IT has been a decade since his ordeal at the Garden of Eden. Every time he looks at his image in a mirror, says

JAMES SHIMITWA, dark memories of how he became wifeless, jobless and permanently deformed rush to his mind. Here’s his sad story…

ELI SAMS night club in Ndola was ever swollen. I carefully selected a secluded place in the dark smoky night club, like any new comer to the city would do.

I had information that night life was nasty in this part of the country. Con men and women harboured in this dense urban city, the only city in Zambia planted with various industries like mushrooms in a forest.

I demanded a bottle of Castle lager and quaffed it in one gulp and my gullet begged for more.

I belched and looked at my watch. It was 19:00 hours. I had time to guzzle some more. My wife Mika wouldn’t expect me until 21:00 hours.

As long as I avoided bad company, an invigorating evening was guaranteed. But I had no idea that disaster would unfold this night.

I surfed through the club from one end to the other. Groups of middle aged men and women gathered around tables cluttered with bottles of Mosi and Castle lagers.

They drank with cheerfulness as if they had completed all their work on earth.

I thought of my new work as the city’s new health coordinator.

“You will be expected to perform diligently with impeccable morals,” so stated my letter of promotion in part.

The beer descended down my esophagus gratifyingly, easing my previously strained muscles.

I had punished my legs the whole hot afternoon walking from house to house collecting data for a malaria prevalence survey in the city.

This night club provided the much needed leisure.

I sat in isolation holding a glass of Castle lager in one hand and a Peter Stuyvesant cigarette emitting fumes of cancer in the other.

The night spot had beautiful panels of mirrors inside, covering every wall.

Electronic red and blue beams raced over them metrically to the beat of the deafening rhumba music.

A mirror ball rotated in the ceiling, casting dots of light that circulated on the floor. The place unearthed memories of old days when, as a bachelor, I frequented similar places.

I watched women flock in, dressed to the nines.

Their short dresses displayed their bodies eye-catchingly for their nocturnal trade.

Their faces were smeared with cosmetics. Time passed swiftly.

I took one chilled lager after another and smoked one cancer stick after another. None of these women captured my attention until my eyes stuck on this woman who suddenly appeared at the entrance.

Unlike the other women, she was not dressed in a short dress. Her long lavender dress was stretched by her corpulent body.

It ran down all the way from her neck, making a hump over her firm breasts on its way down her rounded heaps before resting over her ankles.

She moved her slightly curved legs unhurriedly, swinging her curved heaps from side to side. She wore spectacles only common among learned people, which reflected the night club’s disco lights like stars.

A wrist watch on her arm sparkled, more of a fashion piece than an instrument of time.

She had no cosmetics on her face, her light skin was natural.

She passed just inches from my hideout; a nice rose fragrance penetrated my nostrils and went straight inside me to warm my heart.

My heart became bloated with lust as I watched her disappear in the crowd. I briefly picked her reflection in the mirrors, but she vanished leaving an indelible image of her figure on my mind.

“What would a woman of her prominence be doing in a night club?” curiosity started nibbling my mind.

“She is exquisite, in olden days this would be the type of woman I would pursue,” I thought. Two voices began battling in my head: one said: “A beautiful woman after a cold fresh beer could be revitalising; go after her, your wife will not know.”

 The other said: “Don’t even think of it, trouble appears from nowhere whilst dressed in elegant clothes and not looking like trouble.”

 Wisdom descended upon me and I finally closed the door to this temptation. My job and particularly my new position demanded exemplary behaviour.

And my marriage was too new to spoil so soon.

I was about to retire back home, more than an hour later when the gorgeous woman reappeared and took a seat not far from me facing my direction.

She sat in solitude fidgeting with a cell phone whilst sipping from a glass filled with Redds, a cider common among expensive women.

Imagination forced into my brain. I wondered how gratifying it could be to float on this woman’s feminine body. I observed her keenly, conflict in my mind resumed as the devil cajoled me:

“There is no harm doing things with her. After all, other married men do the same. Nothing goes wrong if one is careful.”

Then light from her cell phone started flashing actively beaming into her face. She slid off her seat, looked searchingly around and walked straight up to me hastily.

My heart gave a little lurch.

“Excuse me, sir, will you be kind enough to take care of my drink, I urgently need to answer a call outside. The door men won’t allow me to carry the glass outside.” She spoke rapidly with a grin that revealed her white teeth.

“No problem, your beer is safe with me.” I felt elated that she had trusted me. I watched her fade out of the club half galloping, her buttocks oscillating. 

Interest urged me to have a little talk with her, nothing more, just a little sociable chat. I jostled my way through the crowd to the counter, got a Castle and a Redds bottle.

I managed to get back to my hideout and settle down before she returned. 

She returned a few minutes later. She grabbed her glass and her bottle, her smile even more enchanting.

