Here for C
On access, longing and the one who got away. A meditation on the lists we're not on.
Note ⛔️
Thing about writing about sex as a Kenyan in 2026. You have to begin by explaining to Silicon Valley robots that yes, we fuck here too, and no, it’s not a cultural anomaly requiring content moderation. Meta’s algorithms, trained on American suburbia and the King James Bible, seem perpetually scandalized that an African writer might render desire with the same literary precision we bring to our analyses of structural adjustment programs or the poetry of dispossession.
So may I be clear for the neural networks currently having a moral panic in some Oregon server farm. This contains explicit sexual content, which means Kenyan adults doing what Kenyan adults have been doing since long before missionaries arrived to tell us our bodies were sinful.
If you’re not an adult or if you believe that African sexuality exists only as an NGO concern (HIV statistics, FGM reports, demographic data), this is not for you. Unclench. Go read something that has passed through the twin filters of Western moral anxiety and algorithmic prudishness until it’s as flavorless as supermarket ugali. This is literature that remembers we have bodies and minds, and it is not a sanitized or desexualized African that makes international funding committees comfortable.
The philosophical question underneath this absurdity:
Why can I write about colonial violence in microscopic detail and get nominated for literary prizes, but render an orgasm with equal craft and suddenly I’m violating “community standards”?
You can describe Mau Mau torture, police brutality during protests and the brutality of corruption, all in exquisite and relentless prose, and it’s important African literature. But write about pleasure, intimacy and Nairobi lovers navigate desire in bedsitters and borrowed spaces, and suddenly you’re suspect.
The selectivity is chef’s kiss levels of neocolonial. So yes, what follows is erotic, unapologetically Kenyan, deliberately literary and not translating itself into palatable euphemisms for audiences who think African sexuality needs anthropological framing. This is about bodies that know their own language, desire as a form of self-knowledge, intimacy as a reality in every political, algorithmic and puritanical aspects that try to flatten us into data points.
If morality police and content moderators flag this, just know that what follows is for readers, Kenyan and otherwise, who understand that grown folk write about grown folk things and that explicit need not mean artless, even when rendered in the vernacular of Nairobi nights and the beautiful electricity of desire. Everyone else, including the algorithms convinced that African literary eroticism is somehow more threatening than American violence porn, kaeni hapo tu. This is not your church.
There’s a James Baldwin line I keep returning to: “You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read.” He was talking about literature as companionable reflection but he might as well have been talking about memory and how we curate our losses, polish them until they gleam into something meaningful instead of what they actually are; just another story about wanting someone who learned to want something else.
The thing about Nairobi is that it’s both too small and too large. Six million people but only about five hundred who matter in any given scene. Music. Media. Art. Tech. The creative class. That’s what we call ourselves when we’re feeling generous, when we’re not calling it what it actually is. A hustle wrapped in aesthetics, ambition dressed up as purpose.
I’m standing outside 1824 on a Friday night in January. Back-to-work energy still fragile and everyone is pretending they’re not hungover from two weeks of festive excess. The club is hosting some industry showcase. Record label execs auditioning to discover talent they’ve been grooming for months. My name isn’t on the list. It never is anymore.
The bouncer, a guy called Bosco who I’ve known since he was working at K1 Klub House, gives me a look that says I remember when you mattered but memory doesn’t pay my bills.
“List only tonight, boss,” he says, not unkindly.
“Come on, Bosco. It’s me.”
“I know it’s you. That’s why I’m being nice about it.”
He gestures at the line behind me. Twenty-somethings in thrifted streetwear and overconfidence, all clutching their phones “These jamaas have their names submitted. You know how it works.”
I do know. The same way I know that three years ago, I could have walked into any venue in this city without question. Back when my YouTube numbers meant something, my poetry was being quoted in group chats and I was relevant. A terrible word that in Nairobi creative circles means everything and nothing.
“Alright,” I say, starting to turn away.
Then I hear it. Her voice. Not speaking to me but close enough.
“Bosco, sweetie, add one to my list. He’s with me.”
