When Broken Glass Floats_ Growing Up Under the Khmer Rouge - Chanrithy Him [83]
I want to go to see Mak, too. I want to explain to her myself why I couldn’t come to take care of her, but only Chea and Map can go, given rare permission. The rest of us must attend the meeting.
The meeting takes place on a patch of open ground surrounded by tall shade trees. Among the clusters of people, I see a “new person,” a man in his late fifties, squatting on the ground beside the Khmer Rouge. His face, eyes, and complexion suggest he is of Chinese descent. He wears an old faded shirt and pants, muddy brown like our clothes. He looks relaxed, as if he’s somehow connected with these Khmer Rouge leaders. The Khmer Rouge point to him as a model worker. He speaks to us shyly. His candor coaxes smiles from us. This is the first time since the Khmer Rouge’s takeover that I hear and see people around me laughing and at ease. But the smiling faces fade as soon as the Khmer Rouge leaders get up to speak, lecturing us about rice production, the people in the “battlefield,” and Angka’s goals.
The meeting ends. The leaders quickly dismiss us, but we can’t go home yet. We must go to more meetings, one for children and the other for adults.
Suddenly I hear a soft voice behind me. “Bang! Bang!” I turn. From the deepest shadows beneath the shade trees, the silhouette of a little girl scurries toward me. I pause, lines creasing my forehead—I’m sure she’s calling me because there’s no one else around except trees.
The girl looks up at me. “They—they threw your mom in a well…a well of the deads,” she struggles to catch her breath, panting the news. “Your mom was still alive…. She groaned when they took her away.”
My heart thunders, rising against my chest. I think I hear what she has said, but nothing registers. It is as if something has lodged between my ears and my brain. I stare back. “What did you say about my mom? What happened to my mom?”
“The Khmer Rouge threw your mom in a well…and she was alive,” sputters the girl, her sharp eyes looking into mine.
Her words sink in. No! The core of my soul screams out from a deep hidden place. My legs carry me away before my brain can command them. Across a dusty path, toward a distant woods, I run as fast as I can, the fingers of anguish squeezing my soul, pumping out pain.
“Mak, oh, Mak.” I drop on the ground, landing by a bush underneath the shade of trees. “I’m sorry, Mak. Sorry I couldn’t help you.…”
Alone in the woods, I call out to my mother, my mind summoning up the last images of her sitting on the bed talking to Map, to me, begging, reminding me to remember to return to her. In frustration, my fist strikes against the ground as Mak’s words replay in my mind, stabbing inside my chest with each syllable. My head hurts, swollen with sadness. My heart aches. “Oh, Mak, you’ve left me…. Koon somtoh [I’m sorry]….”
The pain of losing Mak comes fiercely, without respite. It lingers inside me, lodged like a root. How much will I cry when Mak dies?
Now I know the answer.
10
The Spirit of Survival
The sun penetrates through the cracks of my shack. Alone, I curl up, covered by a scarf; my eyes fix upon the fine particles of dust that drift through the morning light. Most of the day, I lie here, staring into the dark until I tire. The next day the sun rises, and my eyes return to the twirling dust, again awaiting the blanket of night. I think, but I’m not sure what I’m thinking. I don’t remember how I arrived here—a labor camp, I don’t even know its name. I vaguely remember what happened to Mak, but the wound of her death is fresh.
Nights and days pass. I wonder what happened to my siblings. Who brought me here? I am weak, yet I don’t feel like eating. Outside the shack I hear voices. The words, the commands never reach me. A woman in black sticks her head inside the shack. She softly says, “Comrade, go to work.” I glance at her, then away.
A voice within me speaks up: Something is wrong. You must eat. Finally it awakens me, and I obey.
When the sun is blindingly bright, I rise. Out of the shack I walk with my spoon and plate in my hand. I wobble, trying not to fall.