JIJI NDOGO: I’m in the doghouse with a mad dog

Marriage, and relationships in general, should come with a user manual. Otherwise, can someone explain how I’m in the doghouse for doing my job extremely well?

My wife Sophia is mad that I, a policeman, solved a tricky murder case. Therefore, she says, I’ve been hiding stuff from her and I’m not as stupid as she had thought.

For the record, there’s nothing up my sleeve. I may not be up to snuff in lots of stuff but I’m good at solving puzzles. I also recognise patterns that perhaps shouldn’t be there, which I had thought an anomaly but seems is an asset. Who knows? Maybe I might be an idiot savant.

Before you’re impressed and start going gaga, that’s a phrase I came across on old Mr Google. It means a person who has exceptional capabilities in one particular field, say music or mathematics, despite having significant impairment in other areas of intellectual or social functioning. Apart from the music and math part, the statement describes me. Okay, maybe only the part that says “It means a person…” is accurate, but still…

Now I’m sleeping on my father-in-law’s couch, the man who also happens to be my ageing boss. He’s not a good roommate to have. Lately, he’s been forgetting stuff, a fact we’re desperate to conceal; otherwise, he goes on mandatory retirement. This morning, he went to the bathroom at the end of the plot, bathed and then returned to the house in his birthday suit.

“Jesus! Inspector Tembo!” I said, a hand to my mouth. “You’re naked!”

He wagged a finger at me. “First of all, you have to decide whether you’re seeing me or our Dear Lord. It can’t be both.”

“Okay, sir, either you or Jesus is standing in the room naked. Which is your towel?”

“Drat!” He slaps his thigh. “I must have forgotten it in the toilet. I’ll fetch it.”

“No, no, no, sir,” I say on my way to the door. “I’ll get it.”

As I had suspected, a small group of the plot dwellers, women with too much time on their hands, are gathered outside, whispering and pointing.

“Mama-we!” one them says in a harsh whisper that carries. “Jimwanaume jizee lakini mzigo bado kaubeba kweli.”

“Don’t you have anything better to do than embarrass an old man?” I chide.

They laugh as one of them says, “Ai! Sisi twamuaibisha ama ni yeye ana-aibisha mabwana zetu? Bwanangu angekuwa hivo angekuwa anakula nyama kila siku.”

Another quips, “Wewe sema za kwako. Kuvuka bahari si size ya meli, ni uhodari wa nahodha.”

The others laugh at her. One adds, “Ndiyo maana bwanako amezamisha meli kwa kila bahari kwa hii kijiji, ama?”

I leave them arguing and take the towel back to the house, where I find my boss with one leg on the table, applying lotion to his inner thighs.

I cover my eyes. “Surely, sir, can’t you do that in the bedroom?”

“But why?” he asks. “We’re both men, aren’t we? Besides, there’s better light in here. I don’t want to miss a spot.” He exchanges legs and squeezes a healthy dollop of lotion into his palms and rubs them together.

“You know, you remind me of this guy back in the barracks when I was in the military. He couldn’t take a shower with the rest of the guys. He’d wait until everyone was done, which meant he was always running behind. And talking of behind…” He turns his back to me. “Do you mind applying lotion to my back? I can no longer reach the good parts.”

Whatever it takes, I have to make things good with my wife.