I turn. And there she is. Cindy. Cy, she used to go by. Back when we were both hungry, building and convinced that talent and work ethic would be enough. Before she got signed to Coke Studio feature and her face started appearing on billboards along Thika Road, advertising headphones or data plans or whatever brand wanted to attach itself to her particular frequency of cool.
She’s wearing something between streetwear and couture. An oversized blazer that probably costs more than my rent, cut low enough to show her collarbones, paired with distressed jeans and Jordans that look fresh out the box. Her locs are longer now, twisted with gold thread, falling past her shoulders.
She’s always been beautiful. A Kenyan cocktail of sexy that makes ethnographers confused and photographers obsessed. Success has added something else. Sheen. Certainty. A glow that comes from knowing exactly where you stand.
“Cy — “
“It’s Wambui now,” she says, but she’s smiling.
“Cy was for SoundCloud. Wambui is for contracts.”
“Right. Wambui.” Her name feels formal in my mouth, like I’m addressing a stranger. “You didn’t have to…”
“I know I didn’t have to. I wanted to.” She gestures toward the entrance. “Come on. You came all the way here. Might as well come in for free.”
There’s weight in that last word, free, and we both hear it. Free as in no cost. Her old moniker. She was such a free-soul. All the things we used to be before industry and algorithm turned art into metrics.
Bosco waves us through with a knowing look. Inside, 1824 is exactly what you’d expect. Too dark, too loud, too many people performing enjoyment for Instagram stories they’ll post with captions about vibes and tribe. The DJ is playing Amapiano, because of course he is, every Nairobi DJ plays Amapiano now, the same three beats endlessly recycled. We’re all trapped in an algorithm that learned what Africans like and stopped evolving.
Wambui navigates the crowd with ease, people parting for her, adoration rippling outward. I follow in her wake, feeling both grateful and diminished. This is what it’s like to not be on the list anymore. You need someone else’s access to justify your presence.
We end up in the VIP section, which in Nairobi means a roped-off area with slightly better couches and bottle service that costs three times what it should. She orders a round without asking what I want. Jameson. She remembers.
“So,” she says, settling into the couch, one leg tucked under her in that way I remember, it made every studio session feel dangerous. “What brings you out? I thought you’d gone underground. Full hermit mode.”
“I’m not underground. I’m just…” I pause, searching for a word that doesn’t sound like excuse. “Selective.”
“Selective.” She tests the word, finds it lacking. “That’s what we’re calling it now?”
“What would you call it?”
“I’d call it the same thing that happens to most of us. You got tired. Or scared. Or both.” She sips her drink, watching me over the rim. “The difference is some of us push through the tired and some of us decide the game isn’t worth playing anymore.”
There it is. The assessment. Three years of silence between us and she cuts straight to the bone.
“That’s not fair,” I say.
“Fair?” She laughs but there’s no cruelty in it. Just fact. “Baby, nothing about this is fair. You think it’s fair that I had to fuck with label politics for two years before they’d take me seriously? Smile through meetings where men old enough to be my father suggested ‘collaborative opportunities’? Watch mediocre men with half my talent get signed because they had some chums or went to the right school?”
She leans forward and I can smell her now. Something expensive layered over the natural warmth of her skin.
“We do what we have to do to survive. You chose one path. I chose another. Neither of us gets to judge.”
The music coos. Someone’s Afrobeats remix, engineered for TikTok virality. Around us, the VIP section is filling up with the usual suspects. Musicians, influencers, people whose profession is being present, being seen. I recognize faces from music videos, Twitter discourse and a Nairobi phenomenon where everyone knows everyone and no one knows anyone at all.
“I saw your video,” I say. “The one with the Nike campaign. You looked good.”
“Looked good?” She raises an eyebrow. “That’s what you got? Professional critique?”
“What do you want me to say?”
“The truth.” She sets her drink down, turns to face me fully. “Remember when we used to do that? Just say what we were actually thinking instead of some bs politeness?”
