Mon had actually been trying to track down Oan to make him deliver some clothes to a customer. But once she found out that her son was making lottery lists for sale, she bought a copy and then delivered the clothes herself. Her purchase sparked other people’s interest. Once Jua sold the other sheet, he quickly limped his way back. Four more copies were already ripped out and ready for him. His two friends were giddy with excitement when they saw the money Jua slapped on the table. They both continued their copying in earnest.
By evening, the scene around the neighborhood had turned. It was as if all the energy had been used up in the morning, leaving behind only somber silence. Each lottery cycle, on the first and the sixteenth, there might have been one or two people whose luck permitted them to stay cheerful into the evening. Rampeuy, of course, was an exception, since she was in a good mood only on those two days every month.
Among the sullen who had had their hopes dashed by the underground lottery, some had backup chances to keep their dreams alive if they hadn’t yet had a chance to check their state lottery tickets. Jua made the rounds with the results sheets until dusk. At seven that evening, a man whooped—he’d won fifth prize. As soon as he realized his luck, he couldn’t run fast enough to the grocery store to put a bottle of whiskey on his tab. It was Dum, the tire patcher and bicycle repairman. He assembled a crew to drink and treated his friends late into the night.
The next day, Dum got ready to go to the market bright and early. He stopped to get cigarettes right as the newspapers were being delivered. Kampol was also at the grocery store early getting himself some crackers. Because Dum still couldn’t get over his luck, before he headed off to claim his prize money, he took his lottery ticket out to check it against the newspaper again.
He checked and rechecked but still he didn’t have the right numbers. One digit was off.
“What? Did they misprint a number?” Dum squawked, but then he realized that probably wasn’t the case. He looked up from the newspaper, his eyes hostile, and growled, “That bastard Jua!”
Kampol jumped.
Hiding Place
One more term and Kampol would have finished first grade, but he never went back to school after he was abandoned. Penporn, the mentally disabled girl, had been sent to school, but one month in, her teacher notified her family that attending was doing her no good, and on top of it she was a burden on her teacher and classmates. So that was the end of Penporn’s foray into formal education. Jua, or as his teachers called him, Thongchai, sometimes went to school, sometimes didn’t. With his bad leg and the long walk to school, he didn’t like making the trip. Another outcast was Noi, who didn’t go to school simply because he didn’t want to learn. This sorry crew made up Kampol’s weekday friends.
On weekends, Mrs. Tongjan’s neighborhood was like a playground. When the kids gathered for hide and seek, they always came to exactly fifteen. As they started the game, they made such a cacophony—some of the adults couldn’t stand it. But when these grown-ups came out to give them a piece of their mind, they would find the pandemonium had died down. The group would have inevitably dissolved, with the kids having run off to take cover and hide. There would be one lone child standing in the middle of the lot with his or her eyes covered. The adults would just sigh and head back inside their homes.
The kids never gave it much thought: they scattered and hid anywhere that provided cover, be it behind a pickup truck or a door, in a bush or water barrel, up in a tree, or around the back of the rowhouses. It never took long for them all to be discovered, but often the person who was “it” got tagged before all the hiders were found and just had to be “it” again.
One time, a few adults were in a silly mood and asked to play with the kids. Then they felt obliged to show the children that they could come up with the best, most unexpected hiding places. The kids—definitely wanting to hide in the best, most unexpected places—put their faith in the grown-ups. That being the case, a whole bunch of them chased after the adults. They ventured farther than ever before. The parade of hiders even ran past Mrs. Tongjan’s house. They came to an abandoned field cluttered with giant reeds. The dried thickets reached higher than their heads. The whole crew of them charged in, shoving the reeds out of the way and crouching down to hide.
The reeds were silent, giving away nothing of the dozen or so children and adults taking refuge among them. But after about ten seconds, a little voice let out a yelp, then the kid responsible for it bolted out.
“Ah! There’s a hornet nest in here!” someone squealed.
