Her Name Is Samira

My weakness was that I couldn’t be discreet. Which was why when I fell in love with the cook, the affair was like an open secret. Was it love? I couldn’t tell what label to put on a mixture of lust, loneliness and desperation.

She didn’t resist my advances, neither did she give me the green light. I think she was in between, uncertain. She needed more time to process everything, though I could see her slowly opening up. I was a year older than she was, and she preferred an age mate to being the lover of a married man. I knew I had a chance when she revealed this, but it was obvious she wanted things to proceed slowly.

Then there was the problem of her religion. She said she was once a Christian, and all her family members were Christians. She alone had chosen to be a Muslim. It was a personal choice that she wasn’t going to rescind on because of love.

“If I want to be a Christian again, I want it to be from my heart, not from the pressure of love.” she clarified.

I listened without saying anything.

Playing my cards openly at the workplace was a wrong move I would later notice in hindsight.

One time, I was assisting the cook tidy up the canteen after lunch when I noticed someone watching from the top of the administrative block. It was our boss, and her secretary. They had noticed and were monitoring.

The cook was one of the longest serving staff and guarded all the secrets of our workplace, including the dirty ones, and the mystery tales of invisible footsteps sometimes combing offices at night that no one spoke about. I was new, and befriending the cook meant rattling the skeletons in the dark cupboards stored away from prying eyes.

And the suspicions of our boss and the secretary were not unfounded. For during our evening chats on the phone, the cook told me many dark tales that unfolded there long before I arrived.

It made sense that our boss started paying attention to my movements at work, whom I vibed with and how well I did my job. Toes were springing all around me, and I ought to mind my steps.

If only I had the sense to be discreet.

Making rush promises was another weakness of mine that was becoming difficult to control. How I promised the cook so many things. That I will give her 20% of my salary every month, having already spent half my pay taking her out to expensive restaurants. Can’t tell what I wanted to prove as I look back.

But the new love she had found was being noticed on her. People said she had changed. She glowed, and looked happy.

She stares at her reflection with wonder.

Same face she’s known for many years staring back at her as she twists and turns before the mirror, tilting and tweaking her neck to see which pose brought out the best in her and what new pimples were germinating on her cheeks.

What do people see that make them say she has changed?

She had always being strict with men, hardly making time to listen to the nonsense they had to say on the phone. But now she doesn’t know what had come over her. Things were different with this new guy. He seems serious, and daring, coming back to the workplace after work just to see her late night, escorting her to the main gate, not bothered he would be spotted by the security, holding her tight to plant a kiss on her lips before letting her go.

She was becoming less resistant, less judgmental of men. Life was indeed good as they say. The strength to push him away was gradually eroding. Maybe she too had been lonely despite the impression of everything is alright she portrayed, and was finally glad that there was a man with her name on him.

I sensed her joy in our conversations, although I worried I had made too many rush and costly promises and the time to pay my debts was fast approaching…

Genuinely, I meant every promise I made. But fate was bent on testing every alphabet in my words.

It all started with the withholding of my salary over some friction I had with the secretary. He made some deductions from my salary because I was absent without permission. I explained that I was too ill to send a notification. He said there was no proof of my claims.

I was furious as I stormed out of the office, rejecting the envelope of money. We were not paid through a bank. We always received our salaries in envelopes.

What audacity did a secretary have to touch my pay?

It was because his uncle was the owner of the business and no complain we chanted ever got to his ears without passing through this miserable secretary. Our boss could have intervened. She was there when it all unfolded. But she was mute. The cook told me she and the secretary were secretly dating, although our boss was a married woman and far older than her secretary. No wonder she couldn’t act contrary to his will. She too had been wrapped up in his web, a web she probably enjoyed being victim of.

“You should have taken the money, and refused to sign the sheet.” one female colleague told me later when I explained the incident. She meant the sheet we signed to acknowledge receipt.

The deduction was very little compared to the amount I was due, but ego forbade me from stooping so low to pick the remainder after that ugly secretary dipped his foul fingers into my hard-earned money.

I decided to stay home till I get my money before returning to work. It was during that time that the cook was fired, for no reason. Our boss fabricated a fascinating story to explain the departure of the cook. The innocent were being driven out, and those who forge receipts of groceries were still at their posts.

This was a double blow. My salary was blocked, and my girlfriend was sacked. Damn!

She didn’t have relatives who lived in the city so she had to go back to her little town hundreds of miles away from the capital. I hated long distance relationships and here was one staring me in the face.

Samira told me she was searching for a new job and would return once she got one, but that would be after the Ramadan fast. She didn’t want to start a new job in her fast. She said it drained her physically.

Behind my back, my boss contacted Mrs. Nguessan, the woman who recommended me for the job. Mrs. Nguessan was like a mother to me, and my boss sent her a verbal painting of me in which every colour was a shade of black. My Godmother had a hard time recognizing me in the picture.

It wasn’t long before she called me. We spoke for hours, but the long and short of it was that I was to go back there and at least officially inform them of my departure if I were leaving. Indeed I was, although I knew not what I was going to fall on. A rush decision that was going to be more costly than I estimated.

Rent was waiting for me, light and water bills joined the queue among other bills I was too dizzy with shock to figure out from whence they came.

It was now impossible to honour my pledges to Samira. She had been counting on my words to sort out a couple of problems that suddenly cropped up at her end. And now I had to call to tell her I was sorry. Sorry that the money she had been hoping for wouldn’t come. Sorry that we couldn’t continue dating. I couldn’t say it to her, even on the phone. It was all in a text.

At the height of the pressure, my immaturity seeped through my actions and my words. Samira was a beautiful, honest and hardworking lady. Certainly, ours could have blossomed into a beautiful relationship had I been patient, communicated the situation properly to her, and negotiated for time to honour my promises.

And after receiving my text, she called. To tell me something I shall never forget : “I thought you were different from the rest”.

By Benjamin Nambu

From: Ghana

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