The Saviors
“People were rejoicing, I rejoiced. I thought the war was over.” — Rindy
April 1975
had passed, the women from the village covered Chidaun in a white cloth and scattered incense sticks around her corpse to make her spirit happy, but I could still smell the decay. Vuthy and I avoided the house as much as possible, sleeping on the porch like we used to, with the chanting and the mourners crowding the place.
A neighbor sent word to Phom Phen with her teenage son, to retrieve Mteay, and she made it in time for the ceremony, with Ly, Soth, and her new baby, Tang. So did Chidaun’s other children, three sons, including Pou Ponlok, who I hadn’t seen since the temple. I avoided him, not even venturing into the house if he was inside, afraid he might instruct me to bow and then beat me if I didn’t do it right. The night they arrived they stayed up late and discussed the inheritance. Vuthy and I heard them from the porch, shouting late into the night. I didn’t understand all of it, but I gathered that they were upset with the meager amount of money Chidaun had, after Chi Ta’s passing. He had been a wealthy landowner, they said. Why was this all that was left? They fought until each seemed satisfied, but it was decided that Mteay would get Chidaun’s house.
It took Vuthy and I nearly all the next day to gather enough wood to make her funeral pyre. I stacked branches in a pile in front of the house as instructed. Chidaun was placed in a long wooden box on top of the pile, and Pou Ponlock, along with three of the local monks, lit the dry bark, chanting in a shrill pitch. I hid behind an old lady, so he wouldn’t see me. Minutes passed before the flames licked at the wooden box, but soon the blaze leapt into the sky.
Looking through the flames I watched Mteay’s face distorted in grief, her tears streaking in soot. She held Tang to her chest as she slept, shaking in a rhythmic, unbroken motion. Sotha and Ly stood nearby, their faces ashen as they cried silent tears. Their white dresses curled around their legs like the fire curling in the air. In Cambodia, white is the color of death. Chidaun’s death left us all feeling weak.
I studied Mteay as she mourned. She sounded like she was also slowly dying. There was something else weighing on Mteay though, a deeper darkness reflected terror in her eyes. She looked even thinner, and her face was engraved with premature lines as if etched in by force instead of wearing in naturally with age. After what seemed like hours, her body became still. She no longer convulsed, and her tears stopped falling. She and the baby, Sotha, Ly and some of the women from the village went inside. And my uncles, including Pou Ponlok left, with their share of riel tucked securely away. Vuthy and I sat in our hammocks on the porch, not knowing what else to do with so many people about.
“It has been hell.” Mteay’s voice slipped through the open door.
“What has happened in Phnom Penh?” a woman's voice asked.
“The fighting has been so bad. Khan and the other Lon Nol soldiers have been fighting against the Khmer Rouge near the capital and the Lon Nol are no match. There is so much death, so much suffering. I’ve volunteered at a hospital outside the city, but it’s just a tent really. We’ve run out of supplies and morphine to stop the pain. Most of the dying and suffering are trapped behind the Khmer Rouge, and no one can get to them.”
She paused, taking a breath, as if even the memory was suffocating her.
“About a month ago, the Khmer Rouge surrounded the Lon Nol army a short distance from the city. They cut off all the food and supplies coming and going. I keep hearing stories of soldiers starving to death. I’ve been trying to get Khan food, but I can’t.”
“I haven’t heard from him in six months.” I could hear her crying again, her words shaking and unclear. “I don’t know if he’s dead or alive.”
The women cooed and soothed.
“It will end soon, I think. There is nothing else to fight over, no one can resist the Khmer Rouge.”
The burden of the war sat much heavier on the backs of the cities, where most of the population lived, rather than the rural parts of Cambodia. I tried to imagine what war looked like and how it felt to those enduring it for the past five years. Mteay knew. It haunted her. She couldn’t scrub the look and feel of horror from her face.
An elderly man, head bowed in respect and sorrow, walked from the group of men congregated outside to the open door. I knew he was Mteay’s Pou, Chidaun’s younger brother. He was the family member Kiry had gone to work for.
“It was good of you to come.” Mteay’s steps sounded toward the door. “Please come in and eat; we have food prepared for you.”
Obediently, Mteay’s uncle removed his shoes and disappeared inside.
“Please, Pou, tell me of my son, Kiry.”
“I’m sorry to bring this news, on such a sorrow filled day, but Kiry has joined the Khmer Rouge. He left one night and didn’t return, but some men from the village saw him going with the Khmer Rouge recruiters.”
“How long?” Mteay’s voice was cold, void of all emotion.
“He left about six months ago.”
Moments passed, no one said anything. I looked at Vuthy, his eyes large and frightened. We knew what this meant; Mteay’s son and husband had been at war—with one another.
Within the week, the Khmer Rouge took Phom Penh. News spilled from the radios of the black clad troops marching into the city filled with white flags of surrender and the Lon Nol soldiers surrendering their guns after the nearly five-year struggle. Then the radios went oddly silent. Had the Khmer Rouge stopped the broadcasting on purpose? Had they cut the power to the city? Nobody knew. The uncertainty did little to quell the general celebration, as Khmer New Year was approaching. Vuthy and I could hear the neighbors as they drank and played music late into the night.
“What does it mean that the Khmer Rouge have won?” Vuthy asked, unable to sleep from the noise.
“I don’t know. But it means there won’t be any more fighting and that’s good.”