There was a big rush to get up. The grown-up who’d masterminded the spot hightailed it out of there before anybody, but still wasn’t fast enough. He took one in the left temple. The children screamed in the chaos.
Kampol had one hiding place that no one else knew about. He’d once gone off to hide behind the houses. The unit he and his family had lived in was still vacant, even then. Kampol had seen that the back door wasn’t all the way shut. He knew immediately that it wasn’t locked from the inside, because it always stuck and you had to really slam it into the frame to get the bolt to slide. Mrs. Tongjan must have shown the unit to a potential tenant and opened the back door. But when she went to lock up, she hadn’t known the trick and left it a bit open. Kampol knew that door well. He had slipped his little hand underneath it, gripping the bottom edge and yanking on it repeatedly. Before long, the door had swung open. He snuck in and jammed it closed, but not too tight, just enough to get it to stick in the jamb.
Kampol hid in the empty room, or what was still, to him, his home. Once, it had been so full of stuff that there was no space to walk: bed; wardrobe; shoe rack; table with baby bottles and his little brother’s things; bedclothes with a red, pink, and green floral pattern; a navy blue and red plaid blanket on the bed; the cushioned mat where his brother used to sleep. Jon crying, struggling with his hands and feet; his mother pacing back and forth, her sarong secured over her chest; his father shaving in front of the mirror.
Kampol, lulled by his memories, dozed off. In his sleep, he kept dreaming. It felt as though he had traveled back in time, and he had been reunited with his whole family again.
When he awoke, his stomach hurt, and he walked groggily into the bathroom out of habit. As he was wobbling toward the toilet, he heard an angry voice:
“Boy, did you sneak into the water tank again? You’re going to get hit until you learn your lesson!”
Kampol jumped, his eyes wide. He looked around. The cement water tank was almost all the way full. He had submerged himself in there so many times and hung out, only his head above the water. He hadn’t been dreaming. He’d heard his mother scolding him. His father and Jon must be here, too. He dashed out of the bathroom…but the unit was hushed and empty.
Kampol threw the door shut behind him, leaving it as he’d found it. He stepped out into the real world.
“Boy, where the heck did you hide?” Oan asked when they ran into each other. “People quit playing ages ago.”
Kampol chuckled but refused to say. He had found the best hiding place: you’d have to travel back in time to discover it. He skipped away joyfully. But then his melancholy caught up to him and his steps grew slow and measured—he didn’t know where to go.
Fair Game
The fair at the Zeng Tek Xiang Tung Shrine was held over the course of three nights. Since it was nearby, the folks from Mrs. Tongjan’s community grabbed all the kids and headed over for an evening out. Kampol went with Oan and his mother, Mon.
The first thing they had to do was survey the entire fairground. A steady stream of people came in, flowing in one general direction. Parents, worried that they would get separated from their children, gripped their hands tightly. Mon did the same, with Oan on her right and Kampol on her left. Along both sides of the walkway, stands dazzled the eyes with a panoply of mouthwatering treats: marshmallow crepes, coconut pancakes, fried bananas, cotton candy, shaved ices. Next came the toy stalls hawking superhero masks, b
right balloons, race cars, dolls…there were even gold and silver fish for sale.
Kampol held the twenty baht in his pocket tight in his fist—Dang had paid him to give him a massage earlier that afternoon—unable to decide what to spend it on: the merry-go-round, the Ferris wheel, or the train that did a loop around the entire fairground. He had his eye on a superhero mask, as did Oan, but Mon forbade them from wasting their money buying toys; only snacks were allowed.
As they drifted away from the vendor stalls, Mon steered the children toward the Chinese-opera theater, but the curtain was still down so they went to peek backstage. The performers, both men and women, were sitting around putting on their makeup. One of them walked by in nothing but an ordinary pair of shorts, but his face was done up in full opera makeup. The boys ogled, following him as he went to buy himself some grilled squid.
