Kitengela was a barricade of a town: low buildings facing off with the dust, slowly losing the staring match, yet too proud to admit it. Winding roads and plastic bags dancing in the African sun, store fronts displayed milk and bread but sold more cigarettes than anything else. A super highway, the fruits of government labour in a bid to increase the peoples’ living standards, and perhaps sway their vote in the next general election, ran across the main length of the town like a dark serpent shedding its skin. Sarah woke up at exactly ten minutes past midday and had a quick breakfast. She opened the kitchen window, and then the front door.

The sun flooded in and closely behind it, the neighbours’ blaring radio. “The time is now 12.15 pm. This is the news in brief. Four people have been killed on the spot when a bus collided with a small minivan at the Makuyu roundabout. Police are still...” She wished she could turn it off; nothing ruffled her day more than noise in the morning. Sarah changed into her work clothes and neatly stacked the dishes inside the sink, promising herself that they would be the first thing she’d get her hands on when she got back from work. ‘12.15 already!’ She knew she would keep Guthega, the driver, waiting again. He was supposed to pick her up at 12.30 “on the dot” but that was obviously not going to happen today. He’d probably beep her phone a dozen times as he was wont to do on such days.

Sarah turned on the TV. They always showed the weather at this time on the All News station. She had always known that, but for three months she had never turned the TV on at this time. She could not tell why today of all days she decided to watch the weather report. She had promised herself to never watch it but now the urge overcame her. Sarah just had to see her, she just had to see the weather lady. Her fingers were trembling. ‘What am I doing,’ she shuddered inside. ‘I am not yet ready.’ It was now too late, her finger was already on the button. The TV lit up. There she was, the weather lady. Smiling, confident, beautiful, alive, speaking gaily about the weather, as affectionately as if she were describing her child. Without warning, thoughts and memories from the past crowded in on Sarah.

She couldn’t see anything for a moment. Caught in some kind of hysterical blindness, she let out a low wail and collapsed. She began to cry all the tears she’d held back for three months. Sarah cried to liberate herself, to cleanse her soul, to loosen her fingers and finally let go. She didn’t notice the knock on her door. She did not notice him coming in. She was lost in her sorrow. He looked at her, startled. “Hey. What’s wrong,” he asked. She heard him and looked up feebly but was too languid to respond. What could she say? Coming closer, he noticed the news channel and, of course, the weather lady. He immediately understood why she was crying. Reaching down to embrace her, he felt her trembling and the warm tears trailing down her cheeks. “You know, I saw the weather report last week and I cried too.

I was at work, everyone thought I was mad,” he whispered. Somehow she found her voice. It was as though she was just learning how to speak. She said, “When we’d watch the weather with Peninah it would remind us of all those times strangers would come up to her thinking she was famous. Sometimes she pretended that she was the weather lady, it was so funny. Now when I watch the weather report, it’s just painful and unfair and I just wish this stranger didn’t look so much like my sister. When I see her on TV and it’s as if I’m at the funeral all over again.” She sobbed heavily. He held her closer.