February 1948
The sky threatens to drown them. The Brantas River roars with the deluge of rain, ready to suck felled trees and debris down its length and toss it all up on the boulders downstream, threatening to sweep away the village and the post. It thunders on the tin roof of the barracks while Sam sits inside, sweat dripping under his arms and gathering at the waistband of his shorts, the humidity stuck to his skin and crushing his lungs.
He finishes writing in the notebook and lies back, arm over his eyes. He doesn’t write to Petra anymore. What would he tell her? That he’s starting to believe in witch doctors and spirits. That he has a homosexual friend who treats Sam as though he hasn’t been an asshole, making him feel even smaller than before. That he can’t tell friend from enemy, the lines so blurred they shade the space between right and wrong.
Sari only wanted to help her father in the clinic. He understands that. But he wonders what more she is doing, who else she is helping with her beautiful brown eyes and her gift for healing. He knows the power of such people. Like his sisters, or Father Pete. Even Rudy. Do these people choose to do good? Or are they somehow chosen? He sighs and pulls on his flask. He’s drinking too much. He should talk to Father Keenan, but knows he won’t.
On a rainy Saturday, Andre and Darma corner him, sitting on either side of him on his bunk.
“There’s a woman that opened a pub in town last week. We’re taking you for a drink.” Andre is excited at the prospect of this new thing. When Sam protests, they simply heave him onto his feet and push him out the door. “Oh come on, Sam. Whatever it is, let it go. A few beers won’t hurt you.”
They run through the rain, sliding into the muddy village and ducking through the door of a low building. On the outside it’s like many village buildings — three-quarter bamboo walls, red tile roof, a wood floor — but inside it’s filled with round tables, a bar at one end and a small dance floor at the other. A radio plays a loud and crackling “Lili Marleen.” Darma and Andre lead Sam to sit at the bar, Welcome to the jungle carved into the wall behind. They order double whiskies.
“Well, you’re starting hard.” The accent is unmistakably Limburgish. A blue-eyed woman surveys them from behind the bar, crashes three more shots down and motions for them to drink up. Sam slugs one back, sputters, eyes watering. She smirks and sets a beer in front of each of them. “That’ll hold you a while.”
A short woman, she is thick and strong, breasts almost bursting the buttons on her shirt, dark stains under her arms. She wears a skirt, and sandals with a heel, the men watching as she struts away to bang a tray full of beer onto a table, leaning in to whisper something to four attentive soldiers who burst into laughter around her as she walks back. She seems too old for this.
Sitting down beside Sam, she sighs and lights up a fat kretek, the cloves within crackling as their smell combines with tobacco to waft over him. He quickly reaches for his own pack.
“Not that shit,” she says, pushing her kretek between his lips and lighting another for herself. He inhales deeply, the dark taste steaming through his mouth and into his lungs, his delighted sigh blowing the fragrant smoke into the air. It is pure, unfiltered joy. He takes a swig of beer and feels himself let go of the tension in his shoulders and the clenching in his gut even as he tries to hang on to his vigilance. He’s so tired. He only needs a little rest, this chance to relax before taking up his gun again, his duty.
“There you go,” she says, as if knowing his thoughts. She puts a hand on his knee and Andre gives him a sidelong glance before wandering off to sit with Darma.
Sam leans away from her, but doesn’t want to seem rude. “What’s your name?” he asks.
“Cora. And don’t worry, I’m not after anything. You just seem like a nice young man is all.” She leans back a little, takes him in with a calculating eye. “And handsome too.”
He blushes. He likes this woman, Cora, her large voice and attitude, wonders if she’s hiding something behind it all.
“Why are you here?” he asks suddenly.
“Jesus, you get right to the point, don’t you?” The whiskey is warm in his belly and he’s happy to wait. She gazes at him through the smoke spiraling around them. “I grew up here. Well, not here, but in Malang. My father came to make his fortune with the VOC.”
“What did he do?”