The Chinese-opera stage was set up outdoors and the audience sat on the ground. Several people, adults as well as kids, had newspaper rolled up into batons that they were selling for one baht a pop—they were for people to spread out on the ground and then sit on.
At the likay stage, people were starting to stake out their spots. Mon bought rolled up newspaper and secured a place near the front. Oan and Kampol asked if they could go walk around some more.
“Careful not to get lost and make sure you hold hands the whole time. I’ll wait here at the likay theater for you. And don’t be gone for too long—the show’s about to start. Here’s a twenty. If you can’t find your way back, ask one of the vendors, okay?”
Oan nodded his head. Hand in hand, the boys made their way back to the merry-go-round, the Ferris wheel, and then over to the train. They debated for a long time before finally jumping on the train for ten baht apiece.
Kampol and Oan beamed as the train prepared to depart. Some parents had come with their kids and were waving; others had climbed on alongside their children. Once the train started moving, the sea of faces glided by, and passengers hollered to people they knew. Where the train drew close to the Ferris wheel, riders on both caught only a quick glimpse of each other, with the Ferris wheel continuing to circle skyward and the train continuing to chug on ahead. The entertainment had started now—as was the shrine’s tradition, the Chinese opera was the first to start, and the train riders got a piercing earful of it as they passed one of the theater’s huge speakers. When the tracks curved around the stage they were approaching another set of speakers, so the passengers were on guard and ready to plug their ears. As they cruised by the shooting gallery, someone pinged King Kong’s target, and the ape shook and growled until the attendant stood the target upright again. After he’d calmed down, the legendary and fearsome ghost Mae Nak began wailing and calling out for her beloved Pi Mak. Other ghostly figures soon joined her with their own menacing sounds, even King Kong roaring once again. Kampol and Oan giggled themselves silly. They could still hear Mae Nak’s moaning in the distance long after the train had moved away.
Then an announcement came over the loudspeakers: “Could the parents of Somkid—a six-year-old girl with braids wearing a pink skirt—please come pick her up at the information booth in front of the Chinese-opera theater?” When the train rolled by the booth, Kampol saw the girl sitting on a chair next to the donation box and crying.
“I have an idea! Let’s have them page my mama to come and get us,” Oan said, thinking it would be funny.
Kampol agreed to play along. After they hopped off the ride, Oan bought a cone of shaved ice with half red syrup, half green, and the whole thing generously drizzled with condensed milk. Kampol chose blue cotton candy, fluffy as a cloud. Then they headed over to the information booth. The announcements quickly followed:
“Prasit Gaewton, or Oan, five years old, has gotten separated from his mother. He’s currently at the information kiosk. Could his mother, Mrs. Mon Gaewton, please come pick him up at the information kiosk in front of the Chineseopera theater?”
“Kampol Changsamran, five years old, is currently at the information kiosk. Could his mother, Mrs. Namfon Changsamran, please come pick him up at the information kiosk in front of the Chinese-opera theater?”
Oan and Kampol sat down next to the girl named Somkid and took turns eating the shaved ice and cotton candy, swapping back and forth. A minute later, Somkid’s mother scrambled over, visibly distressed, but she grinned as she hurried toward her daughter with open arms. Meanwhile, Mon had parked herself in front of the likay stage and didn’t hear the public announcement, even though it was repeated several times. She realized that she was being paged only when the ranat xylophone stopped playing—then, hearing her name, she jumped up. As soon as she rose, someone swooped in to take her spot.
Oan burst out laughing when he saw his mother’s face. Figuring out that she’d been pranked, Mon huffed and swore that she’d teach him a lesson. But Kampol refused to get up from his chair.
“Quit playing,” Oan told him. “Let’s go watch the likay.”
“In a minute. You go ahead. In case my mama’s here and she hears the PA.”
Mon stood for a moment, looking at Kampol. “If your mama doesn’t make it, come find me over at the theater, all right?”