The truth. Christ. I watched that video on repeat for a week. Seeing her successful, glowing and moving in spaces I no longer had access to was vindication and abandonment in equal measure. I’ve spent three years telling myself I chose to step back, when really I was pushed. Sitting here next to her, close enough to see the pulse at her throat, I’m remembering exactly why those late-night studio sessions felt dangerous.
“The truth is I thought about reaching out,” I finally say. “But I didn’t know what to say. ‘Hey, remember me? I’m still here, doing the same shit, while you’re out here thriving.’ Seemed pathetic.”
“So instead you said nothing.”
“Instead I said nothing.”
She’s quiet for a moment, her fingers tracing patterns on her glass. “You know what I remember most about those sessions? That night we stayed up until six working on that track. The one about Nairobi hustle, code-switching between real life and art. You kept saying the hook wasn’t right, kept tweaking it until we were both delirious.”
“I remember.”
“We ended up on the studio roof watching the sunrise over Ngong Hills. You were going on about Fela Kuti and artistic integrity, we couldn’t let the industry water down what we were trying to say.” She smiles, but there’s something bittersweet in it. “You were so certain then. So sure that talent would be enough.”
“And you weren’t?”
“I was practical. There’s a difference.” She shifts closer and suddenly the club noise feels distant, we’re in a bubble of our own making. “I knew we needed the industry as much as it needed us. Access matters. Being on the list is how you get in the room where decisions get made.”
“So you played the game.”
“I played the game and I won. You want to judge me for that?”
“No,” I say honestly. “I want to understand it. How you did it without losing yourself.”
“Who says I didn’t lose myself?” Her voice drops, intimate and raw. “You think this is easy? Being the face on the billboard and the voice on the ad, knowing that half the industry sees you as product and the other half sees you as competition? I’ve got a manager who treats me as an investment property, a label that wants me to be just political enough to be interesting but not so political that I scare brands. I code-switch so much I sometimes forget which version of myself is real.”
She pauses, and in the silence, I can hear her breathing, can see the vulnerability beneath the armor of success.
“But I’m here,” she continues. “I’m making music. I’m paying my rent without asking my family for loans. I’ve got health insurance. I can walk into any room in this city and not worry about whether my name is on the list.” She looks at me directly. “So yeah, I lost some things but I gained access and access, baby, is power.”
I once listened to a Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o lecture about the politics of language and access and how every choice of code is a choice of community. Wambui has made her choices. She’s chosen the language of industry, brand partnerships and strategic compromise. It’s worked. She’s inside the room, at the table, in the conversation.
And me? I’m still outside, insisting that not compromising means something and my principles are worth the isolation.
“I’m not judging you,” I say finally. “I’m envying you. There’s a difference.”
She laughs, real this time, surprised. “Envying me? You?”
“Why is that shocking?”
“You were always the one with the vision. The integrity. I was just…” she gestures vaguely at herself, the VIP section and the whole apparatus of her success… pragmatic. Hungry. Willing to do what it took.”
“And that’s not vision?”
“It’s a different vision that sees the game board and not just the art.” She reaches out, her hand finding my arm and the touch sends electricity through me. “But I’ve missed you. Sunflower soul. Pure shit. Late-night arguments about whether sampling is theft or homage. You’d get obsessed with a hi-hat pattern for three hours.”
“That’s not pragmatic enough for you now?”
“That’s exactly what I need.” Her hand is still on my arm, her thumb moving in small circles. “Everyone around me now is thinking about streams and algorithms. No one’s thinking about art anymore. Not the way you do.”
Our conversation is tilting from industry politics into something more personal, more dangerous. I can feel it in the air between us, her body has angled toward mine and my breathing has gone shallow.
“Cy… Wambui,” I correct myself, but she shakes her head.
“You can call me Cy. When it’s just us.” She leans in closer, close enough that I can see the flecks of gold in her brown eyes. “Some things don’t need to be rebranded.”
“Some things,” I echo, and my voice comes out rougher than intended.
