Written in Black, page 18
“I don’t care. Probably for a smoke.”
“Well, now that he’s gone, can you please finish your story? I want to know more about Mohidin.”
I wasn’t in the mood, but if I didn’t do it now, Aaron would keep pestering me about it until I blew a fuse or a major blood vessel, so I gave an almighty sigh before continuing with the narration of my adventures in Badir. I was quite thorough and even included the details of my conversations with Mohidin, but excluded anything that indicated or hinted at his weirder side; I did tell Aaron about Michael stealing from Mohidin and about the money he owed him. My younger brother lapped up everything I said then fired a barrage of questions about every single aspect of every single point I’d mentioned.
“And what about that Mohidin? What a nice man he is, huh?”
“Yeah, nice guy …”
“I can’t believe Michael would steal from him. We’ve got to get his money back somehow.” And then he went on to ask me more questions.
I answered them all until I was out of reserves, and then all I wanted to do was hit the sack. My little brother continued to show an eagerness to interrogate me further, but he soon got the idea that I was done for the day.
“It’s almost time. I’m sleepy,” I said.
“Yeah.”
“I hope Michael isn’t sleeping in our room tonight.”
“No, he’s sleeping in the living room upstairs. He’s got the whole room to himself.”
“Why don’t the adults use the upstairs? I don’t know why they want to sleep on the floor …”
“Maybe they want to be closer to Ah Kong?”
“Yeah, that makes sense … Hey, what’s Michael up to? He’s been gone for a while now. Aaron, go sneak up on him. Any trouble from him will cause trouble for all of us.”
Ever the eager beaver, Aaron sprinted off towards the house, in the same direction that our elder brother had headed off in. I sat back, waiting for him to return with some news, hoping Michael wasn’t up to anything worse than smoking.
Aaron returned barely moments after he’d rounded the corner.
“He’s just sitting there by himself.”
“Ah, leave him then.”
“But, you know, he was talking so much tonight,” Aaron said gleefully. “He never used to talk so much to us.”
“Yeah, but now the problem is getting him to stop …”
I suddenly heard the sound of footsteps coming our way, and saw a figure approaching us. It turned out to be Ah Peh, ready to start his shift early.
“Ah, hi, Ah Peh,” I greeted. He didn’t respond to me, focusing instead on his sleeping brother-in-law.
“Ben! Wake up!” he said in an annoyed voice. Uncle Ben gurgled and rolled his head about a little but didn’t wake up. Ah Peh went up to him and gave his arm a rough tug. That did the trick, but surprised Uncle Ben so much so that he jolted awake, his arms flailing wildly, and fell off the chair and to the ground, tipping over a bag of ingots.
Aaron burst out laughing, and that got him a very stern look from Ah Peh. Our uncle ordered us back into the house but neglected to ask us about where Michael had gone, distracted as he was by Uncle Ben’s antics. We went inside, bypassing the other adults asleep in the downstairs living room on our way upstairs and into Kevin’s room. Sleep hadn’t seemed this inviting to me in a long, long while.
After some speedy teeth-brushing, I confidently expected that I’d fall asleep the moment my head hit the pillow. Yet again, for some reason, I couldn’t. And the more the minutes ticked on, the more frustrated I got, knowing and feeling how tired I was but still unable to find a way to fall into a few hours of restful shut-eye.
I listened to Aaron’s quiet and even breathing and assumed that he’d found slumber without any problems. Kevin’s respirations, too, sounded restful; he’d remained undisturbed all the way through our entry into his room and our bedtime preparations …
“Jonathan?”
But asleep he wasn’t.
“Yeah, Kevin? You haven’t slept yet?”
“No, I can’t. Hey, do you still have my phone?”
“Yes, it’s here. Still in my pocket.” I fumbled around for the phone under the blanket. When I found it, I reached up to hand it to my cousin. “Here you go. But, oh wait, the SIM card is still with Michael …”
“Never mind, we can change it tomorrow.” He got quiet after that, but I could hear his breathing come out in quick, sighing bursts.