“Sorry for troubling you. I couldn’t answer the call in this noisy place.”

“Yes, they play the music loudly in here,” I said. She took a little hesitation then bowed with respect and turned in an attempt to leave.

“Wait a minute, your drink is almost finished, I thought you could make use of another drink, I got you another cider,” I said invitingly.

She spun and faced me slightly amazed, her smile subsided. 

Then she shrugged, glanced at her watch then said, “Okay, one more drink won’t kill me.”

“It’s not a bad idea to chat with someone, next time your phone rings, you won’t need to look for another stranger to take care of your drink. I’m also Just trying to de-stress, I perspired too much this afternoon. My name is Adam.”

Everything went according to the devil’s plan. I found her to be friendlier than I thought. Our table soon became cluttered with beer bottles, we ate and talked intimately, time forgotten.

She told me her name was Eve. My eyes never moved from her face; the more I looked at her, the more I liked what I saw. Temptation triumphed.

In the end the affair took its automatic turn.

“So where can we spend a little time together in total privacy?”

“You can decide, I am ready.”

“I can pay for a room at a lodge.”

“That will cost you a lot. I live alone; we can safely enjoy ourselves at my apartment.”

Her house was just a stone’s throw from the city centre, so we preferred to walk.

We went stumbling our way to her house, Adam and Eve, without any space between us and our arms interlocked. Cool night wind blew across the city, making the exchange of warmth of our bodies significant.

Moon light cast dark shadows upon the tarred road, adding flavour to this temptation and lighting our way to the Garden of Eden. With alcohol piloting my head, being spotted was least of my worries.

Her residence had a big iron gate. Eve pushed it open; it made a sharp rusty whinge.

“This thing needs some oil, it alerts the neighbours that I have arrived.” She led the way in.

Her house was a bed-sitter with recently painted walls inside. A large Samsung plasma television rested on a shiny mahogany stand.

Three piece emerald coloured settees were nicely arranged over a crimson frothy carpet making the apartment look elegant. There was no sign of a man sharing this house with Eve.

I had little time to scrutinise the house further as my body ached with desire.

She led me to her bedroom; it was equally neat with a large bed erected on a shiny floor polished with lead oxide.

Soon our clothes became useless, Eve hastily switched off the light. If God came at this moment, we would have started searching for leaves to cover our nudity. But it wasn’t God who came.

I heard a gang of furious voices of men and women approaching from a distance. I tuned my ear to the alarming noise; the voices grew louder and drew nearer.

The voices were now brindled with sounds of footsteps pounding the earth.

The familiar rusty sound of the gate opening sharply, sent my heart into a sprint.

I looked enquiringly at Eve; but darkness in the room only revealed the frame of her fleshy nude body.

“Shh, shh,” she beckoned me to remain silent.

Then a deep abrasive voice boomed amid the rambling voices outside, “Excuse me people, let us decide how we will discipline these people.

I think we first need to ascertain that there is another man in the house?”

A voice of a drunken man uttered incoherent words:

“I saw a man with her. I trailed them from the night club… I.”

A woman interjected:

“There is no need to confirm anything; this woman’s wickedness cannot be tolerated further, her husband has only been in prison for two weeks and she has turned this apartment into a brothel. She will spread diseases to our husbands.

Let us just deal with her, pull her out now!”

Another voice joined in concomitantly, “We are just wasting time, fish her out with whoever is inside, it could be one of the married men in our neighbourhood. We need to guard our husbands.

We will force her to walk around the city naked. There is enough moonlight for people to see how rotten her vegetable has become.”

An uproar of feminine voices exploded in endorsement. A shot of adrenaline surged through my body. I stood motionless, petrified by the sudden fracas outside.

“Who are these people?” my voice was a troubled silent whisper.

Eve stayed dumb; her silence gave me the creeps. My desire for her, vaporized into trepidation. She moved across the room like a ghost to the window and created a slit between the curtains.

The abrasive voice boomed again, “Okay, I will force this door open. But it is this man with her who we should sort out brutally. It could be one of us in prison tomorrow. Our friend is suffering in jail and other men deem it fit to abuse his lonely wife.

“We need to send a strong message to such promiscuous men in the city. We are going to pour paraffin on him and set him ablaze.”

The uproar exploded even louder. Both masculine and feminine voices burst in consent. “Let’s kill him! Let’s burn him! Let’s kill him.”

My heart leapt into my mouth. The room suddenly became smaller as I felt a claustrophobic sensation. My nerves sent my body shuddering. I looked around the dark room; I grabbed my clothes, slid under the bed where I lay flat against the cold floor. I could hear the banging of my heart against my ribs even above the noise of the voices outside.

“Hello, hello, listen to me people. Please listen to me.” This was a new voice.

