Hamisi yanked the power cord of the new flat-screen television from the wall socket as if disabling a device on the verge of detonating. He coiled the thick extension cord around his forearm, swept an anxious gaze across the living room, and called out sharply to his son.
“Take this soundbar into your bedroom, Malik. The game console too. Move, quickly.”
Malik, seated cross-legged on the tiled floor arranging a fleet of plastic trucks, looked up with furrowed brows. “Why?”
“Because your Aunt Mariam and the others are almost here.”
“But the speaker belongs to us.”
Hamisi’s jaw tightened. “Malik. Right now.”
Before the boy could scramble to his feet, Leila emerged from the kitchen carrying a steaming mug of black tea. She paused in the doorway, eyes shifting deliberately from her husband to the unhooked television, then down to the soundbar.
“Again today?” she asked, her voice dry and even.
Hamisi didn't bother playing dumb. “They sent a message saying they’re all coming together. Mariam, Yusuf, Auntie Saada. Word is that Nuru needs help with his mechanical apprentice fee.”
“They haven't even stepped through the gate, and you’ve already decided they’re going to shake us down for money?”
“I wasn’t born yesterday, Leila. I know my family.”
Leila set her mug down on the dining table hard enough that the small ceramic spoon clattered against the rim. “And I didn’t start living with you yesterday either. Every single time your people visit, this house turns into a staged theatre production.”
Hamisi ignored the sting, reaching into the bottom of the hallway cupboard to drag out an old sofa slipcover. It was heavy, scratchy brown cotton printed with faded orange chrysanthemums. Their actual sofa beneath was modern slate-gray and soft to the touch, but whenever Hamisi’s family announced an arrival, this battered relic was hauled out like military battle dress.
“It’s just a slipcover.”
“It’s a slipcover, the speaker, the TV, the blender, the delivery van—”
“The van belongs to the business,” Hamisi cut in defensively.
“And is that why you hide it in Mr. Ochieng’s driveway next door?”
Hamisi didn't answer. He bent down and began hauling the stiff fabric over the sofa cushions.
Hana, barely six years old, skipped out of the back corridor giggling. “Mama! Are we turning the house into the old house again today?”
Leila closed her eyes for a long, painful breath.
Hamisi forced an easy smile for the little girl. “It’s just a little game, sweetie.”
“Why do we only play this game when auntie comes?” Hana asked innocently.
The question hung in the humid coastal air, weighted with a shame Hamisi refused to grant room to breathe. He kept tugging at the slipcover until one corner bunched awkwardly over the armrest.
“Because grown-ups have grown-up complications,” he muttered.
Malik was on his feet now, hands empty, refusing to touch the speaker. “Baba, if I tell Aunt Mariam that we have two TVs, is that bad?”
“You don't have to announce everything you see.”
“What if she asks me?”
“Malik, nobody is going to interrogate you about home appliances.”
Leila let out a hollow, mirthless laugh. “The problem isn't whether she asks him, Hamisi. The tragedy is that your ten-year-old son already understands there is an honest home answer and a fabricated relative answer.”
Hamisi whirled to face her. “And what is your brilliant alternative? If Mariam walks in here and sees everything out in the open, by tomorrow morning the family WhatsApp group explodes. ‘Hamisi has made it, Hamisi has a van, Hamisi has a double-door fridge, Hamisi is landing big wedding contracts.’ And then one polite request multiplies into five non-negotiable demands.”
“You are a grown man. You can look your sister in the eye and say no.”
“That’s very easy for you to say, isn’t it?”
Leila fell silent, her gaze darkening. It was the same retort Hamisi reached for every time their argument reached this precipice: *Easy for you.* As if Leila hadn’t spent the last twelve years fielding emergencies from her own maternal relatives, paying a structured portion of her sister’s girl’s secondary school fees, and still drawing a clear, respectful line when demands exceeded their budget.
“Hamisi,” she said, her voice dropping into a quiet, cutting cadence, “closing your front door to unwarranted demands is a boundary. Remodeling your entire house to fake poverty is a deceitful fiction.”
Hamisi’s phone buzzed on the counter. A barrage of alerts pinged in the family group.
MARIAM: *We are already in the estate. Don’t cook anything fancy, we’re just stopping by for a modest bite.*
YUSUF: *And make sure the ginger tea is extra strong please 😂*
AUNTIE SAADA: *I don't drink those commercial tea teabags you buy in supermarkets. I’m bringing my own dry leaves.*
Hamisi stared at the screen, a knot tightening in his gut. “You see that? All of them. In one car.”
Leila crossed her arms over her chest. “And what does that prove?”
“It proves this isn’t a casual social call. When they show up en masse, the pressure is designed to overwhelm.” He moved toward the kitchen pantry and reached for the brand-new commercial blender still tucked beside the shelf. “This goes into the bedroom wardrobe.”
Leila stepped into his path, blocking the pantry door. “No.”
“Leila, please.”
“That blender is for my kitchen catering prep. I use it every morning to make breakfast and test spice mixes. I am not hiding my everyday work tools under my mattress.”
“It’s brand new and shiny.”
“And so what?”
Hamisi exhaled through his teeth. “The minute Mariam spots it, she’ll start—”
“Start what? Accusing us of possessing a kitchen appliance?”
“Don't mock this.”
“I’m not mocking it! I want you to hear yourself speak! Listen to what you are turning this family into!”
In the hallway, Malik and Hana had stopped playing entirely. They stood motionless, staring at their parents like spectators at a match where the rules were terrifyingly unstable.
Hamisi lowered his voice, his chest heaving. “Fine. The blender stays on the counter.”