“Are you okay, Kevin?” I knew the answer to my own question; my cousin didn’t seem okay at all.
“No,” he said after a few moments. “The Malacca Lady was here today. She told me I had a … a ghost on my back.”
“A what?” I had to keep myself from laughing. Kevin sounded serious.
“A ghost. It’s following me around and bringing me bad luck. She can see it!”
“That doesn’t make sense,” I said to him while lying in a comfortable supine position and with my eyes closed. Maybe all this nattering was the cure for my insomnia.
“I thought maybe it could be Ah Kong, upset about Michael not being here …”
“In that case you’re safe, aren’t you? He won’t hurt you.”
“But what if it’s not him? What if it’s something that stayed behind after I used the magic board? How do I get rid of it?”
“You used it during the funeral? I thought you said it was dangerous to do that. You even asked Aaron not to use it.”
“It was just before the funeral actually. I only wanted to know if Ah Kong was alright …”
“So did you get anything? Did you get to speak to Ah Kong? Or anyone else?”
“Not really …”
“Then there’s probably nothing to worry about.”
“But she said she can see it on my back! And the only way for me to get rid of it is to wear this hu for 40 days. She said it will protect me.”
“Then wear it. It’s just a piece of red plastic.”
“But will it work? What if it doesn’t? And the ghost stays with me forever?”
Now he was getting plain irritating. I wanted to end this as quickly as I could. “You believed her about the ghost, so you might as well believe her about that charm thingy.”
An imaginary solution to an imaginary problem – how ideal.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, I’m sure. Now, go to sleep.”
“But I’m still scared …”
I gave him a loud groan to show how annoyed I was getting of this. “Just pray to Ah Kong. If you can believe all that crap that lady told you, then you might as well believe that he’ll protect you. Now, stop keeping me awake.”
Kevin stopped talking, and for a moment I thought I was finally going to get the quiet I needed to fall asleep. But then he called out for me again.
“Yes?” I replied.
“Do you miss Ah Kong?”
“I guess, yeah. I do.”
“You don’t look it.”
Why did Kevin say it like that? Was he trying to make me feel guilty?
“I don’t know, Kevin … I guess I didn’t know him well enough to feel truly sad about it. I didn’t see him often. And I don’t think he knew me too well either.” It was true that I didn’t know Ah Kong that well, and I was definitely never doted on by him, like Kevin had been, nor had I lived with him for the better part of the last decade.
“He liked you a lot, Jonathan. Maybe he never said it to you, but sometimes, when I was alone with him, he’d tell me to study more so I could become as smart as you.”
“Right! As smart as me,” I replied skeptically. “Hah. Maybe my father was reading out make-believe exam results to him all this time.”
“No, he really meant it …” Kevin trailed off, and I thought that this was the end of the conversation. Finally. Now, I could try to get some sleep …
“I’m sorry, Jonathan,” he blurted out once more. “About yesterday. About getting you into trouble. I did it because … I’m jealous of you.”
“Jealous? Of me?”
“I don’t know why … The more I thought about what Ah Kong said about you, the more I wanted to act that way. And wanted to make you mad.”
I should’ve given him an earful over that confession, but considering that he had apologised to me and had actually confessed to being jealous of me, I decided to give it a pass.
“Forget it. It doesn’t matter anymore. You were the one who was closer to Ah Kong. Nothing can take that away,” I offered. “You know … for me, maybe I’d have felt differently if he and I had spoken more. So, yeah, I guess I wish I’d known him better. That would’ve been kind of nice in a way …”
My cousin got all quiet again, and I assumed it was another attempt to lull me into a false sense of security before he could bug me with more annoying questions. But he didn’t do that this time around. He had nodded off for real, leaving me to wonder as to how much of that unintentional ramble he’d actually heard. Well, it wasn’t going to be repeated tomorrow or ever again for his benefit, should he manage to remember this conversation and the awkward sentiment he’d somehow got me to express openly, against my better instincts.