“Trader. He was away most of the time, sailing the Indian Ocean, looking for markets.” She looks up. “Damn. Right back.” She slips behind the bar and pours liquids from various bottles into an array of glasses, then hustles the drinks over to where Appeldoorn sits with Raj and a few others at a side table. Bart pats her ass and she cuffs his ear.
“Where was I?” she says, breathless as she slides onto the stool beside him again. “Oh yes, lovely childhood and all that. Nannies and houseboys, gardeners and cooks. I was a spoiled little bitch.” She laughs when he cringes. “But somebody decided they could handle it, and married me. A company man just like my father, only Franz was into oil. It was the next big thing, and he made a fortune. Until the government blew up the refineries to keep them out of the hands of the Japs.” She pauses. “He killed himself.”
“Shit, I’m sorry.”
“Yes, well, don’t be.” She grabs a rag to wipe the bar, then folds her hands in front of her. “They were coming for him, for both of us. He knew he’d end up dead in one of their camps so he decided to beat them to it. He was a weak man.” Her voice is sharp. “Left me to face them alone.”
The whiskey turns sour in his belly.
“But he didn’t know I’d been fucking the gardener while he was away. Oh don’t look so shocked. My husband had other women. In Singapore, Malacca, Siam.”
“Why do you talk like that?” Sam asks, his words slurring out of the whiskey fog building in his head.
“Don’t be such a child,” she says, but her voice softens a little when he blushes. “The gardener saved me from the Kempeitai, forged documents for me. His mother took me in when she found out I was pregnant with her grandchild. And so I lived in the village. And now I have this place.”
“What’s his name? The gardener.”
“What is it with you and names? Hasan. His name is Hasan.” Her hard edge evaporates an instant. “I haven’t seen him for two years.”
“Jesus, he’s not with them?” Sam pulls away from her.
“I don’t know.” She sucks on her cigarette and blows smoke rings into the air as though it’s not a critical question, as though loyalties don’t matter.
“But you’re Dutch . . . ?”
She cuts him off with a wave of her hand, stands up and goes behind the bar to pour a whiskey and open a beer. “I’ve lived here my whole life. I know this place and these people. My kids are Javanese, and the Dutch want to keep them in chains. You don’t know who I am.” Before Sam can register her words, Andre and Darma are by his side and her face masks over. “Well if it isn’t the other two musketeers.”
The three get very drunk.
The music slows. Native women materialize. Some hold up soldiers who sway with their arms wrapped round the girls’ waists, happy for any kind of contact. Everyone pretends they see nothing, know nothing of wives and girlfriends at home, a collective understanding that this place is not home and so the rules of home do not apply. One of the women is older than the rest and she sits on the lap of a young recruit who blushes at the erection she encourages with her slow movements. In the light of the kerosene lamp, her expression is far away from this place and unaware of the increasing frenzy of the young soldier under her as he struggles to stave off the inevitable, not wanting to embarrass himself in front of his peers. She doesn’t care, is here for the money he will leave, anticipating that her success with him will encourage others to pay for her experience.
Darma stumbles to the edge of the small dance floor and sways alone, clutching a beer in front of him, smiling softly and eyes closed. His head tilts a little as though he hears something in the music meant only for him, oblivious to the noisy bar and drunken men around him.
“He’s a poof, that one.”
“Right bit of faggot,” someone jeers.
“Get him out of here.”
“Leave him alone,” Sam says. The words hang in the silence a minute before descending like an accusation.
“You should all get out of here,” Cora says, flicking the sound system off. “I’m closing up, boys.”
The men protest, but she ushers them out anyway, leaving Sam, Andre and Darma until last. Darma is so drunk he can barely stand. “Does that boy have a death wish?” Cora shakes her head. “You gotta tell him to be more careful.”
Andre gives Sam a sharp look through narrowed eyes. They prop Darma between them and stagger back to barracks, dumping him in his bunk and heading back outside for a piss.
“What the hell was that?” Andre asks. “Is he a homo?”
“Does it matter?”
“Well, Christ yeah, it matters.”
