The Weight of Our Sky

by Hanna Alkaf

  “Respect? Respect?!” He snorts. “The killing started because her kind, those Malay cibais, started it.” I want to ask what “cibai” means, but from the way he spits it out, I’m guessing it’s nothing good. The Djinn thumps on my heart like a drum, grinning widely. “They think they can just whack us however they like and we’ll roll over and take it, like good dogs.” Frankie looks directly at me then, and I turn away, breathless with the force of his rage. I feel like I’ve been slapped. In my head, Frankie leads a band of armed thugs into Mama’s hospital, shoots everyone in sight, then burns the entire building to the ground. Hidden beneath the table, my hands tap out my usual tattoo on my knees, but they’re shaking so hard I keep losing track and having to begin again, over and over and over.

  “Frankie.” Auntie Bee’s voice is soft, but there is a note of warning that hints at the steel lurking below.

  If Frankie hears that note, he chooses to ignore it entirely. “But it’s true, Ma. Our family has been here for generations! You always talk about our ancestors coming from China, leaving their homes to break their backs in the mines. And for what?” Frankie is practically spitting, so great is his anger. “The British got all the money for our work, and now the Malays want to do the same. The country was built on the labor of our people, and this is how they thank us for it? If they come poke at bees’ nests, then too bad if they get stung.”

  “You sound like a child,” Vincent says coldly. “They started it! They did it first!” he singsongs, sticking out his tongue in mock-playground fashion. I snort with laughter, then cough to hide it as Frankie shoots me a hostile look.

  “You sound like a Malay suck-up, Vincent,” he says coldly. “Who’s a good little doggy, then?”

  “Vincent. Frankie. Stop it,” Auntie Bee snaps, her voice ringing with authority. The brothers subside, glowering at each other over the table, while I stare at my bowl of barely touched food, tapping my fingers lightly along the sides so nobody notices. “We have a guest in our house, and she will share our food and drink because I have invited her to do so. Surely I have taught you better than this.”

  “Sorry, Ma,” Vincent says, shamefaced, while Frankie looks away, mumbling a halfhearted apology under his breath.

  There is a sound then from the doorway. “Baba is home,” Auntie Bee half sighs, her relief obvious, and it’s only when I see her body relax that I realize just how tightly wound she’s been waiting for his arrival.

  She hurries to the door to greet him, ushering him to the table. “Come, Baba, eat, eat, you must be starving. Are you all right? Are you hurt?”

  “Yes, yes, Bee, I’m fine,” he says impatiently, waving her fluttering platitudes away like so many irritating flies. Uncle is a tall, thin man, his silver-gray hair and gold-rimmed glasses lending him a dignified air. He sits at the head of the table, nods to his two sons, and then finally takes in my presence.

  “Hello,” he says, looking at me over the rim of his spectacles. “Who is this?” The words, flung with so much hostility at me only an hour before, are spoken gently, curiously, this time around, and I find myself warming immediately to this kind-eyed man.

  Auntie Bee reaches out to pat my hand. “This is Melati,” she says. “She was at the Rex too. There was some . . . some trouble there. I had to bring her home with me.”

  He nods, as if it’s entirely normal to bring home a random Malay child. “Of course, of course,” he murmurs. “Sorry, I never introduced myself. You can call me Uncle Chong.”

  “Thank you for letting me stay, Uncle Chong,” I say shyly.

  “No, no,” he demurs, stretching out his arms expansively. “Our home is your home.” Frankie snorts imperceptibly into his rice bowl, and I catch Vincent throwing him a murderous look.

  Auntie Bee fills his plate, and Uncle Chong talks. “I was having a drink with Osman after closing the shop,” he tells us between bites. “We were near Osman’s house, up by Jalan Gurney. Suddenly, we heard a huge roaring, a huge commotion, coming from Princess Road. Then we saw a young Malay fellow run past. Aiyo, the fear all over his face! I could feel it, even from where I was sitting. Then Ahmad from across the street yelled at us. ‘They are rioting on Princess Road!’ he said, ‘Go home!’ Osman and I said our good-byes—he bolted back to his house and I ran for the car and drove like a maniac. Didn’t stop until I reached our gates.”

