Of Blue Sweaters and a Red Door

It was usually the smell that got your attention. Hard to describe if you did not know a thing or two about prisons and brothels and bakeries and posho mills and metal workshops. It stuck around your nose, on your skin. In your mind. Like home. Or a bad debt.

And Sons was closed that day. It was always open. Ever since I can remember, the twin doors never met. I was told that they did only when the customers came in. He told me that I was one day going to be ready for when the doors closed, with us inside. He also told me that it was going to be the day he would tell me why he named his shop ‘And Sons’. And Mister M never lied. That day, we had a customer. I took note of this.

‘You can take your mask off,’ he sighed heartily to the figure at the door. ‘This is a safe space.’

The doors silently shut behind the small man. He stepped forward into the soft sunlight peeping through the clear windows. From the corner in which I sat, I could very clearly see him. He was short and in a pair of SAVCO jeans. Tucked beneath a thick leather belt with extra holes in its stripe was a neatly pressed shirt with tiny polka dots on the cotton. Black tie, loose at the knot. He had a folded blue sweater in his right hand, tightly clenched. A modest hankie in his left, drenched. Thick and clean brown boots. He was sweating.

He stepped on forward. The floorboards creaked. I sat up straight, just as he had taught me. I watched as the man’s reflection gleaned off the polished plates and saucers and silver cups. His shadow darkened the sparkling coffee pots and trophies lined along the shelves. His gait was stout enough to see his shiny head at the top of my personal collection of first editions. The counter was the right height for him. He stopped.

‘Are you sure?’ he asked with a cracked and sour voice through the mask. I was starkly reminded of nails on glass.

‘Please,’ answered Mister M, his hands feverishly wiping the tiny silver cups with the red and white cloth.

He took it off slowly with the hankie, as though remorseful. When the last strap was off his right ear, he hastily tore the mask off and stuffed it in his back pocket. I could hear him breathing. I swear his heartbeat drummed across the floor to the nook of my corner. With paper and pencil in hand, I watched, hoping to learn.

Mister M smiled and placed his tools down. A faint smile. A clinking of the pot. The kindling of a flame. The straightening of a back. Connection.

‘Would you like some coffee?’ asked Mister M. The man nodded, faintly, eyes scanning his environment. He did not see me. He could not.

In the silence, I know he wondered what most did before his time. What kind of shop it was. Where it was. Why they found themselves wandering indoors to a place they never could remember thinking about. He coughed and mopped his brow. The room was getting cooler.

‘My wife. I- I-,’

‘No rush,’ Mister M convinced. ‘Take your time.’

My employer was always great with his words. Always great. The coffee pot hissed. Ready. He poured it into two cups. The man sat in the wooden stool, aware of hospitality. I always liked the steam from the cups. It danced.

They both sipped. His eyes popped, then, just as abruptly, they calmed, like those of a drowsing child. He found a place for his hankie in his lap and his sweater across his shoulder, and both hands got busy holding the coffee cup. The silverware glistened and reflected his pimpled face. I took note of this.

‘What brings you to my shop?’ my employer asked.

‘Strange place you have here Mister…’

‘M. You can always call me Mister M. Or M, if you’d like.’

‘How long have you been here?’

‘A while.’

‘Funny,’ he chuckled. ‘I’ve lived here all my life and not once have I seen your shop.’

My employer sipped some more of his coffee, set it down and then rolled up his thick white sleeves. The embossed half-coat on his broad chest spoke of many years in an older service. I always thought he worked as a hotelier. He had no watch on his wrist. Just the fob he chose to hide from my view. He was smoothly shaven. No trace of hair on his person. No scent. Deep brown and black hues within his eyes. Always, always, a bow tie. Stranger still, even for me.

‘Let’s just say not many people come here…’

‘Musyoka. I am Johnson Musyoka,’ the man coughed. His voice was getting clearer, like the spitting of a log on fire.

‘Musyoka,’ he smiled. The cloth was in his thick hands once more, another one of his items in need of a quick clean. ‘Thing is, you found me. Maybe there is something we can do about your current situation?’

Musyoka did not choke on the drink. He spat it.

‘How do you know!’

‘I don’t, believe me. I just assumed you had one. No one who finds my shop rests easy.’

Mister M was calm. He always was.

Musyoka straightened his neck and loosened his tie a little bit more. His sleeved elbow rested on the wooden counter. Dropping his arm lazily, his fingers tapped against the stool bars. He drummed against the wood. His eyes hovered between two spots over and over, until his pupils looked like an unsure bee’s flying pattern.

