First They Killed My Father

by Loung Ung

  “I need water. My throat is burning,” I complain loudly to the girls.

  “Me too,” Pithy echoes in agreement, “but we can’t leave now. We’ll all be in trouble if we don’t bring home enough firewood.”

  “Shhh …” I interrupt Pithy and listen to leaves rustling nearby. “Someone’s coming.”

  Looking up, we are startled to see a Youn soldier walking in our direction. He is thin and tall, maybe two feet above us and dressed in the standard green uniform but without the rifle and grenades on him. The Youn raises his canteen to his mouth and drinks from it.

  “Maybe he’ll give us some water,” I say to the girls. “Let’s ask him.”

  The girls nod. When he is close, we approach him. He stops and smiles quizzically at us. “Water, thirsty, drink.” I say the words loud and slow. He narrows his eyes and shakes his head. I point to his canteen, and with my hand I mime the drinking motion. Finally, he nods and smiles with understanding. He then unscrews the top of his canteen and holds it upside down but nothing comes out. He points to the canteen, points to me, and motions us to follow him.

  “He wants us to follow him to get the water,” I declare proudly to the girls. In unison, we step forward. The Youn turns suddenly around and puts up his palm to stop us. He points to me and waves for me to follow him. “Don’t worry, I’ll bring enough water back for all of us,” I say, and I follow him into the woods leaving Chou and Pithy behind.

  The soldier takes me far away from the direction of the base, where I assume we would go for water. As he leads me farther into the woods, my heart quickens. Looking back, I try to find Chou and Pithy but cannot see them in the thick brush. The Youn points to an area where the shrubs are high and dense, and waves for me to come to him. Standing where I am a few feet from him, I ask, “Where water?” By now my palms are sweating with fear. He points to the bushes and motions for me to follow. “No!” I say firmly, refusing. Breathing rapidly, I turn to run but am stopped by his hands on my arms. He throws me hard on the ground. I fall, scraping my knees and hands on rocks and sticks. Stunned and shaken, I try to get up, but his hands are there again, pushing me down by the shoulders. I land hard on my bottom as pain shoots through my body. My eyes widen in alarm.

  “Nam soong! Nam soong!” He orders me to lie down in Vietnamese. I cannot understand what he says and stare up at him. In our culture, the bride finds out all there is to know between a man and woman on the night of her marriage. I do not know exactly what he wants to do, but I know that it is bad. I struggle to get up. Again he shoves me down. “Nam Soong! Nam Soong!” he screams at me, his white face dark and mean now, like the faces of the Khmer Rouge. I sit there, paralyzed and speechless. I am unable to get the scream out of my throat; my heart pounds; my eyes plead with him to let me go.

  Time slows as he unbuttons his pants and they drop to his ankles. Breathing short, shallow breaths, I scurry back in terror. His bright red underwear stands in stark contrast against his white skin. They hug him tightly and hang below his potbelly. He hooks his thumb on the waistband and pulls his underwear down. A scream claws its way to my throat, but it comes out in a whimper. He quickly squats down in front of me, one hand gripping the back of my neck, the other covering my mouth and most of my face. His nails dig into my cheeks. My eyes follow his stomach down to his penis. It is big and quivers like it’s alive. My head is dizzy as I begin to hyperventilate. I shut my eyes. I have never seen a man’s penis before. Babies, yes, but I never imagined it to be so different on a man. All its wrinkles and pouches. It disgusts and terrifies me.

  He lowers my head to the ground, and while his hand still covers my mouth I can see my reflection in his eyes. “Shh, shh,” he whispers. His body inches away from me. His hand lets go of my mouth and tugs at my pants, pulls them past my hips. A scream crawls its way from my throat and explodes loudly. Shocked, he stops. He quickly looks around. I pull my pants back on and twist my body to get up. His long fingers wrap firmly around my ankles, pulling me closer and closer, one hand now on my thigh. I slide on my bottom, unable to get away. Letting out a loud shrill cry, I squirm out of his grasp and kick to get away.