  He pauses to gulp down some water. “On my drive, I saw columns of smoke rising from different neighborhoods—Dato Keramat, Chow Kit. The city is burning, and who knows when it will stop?”

  There is silence at the table. Vince is poking at his food with his chopsticks, deep in thought; Frankie is chewing furiously, his brows furrowed. Auntie Bee’s eyes are closed, one hand over her mouth as though to keep her thoughts from spilling out. When she finally speaks, it’s in a whisper.

  “Why is this happening?” she says.

  Uncle Chong sighs. “Hard to say, ah Bee,” he replies. “You know lah, the government will say it’s the Communists at work. Who knows? They could be right. But I think the truth is that this has been brewing for a long time, ever since we were working to gain our independence in fifty-seven. The Malays resent the Chinese for taking over the urban areas, getting rich while so many of them remain poor in the kampongs. . . .”

  “As if that is our fault.” Frankie sniffs. “Who asked them to be so lazy?”

  Uncle Chong goes on as if he hasn’t even spoken. “The government was divided even then. Some shouting about preserving ketuanan Melayu—Malay supremacy. Some trying to push for a Malaysian Malaysia, not just a Malay one. Some insisting the Chinese need to protect our own interests. And the Indians are left to gather whatever scraps they can. How do you expect unity to grow from seeds of self-interest? Look at those riots in Penang last year. . . .”

  The Djinn’s ears perk up at this, and he begins to pound gleefully on my heart, each thud echoing loudly in my ears. The riots in Penang, he says. Don’t those sound familiar? I hate that he speaks. I hate that he reminds me. I don’t need reminding. The hartal riots were how Abah died. And now Mama will die the same way, the Djinn crows. Isn’t that sweet?

  I can feel my cheeks burning. I zero in on my food bowl and begin to count all the grains of rice I can see, but only the perfectly white ones, untouched by even the merest hint of sauce or gravy. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven . . . Around me, the conversation continues.

  “But why, though?” Vince says, his voice rising. “Why now? When did it get so bad? My friends and I, we’re all different races, nobody says, Oh, you’re Chinese, we can’t be friends, or Oh, you’re Malay, guess you’re on your own, then. That’s stupid.”

  “Some Malays—not all of you, my dear,” he says reassuringly as he glances at me, “some Malays think the government has been giving the Chinese too much face.”

  “What does that mean?” Vince asks, frowning.

  “It means they feel that they welcomed us into the country and in return we take from them—jobs, land, money—and the government doesn’t do anything to stop it.”

  “But that’s stupid,” Frankie interjects. “This isn’t Tanah Melayu anymore. This is Malaysia. When they declared independence from the British twelve years ago, it wasn’t just the hard work of the Malays that did it, it was everyone—Malays, Chinese, Indians, everyone.”

  I’m too busy counting rice grains to focus properly on what he’s saying, but somewhere in the dim recesses of my head where the Djinn doesn’t lurk, I remember my history teacher Puan Aminah pointing out the obvious Hindu influences in the ruling kingdoms of ancient Kedah, the marriage of the sultan of Malacca to the Chinese princess Hang Li Po. “Do not ever let anyone tell you that you do not belong here,” she had said, looking at us intently. “We all do. There is space for us all.” Saf had leaned against me then—history always made her sleepy—and I remember so clearly the smell of her hair and the way it brushed against my face that I almost burst out in sobs right then and there.

 
; Instead, I tap furiously against my knees, willing the tears away. I wonder if those men in the cinema, or the ones shouting Allahu akbar in the streets, were ever taught the same lessons.

  Uncle Chong leans back in his seat, taking off his glasses and running his hand over his eyes. “You are right, son,” he says slowly. “But when you are fighting for your rice bowl, you don’t think about how many hands were needed to grow the grain. You only think about who’s out to steal your portion. Do you see?”

  The room is silent while everyone else contemplates Uncle Chong’s words and I contemplate my own ever-moving fingers, intent on not losing count.

  “I think I prefer the Communists,” Auntie Bee says suddenly, and we all look at her. She shrugs. “What? Better an outside force we can unite against rather than the bickering that divides us from within.”

  • • •

  We have barely finished the dinner we pretend to enjoy so as not to hurt Auntie Bee’s feelings when it begins. From outside come the sounds of bangs, crashes, yells. Auntie Bee’s face is pale. “Frankie, go and make sure the door is locked,” Uncle Chong says, his face grim. “The gate, no need. Don’t go outside. Vincent, you check the windows. Make sure everything is secure.”