‘Is that why you have that on the wall?’ asked Musyoka, trembling.

Mister M and I turned our heads. There was a framed photo. Old. Faded. Black and white and cracked through the middle. A tree. A car. A man and a woman. The man was short. In the same jeans. Same shirt. Same tie. His hands were wrapped around her from the front. She was splendidly beautiful.

‘How did you get that?’ he asked.

Mister M replied, ‘It was always there, Johnson. Maybe that’s why you found me.’

‘To tell you my problem? Will you solve it?’ asked the customer, shaken.

‘I can try,’ said Mister M.

‘Ha! Try,’ he mumbled. ‘Do you have more coffee?’

‘Always.’

The man poured more black into the cups and settled the steaming pot down. Johnson remembered his hankie and used it against his cheek. The room was quite cool. I took note of this.

‘It is our anniversary.’

‘Congratulations,’ replied Mister M. He put the tip of the cloth through a tall misty glass and started rubbing around it from the inside out. Gently.

‘Thank you. I was on my way from the office. We had plans. There is this bistro. It is close to the water. They have the biscuits she likes. I had it all worked out, you see. We would have some cake and tea and biscuits. Then I would get a horse from the park, pay the owner, and ride with her on it. There was a picnic to be had in the evening, where I would recite my vows to her and keep my end of the promise.’ He started to sob. Mister M waited. So did I.

He wiped his nose and eyes and sipped and swallowed. ‘I did not find her at the hospital. Asking around, they told me her shift had ended the night before. The night before. I had not seen her for two days straight. The first thought that crossed my mind, of course, was another man.’

‘Of course.’

‘So I combed through her letters. I checked for any trace of another in the house. There was nothing. Until — ,’ he choked. Mister M pulled the pot up and added more hot liquid into Musyoka’s cup.

‘Until there was something,’ added my employer.

‘Until there was something,’ reiterated the broken shell. ‘There was a photograph. She was younger. So was he. Scrawled on the back, in cursive, was an invitation.’

‘To what?’ asked my employer, intrigue in his voice.

‘To where, is the question, M. There was a short poem there, and I took my time trying to decipher it.’

‘Did you?’

‘No,’ the short Johnson replied. ‘I have been trying for two days now. It has cost me my sanity, you see. I don’t know what to come of it.’

‘I take it that the photograph is with you as we speak?’

Musyoka lifted his weak arm from the counter and plucked a neatly folded paper from his breast pocket. He handed it to Mister M, who placed the clean tall glass behind the rack and shuffled the cloth atop his shoulder. I took note of this.

Johnson nodded to Mister M’s prodding of the photograph. He took his coffee and sipped, eyes down. My employer mumbled to himself, his mind racing modestly.

‘Well this is a tough one,’ he finally replied. ‘Have you thought of praying?’

Johnson chuckled. Like a child. I smiled.

‘I don’t believe in fairy tales, Mister M.’

‘How about luck? Do you believe in luck?’

‘A little. Man makes his own, don’t you think so?’

‘Oh, I do. I do indeed. Would you mind coming with me behind this door?’ he asked after a pause, pointing to the kitchen entrance.

‘Why?’ asked Johnson, peculiar skepticism and caution in his creamy and now haunting voice.

‘To try your luck, of course.’

He took his time mulling the thought over. Then, gingerly, he rose from his seat, one foot then the next on the floor, stretched his back, and pushed his heavy body alongside the counter. Mister M smiled heartily, already by the counter’s side. The door was red.

‘Are you going to kill me?’ asked Johnson. Mister M frowned, then in consideration, shook his head with a faint smile.

‘You have had a lot of pain and mistrust in your life. I am sorry you feel that way. Maybe something in my kitchen will help with easing that.’

‘You mean food?’ jumped Musyoka.

‘Good food. Soul food. I am an excellent cook, if you don’t mind me saying.’

He laughed. ‘The coffee wasn’t strong enough for you?’

‘Is it ever?’ replied my employer. I craned closer, trying my best to keep away from view. ‘Maybe after a good meal we shall have the answer to your riddle. Agreed?’

The man wiped his brow for a last time. He was relaxed now. I could tell. I took note of this.

‘Then please, by all means Mister M. Let’s.’

From where I crouched I could see the door open. I could see the light beam through it, hard. I could see the legs. What I could not see was Musyoka’s gasp. His shock. The crumple of his blue sweater and hankie on the floor. Mister M’s laugh. A hearty laugh.

It was cold. I took note of this.