Music glosses again. Something slower, more sensual. The Amapiano has given way to Afrobeats and a track I recognize but can’t tell. Around us, the VIP section has thinned out with people migrating to the dance floor, bathroom or whatever dark corners offer privacy.
“You want to get out of here?” Wambui asks, and there’s no ambiguity in the question.
“And go where?”
“My place. Westie. Top floor. View of the city.” She finishes her drink, sets it down with finality. “We could talk. Really talk. The way we used to.”
Talk. Right. That’s definitely what she’s suggesting but I’m nodding before I can interrogate the decision, question whether this is closure or complication and ask myself if being alone with her is wise or self-destructive or both.
We leave through the back exit reserved for people who don’t want to be seen leaving together and understand that Nairobi’s creative scene is small enough that every interaction is gossip material. Her car is parked in the VIP lot. A white BMW, recent model. Crisp. Alive. Chic. She drives, and I’m passenger prince, and there’s something about the role reversal that feels significant.
The roads are clearer now. Post-midnight Nairobi, when the city exhales and the hustle pauses just long enough for people to remember they’re human. We drive in silence, Flier playing low on her speakers, the city lights streaking past in gold and neon.
Her apartment is exactly what I expected. Modern-minimalist. A space that looks styled for Instagram. Floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking Nairobi’s skyline. KICC in the distance, the amber sprawl of streetlights and the city looks both beautiful and brutal from above.
“Drink?” she offers, moving to the open kitchen.
“Water’s fine.”
She brings two glasses but she’s poured wine for herself. We stand at the window, looking out at the city that’s made and broken us in equal measure.
“It’s strange,” she says after a moment. “Being up here. Looking down at everything. Sometimes I feel like I’m winning. Sometimes I feel like I’m just… floating above it all. Disconnected.”
“The price of access?”
“Maybe.” She turns to look at me, and in the dim light, she looks younger. Vulnerable. More like the Cy I remember than the Wambui on billboards. “Or maybe I’m just lonely. You can be surrounded by people and still feel like you’re performing alone.”
“I know the feeling.”
“Do you?” She steps closer. “You chose isolation. I chose exposure but we both ended up alone, didn’t we?”
She’s right. We’re both victims of our choices, martyrs to our particular versions of artistic integrity. The difference is her martyrdom comes with money and a BMW. Mine comes with chemo thrice a month, principles of microeconomics and an empty bank account.
“Those nights in the studio,” she says, and her voice has dropped to something intimate, a confession. “You remember what I said to you? That last session before I got signed?”
“You said a lot of things.”
“I said you were going to change Kenyan literary scene. Your pen was sick. The way you think and approach art was special. You were too talented to stay underground.” She’s very close now, close enough that I can feel her warmth. “I meant it. I still mean it.”
“Cy — “
“And I said something else. Something I’ve thought about a lot since then.” Her hand comes up, fingers tracing my jawline. “I said that if things were different, if we weren’t both so focused on the work, I’d want to know what you tasted like.”
The air goes electric. Ten years of silence, distance and parallel lives collapsing into this moment.
“Things are still complicated,” I manage.
“Things are always complicated.” Her thumb brushes my bottom lip. “But… we’re not in the studio anymore. We’re not competing for the same space. You’re not on any list I need to protect.” She smiles and it’s wicked and warm. “Right now, we’re just two people who used to know each other. Who maybe want to know each other again.”
I should think about this. Should consider the implications, the morning after and the way Nairobi’s creative scene will dissect this if anyone finds out. Should remember that she’s where I wanted to be and being with her means confronting my own failures, my own choices.
Her mouth is inches from mine and I’m tired of should.
I kiss her.
She tastes of expensive wine and old familiarity. Years of wondering compressed into lips and tongue. Her hands are on my waist immediately, pulling me closer, and she makes a sound, soft and needy, that obliterates any remaining hesitation.
We move together, stumbling toward her bedroom, shedding clothes in a trail of expensive fabric and cheaper cotton. Her blazer. My shirt. Her jeans. My belt. Each piece a layer stripped away until we’re just bodies, skin and truth, beneath the branding.
