Black Coffee (Tara's Dream)|Dearest Diary, - Book 1 (unedited)

III

III

"Oh Attara!" Linda shouted as she clapped a hand on my shoulder. "See...I told you! You hadn't grasped the magnitude of this whole thing yet."
"Clearly..." I responded as I thought back to the events that had led to that morning.

"Come on, it's this way." A still laughing Linda attached herself to my side and began steer me towards a set of steel double doorways. There was an escalator too, but the woman ignored it and continued to guide me towards the cluster of waiting elevators. "So, what did you have in mind?" She asked me even as went in to stepp into the glass-walled cubicle. She pressed number two on the wall panel beside the silvery doors and the doors slid closed behind us.

"Definitely a cool quiet place." I mused even as my eyes perused the milling crowds of people that were going about their business in the busy floors that were being left below is.

"I have a few places in mind." She responded. Her eyes continued to watch the numbers blinking on the lighted panel that was above the shiny grey elevator doorway. "We are here Attara." she told me even as the lift came to a stop and the doors slid open. Unsurprisingly, there were a few people waiting outside to board the same elevator, but they were all kind enough to wait until we got out safely in order to get in.

"What are those places?" I asked even as Linda led me towards a line of 'restaurants' as she called them, that were across from the elevator, but seemed to resemble shops more than what I already had in mind. This was despite the blazing signs that said otherwise and the outdoor sitting areas where several groups of people were seated, busy picking away at their midday meal.

"Within the city there is Kileleshwa, Lavington, Upperhill, but if you want to go farther away from town we have Ngong hills, Langata... among others." Linda told me. We had came to a stop at the counter of one of the little 'shops' with the outdoor sitting areas and I was already wondering what I would order.

"It has to be somewhere nice and with enough water, access to social amenities and definitely some good neighbours." I told Linda who was reaching out to pick up a menu. "Otherwise, Bri's dad will have a fit! He's overprotective like that." Linda shook her head in understanding and began to go through the menu that had so many different types of food that I was beginning to feel overwhelmed by just staring at it. "What should I pick here?" I finally mumbled out.

"It depends..." Linda said as she looked up from her own menu. As things now were, Linda and I were supposed to celebrating that morning's successes and she had had this great idea of going out and having a very nice traditional meal. We were also supposed to shopping. Well... it was going to be online, but it didn't matter to me. Shopping was shopping and Linda had told me earlier that these restaurants had free WiFi that we could use to browse different houses in the market even as we continued to have our celebratory lunch. "However, since we want to give you the full Kenyan experience, why don't you try the Mukimo with fish stew and Sukuma wiki?" Naturally, my brows furrowed as my nose scrunched up in disgust. "What?" she asked laughing.

"I hate fish!"

"Fine… Then go get some of the fried goat ribs or beef stew whichever you like."
"I think I'll take the beef stew." I told her and Linda turned to the cashier to begin placing our orders. The cashier gave her a receipt for our order and retained another that they would use to put together our order.

"Table three.” He told us. “The waiter will bring you your food there." He said even as he pointed at the seats that were spread out on the patio was in front of the restaurant kitchen. Linda thanked him and we strolled out leisurely to sit at our assigned table. As we did so, I noticed that all the seats and tables were screwed to the floor and I couldn’t help but smile at their ingenuity. As I continued to take in our surroundings, Linda reached down into the recesses of her bigger bag and retrieved her laptop computer, a huge white thing that was quite classy and beautiful to look at.