I have to explain how it started – we didn’t share an umbrella in the rain or anything like that. I woke up one morning after a long time of not having sex and said, It will be today – I don’t care who it is. And then I rang up my motorbike driver and asked him to take me to the shops. An idea popped into my mind for a second as I was brushing my teeth but I caught my reflection in the mirror and told it sternly:
Forget it – you will not seduce the motorbike man. Don’t even think about it.
The thing is, I hate nightclubs. Especially in South-East Asia, where nightclubs are dotted with pimps and depressing old ex-pat men and younger men who think they are more handsome than they are and are going absolutely nowhere. But mostly, I hate the terrible sycophantic women who glare at me – white women should be home with the children, not encroaching upon their whores’ territory. The whole flavour is just sad sad sad. There is so much booze and ecstasy buzzing around and nobody seems real. It’s just not sexy. I wasn’t going to find someone in a nightclub. A work colleague was out of the question, and the only other way to meet people in Jakarta is to go to church. That was probably not worth it. The lousy singing just by itself is too much to put up with, let alone the shake ’n pour pancakes they use as a lure.
He could have said ‘no’, I guess.
He had innocently offered to help me carry my shopping.
May I accompany you upstairs?
He must have got that from a very old phrasebook somewhere. It made him sound as if he should be getting out of a carriage and retying his cravat. Instead, he was taking off his lime-green motorcycle helmet and kicking the bike stand down. I could have said ‘no’ also, and then he would not have walked behind me in those faded jeans with the fraying cuffs, up the tiled stairway carrying the new quilt I had bought. And then I would not have closed the door so casually on the quiet, white room that seemed to be waiting there for us.
And oh, I see. It will, indeed, be today after all.
We were tapping at each other suddenly in Morse code. This is your hand on mine, this is your leg – I thought it was real – just checking though – I have been watching this face – can you feel my hand – can you feel me now – what is this – are you holding me – and now we take our clothes off – oh God this is a scary part – will you see me naked and run off – no – so far so good. And then there are weird manoeuvres. You are a stranger again and we are doing some awkward dance that we don’t really know the steps to. And then we get into each other’s pattern.
Then he was sitting on the bed putting his shoes on, getting ready to leave.
Can you give me some money? He looked away, at the curtains.
What for?
He wanted to make a payment on his motorbike. If he didn’t pay soon, they were going to take it away.
I can’t pay you for sex, I told him. I don’t do that.
I asked him some more about the bike, about how he got it and why he could not pay for it, and a small, sad story came out. From what he told me, it seems the people in Fajar’s world get by on a system of small personal loans from neighbours and prolonged pay-by-instalment plans from retailers. If you come by a spare one hundred dollars, you can loan it out to someone for a couple of months and make yourself a ten-dollar profit. A person might get stuck and not be able to pay you back, but then they will usually start a new loan with someone else in order to do so. The community is too close-knit for anyone to get away with defaulting on one of these loans. Instead, they will keep moving from creditor to creditor until they find a way to actually pay the money back. It is expensive, because of the interest, but it keeps the person in possession of their bike and their phone, and whatever else they need to keep going. It seemed Fajar had got into a cycle of debt to his family and neighbours that was turning into a spiral.
I really can’t pay you for sex, I told him again. But you can work for me. I’ll give you the money and you can be my driver for a month – and maybe help with some other things.
We drove to the bank and I took out the money that he needed, and told him to leave me there at the mall. He drove off into the traffic without turning back. I half expected that that would be the last I would see of him.
The next day, I was pleasantly surprised when he arrived to take me to work, bringing the receipt for the bike payment. He had, indeed, made two payments with the money.
He continued to do what he promised to do, picking me up in the morning and taking me home in the afternoon, but, of course, he did not just drop me home. Day after day, the same thing happened. We talked as well, and I asked him a lot of questions and started to understand the vast differences between his life and mine. I started to feel his absence, physically, when he was not there, and even missed him a little when he was sitting next to me. It would have all been very nice, if it were not for the nagging issue of the money. I was not sure if I was being used, or if it mattered. Or was it me using him? It was too easy to rescue him and he was very grateful.
Then one day when he came to pick me up he hugged me and did not let go. We were standing there, holding each other, for several minutes. I could feel then that he is grateful, but I realised that it is also something else. I am not just someone who can give him money, I am also a place for him to be accepted and not judged, to be cool instead of hot, to have room and not be crowded out by older siblings. At home, Fajar does not even have a bed, let alone a bedroom. He sleeps on a sofa in their downstairs living room, which is also the kitchen. My small apartment gives him a place to be a grown-up and to explore being a man away from the prying eyes and the harsh judgement of a poor Muslim family. There are no bed bugs and you don’t have to share the TV and there is beer and chocolate in the fridge. Above all, for him, I am uncomplicated sex. It isn’t easy for someone to have sex here without getting married. He can probably find a girl, here and there, who wants a thrill, but it isn’t so easy to have a girlfriend who doesn’t want to remain a virgin until married. She runs a great risk, if she does give in to her boyfriend’s demands, that he will dump her because she is no longer pure, or they will split up for some other reason, and then no one else will have her, because her virginity is gone. It isn’t just sex, though, either. There is something else that just now, today, we have decided to call love, but is probably more accurately relief. We have found something that has been missing for too long and will certainly do for a while.