Chapter Fifteen
I was standing outside the house, keeping watch over the coffin all on my own, the world around me pitch black and as still as death itself. The front door opened, and someone came out to join me.
I turned to look, and saw that it was a boy. A boy about my height and my size, walking over to where I was standing, and I recognised him the instant he was close enough. The boy was me.
It felt so strange to see this, yet, I wasn’t afraid. And as soon as he had reached me, pictures of that boy’s life began floating through my head, flitting glimpses of the things that I’d been told about him. I saw the boy on a ship leaving China, waving goodbye to his parents for that would be the last time he’d ever see them. I saw him toiling away at a sewing machine from dawn till dusk in the backroom of his foster family’s shop, the skin of his fingers raw and blistered. I saw him getting reprimanded by his foster father for not being subservient enough. Getting reprimanded by customers for not being subservient enough. Getting reprimanded by soldiers for not being subservient enough. I saw him taking it all, patiently, not speaking a word in return. I saw him growing up, getting married, buying his own shop, then two more shops, then four more …
When the boy reached my side, the images faded. There we were, the two of us standing in front of the coffin, neither speaking to the other, but both knowing exactly what we had to do. A basin containing a ready-made, self-perpetuating circle of fire was at our feet, and we began throwing things inside it, for them to burn. I started with a ripe banana, and my companion threw in something wrapped up in brown sackcloth with roots dangling out of it. Then I tossed in a chewed-up sandal, and he the obituary page from today’s newspaper. Then, he turned to look at me. And he disappeared, right before my eyes.
And where he had stood only a moment ago lay a doll now, lifeless and inanimate. I picked it up and held it in my hands, bringing its eyes in line with mine. The boy had transformed into this marionette, and it still had my face, and it was staring right at me.
It was obvious what I had to do next.
Looking down at the basin before me, I held out the doll then dropped it into the fire. Folding my arms, I stood back to watch it burn, feeling quite right with myself and with the world as that face continued to look up at me, almost imploringly, while its sides singed and turned black, and yet the face itself somehow resisted complete incineration by the flames that had enveloped it.
Why wasn’t he burning properly? I reached out a hand to test the fire myself.
And that was when the alarm clock woke me.
Why had we set it so early again? Ah, yes. Today was the day we were going to bury my grandfather.
By the time I had got downstairs, everyone else was already seated at the kitchen table for breakfast, except for Ah Em and Ah Koh, who were outside carrying out the wake. We all looked tired and worn out to varying degrees, the girls coming off the worst with their puffy eyes and drained faces. Even Frida didn’t look as perfect as she usually did, and was caught half-dozing off in between bites of her sandwich. Mugs of hot tea went untouched, and little was said between the adults. Even Uncle Ben looked serious, though that might have had something to do with getting busted by Ah Peh for sleeping on the job, and the earful he must have received for it.
A little relief seemed to come our way, however, when some close relatives and family friends started arriving to give their last respects to Ah Kong before the burial. A touch of joviality even returned to both Ah Peh and Uncle Ben’s demeanour, and they started to smile again as they spread themselves out amongst the guests.
This time, there were no serving duties allotted to us children for the few hours until the ceremony began. Crates of fruit juice packs were stacked up near the seated area for the guests to help themselves to, and that was about it in terms of the day’s refreshments.
Of course, I soon discovered that this didn’t necessarily mean we were free to do as we pleased. Aaron and I were ushered back to the ingots and the circle of fire to relieve the ladies, and Michael was similarly exiled to sitting through this duty with us.
“This is even worse than yesterday …”
“No kidding, Michael.”
“This is all so screwed up. I can’t believe I let you talk me into coming here.”
“You wanted to come here, remember?” I snapped back. “Look, everyone’s tired. It’ll be better once it’s all over.”