“If we kill this man, we will be in trouble with the law.” My ears tuned to this new voice with hope.

“Let us spare his life. We will give him a little injury nevertheless. We shall chop off his penis so that he learns to fear women whose husbands are in prison.” There was a mixture of laughter and uproar. I felt sick in the stomach.

A vicious knock came on the door. Then Eve took an unexpected action that really sent my nerves on fire.

She opened the door.

 Air seemed to be insufficient under the bed. With anxiety I attempted to put on my clothes but the space under the bed was too small to allow adequate movement.

“What is all this rubbish about? Why have you people come to disturb me?” she challenged the mob courageously. There was silence.

“I have heard all the invectives you are uttering. Why do you want to tarnish my name?”

 The pandemonium that had escalated a while earlier abruptly switched off.

The abrasive voice spoke, “There are concerns about what has been happening here since your husband got jailed. We feel obliged to do something. For instance the man who is inside there, who is he?”

“Which man? There is no man inside, I am alone. Come and check if there is anyone inside,” I heard her open the door further, cold air rushed in the apartment turning my heart cold.

“Are you saying there is no one in there?”

A switch clicked, light flooded the sitting room and penetrated through, partially illuminating the bedroom, “You are free to come and inspect.”

A woman’s voice spoke pusillanimously, “You men take the lead. What are you scared of? You are the ones who hauled us into this feat.”

“No, it isn’t all of us; it’s this drunken guy who came with this idea. But you women have been complaining, so tell her what you have been saying and we will take action,” a man spoke defensively.

Eve’s voice shrieked through the night sharply, “Come in all of you. You are wasting my time!”

There was no movement of feet.  A voice that had earlier proposed cutting off my penis came again.

“It seems there is nobody inside; I actually suspected that this drunken incendiary brought us false information.  Let us come back and tackle this issue maturely, otherwise we will just look foolish.”

“None of you is leaving. I am going to call the police right now so that you people can exculpate yourselves for planning to kill me.”

 The gate gave that rusty squeal again, followed by the sound of footfalls moving away. Voices mumbled as the mob seemed to disperse.

“I know all of you, this matter will not rest easily,” Eve spoke victoriously, “I am going to report to the police right away.”

She got inside the house banging the door behind her. I heard footsteps of the mob fading away.

“They are gone,” she whispered.

Without hesitation, I struggled out of my hiding place and hurriedly writhed into a trousers and a shirt breathing heavily like a marathon runner who had just crossed the finish line.

“You are not leaving just like that are you?

It is alright now, they are not coming back, you can spend a night.” She stood in the doorway.

I moved on without tightening my belt. With one hand preventing the trousers from falling, I used the other arm to push her out of my way.

I stealthily passed through the gate, making sure it didn’t squeal. Once I reached the road, I broke into a race, supporting my trousers around the waist.

I seemed to have rocketed through town because soon I found myself knocking at the door of my house.

I rapped twice; the irritating delay that Mika took seemed like centuries.

Mika swung the door inside, her eyes popped out with fear

“You look horrible, what happened?”

“I just escaped an attack, thugs,” I answered panting.

“Oh, Jesus! Did they do anything to you?”

“No, I managed to escape.”

She scanned me probingly with her eyes narrowed, her arms went akimbo.

“But how come you have no shoes and you are wearing a woman’s blouse?”

I lowered my heard not believing what I had just heard. It felt like looking at a burning explosive. A lady’s blouse decorated with flowers clumsily covered my chest. My mind snapped into blankness.

Mika’s facial muscles tightened with rage; she looked like a python about to strike. Her eyes moved from the blouse to my trousers.

“Tell me the truth, where are you from? What have you been doing? Is it the attackers who made you wear the trousers inside out?”

I suddenly felt naked.

My hands rushed to cover the zipping area of my trousers.

“Please don’t yell like that, you will attract attention, let’s go inside I will explain this issue.” I made an attempt to move past her.

She pushed me back

“You have been committing adultery haven’t you? Don’t you know that you can contaminate me with disease?” I opened my mouth then shut it.

No word came out.

“Now let me teach you a lesson so that even your boss will regret having made the mistake of elevating you!” She surged into the sitting room like a wounded buffalo. I watched her fade into the kitchen, “Oh my God, help me please. It is the devil that came into me,” I cried lamentably without tears rolling out.

I saw Mika return carrying a large heavy pot with my punishment inside. Steam ferociously escaped from the pot, hot water spilled as she stormed towards me.  My knees reflexively dropped to the floor as I pleaded for leniency.

“Please don’t harm me!”

Like the strike of lightening, I felt liquid fire cover my face, corrosively running down my body to my feet. My body burned with agony.

It has been a decade since my ordeal at the Garden of Eden. Every time I look at my image in a mirror, dark memories of how I became wifeless, jobless and permanently deformed rush to my mind.

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