In the Shadow of the Banyan (14 page)

His unworried manner further quelled my apprehension, and I found myself staring at the baby. The wife smiled and parted the
kroma
to reveal more of the tiny infant. She nodded at me as if to say I could come closer and touch it, but I stayed where I was. It looked too small, too precious for hands as dirty as mine. My eyes went to the tiny earlobe. No earring there. I guessed it was a boy. He was deep in sleep, his hands wrapped in thin white cotton mittens that resembled tiny boxing gloves. When he felt the air brushing against his skin, his arms jerked in reflex, a boxer taking punches at the air.

“And now you’re a civil engineer.” Papa turned to Mr. Virak, beaming proudly. “Working for a foreign firm, you said.”

“
Was,
Your Highness.” Mr. Virak sighed. “I was working in Malaysia, but I came back at the beginning of the year. Now, I’m . . . well . . .”

Just then the new arrivals began heading in our direction. Among them was the old man who had thrown himself to the ground weeping, and as he shuffled past, moving along with the throng toward the school buildings, I noticed a bamboo flute tucked in the
kroma
around his waist. When he caught sight of the stupa and the surrounding
cheddays,
he let out another despairing sob.

“Poor man,” Mr. Virak said, shaking his head. “His wife suffered an
asthma attack and died on the journey. We had to leave her on the side of the road. Imagine you’re a funerary musician and you’ve played your music at all these funerals, but when your own wife died, you couldn’t bury her, couldn’t even play a single note to mourn her death. It is a nightmare, Your Highness. A nightmare. I feel as though we are journeying through
thaanaruak
—an underworld.”

Papa looked at me, and turning back to Mr. Virak, said, “Well, you are here now. This is a sanctuary.”

Mr. Virak looked around. He seemed skeptical. I could see why. It wasn’t the same place now with the soldiers everywhere shouting, the camions churning up dust and debris, people milling about in a confused mob, uncertain where to go except to follow those in front of them.

As another throng pushed past us, Papa suggested we ought to hurry. With so many families, the classrooms would fill up quickly. He told Mr. Virak and his wife about the room adjoining ours, which was a bit small, but they ought to take it, as they would have more privacy than they would sharing a bigger room with another family. He then took the two valises from Mr. Virak, who stammered in protest: “Your Highness, I cannot let you . . .” Papa told him, “You are among friends now. There is no need for formality or status. Here we are the same. Address me as you would a friend.” Mr. Virak’s eyes flashed with understanding. “Yes, of course, of course.”

We headed toward the school buildings. I rushed ahead to alert the rest of our family, thrilled now to have the couple and their baby joining us, comforted by the sheer number of people, a larger presence around me. Soon it would be just like home, I thought happily. This place would be filled with people we knew, with friends and family. More would join us, the soldier had said. Hope flitted through my heart.

•  •  •

We moved our pots and pans and whatever else we’d scattered on the floor and gave our friends the small adjoining room. It took them no time at all to settle in as they had only the two valises, one full of clothes, and the other food. In the fright of being ordered to leave at gunpoint, Mr. Virak explained, they had neglected to pack any kitchenware. “Not
even a spoon,” his young wife admitted, shaking her head, blushing with embarrassment. Not to worry, everyone assured them. They could use ours. “Do join us for some porridge!” Auntie India sang. “It’s ready!”

It was almost noon, but with all that was happening, we had yet to eat our morning meal. Radana and the twins were delirious with hunger. They banged their spoons and bowls, making a head-splitting ruckus as they waited to be fed. Auntie India, with characteristic cheerfulness, spooned some porridge into a large bowl and led the three to the doorway, where she sat down to feed them, giving each a turn from the same spoon and bowl.
A mother bird feeding her chicks,
I thought. The three chirped and clucked, swallowing the porridge with insatiable relish.