“Yeah, right …”
The three of us toiled away in silence, without any energy left in us to talk or fight. Free to let my mind wander, I allowed it to drift back to thoughts of yesterday’s events – the creepy house, the crazy poklans, my strange friend Mohidin – all the while carrying on with the paper folding with the least amount of diligence I could muster. I carried on in this trance-like state until Pa walked up to us to announce that the ceremony was about to begin.
We watched on as a middle-aged man dressed in a green polo shirt and cargo shorts picked up a microphone and began making announcements in Mandarin. We couldn’t understand him, not only because we didn’t know any Mandarin, but also because the speaker to which he was hooked was broadcasting a sound so fuzzy it sounded like he was talking through a mouth stuffed with a swarm of cicadas. Fortunately, a second person was available to translate the instructions for the non-Mandarin speakers present, of whom there were a fair few, including many of the deceased’s own kin.
We were told to stop with the ingot-making and the circle of fire, so Aaron, Michael and I left behind our duties to join our father near the altar. I peeked back at the untended bags and basin, and felt a little guilty about deserting them. The fire must have gone out by now, I realised with some unease, and wondered if Ah Kong had made it to his final destination on time.
The girls and Ah Em emerged from the house and stood beside us. Only one person from the family was missing now. Well, two persons actually, if you counted Mum, but I wasn’t sure if anyone was really keeping count of her.
“Pa, where’s Ah Ma?” I asked.
“She’s inside.”
“Why?”
“The wife isn’t supposed to join in, Jonathan. Only the children and grandchildren do,” Ah Em, who was standing next to me, explained.
“Yeah, but she’s the wife. Isn’t she the person who needs to say goodbye the most?”
“Oh, such a sweet boy,” Ah Em cooed. “No, it’s tradition. Ah Ma has to stay there for the rest of the funeral, and she can’t follow us to the grave. But she’s okay. Her family is in the house with her.”
I still felt sorry for my grandmother. But before I could challenge her absence again, the MC’s distorted voice boomed through the speaker and announced that it was 10.00, thus time for us to commence the ceremony. Apparently, it was up to us bereaved descendants to start things off, and as with traditional Chinese hierarchy, it was to begin with Ah Peh, who was Ah Kong’s eldest son.
The MC removed himself from the microphone and walked over to hand my uncle the framed black-and-white photograph of Ah Kong from the altar. Clutching it with both hands, Ah Peh got down on his knees and proceeded to drag himself through the grass and soil around the coffin. The sight of my big, important uncle doing this in front of us and the guests caught me off guard, and I stared in shocked silence as he completed three such rounds with absolute compliance.
When Ah Peh was finished, my father was given a bamboo staff, thin and flimsy but nearly two metres long and with a white flag tied to its tip. He propped it onto one shoulder, the flag-end dangling high above him, and repeated my uncle’s actions just as devotedly and subserviently, making for a viewing that was just as unsettling to watch. Down on his knees and bent forwards, his head bowed low, he crawled around Ah Kong three times, his face as hard and clenched as it usually was. I was sure that the image would stay with me long after the funeral was over; this man whom I would’ve never thought capable of bowing down to anyone under any circumstance was doing it here so willingly. When he was finished, it was Ah Koh’s turn, who executed the coffin-crawl holding on to a paper umbrella.
Ah Em and Uncle Ben as the in-laws followed suit, empty-handed, and then it was down to us grandchildren. We were given no items to hold on to either, but we were provided an additional instruction to get on with it on both our hands and knees. The funeral customs mandated this as a mark of respect, the MC informed us.
While going around the casket on all fours, I realised to my horror that the ground was much damper than it looked. Muddy soil squeezed in through the gaps between my fingers and caked on to my fingernails each time I planted a palm down. The worst part was when I accidentally touched a patch of stripped-off earth on the other side of the coffin, closer to the guests, while finishing my first circle. Pasty, greyish-brown muck got stuck all over my hands, making me balk with disgust as I recalled that this was the exact same patch that two stray dogs had messed up a year ago, and the neighbour’s mutt the year before that.
