The Language Inside

by Holly Thompson

  between the poles

  all through the

  slow and formal fan dance

  by the girls

  I wait

  knowing that like those girls

  he has to be

  sewn into his costume

  that it takes more than an hour

  to ready for his role

  but finally Serey is there

  onstage

  alone

  in an orange skirt

  and gold top

  and gold tail

  and headdress

  as the mermaid

  Sovann Machha

  she dances

  around the stage

  in stately circles

  and slow one-legged turns

  her hands curving through the air

  then Hanuman

  the white monkey king

  appears

  and Hanuman is Samnang

  and I know this is his first time

  dancing this role

  before an audience

  Samnang follows Serey around the stage

  in all her mermaid’s glitter

  and my heart races for him

  he bounds monkey-like

  holds his dagger high

  approaches her from all sides

  and in the end

  he wins her over

  and cartwheels offstage

  after a celebratory coconut dance

  there’s another classical dance

  then for the last piece

  Samnang is onstage again

  in loose blue trousers

  with all the dancers—

  it’s the fishing dance

  with the flirting guys

  circling the shy girls

  the advances

  the rebuffs

  the beat

  of the bamboo fish traps

  on the floor

  I love this one

  and I am hoping

  especially I can

  learn this dance

  but near the end of the fishing dance

  I lose one performer

  then another

  and when I try to see Samnang

  his whole body disappears

  I want it to be just

  the after-blindness

  from someone’s flash

  or a stage light

  but it’s not

  I sink down in my chair

  put on my coat

  cover my head

  with my scarf

  the lights come up

  the applause is too loud

  people rise all around me

  I let them climb over my knees

  file out

  while I stay in my seat

  quiet

  hidden

  eventually Samnang finds me

  when the numbness

  is in my jaw

  and up my arm

  and I’m blind and

  the crescent of triangles

  is flickering and arcing

                                          right

                                           out

                                           of

                                           his

                                           head

  hey

  he says

  knowing

  I reach my hand out

  he takes it

  squats down

  kisses my hair

  and helps me up

  and outside to the parking lot

  inside the car I’m shivering

  Samnang reclines my seat

  blasts the heat

  covers me with his jacket

  drives

  when we stop

  he helps me into

  YiaYia’s house

  I hear my mother and Toby

  I feel myself led

  to my mother’s bed in the den

  I feel my shoes removed

                 by Samnang

  my coat removed

                 by Samnang

  smelling his head

  hot, damp and not yet showered

  after dance

  and I hear some words

                 stay

  sit

                                          Emma

                           while

  it seems everyone has left

  the voices are farther

  the dark is smooth

  then the edge of the bed

                 dips

  and someone is

  beside me

  with me

  Samnang

  still

  and quiet

  he takes my hand

  and I curl against him

  and sleep

  he’s gone of course

  when I wake in the night

  and go out to the kitchen

  for some toast which I eat

  sitting on the counter

  in the ghostly blue streetlight

  and in my head I hear

  hey

  and I think

  maybe now

  I’ll start to know

  my life

  in the study I find my phone

  in my bag on the floor

  and from the bed set up for my mom

  I call Samnang

  wake him

  apologize

  we murmur

  our voices low

  both of us half-asleep

  you were a great Hanuman I tell him

  thanks he says sorry you got sick

  he tells me he sat and talked

  with my mom and Toby after I fell asleep

  before YiaYia got home

  he tells me Mom asked him

  if he knew

  what I’d decided

                 and he said he didn’t

                 but he hoped I’d stay

                 even though he understood

                 that maybe I needed to go

  and she said she felt exactly the same

  she mentioned a dance project he says

  and I realize I haven’t told him

  my plans for Dance for Tohoku

  I close my eyes and tell Samnang my idea

  the vision that was so clear

  in that creative burst

  during my last migraine

  my dance program

  of hip-hop

  followed by soran bushi

  more hip-hop

  a folk dance from Tohoku

  then a circle dance of tanko bushi

  with the audience

  all to raise money for Tohoku

  and I tell him what Tracy suggested

  tanko bushi for halftime shows

  then the full program in March

  but the full program doesn’t feel quite full enough

  I say groggily

  the program needs more . . . something

  then Samnang says soft but so clear

  that the words plunge deep into my ear

  maybe you should add some other kind of dance

  like Cambodian

  Cambodian? I say

  to raise money for Tohoku?

 
yeah, like the fishing dance

  or the monkey dance

  I don’t get it I say

  how does that relate to Japan?

  well, in the villages where my relatives live

  tons of things were funded by Japanese NPOs—

                 schools, wells, irrigation systems, even some of the houses

  you could mix in Cambodian dance

  Cambodian dancers raising money, too

  as a kind of thank-you to Japan

  I take this in

  what he’s saying

  my eyes wide open now

  you mean, like, some members of your troupe

  plus the school dance club

  performing together?