The rest of us gathered in a circle on the eating mat like one big family. Mr. Virak’s wife had brought out a container of sweetened ground pork and a can of pickled turnip to add to our usual but dwindling portion of dried fish. Everyone joked at how the meager spread looked like a feast, how everything seemed to taste so good. Maybe it was because of the fresh country air, Papa pointed out. Yes, Big Uncle agreed, maybe it wasn’t a bad thing after all to be brought here. “Maybe they’re right, city life was corrupting our appetites—our taste buds!”

At the mention of “city,” everyone turned serious, and soon we were all listening quietly to Mr. Virak’s descriptions of Phnom Penh and the ordeal that had carried them here.

Like us, on New Year’s Day, he and his wife were told to leave their home, but as it was already evening, they decided to wait. The next day when they opened their gate they found a flood of humanity as impassable as the Mekong during a thunderstorm. Again, they thought it wise to stay put and wait it out. They would wait and see what happened in the next few days, if the seething mass would let up, and maybe then they wouldn’t have to leave at all. They locked the doors, pretending they weren’t home, hiding most of the time in a small storage closet under the stairway of their house, holding their breath whenever a Revolutionary soldier banged on their gate, fearful the cry of their two-month-old infant would be heard through the layers of doors. Meanwhile, without their realizing it, the world outside their home plunged into darkness,
and by the time they emerged—forced out at gunpoint by a soldier who had blasted open their padlock with a single shot from his pistol—it was not the same place they had known. Destruction was all around them—buildings reduced to rubble, vehicles abandoned and burnt, corpses of people and animals alike rotting in the heat, an overwhelming stench everywhere.

“Phnom Penh is no longer,” Mr. Virak murmured quietly, stirring the porridge in his bowl. “We can never go back. Never. It’s the end.” He kept stirring, unable to take his first bite, the porridge starting to congeal. Then he looked up and added, hesitantly, “When . . . when they drove us through the city, one of the Revolutionary soldiers—their commander, I believe—pointed in the direction of the Cercle Sportif and said they’d executed the prime minister and other important leaders.
Traitors,
the commander called them.
We’ve no need for such men in the new regime.
Those were his exact words. You must be careful.”

Papa and Big Uncle exchanged looks but said nothing. A deathly silence settled upon the room. Mama nodded at me, and I realized I’d been holding my spoon in my mouth, riveted by the whole account. I had listened to Mr. Virak’s every word, hoping for glimpses of a familiar street or corner of the city—for home. Instead he’d painted a picture of an unrecognizable place, an “underworld” where gods and
tevodas
were not revered but captured and shot like caged animals.

Mr. Virak continued, “In a matter of a few weeks, they’ve done what they said they would—take us all the way back to nothing. It’s clear that not just Phnom Penh, but the whole country is being rearranged. It seems those living in provincial cities and towns are now being evacuated also, under stricter and harsher rules. People can’t choose which way to go—if they’re directed to go south, they go south, even if their hometown is to the north. In countless instances, we’ve seen family members being separated, some pushed in one direction and some in another. It’s an elaborate evacuation scheme, and it’s only starting. I sense they’ll keep moving us around—”

“But why?” Tata interrupted impatiently. “What good would that do?”

“It’s how they will hold on to power,” Mr. Virak said.

“Yes,” Big Uncle echoed, nodding, as if seeing it all clearly, “they keep us fearful and helpless by destroying our most basic sense of security—separating us from family and preventing any connections from being formed. All the more reason to stick together.”

We finished eating. The air felt heavy, bloated with foreboding. The grown-ups neither looked at one another nor said anything now, but moved about in their separate spheres of silence as they cleared away the dishes, rolled up the mat, and swept the floor. Mr. Virak and his wife excused themselves and went to their room. They shut the slatted door and walked about the tight space with hushed steps as they set up their home.

Through our doorway, I could see that some of the new arrivals had found themselves without a place and were heading, their belongings in tow, toward the monks’ sleeping quarters. There, they would see what we’d seen, and they would turn around, unwilling yet to live among the ghosts.