  When they return, the five of us huddle around the large transistor radio in the living room, and through the crackle of incessant static we hear the words “emergency” and “twenty-four-hour curfew.”

  “What does that mean, Ba?” Vincent asks his father, who is pacing up and down the room, lost in thought.

  “Hmm? It means we can’t go out. We can’t leave the house.” Uncle Chong rubs his forehead, sighing.

  “I . . . I can’t go home?” I blurt out. My palms are damp with sweat; I wipe them off discreetly on my borrowed skirt, tapping as I go. I knew we were in the middle of something big, but for some reason I’d never equated that with not being able to go home. The idea of being away from Mama for so long makes me light-headed and clammy. The Djinn, sensing a weak spot, works out a particularly gory death scene. Count, Melati, he whispers, and I don’t have the strength to fight him.

  “We’ll have to ration the food,” Uncle Chong is saying. “Make sure nothing goes to waste.”

  Auntie Bee leaps to her feet. “I’ll check what stocks we have in the pantry,” she says, already making her way to the kitchen. Uncle Chong nods and walks out of the room. Approximately 608 counts of three later, he reappears, his arms laden with sticks, lengths of pipe, an assortment of tools. A heavy wrench slips from his grasp and falls to the ground with a loud clang.

  “Just keep these close,” he says, meeting our questioning gazes levelly. “Keep them close. You never know when you might need them.”

  He hands them out. Frankie claims a thick length of heavy iron pipe for himself, swinging it about to test its weight, and I wonder if he can hear the imaginary cracking of a thousand Malay skulls. Vincent takes a long stick and grasps it with both hands, his head bowed. Auntie Bee takes the wrench and prods me to choose a weapon; I grab a hammer and imagine what it would feel like to bash someone’s brains out with it. Then I think about Saf, and how she was left—How you left her, the Djinn whispers—alone and defenseless, and I think I may throw up. Count the floorboards; it will make you feel better, he tells me, and I hate how readily I agree.

  Uncle Chong sighs. “At least we’re ready for anything,” he says.

  Then, from outside, we hear it. “Please! Please! Help us!” The desperate cries are punctuated with frantic pounding on the door, and we all immediately draw our weapons close. “Tolong, help, please! Open the door! Tolong!” The woman’s cries are piercing and tinged with hysteria; in the next moment, a baby begins to bawl.

  Before anyone can stop her—“Wait, Ma, it might be a trick!” Frankie hisses, to no avail—Auntie Bee strides across the room and flings the door open. A slight young woman with a hunted look in her dark eyes trips over the threshold in her eagerness to get inside and crumples on the floor. In her arms, the squirming bundle continues to bawl—a tiny little baby.

  “Shhh, shhh.” Auntie Bee strokes the young woman’s back soothingly, but she can’t speak and she won’t let go of the child. For long minutes, the room is filled with the sound of her sobs and the child’s wails, and all of us just stand and stare, uncertain of what to do next.

  When she’s finally calmed down, we learn that her name is Ann, and that she took the baby and ran for her life after their home was engulfed in smoke and fire.

  “Nothing left,” she says quietly, rocking the now sleeping child in her arms. “All gone. Nothing left.”

  • • •

  When we’re all awake, it’s easy to pretend we can’t hear what’s happening outside. But in the silence of the night, I lie awake, listening and absorbing every crash, every shout, and later, every gunshot.

  The Djinn thrives in the chaos, wrapping his arms around me and whispering his poisonous thoughts in my ears gleefully. My mind races, cycling through scene after scene with every sound: Saf’s lifeless body slumped in the seats of the Rex; Mama, doused in flames and screaming in agony; Frankie, a bloodied knife in his hands and a crazed grin on his face. I cower under the sheets on Vincent’s bed, clutching my hammer and counting every single book on the shelves that line the opposite wall, then again by color, then alphabetically by title, then by author.