  why not? he says

  and I smile

  there on my mother’s healing bed

  in my grandmother’s den

  holding the voice of Samnang

  close to my ear

  that

  would be amazing I say

  yeah he says

  but Samnang I whisper

  if we did that

  we’d have to start practicing soon

  to be ready for the one-year anniversary

  and I hear his breath catch

  as he calculates

  that date

  I sleep late

  shower

  eat cereal

  and finally

  call Madoka

  midnight

  her time

  turn on Skype

  I tell her

  please

  when I can finally see her on the screen

  seated at her desk

  face brightened by her study lamp

  her favorite sax-player posters

                 Sadao Watanabe, Kaori Kobayashi and Mindi Abair

  barely visible in the dark behind her

  I take a long breath and say

  I won’t be coming back with my father

  there are too many reasons to stay—

  my mom, Zena, dance

  Samnang . . .

  she smiles, wearily, says it’s okay

  she hadn’t expected I would

  and had worried that I actually might

  even though I shouldn’t

  when I squint at her, puzzled

  she elaborates

  just take care of your mother

  that’s your obligation now

  and I marvel at how in just a couple months

  my thinking seems to have shifted slightly

  like a fault slip in an earthquake

  away from Madoka’s clear-cut view of life

  with obligation guiding everything

  and I’m glad that I made this decision

  not just by ranking my obligations

  maybe I have

  become a little more of an

  amerika-jin

  but Miyagi I say

  your relatives need so much help

  your grandparents, your cousins, those towns

  up and down the coast of Tohoku . . .

  Emma she says

  it’s just a half year or so, right?

  and besides, other people are helping, too

  that’s everyone’s responsibility, not just yours

  well, tell your cousins

  I haven’t forgotten them I say

  and that I’m starting a project

  to raise money for their schools

  so we’ll want to know what they need—

  can you ask them to make some lists?

  talk with their teachers, start thinking

  of what they might purchase

  with funds we raise?

  I explain my dance idea—

  Tracy’s crazy suggestion

  of tanko bushi at halftime

  and the full Dance for Tohoku program

  for the one-year anniversary

  Emma-chan, sugoi!—great!

  they need so much she says

                 band instruments, sports uniforms, cameras . . .

  everything was swept away

  then she tells me about the service for her aunt

  changes in her grandparents’ town

  and the plans for rebuilding

  we’ll do what we can to help I say

  after we end our Skype

  I shut myself in my room

  and make a card

  using the outline of a runner

  I find on the Internet

  shaped a bit like my mother

  traced again and again

  to create a woman speeding

  across the page

  inside

  I write my message

  with my revised poem

      a healing breast

      on a running woman

      is hardly noticed

  early afternoon I give my mother the card

  and I tell her I look forward

  to being her pacer

  when she starts running again

  in spring

  and suddenly she’s bawling

  like she hasn’t ever let herself cry

  through any of this cancer mess

  YiaYia comes running

  followed by Toby

  and at first they wonder

  what I did now

  to upset Mom

  but I tell them my decision

  and Toby does this new high five

  he’s been trying to teach me

  and my mom smiles through her tears

  and YiaYia hugs me tight

  then I call my father in New York

  and he is so relieved

  he sounds like he might cry, too

  finally I call Samnang

  hey he says

  hey I say

  you decided he says

  I decided I say

  well? he asks

  can you come get me? I say

  now? I’m at my mother’s

  and I’m watching Lena and Van

  can’t someone else stay with them?

  he takes forever to think this over

  and I have to summon all

  my Japanese patience

  as I wait

  let me see what I can do he finally says

  it may take me half an hour, okay?

  finally an hour later he rings the doorbell

  sticks his head inside to tell YiaYia

  he’ll have me home by dinner

  then takes my hand

  on the walkway I pause to face him

  as he eyes me with anticipation

  I ask if he can take me to a place

  where we can see water

                 if not the sea

                 at least a pond

                 or lake

                 or river

  so we can talk

  there are about two hours

  left of daylight

  he looks toward the car

  examines the sky

  scrunches his face

  let me call Serey he says

  and I squint at him thinking

  what?

  for a while

  he paces up and down the sidewalk

  smiling, waving his hands

  jabbering into his cell phone

  then he returns to me

  I asked her to come, too he says

  and to my quizzical look

  he bursts out laughing

  pats my shoulder and says

  kidding!

  she was giving me directions

  I climb into the front seat

  then shriek and bump my head

  at the sound of two voices

  saying hi from the back—

  Lena and Van

  bundled in winter jac
kets

  sorry, I had to bring them Samnang says

  oh I say, taken aback

  rubbing my head

  it’s fine, but . . .

  I tell Samnang to wait a minute

  and run back inside

  grab some origami paper

  and in the car I send some sheets

  and a little instruction booklet

  to Lena and Van in the backseat

  and up front start to fold

  a crane, a frog, a cicada

  guys, we’re going on a mystery ride

  Samnang announces

  to find something

  golden treasure? Van asks

  water says Samnang

  the kids frown

  the beach? Lena asks

  maybe . . .

  but I didn’t bring my bathing suit! Van whines

  it’s too cold anyway Lena says

  and Van scowls

  shrinks down in his seat

  until I toss him a frog

  and its companion

  cicada

  on the back of a piece of origami paper

  Samnang has scrawled

                 495 95 113 1A

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