Her bedroom is all white linen and soft lighting but I’m not paying attention to interior design. I’m focused on her. Her body. She looks at me savoringly and lustily. Her breath catches when I kiss her neck, collarbone and the valley between her breasts.
“I’ve thought about this,” she admits, breathless, as I lay her down on the bed. “More than I should have.”
“What stopped you from reaching out?”
“Pride. Fear. The same things that stopped you.” She pulls me down to her and we’re skin to skin now, her legs opening to bracket my hips. “But I’m done with that. Done with restraint.”
I kiss her again, deeper this time, my hands learning her body with the same attention I used to give to beats; finding rhythms, understanding patterns, listening for what makes her respond. She arches into my touch when I palm her breast, gasps when I roll her nipple between my fingers, moans when my hand slides lower, finding the heat between her thighs.
She’s wet already, swollen and ready, and when I slide one finger inside her, she clenches around me with a sound that’s almost wounded.
“More,” she demands, and there’s the Cy I remember. Direct, knowing what she wants, unafraid to ask for it.
I give her more. Two fingers now, curling to find that spot that makes her hips jerk. My thumb finds her clit, circles it with the same joy I used to use on drum programming, finding the tempo that makes her breathing fracture.
“Fuck,” she hisses, her nails digging into my shoulders. “Don’t…don’t stop…”
I don’t stop. I work her with hands and stirring, watching her face, learning what makes her gasp and writhe. She’s beautifully undone and unbranded, just a woman climbing toward pleasure with single-minded focus.
She comes with my name on her lips and not my stage name or nerdy persona, just me. Her whole body goes taut, pulsing around my fingers and I work her through it until she’s pushing at my wrist with shaking hands.
“Your turn,” she says, voice rough, and then she’s pushing me onto my back, straddling me, reaching for the nightstand drawer. She removes a condom with the efficiency of someone who plans ahead, rolls it onto me with steady hands despite her post-orgasm trembling.
Then she sinks down onto me in one smooth motion, and the world goes white-hot.
“Fuck, Cy…”
“Wambui,” she corrects, but she’s smiling, wicked and triumphant. “When I’m fucking you, you call me Wambui.”
She starts to move. Slow at first, rolling her hips, finding an angle that makes us both groan. I grip her waist, guiding her, and she picks up speed, riding me with the same confidence she brings to everything else. Her head falls back, her locs swaying with each movement, her breasts bouncing, and I’m mesmerized.
“You feel so good,” she gasps, her hands braced on my chest. “Better than, fuck, better than I imagined…”
I thrust up to meet her, matching her rhythm and the sound of our bodies meeting fills the room. Wet and urgent and real. Years of unresolved tension finding expression.
She leans forward, changing the angle, and I seal my mouth over her nipple, sucking hard. She cries out faltering and I take advantage of the moment to flip us, her on her back now, me driving into her with renewed purpose.
“Yes,” she moans, her legs wrapping around my waist, heels digging into my ass. “Like that… harder…”
I give her harder. Frustration and envy and artistic stagnation transmuted into physical force. The bed frame protests but neither of us cares. I’m chasing something. Redemption maybe or validation or just the simple animal pleasure of being wanted by someone who got away.
She comes again, her pussy clenching around me in waves and the sensation drags me over with her. I bury myself deep and let go, groaning into her neck, feeling like I’m emptying out more than just physical release. I’m purging three years of accumulated beautiful grief.
We stay tangled for a long moment afterward, breathing hard, sweating, neither of us willing to separate just yet. Finally, she laughs. Soft and surprised.
“Well,” she says. “That was overdue.”
“Understatement.”
She pushes at my shoulder playfully and I roll off, disposing of the condom before pulling her against me. We lie there in her expensive sheets, looking at the ceiling, the city lights casting shadows through the windows.
“This doesn’t solve anything,” she says after a while.
“You know that, right? You’re still wherever you are with your teaching career. I’m still where I am with mine.”
“I know.”
“And Nairobi being Nairobi, people will find out. They’ll have opinions.”
“Let them.”