He didn’t seem convinced.
“Will he come home now?”
I knew he meant Khan. I had been avoiding the question, like pretending rain wasn’t coming.
“I don’t know if he survived. You heard Mteay. The war was bad where he was. Maybe all the Lon Nol soldiers were”—I swallowed—“killed.”
I was conflicted. Mteay relied on him, and his death would devastate her, but I had never liked Khan, and I hated the words he constantly spewed at Vuthy and me. I closed my eyes against the bad thoughts.
We waited for days. The returning soldiers brought stories of death, destruction and the brutality of the Khmer Rouge, speaking in hushed tones and looking over their shoulders. Each day that passed we wondered. Would Khan return too?
The wondering stopped a few days later when we returned from gathering wood for Mteay’s dinner fire and saw Khan leaning on the porch. He wore his green uniform, but he didn’t have a gun. Mteay was talking inside with some of the village women. The cigarettes the men were smoking cast eerie shadows across their faces. Khan’s cheeks were sunken, and his frame balanced against the wall as if that was the only thing holding him up. I pulled Vuthy down, and we squatted outside the circle of men, keeping to the shadows to catch what bits of the conversation we could.
“We’ve put our weapons down.” Khan’s tone was flat and low as he exhaled the cigarette smoke. “I didn’t think I’d ever smoke one of these again.” He cursed. “It tastes so good.”
“Is it true the Khmer Rouge have captured the capital?” one man asked with eyes shining in the orange glow. “Lon Nol is completely powerless now?”
Khan scoffed. “Phnom Penh was his last hope. He lost every other territory, including the one he held on the border of Thailand. He had declared himself Marshal over all of Cambodia and had dismissed the General Assembly, seizing all power. He said he wasn’t going to ‘play at democracy during times of war.’ In the end he had nothing left but his Buddhist beliefs. He sprinkled some sand at the entrance to the city while saying a chant before admitting defeat and running like a scared dog. Every soldier who didn’t get shot is making their way home I’m sure.”
“How did you get away?”
Khan paused, staring into the darkness. “I hid in a rice paddy until I could get away undetected. Most of the Khmer Rouge entered the city.”
“The Khmer Rouge are the savior,” one man whispered to his companion, being careful to keep his voice low enough that Khan couldn’t hear.
“What was that?” Khan asked the whisperer, his frame popping in agitation. He didn’t respond.
“You may think you know the Khmer Rouge, but they’re a bunch of kids with guns, boys and girls who aren’t even teens yet. They were recruited from the poorest villages and trained for years in the jungles to be brutal, little war machines. I thought they were simple villagers, but they are full of tricks. One time, our battalion snuck up on what we thought was one of their ‘talking meetings’ where they rehearsed their code of ethics and played horrible music. But we found loudspeakers hooked up to a tape player, hanging from a tree. They had planted so many bombs that we lost almost half of our men.”
He paused, taking a long drag on his cigarette. “They are not what you think.”
Later that night, I heard Khan asking how much money we had made while he was away. He grumbled and huffed, and Mteay assured him she would find somewhere to send us to work soon, especially with the rice planting season coming. Then he asked about Kiry, and I held my breath, knowing Mteay’s answer would enrage him. Would she tell him the truth about her son’s disrespect for joining the opposing side to Khan, his stepfather? Or would she lie and leave it up to someone from the village to tell him?
“You just got back, let’s leave this for another time.” Mteay’s words were soothing.
“You’ll tell me now. Give me the answer to a simple question.”
“I don’t know…”
“Is he not still working for your pou?”
Mteay hesitated.
“Speak up, woman.”
“He’s joined the Khmer Rouge.”
Khan rose to his feet.
“What? How long ago?”
“Maybe six months?” Mteay’s voice was even and calm, lowering in pitch with Khan’s mounting one.
Khan cursed, his voice booming. “How could the worthless boy—your worthless son—do such a thing? How could he disrespect me in this way? He probably hid in the jungle and laughed with the rebels, firing his rifle like a big man.”
Khan’s fists crashed against something inside, and Tang woke with a cry. I stood up. Would he hurt Mteay in his rage? Vuthy grabbed my arm, shaking his head.
“What are you going to do, Rindy? He’ll kill you.”
Khan’s voice rose in pitch.
Regardless of our past, she was still my mteay, and I didn’t want anyone to hurt her. Least of all Khan. I shrugged Vuthy off and walked toward the door.
Khan's voice continued to rage.“He probably tried to kill me. Well, if I ever see him again, I’ll beat him to it. He was too slow, and I outsmarted him and the rest of them.”
“Please, Khan, let us be until you are calmer. Please come back then.” Mteay’s voice was no longer calm but was laced with sobs. I reached the door, my hand trembling as I pushed it open.
I watched Khan disappear down the back steps with his curses. Relief flooded me, I wouldn't have to face him this time. Mteay sat holding Tang, rocking back and forth, tears streaming down her face. I approached, but she waved me back outside. She was no longer the woman I remembered when she was married to Aupouk, full of spunk and fire. She was worn down like an old pair of sandals.
I felt bad for her and how hard she had tried to find Khan and smuggle him food while he was fighting in the war. How she had endured months near the battlefield with all the death and starvation for a cruel and brutal man. He had survived the war, but his rage and demons had grown, and he couldn’t drown them in his spirit worship or alcohol. The war might have been over, but it was just beginning in my family.