "Cell phones, furniture, groceries."

My phone kept buzzing the whole time. It was Kay, already in Nairobi waiting for me at the hotel. We hadn't seen each other in a year and she was hyper. She texted me: how is it possible you are taking this long to get here?!? I replied: worst. traffic. Ever. When she kept texting more of the same I put my phone away and put it on silent. I looked out the window and drummed my fingers on my thigh. Could it be? I wondered, but I pushed the thought out of my mind.

When we finally got to the hotel there was a further delay at the gate. Two security guards sauntered out, one with a mirror on the end of a pole that he used to check the underside of the car. The other leaned in the driver's side window and chatted up the driver in what I assumed was Swahili. The driver was told to open the "boot" of the car and he popped the trunk. I sat in the back seat fidgeting.

The Fairview turned out to look just like its pictures: verdant, tastefully opulent and surrounded by high, barbwire topped walls.

Kay was waiting for me right at the reception desk and I barely had time to set my luggage down before she embraced me. She was thinner than I remembered her and her teeth were notably whiter as well. When she pulled back I noticed other changes.

Kay had always been a little soft around the edges – round face, round breasts, round bottom and a bouncy bleached perm. But this new Kay was very thin, muscular, slightly spray tanned and she had let her hair go straight and black. She was also wearing more make up than she normally did, especially around her eyes, which I realized had been slightly modified. She had a double eyelid now. I could see the crease. 

"What do you think?" She asked, twirling around. "I look fucking hot, right?"

"When did this happen?" I replied.

She pouted. "You don't like it?"

"I mean, I just how did I not notice on Facebook or...?"

"It's a little recent I guess. I've been getting fit but the hair, the make up, the eyes, the teeth" She paused to flash her pearly whites, "These are all within the last...month or so. Don't I look fab?"

I squinted briefly before a realization I should have had before hit me. "Oh shit, you and John broke up, didn't you?"

"You're the worst," Kay sighed. "Just tell me I look hot, okay?"

"You look hot. I mean you also looked great before. Why didn't you tell me you and John broke up?"

"Because." Her shoulders sagged. "Look, it's a big to do and I wanted to get it out in person. Over a lot of wine. But first," She forced a bright smile, "Let's get you all checked in and then we can...well we can do whatever we want." She laughed a tinny, fractured laughed that sounded a bit like glass breaking.

I got checked in and the whole time Kay chatted at me. The talking was rapid fire in a way that wound me up inside. I had been right. It had just taken a few texts and I had known.

Back when we were both in teacher's college Kay had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder. It had been the first time I had experienced being so close to someone with bipolar and at first I hadn't been sure exactly what was going on. By the end of it I could tell within minutes if she had stopped taking her medication and I knew now. The only question was: how long since her last pill?

"This is soooo exciting. O-M-G we're in Africa, right?" Kay prattled on my way to my room. "Like I cannot honestly believe we are here."

I had got us separate rooms a few months back when I booked and I was now especially thankful that I had resisted Kay's protesting about the cost. It didn't matter to me, at all, but I knew it still made Kay a little uncomfortable when I paid for things. She preferred the idea of "crashing" in a room with me than having her own but I liked my own space.

"This is suchhhh a nice hotel," Kay said, "Like honestly, I'm impressed. I didn't think it would be this nice. Or that like this city would be soooo big. Can you believe it? I didn't know they had cities this size in Africa."

Kay came in the room with me and sat on my bed. It was a nice room – all restrained, gray and white elegance and clean lines.

"You didn't read about Kenya before you came?" I asked.

"I guess not that much. I mean of course you did, you've always been such a keener. The smartest girl I know, that's what I always say about you, you know that right, Luisa?"

"We're here to help Kenyans, Kay I thought it might be a good idea to learn a thing or two about their country first."

Kay rolled her eyes dramatically. "We're going out into the countryside to help them learn how to read. I'm not sure how much cultural context I honestly need to do that."

"You're kidding right?"

"Are you going to lecture me again about how poor kids in Oakland don't like reading about not themselves? Honestly, I'm not in the mood. Can we just try and have a little fun here? You're my funnest friend. And I want that Luisa not your moody, overly intellectual ...Mother Teresa Luisa, okay? It's not that I'm not smart, Luisa, it's just that I know when to relax."

I started unpacking. I didn't trust myself to respond. I wasn't sure if she was annoying me because of what she was saying or if I was angry because I had started counting down the minutes to when I would have to ask her if she had brought her medication with her.

"Show me what you brought," Kay said, bouncing into view on my right hand side. I had left an awkward silence fall between us but she acted like it hadn't happened. "Did you bring anything cute?"

I pulled out a fitted black dress. "Just this."

Kay squealed. "You're going to look so hot in that. We're going out tonight 'cause I really, really need to get super fucking drunk. The concierge – you know the cute one, the tall one - was telling me about this restaurant – Carnivore and some bars in some neighborhood called The Westlands." She checked her phone. "We've got like what...two hours before dinner. Should we go shopping?"

I forced a yawn. "I could use a nap, actually," I said.

It took about fifteen minutes more to get Kay out of my room. Before she left she insisted on taking about two dozen selfies of us. She kept readjusting the angle of her face and the filters until she found something she liked. I noted, with dismay, that she kept gravitating toward filters that made her look more white by distorting the size of her eyes and doing something else I couldn't quite put my finger on. It was upsetting, watching her with her phone, her fingers rapid fire typing, her movements a little too truncated. She talked the whole time, ripping apart her appearance and then telling me it was important to have good self esteem and that this was a thing she was really working on.

I lay down on my bed after she left and starred at the ceiling. I was on the other side of the world about to travel into the Kenyan countryside in a little under 48 hours and the only person I really knew was either hours or days away from a full blown manic episode.