  When that doesn’t work, I slip out of bed and methodically begin to arrange them. In the back of my mind, deep in the recesses, where the Djinn can’t seem to reach, I know this is irrational, stupid, crazy. I know just thinking about death won’t cause my mother to die. I know that books on a shelf won’t stop her from dying, no matter how I arrange them. But every time I try to stop myself, a cold, creeping dread envelops my entire body. Are you sure? What if it’s true? What if the moment you stop is the moment Mama dies? How can you be sure? And I turn back to the safety of the numbers, fearful and shaken.

  Eventually, I fall asleep on the floor in front of the bookshelves, curled up with a copy of The Old Man and the Sea (H for Hemingway, first name Ernest, so it belongs on the fifth row, right between Hawthorne, Nathaniel, and Hesse, Hermann; I also take comfort in the fact that the title has six words, the first name has six letters, the last nine. The Djinn grins, baring his sharp teeth: three times lucky).

  When I wake up, it’s so early that the sun hasn’t yet risen. My throat feels like sandpaper, and I’m desperate for a drink, so I open the door . . . and nearly trip over the body lying in front of it.

  All over Auntie Bee’s living room, packed from wall to wall and in every available inch of space, are people: men, women, children, Malay, Chinese, Indian. The chairs and tables are stacked in one corner of the room and piled high with a motley array of bags and baskets. Auntie Bee picks her way through the bits and bobs and bodies as best she can, holding a tray laden with goodies and handing out a drink here, a biscuit there, and a comforting pat or word to all. She sees me in the open doorway and makes her way over to me.

  “Here you are, girl,” she says, handing me a cup of steaming tea from the tray. “Drink, drink. It’s good for you.”

  I take the cup and sip obediently. “Who are all these people, Auntie Bee?” I whisper.

  There is a pause. “These are our neighbors,” she says. “They had nowhere else to go. The people came with knives and gasoline and fire. Wooden houses, they burn so fast—it spread everywhere.” I look at her in the dim early morning light and realize her face is wet with tears. “They burned them,” she says, sighing. “They burned them, and now our friends have no homes.”

  I nod. I don’t ask who “they” is. I’m not sure I want to know. Instead, I count the bodies in the room, three at a time, sipping my drink. The hot, hot tea burns my tongue and scalds my throat.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “HERE YOU GO.”

  Vincent passes me a bowl filled with porridge so thin you can count the number of rice grains that went into it. With so many mouths to feed, and a tw
enty-four-hour curfew preventing us from making our way out for more supplies, Auntie Bee is trying her best to make do with what she has. As I force down mouthful after mouthful, the Djinn tickles my stomach with his sharp little claws and Mama withers away from hunger, trapped and alone. Chew three times, swallow, chew three times, swallow. Chew three times, swallow. After every third spoonful, I pause for a sip of water. Again and again, I sip, chew, swallow, until it’s gone—the porridge, and the image of my mother’s wasted body.

  The rioting seems to have died down this morning, though when Frankie sticks his head out the window to see what’s happening, there are immediate yells from the police officers patrolling the streets. “Get back inside now,” a voice bellows, “or I’ll blow your head off.” Auntie Bee tugs at Frankie frantically—“Aiya, come inside now, come inside! Faster!”

  Once he does, we quickly bolt the window. “The man was pointing a gun right at me,” he says, his eyes wide with a mixture of fear and excitement. “Right at my head, here, see?” He points to a spot in the center of his forehead.

  Auntie Bee shakes her head, her hand on her heart. “Don’t ever do that again,” she scolds. “Asking for trouble. If they don’t blow your head off, I’ll smack it so hard you’ll wish they had.”

  • • •

  Uncle Chong spends his time in front of reams of paper spread across the dining room table, the radio always on beside him, making lists, weighing options, sketching plans. The radio, which is kept on so we can hear the latest news, plays a constant stream of patriotic songs, as though admonishing us for not being better citizens. “We could go seek protection in another kampong,” he muses. “Maybe here, or here.” He jabs at a map laid out before him, scribbling on a notepad. “You two must be ready,” he tells his sons, who stand close by, their eyes scanning the map eagerly. “We need to plan an escape route. If the mob comes, we must be ready to leave quickly and quietly.” They make plans for a tunnel to be dug in the garden, behind the flowering jasmine shrubs, under the wall and out to the road and beyond. “That would work.” Vincent nods, pushing back his chair to stand. “I’ll go and get the shovels; I think Ma put them in the garden somewhere. . . .”