Mpenzi wa Baba | NEON LIT

Everyone knows about Mariamu.

My mother knows. My sisters know. The whole neighborhood knows that my father keeps a woman in a flat in Ganjoni, on the other side of Mombasa. A woman he's been visiting every Thursday for fifteen years.

No one speaks of it.

That's the Swahili way. What men do outside the house stays outside the house, as long as they provide for their family. And my father provides well.

But now he's sick.

A stroke that left him bedridden, barely able to speak. My mother cares for him with grim duty. My sisters pretend everything is normal.

And someone needs to deliver Mariamu's monthly allowance.

"You'll go," my mother tells me, pressing an envelope of cash into my hands. "Your sisters can't be seen there. I certainly won't. But you..."

"I'll handle it."

"I'm sure you will." Her voice is cold. "Just remember who she is. And who you are."

The flat is modest.

Third floor of a decent building, good but not extravagant. I climb the stairs with the envelope in my pocket and questions in my mind. What does she look like? This woman my father chose over my mother. This woman who has received his attention for fifteen years.

I knock.

The door opens.

And everything I expected is wrong.

Mariamu is thick.

Not the waif I imagined. Not a slim young thing trading beauty for security. She's substantial—probably two-forty, with breasts that strain her house dress, hips that fill the doorframe, a belly that curves soft beneath the fabric.

She's also beautiful.

Forty-something, with skin dark as coffee and eyes that have seen everything. She looks at me for a long moment before speaking.

"You must be Juma's son. You have his eyes."

"Yes, mama. I've come with your—"

"I know why you've come." She steps back, opens the door wider. "Please. Come in."

I enter my father's other life.

The flat is neat, feminine, full of small comforts.

Photos on the shelves—my father, looking younger, happier. Curtains that let in soft light. A kitchen that smells of spices.

She offers tea. I accept. We sit across from each other in her small sitting room while the afternoon sun paints patterns on the floor.

"Your father was good to me," she says. "Fifteen years of Thursdays. Never a missed visit until the stroke."

"He was consistent."

"He was lonely." She sips her tea. "Your mother is a good woman, but cold. She gave him children, respect, a household. She didn't give him warmth."

"And you did?"

"I gave him everything he needed that she couldn't." She looks at me directly. "Does that shock you?"

"I don't know what shocks me anymore."

"Good." She sets down her tea. "Your father told me about you. The youngest son. The one who sees things clearly. He said you were the only one who might understand."

"Understand what?"

"Why men come to women like me." She stands, moves toward me. "Why loneliness drives people to find comfort wherever they can."

"I should go," I say.

But I don't move.

She's standing in front of me now, her thick body blocking the sunlight. Close enough that I can smell her—jasmine oil and something warmer.

"Your father visited me every Thursday for fifteen years," she says softly. "Do you know what that means? Fifteen years of being someone's secret. Fifteen years of waiting for one day a week."

"I'm sorry—"

"I'm not looking for sympathy." Her hand finds my shoulder. "I'm looking for honesty. You've been looking at me since you walked in. Not with disgust. With curiosity."

"You're my father's—"

"Your father is in a hospital bed, unable to move or speak." Her voice doesn't waver. "Whatever I was to him, I'm not anymore. I'm just a woman who hasn't been touched in three months, sitting alone in a flat that echoes with absence."

"What are you asking?"

"I'm not asking anything." She reaches for the buttons of her dress. "I'm offering. Just this once. A kindness for a lonely woman. No one will ever know."

The dress falls open.

She's magnificent.

Her breasts are heavy, dark-nippled, falling free from a bra that can barely contain them. Her belly is round and soft, the kind of belly that's meant to be kissed. Her hips flare wide, leading to thick thighs that press together at the apex.

"Your father said you were handsome." She steps out of the dress completely. "He didn't say how much you look like him. When he was young."

"This is wrong."

"Many things are wrong." She takes my hand, places it on her breast. "But some wrong things still feel right."

I should pull away.

I don't.

I worship her the way my father must have.

My mouth on her neck, her shoulders, the heavy swell of her breasts. She moans softly—not with practiced seduction, but with genuine need. I suck her nipples while her hands grip my head.

"Yes—like that—just like him—"

I kiss down her belly. Lower. Part her thick thighs.

"No one has—since he—"

I lick.

She cries out, grabbing the chair for balance. I hold her hips steady—so much flesh, so much warmth—and I eat her the way my father must have eaten her every Thursday for fifteen years.

She comes quickly.

Floods my face, her thick body shaking. I don't stop. I push her through that orgasm into the next, then the next, until she's begging.

"Please—inside me—please—"

I stand. Undress. Watch her eyes go wide.

"Your father was..." She reaches for me. "You're more."

"I'm not my father."

"No." She lies back on the small couch, spreads her thighs. "You're not. Show me how different you are."

I enter her slowly.

She gasps—tight, wet, welcoming. Her thick legs wrap around my waist, pulling me deeper. I feel her stretch to accommodate me, watch her face transform with pleasure.

"Ya Allah—you're so—"

I start to move.

This is my father's woman. This is the body he touched every Thursday. The woman he chose over my mother, over his family, over everything proper and expected.

And now she's mine.

"Faster—please—"

I give her faster.

The couch shakes. Her body shakes. She's crying out with every thrust, her thick flesh rippling, her breasts bouncing wildly.

"He never—your father never made me feel—oh God—"

"Feel what?"

"This full—this wanted—this—"

She comes screaming.

Her pussy clamps around me, her whole body convulsing. I fuck her through it, don't slow down, drive her into another orgasm while she sobs with pleasure.

"Inside me—please—give me what he couldn't—"

I let go.

Fill my father's mistress with everything I have. Pump into her while she shakes, while she screams, while fifteen years of secret Thursdays become something new.

We lie tangled on her small couch.

Her thick body soft against mine. The afternoon sun moving across the floor.

"The allowance," she finally says.

"It's in my pocket."

"Keep it." She kisses my chest. "I don't need his money anymore."

"Then what do you need?"

"I need someone to visit." She looks up at me. "Not every Thursday. Just... sometimes. When you can. When you want."

"I'm not my father."

"I know." She smiles sadly. "That's why I'm asking. Your father came because he was lonely. I want you to come because you want to."

"And my mother? My family?"

"They never knew about the Thursdays. They don't need to know about this either." She traces a finger down my chest. "I'm not trying to replace anyone. I'm just trying not to disappear."

I look at her.

This woman my father loved in his own complicated way. This woman who waited every Thursday for fifteen years. This woman who is asking for so little after giving so much.

"Next week," I say. "Same time."

She smiles.

"I'll be waiting."

My father dies three months later.

At the funeral, I see Mariamu at the back of the crowd. Veiled. Invisible. Mourning a man no one knows she loved.

Our eyes meet once.

I nod slightly.

She nods back.

And that night, after the family goes home, I drive across town to a flat in Ganjoni. To a woman who has been waiting. To the inheritance no one knows I've claimed.

She opens the door.

I step inside.

Some secrets, it turns out, are worth keeping.