The long night of watching Fajar’s dreams is over. Although it is a weekday, our school is closed for some kind of Muslim holiday. From the window, I can watch the children playing. They like to follow me, running behind the motorbike whenever I leave the courtyard. Fajar, in his suit of brown skin, has the timeless ease of a man who has just had sex with a woman and is drinking his morning coffee. Right now we are pinioned on this sea of energy, rising and breaking and then becoming totally smooth. Now, and every day, for just a minute or two, we don’t want anything. Can be like cats, blank and armchair easy. And there is nothing else to take off.
Chapter Five
Aryanti
My mother is not only good at making cakes. She can cook anything well. When I go to Fajar’s family’s house, I try not to notice that they have very poor food – they cook the fish together with the vegetables and they don’t properly mix the chilli and salt and sugar. They cook everything for too short or too long a time. The rice is not washed or stored properly. The food is not good quality, which does not help, but my mother says a poor workman blames his tools – you can cook any simple thing well. It is a matter of taking your time and having a clear idea about the final product before you start. In spite of saying this, Ibu1 never follows any recipe and only uses her hands and one old cup to measure things. I usually cook the rice and the vegetables while she makes sauce and sambal and uses oil for cooking tofu and meat. While she is cooking, she talks, and pays no attention to what she is doing, as if her mind and her fingers were staying in two different houses.
We always cooked in harmony
and enjoyed shaking our heads at the daily bickering that went on between my father and brother, until the day that Fajar came to visit. My mother had been working that day, and she was not consulted before Father gave him permission to court me. As soon as she got home and heard the news she began complaining to my brother and scolding my father, but he stood up for himself that time.
You should trust in your husband’s judgements, he told her. Because my body is sick it does not mean I am no longer the man of this household.
At first this was a good sign for me, because it meant that he had decided to dig his heels in and Ibu would be unable to force him to change his mind. But then she tried another way. It was I who should tell my father that I had changed my mind. I told her no, straight up and no beating around the bush. Then she believed she had been disrespected and began to get impatient.
You are usually such a sensible girl, she complained. What has happened to you?
I was surprised by my own disobedience, but felt pleased and powerful at the same time.
What makes you so sure of him? He has not asked for your hand in marriage yet, she added.
He will, Ibu, I answered.
In fact, Fajar and I had already made many plans together for our wedding and our future family. It was I who had been pushing him to choose the right day to speak to my parents. I was unhappy that he seemed content to leave our future to wait as soon as he felt sure of my heart.
At first I thought Ibu’s objections were simply because the match was not her own idea, but later I suspected the problem was with Fajar himself, and I gathered up the courage to ask her about it.
That boy’s family has no father and the eldest brother is not liked, she said.
But I thought there was more to it. It was not her habit to blame people for their misfortunes and every family has its black sheep, especially if there are twelve children. I finally pushed her to tell me the truth.
She swallowed hard and looked uncomfortable, which is something I had rarely seen from her before, but her answer was even more surprising than her look.
He is very handsome, she said.
Do you think that’s why I want to marry him? I replied. I do not look at him for handsomeness.
It isn’t what you are looking at, but other girls, and Fajar also.
Is this the big problem, Ibu? He doesn’t look at other girls. He looks at me.
How do you know what he does when you are not there?
Shall I ask Father to find me an ugly husband?
Ugly or handsome is beside the point, she said, contradicting herself.
You need a good husband. One who does not have all this debt to worry about.
The discussions went around and around and father and brother had to listen to our squabbling for a change.
In the end everybody got tired of it. We struck a deal with Father in the middle, keeping the peace. When Fajar had finished paying his bike then I could marry him.
He has not even asked yet, I reminded them.
Only two days later, as fate has a way of driving everybody crazy, Fajar suddenly decided that he must speak to my parents about our marriage as a matter of urgency. He was disappointed when I told him about the deal I had struck with my mother, but not put off. At that time, I did not tell him the reasons for our arrangement, so as to avoid trouble between them later on after we were married. Nobody wants to be the unhappy meat in the sandwich of son-in-law and mother-in-law.
In my head, I had begun to prepare our future the way my mother prepares the food ahead of time. Where we would live was the biggest problem, as I did not want to live with Fajar’s brother, and also not in their very small house, but I did not want to insult his family by asking Fajar to come and live with my parents. We decided to rent our own house and live together without parents. It would cost money, but we would both work and we could afford it if he had already paid the bike.