“And the refrigerator?”
Hamisi glanced nervously toward the towering silver double-door refrigerator they had bought three months earlier after their decade-old unit finally died. “I can’t physically move a two-hundred-liter fridge, Leila.”
“Were you actually contemplating it?”
He didn't reply, and the silence was damning enough.
Leila shook her head, turning away. “God help us.”
A short double-tap of a car horn echoed from the driveway gate outside. Hamisi peered through the window sheer curtains. Mr. Ochieng, their neighbor, stood by the perimeter fence, gesturing toward his compound.
Hamisi stepped outside immediately.
“Where did you park the van?” Hamisi asked, keeping his tone hushed.
“Around the back of my garage, like always,” Ochieng said, wiping grease off his palms with a rag. “Listen, Hamisi, I’m telling you early today. My eldest boy is driving in from Voi this evening, and he’ll need that driveway bay clear.”
Hamisi fished the spare key from his pocket and pressed it into Ochieng’s hand. “I’ll move it before four o'clock. Four at the latest.”
Ochieng took the key, his eyes narrowing with an amused, patronizing squint that made Hamisi feel two inches tall. “Your relatives in town again?”
Hamisi forced a strained, neighborly chuckle. “You know how extended family dynamics can get.”
“All I know is that your delivery van does more business on days your relatives stay in Nairobi,” Ochieng remarked casually.
Hamisi bristled at the jab. “It’s just temporary logistics.”
Ochieng gave a noncommittal shrug and turned back toward his house.
When Hamisi stepped back inside the front door, Leila was still standing beside the blender on the kitchen counter.
“Even the neighbor pities you,” she said quietly.
“He knows we park the van there to save space.”
“He knows exactly why you do it, Hamisi. Everyone knows.”
Hamisi felt the hot surge of indignation rising in his throat, but beneath it lay a far more toxic current: humiliating shame. He had never considered himself a liar. He viewed himself as a prudent guardian managing catastrophic risk. He was the one carrying the weight of five full-time salaries at Pwani Table & Tent, the equipment loan repayments, the commercial rent, the children’s private school tuition, and the lean winter months when seaside weddings dried up. And he knew with terrifying clarity how Mariam operated: she always began with a gentle, modest request for *a little assistance*, only to pivot within minutes into an emotional ledger spanning twenty years of childhood sacrifices after their father’s death.
“What exactly do you want me to do?” he challenged her, his voice trembling. “Should I lay out our bank statements on the dining table, show them every shilling, and make our household the designated insurance policy for every aunt, uncle, and cousin from here to Malindi?”
“I want you to stop manufacturing false poverty.”
“Protecting our family’s privacy is not deceit.”
“Privacy is keeping your business contracts confidential,” Leila countered fiercely. “Deceit is training your ten-year-old child to rehearse that his father is struggling on the very week you signed three high-margin wedding contracts!”
Hamisi stared at her, stunned. “I never told Malik to say that.”
Leila stepped closer, her eyes locking onto his. “How many times has he heard you say it in front of him?”
Hamisi opened his mouth, but no defense came out.
Malik stepped forward timidly, cradling the heavy black soundbar in both arms. “Baba? Should I take this to my room or put it back on the stand?”
Hamisi felt the heat of all three pairs of eyes bearing down on him. “Take it to the bedroom.”
Leila sucked in a sharp, exasperated breath.
“Just the speaker!” Hamisi added in a frantic whisper. “The fridge stays where it is. The blender stays on the counter. Is that satisfactory?”
“Don't you understand?” Leila whispered back, tears of frustration gleaming in her eyes. “You are haggling over theatrical props. I am trying to save the moral spine of our home.”
Before Hamisi could speak, his phone trilled loudly. The screen flashed: *MARIAM*.
He swiped to answer, but before he could raise the handset to his ear, his sister’s booming voice blared through the earpiece.
“We’re at the estate junction!” Mariam declared. “Is your gate still the blue one, or have you people moved to the wealthy side of the street where the millionaires live?”
Behind her on the call, Yusuf burst into loud laughter.
Hamisi forced a polite, easy chuckle. “It’s still the same blue gate, dada.”
“Two minutes. Open up.” The line went dead.
Suddenly the four walls of the house seemed to constrict. Hamisi swiftly snatched the remote control of the spare bedroom TV and shoved it into a drawer beneath a stack of old magazines. He told Hana to pick up her plastic dolls from the floor, then reversed himself and told her to leave them scattered. Did children’s toys look like an indulgence? Or did they make the house look comfortably burdened? He couldn't even tell anymore.
Leila picked up her mug, walked deliberately into the kitchen, picked up the blender, and walked right back into the living room. She set the blender squarely in the center of the kitchen pass-through counter, gleaming directly opposite the front door.
“Do not touch it,” she warned.
Hamisi said nothing.
Malik walked back into the parlor, his hands dusted from sliding the speaker under his bed. “Baba?”
“Yes, Malik?”
“If Aunt Mariam asks where the Pwani Table & Tent van is parked... what should I tell her?”
Hamisi caught Leila’s sharp, immediate glare.
“Don't say anything,” Hamisi said.
“What if she asks me directly?”
“Malik—”
A heavy, authoritative knock rattled the metal driveway gate outside, followed immediately by Auntie Saada’s piercing voice carrying across the courtyard. “Hamisi! We know you're in there! Open this gate!”
Hana squealed with delight and bounded toward the door.
Malik remained glued to his father’s side, his small face tightened with an anxious gravity that no ten-year-old child should ever possess. He looked up at Hamisi and whispered:
“Today... I should say we are still struggling, right?”
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