  “Help! Monster! Somebody help me! Monster!” I yell as tears stream down my face and snot drips from my nose to my mouth. Dark, thunderous, powerful hatred rises in me as I scream and call him names. With a surge of anger, I twist and snap my left leg out of his grip. “I hate you!” I yell into his bewildered face as my leg crashes into his chest. His face winces in pain. He gasps for breath and lets go of my other leg. “Die! Die!” Screaming at the top of my lungs, I kick him in the groin with all of my hatred. He doubles over and falls to the ground, hollering like an injured animal. My legs push me up and I run as fast as I can without stopping.

  I flee to where I left Chou and Pithy, and see their figures running toward me, axes over their shoulders, faces full of worry and fear.

  “Loung! Are you all right? I heard you scream!” Chou questions me shrilly.

  I nod shakily.

  “We were so scared for you! We thought it was strange when he took you to the woods, away from the base. We kept our eyes on you, then you disappeared!” Chou is crying now. She drops her axe on the ground.

  “I’m never going to be that stupid again. I want to report him to the authorities,” I tell her.

  “No, let’s get out of here and go to a place where there are lots of people,” Pithy pleads, and drags me away by the arm.

  Reluctantly, I allow myself to be dragged away. Pithy helps Chou wrap the rope three times around the pile of wood. Then they sit facing each other with the pile in the middle. Both put their feet on the wood and push, each pulling one end of the rope. When the rope is taut, Chou ties it in a double knot. She lays the axe in with the pile of wood and strings her scarf through the rope to make a handle. Once she finishes, she helps Pithy with the other two piles. Grabbing the scarves, we pick up the wood, now the size of our bodies, and carry it horizontally on our backs. When we get close to the base I look closely at all the soldiers, hoping to catch the monster. I want to report him, but I do not know who to report him to. With their funny round hats and uniforms, most of the soldiers look the same to me. I am not sure which one to tell my story to. I thought they were here to save us from the abuses of Pol Pot and not to hurt us. “Come on, we have to go,” Pithy again pleads after a few minutes.

  Then from the corner of my eye, far in the distance, I think I see him. My mind swirls with rage of revenge. My heart jumps to my throat, and I take off after him. “Monster!” I yell, running. Chou and Pithy call for me to stop and return, but I ignore them. I am so full of hate I pay no attention to where I am going. Suddenly, something crunches under my foot and pain shoots through the sole. I break into a sweat but do not stop. I focus on him and leap on my toes in his direction. My foot throbs painfully as blood leaves a trail over the ground. Briefly, I look to see a piece of broken glass sticking out of my foot. I look down and yank the glass out, causing more blood to spurt. When I look up again, he is gone.

  “He’s gone!” I scream when Chou and Pithy catch up to me. The pain is so great now that I have to sit down. Saying nothing, Chou takes her scarf and wraps it around my foot to stop the bleeding.

  “Come, we have to go,” she says sympathetically.

  “He’s gone—”

  “Leave him behind. We have to go.”

  I stand up and limp around for a few more minutes looking for the Youn, but he is nowhere to be seen.

  They walk ahead of me as I hobble slowly behind them. Along the way we do not talk about it, and they do not ask me about the man’s penis. I wonder if Chou will tell Kim, or if Pithy will tell her family. For me, the humiliation is too much, the terror too real to relive by bringing it up. I am determined to keep my secret until the day I die.

  Once we reach our meeting place, Pithy leaves and goes her separate way. Chou and I continue on in silence.

  “You were gone all morning and these small piles are al
l you brought?” the mother hollers at us when we get home. Chou and I nod. “And what happened to you?” she asks, noticing my foot.

  “I stepped on a piece of broken glass,” I tell her.

  “Careless, lazy girl! You are so stupid you will amount to nothing.”

  “No, you’re wrong. I am going to be somebody great,” I mutter to her.

  “What? Are you talking back to me?” She walks up to me and pushes my forehead with her index finger, spits at my feet.

  “You will never be great. What makes you think you will be great? You are nothing. You are an orphan. You’ll only be somebody if you become a hooker!” Her words ring in my ears as hate pulsates through my body.

  “I will not become a hooker,” I reply indignantly, turning my back to her and hobbling away. Later, crouching near a bush, hugging my knees to my chest, the mother’s words echo in my mind and despair creeps into my heart. She is right. I am an orphan with no future. What will happen to me? Then, as I sit in the woods in a corner of the world, hiding from a war I know little about, I hear Pa’s voice.