Again fate came to laugh at us, because very soon after all this was agreed and everybody was calm and peaceful, he lost the job.
He came to my house and I could see straight away that something was wrong. There was a small bruise on his cheek and a big scratch down the side of his face. He told me the story, waving his long arms around in fury.
My mother has never seen this temper of his and she would certainly not approve, as nobody gets angry like that in our household. I told her the story but left out the parts where she could blame him.
Ibu surprised me at that time by saying:
I don’t want to make you unhappy. Let us give him some time to find a new job.
But three months later he had not found a job and she was very upset to walk past him one day, laughing and smoking, in the line with the ojek drivers.
This man does not have any way to support you. It will be up to his mother and your own parents to feed your child after you are married, while he stands idle in the street. Is that what you want? she asked.
Ibu, what do you want him to do – stay home and cry, or try to find some driving work? I answered.
I could see that this time there would be no fighting with her. She wanted me to call Fajar to a meeting with my father, but instead I went over there to see him alone. A meeting with my parents would make it final and there would be no way to fix it later, if a way could be found. I wanted my parents to believe that I was obeying them, but I told him:
Let us break and wait until later when you have found some work. Then you can visit my parents and we will marry quickly.
He refused the plan. He did not want to break with me at all. I said no to him many times before he stopped calling me.
In truth, I did not want to marry a man without a job, but I did not want to break with him either. I was tired of everybody always telling me what they want – what Ibu wants, what Father wants, what Fajar wants, and, of course, we also had to consider his mother, and his eldest brother, and then his eldest brother’s wife would like to add her unwanted opinion.
My mother and I stopped fighting aloud, but we were mostly silent when we were together in the house.
Fajar
Suddenly I felt that I was really a man. This woman became a drum beating inside me. She did not have shame about anything. She would even take my penis in her mouth like some kind of special sweet, which no Muslim girl will ever do for any reason, even after she is married. She spent her sex and her money, and did not save it or deal it out in modest portions, and she would stand before me naked and sleepy and touch my face, eyes, lips, softly, like a blind woman.
At first I told myself it was for the bike, and then to make me feel stronger, because Aryanti had broken with me. I was a little afraid to be with a woman who worked for the government and thought it might cause me some trouble, but she laughed when I told her that. She was very calm and sure about everything and sometimes I wondered if she was laughing at me.
She would also give me money. I told myself again it was for the bike but then I was thinking about her all the time and began to go to see her when I had not planned to.
One day my mother asked me to paint the house and I told her:
I have no time to do this. I must work.
She looked at me sideways.
What kind of work do you do for this woman?
Driving. Shopping. Many kinds. Is it better I don’t bring home money? And is it better I don’t pay my bike, like before?
She looked at me carefully and then said:
Leave the painting. Only go and buy the paint now, and bring it back. Then you can go.
But I went to Vic’s first and brought her rose apples and chocolate. It was hours later when I remembered the paint, and rushed to buy it and bring it home. My mother was very angry and began to watch me very closely after that. A few weeks later I fell asleep and Vic couldn’t wake me up, so I had to return home in the morning; this time my mother and sister and older brother were waiting for me. I told them I had stayed at Budi’s house because I had eaten some bad food and was
too sick to return. My mother only said:
Do not forget that it is Friday, to remind me to go to the mosque.
It was clear they had been talking, and they would watch me together. I wished I could be like Satiya, and ignore all of their questions, but for some reason that doesn’t work with me. Perhaps because I am the youngest.
I decided it would be easier to see Vic less often. I was still working ojek in the daytime, when she was at work, and going down to the river with Budi at night, but not as often as before. I had started to put bigger money on the races, which Budi had been pretending not to notice, but when I pulled out my new phone he couldn’t help himself.
What the hell is going on with you, man? Did you rob a bank? What kind of money does she pay you?
I looked off into the stars.
It depends on how much work I do, how much she pays me. Anyway, the phone was a gift, not payment.
And what kind of work did you do last night at eleven o’clock?
I just brought some food to her.
What kind of food?
Budi, have you been making cakes and talking with my mother? I brought her some food!
But he knows me better than a brother and he wouldn’t let up until I told him everything. In truth, it was a relief, and I was proud of his excitement.
You have got to be kidding me! A bule! You should marry her, man – get the hell out of this shitty hole!
She says she is too old for me to marry.
How old is she?
She is thirty years old, I told him, and he whistled through his teeth. But I was not telling the truth. She is older than that.
In fact, she was just as shocked as me when we revealed our ages to each other. It was when she showed me a picture of her friend and I asked her:
How old is she?
Well, she is one year younger than me. She is thirty-eight, she replied carefully.
Ramadan Sky Page 6