Sam stands pissing and swaying, thoughts muddled in alcohol. Why does Darma make the other men so angry? Why anger, as though Darma has betrayed them, as though he owes them his manhood. Sam gazes into the night, picturing Marcel’s bruised face.
“You told me we have each other’s backs, no matter what,” he says into the night. They all have secrets now. “You’ve got your own shit to hide. Just let it go.”
Andre nods, but looks skeptical as he heads to his bunk. He doesn’t kneel or pull out his beads tonight. Sam hopes it’s because his friend is too drunk, but he wonders if they are all fading away from themselves, losing connections to things they once thought important, unsure if any of it means anything anymore.
The rain is loud but it keeps the rebels quiet. Finally, the heavy clouds thin, blue breaking through to rope across the sky, the sun casting light back over the past dark days to lift Sam’s spirits. He wants to get away from the post and the village, and he wants to do something to show Darma that Sam is not like the others, that he can be generous like Marcel. The unit gets a day leave and Sam hits on an idea; he will take Darma fishing. By the time it is arranged, Andre and Bonita and Taufik are included as well.
“If I had a day off, I’d go to Malang and get laid.” Young Willem looks up from his book, glasses hanging on the tip of his nose.
“Right,” Sam laughs.
Andre throws a blanket in the back of the jeep, raising his eyebrows suggestively. Sam grins, fills a flask with whiskey and a jug with water and they drive into Ngadipuro, a flock of children running to catch them, envious of Taufik beaming in the back seat. One more stop for Bonita. Sari is with her. Bonita gives Sam a mischievous smile and he mumbles hello as she swings an overflowing basket into the jeep and climbs in the back with Andre and Taufik, Darma riding shotgun with Sari snugged between.
They head further east into relatively safe Dutch-held territory, their Stens resting in the far back. In the mirror, Sam watches Taufik absently stroke the barrel of one weapon, eyes flicking back and forth as the jungle races past, opening suddenly into sun-warmed fields. Villagers take advantage of the break in the weather to descend the trails from their homes and check on rice paddies that will soon be harvested. Others pick tea leaves. He catches Taufik’s eyes and they grin at one another as he settles behind the wheel to enjoy the feel of the wind in his face.
“It’s a fine day for fishing.” He sneaks a glance at Sari, blushing when she smiles up at him.
The rains have flushed the countryside clean, forcing flowers full, creating a vivid splash of yellow and red and orange and blue against the sparkling greens. The sun is intense, the breeze from the moving jeep unable to cut through the humidity. Sam drives off the main road onto a small trail that leads to a tributary, the water shimmering in the jungle heat. Unloading their picnic, they set up in the shade of a huge jambolan, its leafy foliage reaching thirty meters into the air, decaying orbs of its blood-colored fruit on the ground. Taufik takes off to the edge of the stream, stripping down to his shorts and hopscotching across the rocks and into the water to float lazily on his back. Sam joins him, and they are quickly splashing and dunking one another until Andre and Darma join them in a free-for-all. Bonita and Sari laugh from where they sit on a large rock and dangle their feet in the water.
“Must be fish.” Andre points downriver to where they can make out the silhouette of a man standing in the middle of the confluence of this stream and another, line flashing in the sun from the rod stretched tall in front of him, head bent to where his hands clasp the spool.
Taufik pokes Sam, handing over the two rods Sam made from bamboo and equipped with line he managed to buy in Ngadipuro. The leader is wound from trip wire, simple J-hooks made from surplus ends of the village’s perimeter fence. He attaches a pill bottle with a couple of rocks in it for a weighted bobber.
“Okay, let’s go,” Sam says to Taufik.
They stand on a rock where Sam casts his line and watches it flash across the water to land in the middle of the stream and float with the lazy current. The whole rig works remarkably well, and he feels an unusual contentment. He outfits the other rod for Taufik, shows the boy how to cast and sends him to a spot a few meters away to avoid their lines tangling. After a few minutes, Sam sits, the rock cool against his legs, the rod held lazily in one hand. He doesn’t really expect to catch anything, happy to jig and let his mind go.
