Man Down

When Pius woke up that fateful morning, he didn't know that he would kill a man . He had dressed in his work clothes (dirty old clothes for he was a menial laborer), washed his face and was ready to face the day. Pius didn't even greet his wife that morning, because poverty strips you of everything remotely related to romance and replaces it with a single instinct - survival. 

Pius took his tea without even contemplating anything. He was just glad that his only cow, as emaciated as it was, hadn't given up yet. Judging from the color of the sugarless tea, Pius knew Chesumei (the cow) didn't produce much. He thought maybe they should slaughter it, eat the meat and forget he ever owned a cow instead of waiting to it to succumb to natural courses. Truphena, ever optimistic, wouldn't agree to it. 

After his not so hearty breakfast, he rose slowly and curtly told his wife that he was going. 

"Where?" Truphena asked without looking at her husband. 

"I am going to Kapchombir. Didn't finish the work," he replied, volunteering extra information so that she doesn't pry, so that she doesn't speak. He stepped out of his humble abode. For the last time. 

Truphena understood him. She had wanted to tell him not to pass by the local when finished but she thought better of it when she saw him with a machete. Pius wouldn't use it on her but she knew he would grab anything, from time to time, to hit if she asked anything he deemed emasculating. She just hummed her a gospel song as she went about her chores. Pius went his way. 

Pius strolled along listlessly, his face wearing that forlorn look that seemed to have been permanently imprinted on it. He never smiles. Nobody knows the last time he ever smiled. Probably a decade ago. He takes detours here and there, exchanges greetings with neighbors out of obligation rather than courtesy. He reaches Kapchombir a few minutes to 9 AM and begins clearing overgrown weeds, for that was the specifications of the mundane job. For it, he would earn a thousand shillings. 

After an hour and a half, Pius had cleared the remaining patch. Maybe he would have to come back to till but that was a job for another day. He was certain Chombir would reach out to him first if he needed that task to be done. 

Having no phone to contact Chombir, he was forced to walk to his homestead to claim his wages. Upon getting there, he was informed that Chombir had travelled outside the country and didn't leave any 'report' concerning Pius. He was dejected but didn't say a word. 

What has become of people? Pius asked himself. Didn't he expect that I'd finish this and have my payment pronto? Rich people, he thought ruefully. He gurgled his throat, concocted a phlegm and spitefully spat on the ground and made his way towards the iron wrought gate. He didn't utter a word. 

As he walked, he subconsciously dipped his hands into his pockets. Pius felt a piece of paper with the left hand. He fished it out and discovered, delightfully, a worn out one hundred shillings note. It felt like he had just gifted himself, or tipped himself. 

Buoyed by the little fortune, he walked with a renewed purpose. A hundred shillings weren't that much, but with prudence, born of experience from never having much, Pius knew it would make intoxicated enough to forget his sorrows. 

At noon he sauntered into Mama Rick's homestead. A bunch of haggard looking men in various stages of intoxication gazed at him nonchalantly. Pius didn't know that he would have to kill one of them. 

Although it's whispered that distillers (mostly women) of illicit brews make a lot of money, they never make an effort on their appearance. They look haggard just like their customers. Their attires seem to say, 'come ye all with miseries you would want to forget awhile, for I too have miseries that don't make me any better than you.' It feels like a communion of people with similar grievances against God yet the distiller, like Mama Rick reaps more from people like Pius. 

Pius settled down on the grass as the other patrons. There's a permanent bench with a thin plank on one side but no one prefers to sit there. Mama Rick's assistant winked at Pius, and gestured with her hands. He understood that she meant 'the usual.' 

There was nothing usual about the usual. It tasted like a donkey's piss. Granted, Pius had never tasted donkey's piss but he just had a gut feeling it would taste like that chang'aa. Well, it has never tasted any different, he just had a different mood. Unexplained mood. 

Pius took a sip and placed the green enamel cup on the grass gingerly as though it contained some secret to eternal life. He scanned the environment he was in and determined that there was no other place he had to be other than Mama Rick's. He removed his machete, which he had tucked in his gumboots, and and placed it beside him. 

He surveyed the area, noting all the hallmarks of poverty - a toddler dressed in an adult's T-shirt, an emaciated cow just like his, a grass thatched house. Two drunkards were arguing about a subject that did little to interest him. Pius sipped his poison slowly, almost as if an external force willed him just to lift the cup. 

The village's resident joker showed up. It was whispered that he often drunk more than people who went to work, yet was the laziest person ever seen. His modus operandi was simple: get cup and charm drunkards into pouring him a tot. On a good day, he might end up with a full cup upon which he would make fun of hardworking people. He called himself the government, since governments work on the same principle as him - collect taxes and piss on people. 

Pius wasn't in a mood to be pissed on. When the joker came around, he politely warned him to stay a few kilometers from him. On other days, he would have chosen to walk away, but not today. Maybe if it's the Day it's the Day. The joker got the message and walked away only to return a few minutes later having found a receptive audience for his stale jokes as well generous with their meagre resources. 

He warned him but his arrogance, driven by inebriation, couldn't allow him to take no for an answer. Tax evasion, he called. Pius warned several times but when he decided to use force, Pius called on his machete to do the talking.