Insight of a Kenyan Girl

The first spoonful of biryani tasted like comfort and sunlight — warm, spicy, filling in a way hospital food never could.

He stayed by the door, leaning casually against the frame, hands stuffed deep in his pockets like he wasn’t sure if he was allowed to step closer.

Neither of us spoke much.
The room hummed with the quiet kind of conversation that doesn’t need words.

I noticed little things I hadn’t before: the way he scuffed his shoe lightly against the floor, the slight twitch at the corner of his mouth when he fought a grin, the way his gaze flickered to me when he thought I wasn’t looking.

It would have been easy to pretend this was normal — a friend visiting another friend — but it wasn’t.
There was a thread stretched tight between us, invisible but heavy, pulling, waiting.

“Good biryani?” he asked finally, his voice a little rough.

I nodded.
“It’s perfect. Thank you.”

He smiled, relieved.
“I’d like to take credit, but honestly, my auntie’s the real MVP.”

A pause.
I swallowed the next bite, suddenly too aware of how small this room was, how different this city felt when I wasn’t alone in it.

“You’re different here,” I said softly.

He raised an eyebrow.
“Here as in… hospital chic? Or here as in this town?”

“Both,” I admitted. “You seem… calmer. Softer.”

He chuckled under his breath.
“Hospital gowns have that effect on people.”

I smiled, but there was a question lingering under my skin — a question I didn’t know how to ask without making it sound like more than it was.

Why are you still here?

Why bother with a girl you barely know, in a place that’s not even her home, carrying baggage she hasn’t even unpacked yet?

Instead, I said, “You didn’t have to come.”

He shrugged like it was the simplest thing in the world.
“I wanted to.”

Three words.
Soft. Certain. No weight attached, but somehow they filled the whole room.

I set the fork down, my appetite fading under the sudden thud of my heartbeat.

“Thanks, Patty,” I said, voice barely above a whisper.

He straightened, as if about to say something more — then thought better of it.

“Rest up, Minnie,” he said instead, backing toward the door. “And if you need anything… anything at all…”

“I’ll text,” I promised, even though we both knew I probably wouldn’t. Not right away.

He gave me a final smile — small, lopsided, genuine — and then he was gone, the door clicking softly behind him.

I sat there for a long time after, the biryani growing cold in my lap, the lilies drooping in their glass vase, and the quiet buzz of something dangerous and beautiful taking root inside me.

Something I hadn’t let myself feel in a long, long time.

Hope.