Pulling himself up, Papa murmured something about a walk and asked if Big Uncle wanted to join him. Big Uncle responded with a solemn nod. They needed to talk. I knew better than to tag along. Outside they told Mama and Auntie India—who were busy washing the dishes—they’d be back shortly. “Just need to clear our minds a bit and work things out,” Papa explained, and Big Uncle added, “Think of our next steps.” The women murmured their consent, and once the two men were gone, Auntie India ventured cautiously, her voice lacking its usual singsong melody, “Do you think it’s true . . . about the prime minister?”

“It doesn’t help to imagine what we don’t really know.” Mama tried to maintain her calm, but I could tell she was getting tired of explaining, taking care of everyone’s feelings. “We just have to do what we can
not
to stand out.” She scoured the rice pot vigorously with a piece of coconut rind. Then, noticing Auntie India’s lacquered nails, she looked up and said, “You should really remove the polish.”

Auntie India seemed confused. “Pardon me?”

“The nail polish,” Mama told her.

“Oh, yes, I know it looks awful—all chipped.” She sounded distressed. “Makes my hands look like a market vendor’s. But I forgot the
remover, and the bottle I’ve found in my purse is the wrong color, and of course I can’t—”

“Use a knife,” Mama said. “Scrape it off.”

Auntie India frowned but dared not contradict Mama. We had to rely on her judgment when it came to conducting ourselves as ordinary people, as commoners. Auntie India knew this. Still, Mama had to explain. “It makes you look like a city person.”

“Oh, I see.” Auntie India nodded. She let out a sigh. Then, changing the subject, she said, “We’re almost out of rice. We may have to cut our meals. But the children and Mother—they’re always hungry.”

“They’ll eat when they’re hungry,” Mama told her forcefully. “Even if the rest of us have nothing.” She rinsed the rice pot, put it aside, and looking at Auntie India, added, more gently, “We’ll take some things to trade this afternoon.” She attempted a smile.

Auntie India looked somewhat reassured.

I felt a hand on my shoulder. “Come here,” Tata beckoned, drawing me away from the door. “Help me set up a place for Grandmother Queen to rest.” She handed me a straw mat to unroll. Then she started to mumble, “The problem with being seven—I remember myself at that age—is that you’re aware of so much, and yet you understand so little. So you imagine the worst.”

She was right. I didn’t understand. There was so much to piece together. So I asked her what I sensed was most immediate: “Do you think we’ll starve, Tata?”

She didn’t answer right away. Finally she said, “No, Raami. No, we’re not going to starve.” She turned away, clearly upset.

I swallowed. I didn’t know what troubled me more—the possibility that we might not have enough to eat, or the realization that Tata had just lied to me.

The problem with being seven
. . .

I wondered at what age one understands everything.

nine

S
everal days later, at dusk, a group of solemn-looking men and women began to arrive at the temple. Like the Revolutionary soldiers, they were dressed in black from head to toe and walked with such furtive steps it seemed they appeared out of nowhere and were suddenly in our midst. They floated toward the school buildings, a black bat-like mass stirring the air with disquiet. Something about the way they moved, drifting like one giant shadow, made me think I’d seen them before. Then I realized indeed I had—days earlier when we were bathing at the pond, the black figures pacing the distant fields. They’d watched us surreptitiously from afar while pretending to survey the crop. The old sweeper had warned us of this. Now they’d come for a close-up, bearing baskets of rice and dangling chunks of cane sugar in bamboo nets as if to entice us like ants out of our holes.

“Strange-looking peasants,” Tata murmured, watching from our doorway. “Wonder who they really are . . .”

They introduced themselves as the Kamaphibal, as if to distinguish themselves in our eyes from the Revolutionary soldiers. They spoke Khmer using village vernacular, sounding like rice farmers even though they looked like they could be teachers or doctors. One was even wearing glasses.
How are you, Comrade?
they inquired, moving from door to door, family to family, passing out the food they’d brought, startling everyone with their way of talking, the words they used, as if they didn’t know
adults from children, elders from infants. They invited everyone to meet outside. The man with the glasses stood over the charcoal outline of the hopscotch board. As he prepared to speak, the others stood back, opening the way for him with a resounding clap.