He watches Andre and Bonita side by side on the blanket. Their lips move in quiet conversation and he feels a wave of envy, a sudden longing for that kind of intimacy. He doesn’t remember it in his own life, Anika the only one in the family able to show her feelings. It’s sad, he thinks now as he watches his fishing line tugged by the river current, to have lived his life so long without such expression.
His chest aches with wanting as he watches Sari. She sits on the riverbank, leaning against a tree, book forgotten in her lap as she stares into the distance. She suddenly looks at him and, on impulse, he beckons to her, surprised when she smiles and comes to sit on the rock, arranging her sarong, her thigh a hand-width from his. He isn’t sure what to say to her, hasn’t spoken with her since the night he helped with Amir. He’s imagined how he might explain why he ran from the clinic, imagined apologizing, but how to be sorry without giving the wrong impression of his loyalties. The silence is long.
“I’m glad you came,” he says finally. “I would have invited you but I wasn’t sure . . .”
“How are you?” she asks, a little breathless. Maybe she’s as nervous as he is.
“Fine,” he says. “And you?”
She nods.
“The clinic is busy.”
“Yes, it’s been so good for the village. The children.”
Good for Amir too, he thinks, and wonders again why he can’t control the mean thoughts in his head. He is desperate to ask her what it all meant. For her. For them. But he can’t. Not without asking her impossible questions about her father. Not without telling her the rebel at the clinic made him feel so weak and small the memory turns his thoughts to violence. Not without telling her that in the dark jungle nights he’s wondered if it would have been easier just to walk away and let the rebel make the choice about her life. And here she is so close. So beautiful. He watches his line and bobber as though, in this moment, catching a fish is the most important thing in the world. Butterflies whirl in his stomach.
“I’m happy for her,” Sari says, nodding to where Andre and Bonita sit. “There was a time I envied her light skin. When I was ashamed of my own, embarrassed by my father and the work he did for the Hegmans.”
Sam listens with his whole body. “But your father seems a proud man. And you . . . you are beautiful.” He feels his face redden.
She looks at him gratefully. “Perhaps, but we lived in servitude. To her family.”
“What?”
“Bonita is a Hegman, Sam. Indo. And when the Dutch were in control she had everything I wanted, the best toys when we were children, education in the best schools, freedom. We became friends in spite of our differences — good friends — and they treated us well, but I knew I’d never have the opportunities she did and that she’d leave me behind.”
He knows nothing, embarrassed again at his conceit that he might make a difference in this country.
“The Japanese came. And her light skin didn’t protect her anymore. They sent her parents with the romusha, worked them to death. And kept Bonita. It was unimaginable what they did to her.” Her voice breaks. “My mother found a way to get her off the plantation and hide her here in Ngadipuro.”
“Dear god.” Sam looks to where Bonita sits laughing quietly with Andre. “Does Andre know?”
“Does it matter? Look at her.”
Her words so tender he can’t stop himself turning to see the sadness in her eyes radiate through the fine features of her face, such compassion he can barely breathe. He swallows hard, looking to the river. The sun is high, bright jewels of light bouncing across rivulets of water.
“I’m not ashamed of my father anymore,” she says. “It was terrible what the Japanese did, but they let my father run the plantation, gave him independence even before Sukarno proclaimed it. He came alive then. Before the Dutch came back it felt like we all had a real future.”
The Dutch.
“I thought we were here to help, to secure a future for everyone in this country,” Sam says quietly. He remembers Amir in the shed, a man comfortable in his own skin, hoping only to be left alone to fix a Mixmaster for his wife and grow coffee for his livelihood. “But I don’t know what we’re doing.”
She sighs her agreement at his ignorance. “Sam, I need to thank you.”
“No.” He says it too quickly. “Please, don’t thank me. I’m still not sure I did the right thing.”
She’s quiet again.
“I know how that sounds, but it’s just . . .” Raj’s disappointment flashes through his head.
She nods. “None of us knows what’s right. But you did save my father.” She moves to cover his hand with hers on the rock between them, her small fingers pressing into the tops of his. “And me.”
