BITTER LOVE

Chapter 1

Bang! Bang! The sound of two gunshots echoes throughout the atmosphere of Kasarani. Jaiden who has been walking aimlessly for the past two hours fell down due to the shock that stroke him like lightening. This kind of sound Jaiden has only heard in movies and in real life in was like terror. Disoriented and confused he remained still on the ground as everything started to move in slow-motion. The twenty seconds he remained on the ground seemed like forever to him. The deafening silence that followed made the already dark alley to look like a street to hell.
Lying there motionless, the events of that day started to replay in his mind. Everything in his simple life was going exponentially southward. In that day only, the thing that have happened in his life was like twenty years as compared to the life of the cool kids living in gated estates of Runda and Karen who even are not required to know their root to school. As compared to him his school mates are brought to school by cars with drivers. Every day he goes to school people looked at him like he doesn’t belong there. To him what the other students thought was somehow true because he is in a private university and one of the most expensive ones because he was   able to pass his exams well. He went to a day school in shimakhokho one which there was only 8 teachers in school. Most of the students only knew very little English and a lot of mulembe language. He was able to perform well due to his determination to be a doctor and be able to raise his family from the hungry teeth of poverty. He got scholarship from wings to fly sponsored by equity. This scholarship made him to join one of the most prestigious university in the country. Dynasty university as the name suggests is one of the poshest university and even walking to school seemed like a sin. Jaiden with his three material trousers, two black shirts, one leather jacket and one leather shoe was seen like an outcast.
This morning he work up early ready to do his end of semester exam. He ran to the neighboring cybercafé to go and print his exam card, since he did not own a smartphone and everyone downloads and shows it to the supervisor. His ksh400 kaduda phone could not make clearly heard phone calls let alone download something from the school portal. He was met with a big surprise when he wasn’t able to see his exam card in his portal. This only means that one maybe his fees areas were not cleared or someone had intentionally deleted it. He remembered checking his school fees arrears the previous day and they were all cleared, that’s when he remembered the chicky smiles two of his bully have just given him 5 minutes ago when he was entering the cybercafé. It dawned on him that the previous day he forgot to log out of his portal and it was evident that the dope boys as they like to call themselves knew about it.to make the matters worse the school rules were clear that one the exam cards were sent they cannot resent it.
Devastated by the turn of events Jaiden decided to go and try his luck at the administrator’s office. On arrival at the administrator’s office he was told that the administrator had called in sick. His second option was to go to the to the dean’s office. As if the day couldn’t get any worse the dean told him that there was nothing he could do since only the admin and the director of the university dealt with those kinds of stuff.
An idea struck Jaiden, he took a piece of paper where he wrote a letter and forged the director’s signature. Little did he know that that would be another nail on his coffin. He was planning to use the piece of paper to enter the examination room. He reached at the door and as soon as he started to explain it to the supervisor the director arrived at the scene. He was tongue tied no knowing what to say. The supervisor knew something was wrong and called the director. To make the story short this ordeal gave Jayden one-year suspension. Jayden went back to his house only to find a very big padlock on his door. That was another blow to him since no one had to tell him the reason since he knew it was due to the three months he had not paid rent. He couldn’t even call the caretaker to explain him current situation since his phone was in the house. He had planned to cook the remaining two cups of maize flour to combine lunch with supper and sleep for the day. That’s when he decided to just roam around.
Pendo is the most beautiful lady that any man could ever dream of. She is the queen of dynasty university, she comes from the richest families in the country. Some people say that his father owns his own city in the neighboring country. Pendo is what one can use when describing a spoilt brat. She goes to school with different cars every day and never even attends classes. It is rumored that her father owned a half of the shares of the school. She is so arrogant and she always doesn’t care about anyone’s feelings.
That particular night Pendo and her boyfriend Rodney where just driving around when their car broke down at around Kasarani. They called their mechanic and it was like he was taking forever to arrive. So, Rodney decided to go and find something to keep them busy. Pendo remained in the car but as some minutes passed by she decided to walk around. After walking for a small distance, she heard the gunshots and everyone was running away from the direction where her car was parked. She contemplated on going back to her car but since everyone was as running away from that direction she decided against it. she followed the direction everyone was going but soon enough she entered a dark alley and everyone had disappeared. Her high heels shoes did not give her any advantage since it was only slowing her down. She took the shoes off and started running barefooted. She didn’t go for long before she hit her leg on a stone. The excruciating pain made her to scream in pain.
“HELP!” “SOMEBODY PLEASE HELP ME!” Pendo screamed on top of her lungs. The scream from the dark alley woke Jayden up from his reveries. He ran very fast toward the screams, carries the girl up in bridal style and run. When he got to more open place he stopped to rest. He looked at the lady he just carried and he got the shock of his life when he saw it was Pendo. He couldn’t believe his crush was just in front of him. Pendo was still confused because she didn’t know who her savior was.
“who are you?” this was the fast sentence that came out of Pendo’s mouth.
“my name is Jayden, Jayden wafula.” Jayden reply with the etiquette that his mother taught him. He even bowed slightly to show respect. This is the behavior of his people from lurambi.
“could you please help me with your phone so that I could call my driver to come pick me up.” Pendo said.
Jayden was so ashamed to tell her the truth about why he didn’t have his phone so he pretended to be searching his pockets as if looking for his phone.
“I think I have lost my phone when I was running. “he replied.
“could you please then lend me some 4k I board a taxi the I’ll refund you when I reach home” said Pendo in a very sweet voice.
Jayden pretended again to be searching his pockets as if looking for his wallet.
“I think I lost m y wallet too, “said Jayden in a rather embarrassed tone. Only him knew that he only had ksh 50 which was also locked in his house. The thought of his house made his stomach to rumble since he had not eaten anything from morning.
“I can walk you home if you don’t mind” Jayden offered.
Pendo looked him up and down as if what Jayden was saying was in Latin. Immediately Jayden regretted what he said.
“I can help you find a phone then” Jayden quickly offered again.
“that will be better” Pendo said while smiling.