  “No one knows how precious you are. You are a diamond in the rough and with a little polishing, you will shine,” Pa whispers softly. His gentle words bring a small smile to my lips. The mother may not give me the love I crave, but I know what it feels like to be loved. Pa loved me and believed in me. With that little reminder from him, I know the foster mother is wrong about me. I do possess the one thing I need to make something of myself one day: I have everything my Pa gave me.

  flying bullets

  February 1979

  I have lived with the family for a month now, and the longer I am with them, the more my hatred grows. However, I know that no matter how I feel about them, their home is safer than living by ourselves. Even though Pursat City is protected by the Youns, people still live in fear. Among the villagers there have been many discussions about the Khmer Rouge closing in on us. The village men say the Khmer Rouge soldiers are all around us, some even hiding in the village or in nearby woods. It is hard to tell the soldiers from the civilians when they are all the same people, speak one language, and wear the same black clothes. Hiding their guns, the soldiers can easily infiltrate the refugee camp and spy on our activities. Every once in a while, a group of Khmer Rouge soldiers attacks a random village, raids the houses, kills a few people, and then ducks back into the woods. They attack without warning, and since no one knows when or where they will appear, we must have eyes in the back of our heads all the time. The refugee village is so large that in these surprise raids, the Youns are not able to arrive in time to protect us until people have been killed.

  One afternoon, while the grandmother and I are outside the hut, squatting near the well scrubbing pots and pans, I hear the unmistakable whizzing of bullets around me. “Flying bullets!” I scream, dropping flat and pressing my chest against the wet ground. I lay in the wet scum of dishwater as it soaks through my shirt and pants. My heart pounding in my ears, I stare at a small ant spinning in a circle in a puddle next to my face. I clasp my hands over my ears as more bullets ring in the air. They explode like Chinese firecrackers, one after another in a feverish succession. A few seconds later the bullets stop. My cheek presses to the ground. I watch the same ant flailing its four legs in the half inch of water. The more it struggles, the more it spins. A few seconds pass and still no more bullets. Raising my head, I quickly get up from the dirt and crawl on my hands and knees behind a tree.

  Suddenly, the grandmother screams a loud, shrill cry. Up above, the sun hides behind the clouds. My body still protected by the tree, I peer out to look at her. She is on the ground, lying in a fetal position on her side, both hands clutching her leg as thin, red blood pours out from a wound above her ankle, staining her skirt. The blood forms a pool around her feet, mixing with dishwater as it seeps into the earth. She screams and cries for help, but I crouch in my hiding place. In the hut, the children scream and cry as the mother hushes them. Seconds later, the father jumps frantically out from the hut and picks her up off the ground. Then he carries her off to the camp’s hospital with his son trailing behind him.

  I do not come out of my hiding place, afraid that if they see me they’ll blame me for not helping the grandmother. Long after they have gone, and after the mother has calmed down the little kids, I am still behind the tree. I sit there, scratching the dry mud out from between my toes and then looking up at the sky, wondering when more bullets will rain down on us. Though my heart is beating wildly I feel nothing. My mind still makes pictures and creates thoughts, but I do not have any attachment to them. I am sorry she got shot, but she is mean and often slaps my face and pinches my arms and ears. Now I will not have to see her wrinkled face or hear her poisonous mouth for a while. I stay behind the tree, deep in my own world, until Chou and Kim return from gathering wood.

  Three days later, the mother sends me to bring food to the grandmother in the hospital. I take the packet wrapped in banana leaves and head toward the hospital. It takes me an hour to walk the two miles. The small, well-traveled, red dirt footpath cuts through the town and is usually quite safe. On this day, all is quiet and yet I nervously put one foot in front of the other, my eyes scanning the trees and bushes around me for signs of the Khmer Rouge. Neglecting to look down, I kick something and hear it roll away from me. It is rusty-green and shaped like an egg with little square boxes on the surface. I freeze and suck in my breath. My knees are weak and my feet sting as if I have been electrocuted. It is a grenade. “Stupid girl! You have to be more careful,” I curse under my breath.

