I didn’t like it one little bit. My landlord, Mr Tigere did not care about whether I liked it or not.
What binds the landlord and the lodger is money, nothing else.
It was not about what I wanted, but what the landlord desired on his property.
I was using two rooms with my family.
There was one other room, Mr Tigere had preserved for himself.
He had not used the room himself for months.
One day he just pitched up collecting his rentals for the month and announced that another family was coming to live with us.
“I can’t afford the loss in rentals anymore, another family will be coming to rent the other room,” he said.
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I was silent.
“I am not even using the room myself. I offered you all the rooms before, but you said you can afford only two rooms,” he said.
I wanted to say,”you can’t do that,” but my tongue stuck in my mouth and no words came out. How I hated my landlord!
He enjoyed to see me squirming.
Each time he came to collect his rent, I could see his face lighten up with glee when I struggled to produce the money for rent.
I learnt the hard way that there are some people who thrive on the pain and discomfort of others.
To my list of types of people I did not like, I added landlord due to my love/hate relationship with Mr Tigere.
So when he declared that someone was coming to rent the vacant room, I could not help the feeling that this was another new battle frontier with my landlord.
My privacy was gone.
“If you want your privacy so much, pay for the room and you will not hear another word from me,” he said. I was standing in the shadows when he had said that and I am not sure he saw the murderous eye I cast him.
Luckily for him, he noticed nothing.
And it’s good he did not. I blame myself. Each man for himself and his interests.
The poverty trap always keeps one in chains. If only I had money, I could pay for the other room and maintain my privacy. But that was not to be.
A few days later, the new tenants came. I knew that they were the new tenants with the way they stood uncomfortable at the front porch.
“We are the new tenants, my name is Uncle Hwidza and with me is my wife, “ said the man.
He was dark and remarkably tall, with a small scar on the bridge of his nose.
The nose in itself was spectacularly big and covered most of his face.
Mai Hwidza was gifted perpendicularly. She was naturally stout and struggled to enter through the door. I could barely see her waist.
I could see that she had been dark before, but she was applying too much skin bleaches whose common ingredients like hydroquinone and mercury can cause skin irritation, dermatitis and even skin cancer with prolonged use.
She was trying too hard to be sophisticated.
My children all stared at them as we showed them their room.
All this time, Mai VaMaidei, her arms akimbo, had not said a single word.
I knew what they were all feeling.
Trouble was in the air. Our personal space was being invaded by strangers.
Things were not going to remain the same.
I could see that they liked the room. “We will come tomorrow with our things,” said Uncle Hwidza as he led the way out.
Their room could only take a bed, maybe a small wardrobe and a few things. I wanted to laugh when he said he will bring their “things” as if the room could accommodate sofas, among other things.
To get to their room, one had to pass through our kitchen.
We were literally going to be living together.
That’s why I said at the beginning I did not like this living arrangement even one little bit.
The next few days were going to be trying times if we were going to adjust to this arrangement foisted upon us by the landlord.
*Onie Ndoro can be reached on X, Onie@X90396982