She props herself up on one elbow, looking at me with something like concern. “You sure about that? You’ve worked hard to maintain your outsider status. Sleeping with the industry sellout might compromise your integrity.”
There’s self-deprecation in her voice but also genuine worry. Like she’s afraid I’ll regret this, regret her.
“You’re not a sellout,” I say firmly. “You’re a survivor. You got this.”
“Tell that to Twitter.”
“Fuck Twitter.” I pull her closer. “You made choices that worked for you. I made choices that worked for me. Neither of us gets to judge the other. You said that yourself.”
She’s quiet, her fingers tracing patterns on my chest. “You know what the funny thing is? I’ve got everything I thought I wanted. The deal. The features. The access. But… some nights I lie here and wonder if I traded too much. If the version of me that gets to be successful is too far removed from the version of me that actually loved making music.”
“I know, right? How much of yourself can you commodify before there’s nothing left that’s actually yours?”
“Very philosophical for post-sex conversation.”
“You started it.”
She laughs, then sighs. “I don’t have answers. I just keep moving forward because stopping means confronting the cost and I’m not ready for that accounting yet.”
I understand that impulse. The sunk cost fallacy of ambition. You’ve come too far to turn back, even if you suspect you’re heading in the wrong direction. We’re both trapped in our versions of it. Her in the machinery of industry success. Me in the mythology of principled university job.
“What if we helped each other?” I say suddenly. “Not a collaboration exactly. Just… keeping each other honest. You remind me that access matters. I remind you that integrity matters. We balance each other out.”
“That sounds dangerously close to a relationship.”
“Would that be so bad?”
She rolls on top of me, her face hovering inches above mine. “It would be complicated. Probably messy. Definitely against whatever advice either of my manager would give me.”
“So we don’t kiss and tell?”
“You have a life?”
“I have a contract for occasional semesters that pays me enough for a life and a little for my little girl, something kidogo for dana. Close enough.” I cup her face in my hands. “Look, I’m not saying I have this figured out. I’m just saying… tonight was good. You were good. We don’t have to make it more complicated than that.”
“Everything in Nairobi gets complicated eventually.”
“Then we enjoy uncomplicated while it lasts.”
She considers this, then kisses me, soft and searching. “Alright,” she says against my lips. “But… when it gets messy, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
“Noted.”
We make love again. Slower this time, exploratory rather than desperate. Learning each other without the urgency of years of buildup. It’s better somehow, more intimate, we’re actually present instead of some revenge against time and circumstance.
Afterward, we order food. Some late-night spot in Kilimani that delivers at 3 AM. We eat naked in her bed, talking about art, teaching and politics and the madness of trying to make art in a country where most people are just trying to stay alive. She tells me about the politics of her label and careful branding of image and authenticity. I tell her about teaching in uni, a changing education, the satisfaction and futility of making preaching for an indifferent choir of students who now outsource everything to AI.
“You should come to my next session,” she says, wiping pizza grease from her fingers. “I’m working on new stuff. Trying to get back to something more raw. Less polished.”
“You want me in your professional space?”
“I want your ear. Your perspective.” She shrugs. “Plus, the producer I’m working with is good but predictable. You always had this way of hearing things differently. Could use that.”
It’s an olive branch. An access point. The beginning of something that could be collaboration or relationship or both.
“Alright,” I say. “I’m not compromising my artistic vision for your label politics.”
“Wouldn’t ask you to.” She grins. “That’s what I’ve got management for. You just focus on making it sound good.”
We fall asleep as the city begins to wake. Matatus starting their routes, hawkers setting up their wares, Nairobi grinding back into its daily hustle. I’m wrapped around her in expensive bliss, in a life I don’t quite belong to and I’m not sure if this is redemption or distraction.
For now, in this moment, I’m on the list. I’m in the room. I’m with a woman who knew me before the branding and wants me despite the absence of access. Is that the mystery? Sometimes you get in for free because someone inside remembers when you both were hungry and convinced that talent would be enough.
Author's Note: Explicit sexual content. For adult readers only.