Kampol nodded. Slumped in his chair next to the donation box, he swung his legs back and forth as he listened as if hypnotized: “Mrs. Namfon Changsamran… Mrs. Namfon Changsamran, please pick up your son at the information kiosk in front of the Chinese-opera theater.”
…Make a Person Want to Eat
On days when he couldn’t find any buddies to drink with in the evening, Dum would go around looking for Kampol, yelling and making lots of noise in the process. Dinner at Dum’s was usually sticky rice and papaya salad, but the grilled dish varied, sometimes chicken and sometimes pork, and the meat salad switched between larb and nam tok. Once his whiskey bottle was empty, Dum would inevitably forget that the kid was staying over. At his house, there was only one bed, and once asleep, Dum tossed and turned, throwing his arms around, and he invariably ended up smacking Kampol multiple times. Every time, eventually, Kampol got pushed off the bed and had to drag his pillow down and sleep on the floor below the bed.
Tongbai also had Kampol over for dinner regularly. But each time, before they sat down to eat, Kampol had to help her wash a huge pile of dishes. Even so, they usually weren’t able to get done quick enough—when her husband, Gaew, came into the kitchen and saw that there wasn’t a plate or bowl he could use for his rice, he complained. Tongbai snapped right back at him. The couple would squabble until the first bites of food made it into their mouths. Only then would they quiet down. After dinner, they never bothered with the dishes; they simply left them to soak. The evening would conclude with them lying down and watching TV until they fell asleep.
Kampol liked staying at Old Jai’s. The big, rundown wooden house was livelier than all the other homes. Old Noi’s family rented part of the house. They had seven grandchildren between the two of them. Because the house didn’t have a television, when night fell, the kids came together and played. They always made a racket but no one tried to force them to keep it down. Whenever Kampol stayed over there, he got to join in on the fun, too. The only problem was the food wasn’t very good, regardless of whether it came from Old Noi’s or Old Jai’s kitchen. Everybody there mostly ate vegetables with a dip of chili paste and nothing else. Kampol hadn’t learned to like chili paste, so every time he slept over there, all he had to eat was rice sprinkled with fish sauce, but he still liked staying there regardless.
Kampol stayed at Mon’s more often than anywhere else. He kept his clothes there, and Mon was the one who washed them for him. He and Oan had been classmates in first grade, and Oan would always bring him the news from school. The academic year was going to be over in a few days, at which point Oan would be finished with first grade. Listening to his stories, Kampol felt wistful—he really wanted to go back to school. Mon suggested that, since Chong the grocer liked to read, if Kampol was not in school, he should spend a
s much time as possible with Chong, so that the grocer could tutor him.
She was right: anytime Kampol spent the night at his place, Chong would take out a book and read to him. The shelves in his bedroom were stuffed with books, which then overflowed onto his table and bedside. But the stories Chong read to Kampol often left him confused, even when, afterward, Chong retold them as if they were fables or fairy tales. Still, the stories were sad and often made Kampol cry.
One time, Chong read Kampol a story about a man who hadn’t had anything to eat for three days. He went around staring at the food displayed in glass cases at restaurants, all the while feeling faint because he’d put nothing in his stomach for so long. Then he imagined the crunch of a boiled egg being cracked against a steel plate. The memory of the sound reminded him of the taste of a boiled egg. With all the energy he could muster, he went out onto the street and slit a person’s throat with a knife, to steal nothing more than the paltry sum of money for a boiled egg. This story haunted Kampol for days. Chong told him over and over again that if he felt hungry or nobody called him at a mealtime, he should come and get himself something at the shop, because extreme hunger could make a person lose control and hurt someone.
Kampol didn’t forget his instructions. He couldn’t get the man who killed for a boiled egg out of his mind. He studied the people walking up and down the street. When he really looked closely at each one, he realized that almost everybody looked rather hungry. But he wanted to find the person who was starving the most. He set about his task by wandering beyond Mrs. Tongjan’s neighborhood and into the old housing development down the street, which was crowded and full of hungry people. But he was searching for the most famished of them all.
Bright Page 4