He saved her from the rebel. He did. This beautiful, gentle girl. And suddenly, he can’t think of anything he’s happier to have done. He lifts his hand so their fingers twine. Eyes on the river, he moves his thumb across her palm, up the length of her fine index finger. She doesn’t move. Finally he turns to see her eyes are closed, the brown glow of her face lifted to the sun. His fingers touch the inside of her narrow wrist, feel the pulse there as her breath catches. His doubts evaporate. This is all he wants. Just this. Her hand in his, with the sun warm on their heads. He wonders if he might kiss her.
A splash from Taufik startles them both and they let their hands go. Taufik’s bobber has disappeared and his line is taut as he jumps with glee so the downstream fisherman raises his arm in salute. Sam throws Sari an apologetic glance.
“Go,” she says, kissing him lightly on the cheek. “I’ll help Bonita with lunch.”
Sam pulls in his line and scrambles to Taufik’s side, winding the line the boy pulls in hand over hand until a small barb flops onto the rock beside him. It thrashes and flips on the end of the line a couple of times before lying spent and still. Taufik stares at it.
“You want to keep it?” Sam asks, and reaches to hold the fish just under its gasping gills, working the hook free with his other hand. He holds the fish close to Taufik for a moment, the boy reaching out carefully to stroke its slimy surface, stumbling back as the fish thrashes again. Sam loses his grip and it jumps out of his hand and back into the water. Stunned, it rests in the shallows a moment and then with a sudden splash of its tail, flips out of sight amongst the rocks. Sam claps the boy on the back. “Well done.”
Eyes shining with excitement, Taufik unwinds his line, re-aligns the bobber and casts again. Sam realizes Taufik had likely never left Malang before coming to the village, never seen a fish caught. He goes back to his rock, casting his line again just as Darma comes to sit on the bank in the shade nearby, relaxing back so his hands cradle his head. They both watch the boy.
“Wonder why he doesn’t speak,” Sam says.
“Traumatized, I guess.”
“Lots of bad stories out there. Doesn’t make everyone mute.”
“Well, maybe if he starts to speak, he won’t be able to stop. And then he’ll have to remember. Saying it will make it real.”
Sam thinks of his dad’s silence, of all that was misunderstood until it was too late to say anything at all. How different things might have been if his father had told Sam what he was doing, how perhaps he saved other little girls from a Nazi fate, the choices he made. The bobber blurs in the distant water, and Sam looks up to see Darma watching him closely, holding his gaze an instant. He needs to say it now or he never will.
“I’m sorry, Darma.”
“For what?”
“Before. Being an asshole. You know.”
“You’re not the first.”
Sam thinks of Marcel. “Yeah, but I’m supposed to be your friend.”
“Then be my friend. That’s good enough.”
He is surprised by the lightness rushing over him.
Bonita calls to them and Andre gestures toward the blanket where she’s laid out the picnic. Sam smiles gratefully at Darma, winds in his line and calls to Taufik to do the same, but the boy doesn’t budge. They gather, sitting cross-legged on the blanket to share sticky rice wrapped in cones of banana leaf, curried fish, boiled eggs, papaya. Darma fills an open banana leaf with food and sets it on the rock beside where Taufik continues to fish. No one asks where Bonita managed to find food for such a feast.
Stomachs full, the others stretch out and snooze a little in the shade while Sari sits beside Sam, her leg just brushing his own so it seems every pore of his skin reaches toward her.
“This was a great idea,” Andre says, absently stroking Bonita’s back as she sits beside him, watching Taufik fish.
Sam thinks of Darma’s easy forgiveness, of Taufik’s joy, and the pulse of Sari’s heart under his thumb. He realizes with a start that he would do anything for these people. Like family. He needs them. Why can’t this be his family? Strange, but his. Such contentment in the thought, he’s less disappointed when the sun begins to dip and they load into the jeep to make their way back toward the village where they will be soldiers and cook, nurse and houseboy again.