It had not been intentional being 'late'. She had gone to bed at a far too early an hour in the morning and her ears had refused to cooperate with the irate ringing of her alarm. Somehow though, they had embraced the shrilling of Joyce and she had been plucked up to wakefulness at the ungodly hour of five am.

“The meeting,” Pendo said for the fifth time, “is at seven. Why are we meandering about at,” she turned to look at the microwave clock, “five thirty?”

Joyce huffed for what was the sixth time that morning, rolling her eyes about and pacing back and forth as she buttered her bread. Mouth half full she said, “Did you consider traffic, eh? What about how long you take to prepare? Cleaning the house? Being professional!” She placed the butter knife on the kitchen counter and swallowed her furiously chewed bread. “You promised,” she said, eyes softening. “You said you were going to cooperate on this. Hell, this is more your business than mine yet you make it so difficult for me to work with you.”

Pendo took a small sip of her hot tea. She shrugged in acceptance. She was being a bit of a bitch and it was not fair to Joyce. It had been her dream. Her new ambition that she had promised her parents was going to set her for life. A quaint little life that supported her entirely. It also helped a lot that she had pulled Joyce into it. “You’re right. Just a foggy brain is all.”

“Well, if you hadn’t gone drinking…” Joyce mumbled.

“You’re doing it again.”

Joyce’s eyes doubled in size which was slightly alarming as she already had large eyes and making them any larger had them shift from the realm of princess to manic. “What?”

“Nagging like a wife.”

With a last sigh, she threw her hands up in the air and made for her bedroom. For twenty minutes, Pendo had enjoyed the peace of her morning tea and ignorance of the messages she was getting so early in the morning. Messages from her perfect little sister. She loved that creature sometimes but never times like that exact time when she wanted the purity of peace.

By five to six, they were out, Joyce going on and on about the traffic that might be. Pendo had to remind her constantly that even though they were in Nakuru, they were in the middle of fuck all Nakuru and traffic really didn’t happen to folks like them. If anything, they could simply choose to walk and they would get to the school with so much time to spare. Joyce chose to hear none of it as they made to the bus station and got into the lone matatu that was going to transport them for the low price of twenty shillings.

Twenty to the allotted time, they were walking the grounds of Our Lady of Perpetual Tears Primary School, children throwing them curious looks as they made for class with cups and plates filling their hands. “You know,” Pendo said as they made themselves comfortable on the seats outside the headmistress’ office, “I never thought I would walk into a primary school ever again after I finished class eight. Like, I had cursed out the catholic church so hard as I left mom punished me for using bad words. Mind, it was just fuck.” She turned to face Joyce, a small smile on her face. “Your sister can be a bitch sometimes.”

“Don’t talk about your mom like that!”

Pendo shuffled her feet. “Do you sometimes think it would have been better if you were my cousin instead of my aunt? Coz, look at us right now. We should be laughing about that but you’re being all uptight and angry.”

Joyce’s eyes were trained on a little boy who had fallen over and was trying his best not to cry. “It’s morning, okay. It’s not started how I wanted. We’ll laugh about it later.”

“No, we won’t,” Pendo swiftly objected as she turned around to look at the children pass by. “We are roughly the same age, yet you spy on me for my mom instead of, I don’t know, being the cool aunt.” Her phone chimed and when she looked at it, it was the fifth message from Ivy that morning. She ignored them and pocketed the damn thing. “Imagine that – so much potential to be the cool aunt yet you spoil it.”

“Ever thought about being the cool niece then?” Joyce retorted. “There was a time you were and then suddenly you were not. Thought that when you asked me to do this with you, you would have gone to be the cool niece again but somehow, you became worse.”

Pendo’s neck twitched as her lips pursed. “Excuse me?”

“You went to uni—”

“—oh! Let it all out now, I guess.”

Joyce ignored her. “—and you were fine at first. We still talked and I still thought you were cool and then you just weren’t. Then the next thing I hear is you have dropped out of med school and that you’ve become this ragging bitch who is angry all the time.”

“I think we should talk about this later.”

“No, no. You brought it up so let’s finish it.” Joyce turned around to face Pendo. “I want to know. I want to know what happened that made you into this… person. You were my idol and now you're… this. I don’t know what this is. You say that I nag like a wife well, you behave like a child and I don’t want to be dragged down.”

“Then why are you here?”

“Despite myself, I have hope that this is your one shot at succeeding in something and I don’t want to disappoint your mom.” They went quiet, the excited and energetic laugher of children with far too much hope filling most of its space. “I also wanted to hang out with you.” Joyce said as she turned around to look at the children passing about. “I miss how it was when we were younger sometimes and you were like the closest thing I had to a sibling who didn’t parent me. Then I lost that and I was all alone and even now when you are with me, you are not and it’s annoying. You annoy me, Pendo and I am not a person who is easily annoyed.”

“If we share the same genes, yes you are.” Pendo fiddled with her right sleeve. “For what it’s worth, I’ll try to be a bit better.”

Joyce chuckled. “You’re supposed to say sorry.”

“Baby steps. Haven’t used that word for a good ten years. Not breaking that streak just yet.”

The bell rang. The slow and jolly pitter patters vanished as the children begun sprinting for class. Pendo couldn’t help the smile on her face. She could remember the weight of the bell and being late. How she would be out of breath as she sat on her desk then tried to not breath too loud lest the kids around her thought her this unfit creature. Then she would struggle with the not passing out as she pretended calm quiet breaths.

A small ball filled her chest. She hadn’t been a good person to Joyce for so long and now that they were hanging out once again, she simply wasn’t there. She would be better. She was going to live up to that small promise. Then, in leu of feeling a bit charitable, she chucked out her phone and decided she was going to text Ivy back.

She hadn’t had the chance however as the door to the headmistress’ office opened and out stepped a very old little woman, a big smile on her face as she looked back. Both Pendo and Joyce got up to their feet, schooling their face into friendliness and almost laughter.

That was until Flora stepped out as well and Pendo could fell her smile drop and the lifted airiness of her heart just about flutter away.

To think of the progress she’d made with her life just then.