My roommate was going to drop me and Dina-the-housekeeper off, but first she wanted to stop and give food to some kids, so we pull onto the roundabout off Ring Road. In the island in the middle these kids--twelve year olds who look like ten and act fifteen--spend the afternoon hanging out and sniffing glue.
Roommate made eye contact with the pack--probably about a dozen of them spread loosely around the island--and they began to get up from where they were sitting. At the south end of the roundabout, the Landrover hit that temporary gridlock of too many merging cars. Three kids got to the car first, and Roommate recognized one of them, wearing a red shirt. I passed Roommate her green plastic bag filled with a loaf of bread and two cartons of this strange milk that doesn’t spoil even if you leave it unrefrigerated all week. She passed it to the boy in the red shirt.
“Now you share this. You don’t keep this.” His face was excited. “You share this with everyone.” He nodded, glowing. One of the younger of the three grabbed at the bag, Redshirt yanked it away and cursed him in Swahili. “No, you share.” He walked quickly behind the car.
Traffic had opened in front of us, so we pulled up two car lengths. The rest of the kids came up to Roommates window, saying hi and showing her their empty hands. “No more. You go share with him,” she jerked a thumb toward where we’d left Redshirt. “Red shirt. I cannot remember his name.” They didn’t quite understand.
I was sitting sideways in the back of the Land Rover, and I tried to find him. There he was, walking back across the street, back to glue sniffers’ island. He had the same green plastic bag, but now it was less full.
“He sold it!” said Dina. Apparently so. There was clearly only one carton of milk in his green sack now. As soon as the kids at Roomate’s window saw him, they charged.
“He sold it?” asked Roommate.
“Look like he sold one of the cartons,” I said. Now the street vendors saw that there were mzungus stopped with their windows open, and they converged, offering us small boxes made of beer bottle caps, tiny motorcycles made out of shirthangers. We couldn’t see what was happening to Redshirt through the crowd of vendors. Roommate plowed through them, and we circled round again. When we got back to the South end all the other kids were yanking at Redshirt’s clothing, pushing him back and forth. Roommate said, “Come here,” and they all responded to her as an authority figure.
Redshirt ran ahead of the rest, looking to plead his case. Beads of milk covered his face: my guess is they wacked him over the head with the unsold carton. Roommate asked if he had sold the other one, but I couldn’t hear his answer. There were cars honking behind us. “I told you to share! Next time you share!” Redshirt had on a face any middle school teacher would recognize: Did I do something wrong?
The horns honked again and we pulled away. The kids didn’t step back an inch from the car--they adjust assumed it wouldn’t run them over as they turned. Except one of them, in a torn black shirt. He put one foot on our back bumper, grabbed something on the Land Rover's side panel. He was on half a second before I slammed my forearm against the back glass and told him No. He looked at my face quickly, then let go as we accelerated away.
