The second night at Salma’s house had none of the silence of a home that belonged to you. There was the refrigerator switching on and off, the children’s bedroom door knocking against its frame whenever someone passed, and Musa’s footsteps as he prepared for his night shift. Mariam’s boxes were stacked behind the sofa, the small sewing machine was covered with a kanga, and Tunu’s mattress leaned against the wall until bedtime.
Salma put four plates on the table and said, “Let’s talk tonight before things become difficult.”
Mariam knew that tone. It was not a threat. It was the voice of someone helping you who needed that help to have a shape.
Tunu sat at the far end of the table. Her school uniform was still inside a plastic bag because she had not found anywhere to iron it. Salma’s children were in the sitting room arguing over the remote.
Musa lifted his tea. “This house is small. We cannot pretend it isn’t.”
Mariam nodded. “I know.”
“We can organize ourselves,” Salma said. “But we need to know for how long.”
“How long?”
“Three weeks.”
Tunu looked up at once.
Mariam did not answer immediately.
Salma continued. “I’m not throwing you out. But the children have school, Musa sleeps during the day after his shift, and your things have filled the sitting room. If we know it is three weeks, we can plan around it. If it is three months, that is a different life.”
Mariam touched the document pouch beside her chair. The green priority card was inside. So was the deposit receipt.
“The housing office said my priority is confirmed.”
Musa said, “Confirmed is not a date.”
Mariam looked at him. There was no contempt in his face. That made the words hurt more.
“I know.”
Salma opened a small notebook.
“And let us agree on a contribution. Not because you are a guest. Food, water, electricity—they have all gone up.”
“I’ll pay.”
“Don’t just say you’ll pay. Let’s choose an amount that won’t finish you.”
Tunu pushed her plate slightly away. “Mama, how much is the school bus from here?”
“I’ll know tomorrow.”
“What if I take two buses?”
“We’ll calculate.”
“I was fifteen minutes late today.”
Salma looked at her. “Tomorrow you leave earlier.”
Tunu said nothing.
Mariam had noticed how quiet her daughter had become since the demolition. Tunu did not want classmates asking why she now arrived from another side of the city. She did not want her suitcases to become a story. Even here, she kept her books inside a box rather than using the shelf with Salma’s children.
“I’ll rearrange my work hours,” Mariam said. “If I open the stall earlier, I can close earlier and meet you on the evening route for a few days.”
“I don’t want you leaving work because of me.”
“It’s not because of you. It’s because the route changed.”
Tunu looked at her for a moment. “That is the same thing.”
Musa breathed out and stood. “I have to go. But Salma is right. Three weeks is fair.”
After he left, Salma pushed the notebook toward Mariam.
“Look. This is food. This is water. These are electricity tokens. It is not rent.”
Mariam worked through the numbers. The amount was far less than a bedsitter would cost, but once she added Tunu’s transport, storage for the heavier sewing equipment, and the SACCO repayments, the margin in her cash flow began to disappear.
“I can contribute this every week,” she said.
Salma nodded. “Fine.”
“And if the house doesn’t come within three weeks?”
Salma paused.
“We talk again. But don’t build your whole plan around maybe.”
Mariam felt as if her sister had said aloud something she already knew and did not want to hear.
After supper she opened two boxes looking for her fabric scissors. Salma let her use one corner of the dining table after the children went to bed. The small machine shook against the surface because the table was not as stable as the one she had lost.
She had three school trousers to take in at the waist, one skirt to lengthen, and two zips to replace. Small jobs. But every shilling now had two duties: feed them and buy time.
Tunu sat on the floor doing homework.
“When are your exams?” Mariam asked.
“Week four.”
Mariam’s hands stopped for a second.
Week four.
After Salma’s deadline.
“We’ll have moved by then,” she said.
Tunu did not lift her head. “Did you say that, or did they write it?”
The needle caught Mariam’s finger. A bead of blood appeared.
“They wrote that I have priority.”
“But the date?”
“They didn’t write a date.”
Tunu gave a small nod, not mocking her. It looked more like a child learning to separate a promise from a fact.
Mariam cleaned her finger and kept sewing.
The next morning she went to her stall near the bus market. Two customers were already waiting. One had come to collect a blouse delayed on demolition day.
“I thought you had closed,” the woman said.
“I moved my home. The business is still here.”
“For now?”
Mariam looked at her.
“For now and after.”
She said it with more confidence than she felt.
At midday she opened the Tumaini Housing portal on her phone and entered her priority number: BM-P-0417.
Status: ACTIVE PRIORITY.
No unit number. No handover date. No allocation window.
She saved a screenshot.
Then she called the Bandari Mashariki Housing Office. The hold music lasted eleven minutes. When someone answered, he told her, “Madam, active priority is the first step. Allocation continues in batches.”
“Which batch am I in?”
“It doesn’t show here.”
“And the date?”
“There is no date on my screen.”
“How am I supposed to plan?”
“Keep checking the portal.”
Mariam wanted to say her old house had never asked her to refresh a portal before allowing her to sleep. Instead, she wrote down the officer’s name, the time of the call, and exactly what he had said.
That evening, when she returned to Salma’s, Tunu had already unrolled her mattress along the edge of the sitting room. The children were watching cartoons loudly. Tunu had earphones in her ears, but Mariam noticed they were not connected to anything.
“I cleared one kitchen shelf for your things,” Salma said. “And this drawer is Tunu’s.”
“Thank you.”
“Stop thanking me every minute. We’ll both get tired.”
Mariam laughed softly.
After supper, she pulled out the large calendar sheet she once used to plan customer deliveries. Across the top she wrote three headings:
HOUSING / SCHOOL / BUSINESS.
Under HOUSING: Priority active. No unit. No date. Deposit paid.
Under SCHOOL: New route. Exam week 4.
Under BUSINESS: SACCO due. Storage. Transport.
Salma stood behind her. “What are you doing?”
“Putting time around something that has no time.”
“Does that help?”
“It helps me.”
Mariam counted from the day they arrived. She marked day one, day seven, day fourteen. Then she reached the end of the third week.
Tunu came and stood beside her.
“Is that the day we leave?”
“That is the day we decide we cannot keep living like this.”
“And the house?”
“We will know before then.”
Tunu said nothing.
Mariam circles a date on the calendar—day twenty-one.
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