  It is noon when I see the hospital. Taking short steps, I proceed slowly toward it, dreading going in. The abandoned makeshift hospital looks sicker than its patients. The one-level warehouse is gray with age, crumbling from the destruction of war. Dark green mold eats through the cracks in the wall as wild trees and vines threaten to overtake the building. Stepping out of the sunlight into the dark building temporarily blinds me. Inside, the temperature is uncomfortably hot and the air hangs heavy, unmoving. The shrill cries of babies, the repetitive moans, and the echoes of shallow, labored breathing bombard the large space. The stench of human waste, urine, rotting wounds, and strong rubbing alcohol surrounds me, permeating my clothes, skin, and hair. My throat tightens and I swallow hard to suppress a gag. I want to run out of the building. My eyes twitch, wanting to shut so I do not have to look at the bodies lying on the floor. During the Khmer Rouge rule I saw many dead bodies. Having lost all hope of escaping the Khmer Rouge, many went to the infirmary to die. They did not have families to hold their hands and swat away the flies when they became too weak. Like Keav, they wasted away and laid in their own feces and urine, completely alone. In a Khmer Rouge hospital, people moaned and whimpered in pain but did not scream. Here at the hospital in the newly liberated zone, people scream in pain because they’re fighting to live.

  Taking small, cautious steps I walk past rows of people lying on cots and mats on the ground. Out of the corner of my eye, something scurries away. I jump, then relax. It is only a mouse. Walking on, I look at each patient, searching for the grandmother. I hate having to bring food for some old lady I don’t care for. If she were Ma, it would be different. My heart sinks at the thought and sadness spreads throughout my body. If she were Ma, taking care of her would redeem all the wrongs I’ve committed.

  Ahead of me, two nurses kneel beside a young boy. An old woman sits cross-legged next to them, her face long and sad. The nurses are busy preparing silver trays of tools, bandages, and alcohol bottles. I hover over them, looking at the boy who lies motionless on a straw mat. He looks five or six years old, but I really cannot tell. His eyes are slightly open; his lips are gray and bloodless. My body vibrates with pain when I see that his upper body is badly burned. The skin looks as if it will peel off in one crisp layer. One of his legs is missing from the thigh down and the other is wrapped in bandages. The old woman cries softly, her hand clutching his small one, her thumb massaging the
top of his hand in a circle. Her other hand fans his body, chasing away the black-green flies that wait to lick his scorched flesh.

  “Bong Srei, what happened to him?” I ask the nurse as she prepares to clean him.

  “He was walking here to visit—”The boy screams then, making the old woman sob louder. My toes and feet tingle when I hear the nurse say the boy either kicked a grenade or walked over a landmine. I quickly walk away and leave them with the boy screaming until he passes out.

  When I find the grandmother, she is in the process of having her bandages changed by a nurse. The nurse is young and pretty, and wears a graying white uniform. She kneels by the grandma and reaches out for her arm. The grandmother swats her hand away and screams in protest. Hearing the screams, another nurse walks briskly over to assist the first nurse. She holds the grandmother by the shoulders and pushes her down on the cot. Under her weight, the grandma is forced onto her back.

  “Are you with her?” the nurse asks, noticing me standing behind her.

  “Yes.”

  “Well, you better help us then. She is a tough one. Grab on to her other leg so she won’t kick me. I have to change the bandages.” I quickly obey her.

  With one nurse pushing her down by the shoulders and my arms wrapped around her leg, the nurse unravels layers of bloody bandages as the grandmother squirms and shakes to be free of us. The bandages coil on the floor like red-dotted albino snakes, exposing the grandmother’s ankle. It is red, raw, and covered by a thin cake of dried blood. Just above her ankle is a tiny black circle the size of a cigarette burn. “It’s lucky the bullet went straight through the flesh. Any lower and it would have shattered the ankle.” The grandmother screams in response. “It looks good, but we still have to clean it.” The nurse takes the silver tray of tools and pours alcohol into a white plastic bowl. With a pair of thongs, she dips a piece of white cloth into the alcohol bowl, allowing it to soak through. “Okay, it’s time to really hold her down now.” I grip her leg tight, my nails digging into her flesh as the nurse swabs the alcohol-soaked cloth on the wound. The grandmother screams and curses us, but the nurse continues to jab the cloth at the wound, wiping away the caked brown blood. When she is satisfied it is clean, the nurse wraps the ankle up again with clean white bandages.