Inspector Awang continued. “We are doing our best, but as you can see there are all kinds of possible scenarios.”
“Scenarios? What do you mean?” Del choked.
Inspector Awang warned, “This could be a kidnapping, madam. We have to wait to see if the kidnappers ask for a ransom. But if you say you have not heard anything in the past forty-eight hours, then we have to assume that she has been taken.”
Omar was quiet now, his voice stilted with anger. “Taken?”
“This would mean, what…?” Del pleaded.
“I am sorry, madam, but it’s to early to speculate. Anything can happen.”
“What? What? Are you saying?” Del shrieked.
Omar walked towards Del and hugged her. “Calm down, darling,” he pleaded.
“I am sorry, madam, but we are doing everything we can. We shut down the shopping centre, we checked all exits and entrances, my officers checked every shop, asking people what they saw, we have interviewed more than fifty people…nobody saw anything…please understand, we are doing our best.”
“She’s not there! Can’t you see! She’s gone!” Del screamed.
Omar steadied himself. Del pulled away from Omar and paced up and down the small, airless office. The small Pondok Polis was more like a hut, compact enough to fit the Inspector’s office, a holding room, one toilet and a front office for reports.
Inspector Awang felt sorry for the couple in front of him. His instincts told him that after twenty years of being in the police force this was not a kidnapping. This was a child who had been taken.
“Here is my card. Please call me if you need to… and thank you for meeting me here, the renovations at HQ will be done soon,” he continued, hoping to dismiss them.
Del burst out, “But surely, you can do something? Send the coast guard out, check the boats…?” She was shouting by now. “Do something! Please. I am begging you!” She lunged at him, grabbing him by the lapels of his uniform, her eyes filling with tears, her voice hoarse. She then let go and fell to the floor, her knees prostrate, her head on the ground.
Taken aback, Inspector Awang knelt down. Del was banging her head on the floor repeating “Please, please…please…help us.” Omar reached for her shoulders and tried to help her up but she pulled away.
Inspector Awang straightened up, smoothed out his uniform, looked squarely at Omar and said, “At any given day there are at least a hundred and fifty vessels, big and small, in those waters…just about six nautical miles off Port Klang. Once you’re further out in the Straits of Malacca, there are hundreds of vessels, cargo ships, fishing trawlers, sampans, speedboats, luxury yachts, everything! And…you need a warrant to search international vessels, which we will need to get from the International Maritime Law Institute in Panama. You would have to go through Wisma Putra and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It would take days, weeks…! The paperwork alone will be a nightmare…! It is simply impossible, simply impossible!” He shook his head and glared at Omar. He then turned around and strode back to his desk.
Omar remained quiet, stunned by the new revelations. Del slowly pulled herself up to standing position, her eyes puffy, her mouth quivering with silent sobs. She squeezed her eyes shut, and forced her fist into her mouth, summoning herself into silence.
“Del, let’s go, there’s nothing more here.” Omar threw a look of scorn at Inspector Awang, grabbed Del’s hand and walked towards the door pulling her forward. She followed reluctantly and let out a wail, which came deep from the recesses of a grief, so primal, so visceral, Inspector Awang was forced to light a cigarette after he shut the door. He felt sorry for the couple and knew from the familiar feeling in the pit in his belly, now hardened by years and the evil in men’s hearts, that their child would never be found.
There were no words to describe this. This pain. What I thought I once knew, I knew no longer. There was a darkness and despair that plagued only people who had lost children. It was an unspeakable, unknowable thing. There was a void that could never be filled unless your child was returned. Until then, the desire to die was stronger than the desire to stay alive, and this was the terrible place I found myself in. After Alba was taken, a frenzy fed the media. It was a maniacal clown juggling a sick circus. The glare of the media, on us, like a 24-hour spotlight.
“Grandchild of famed human rights lawyer goes missing.”
“Child taken from exclusive mall in Bangsar.”
“Toddler taken from supermarket.”
“KL is no longer safe.”
“Activist parents lose child.”
Our apartment became an instant operations centre for Alba. A day after the abduction, policemen and policewomen showed up, and we had to rearrange the furniture in the living room, move the couch, the coffee table, the TV consul, the book cases; we moved everything to fit tightly against the edge of one wall. They brought in foldable tables and chairs. We added extensions to power points, added phone lines, power lines, we set up a hotline with five different phones. We all sat and waited.
Thousands of posters were printed. Pictures of Alba were plastered on telephone poles, tollbooths, shop windows, ATM machines, the backs of lorries and taxis—from Kepong to Subang Jaya, Kinrara to Taman Tasik Permaisuri, Ampang to Taman Tun. It was on the radio, TV, chatrooms, the newspapers. Her face was everywhere. Imran had even created a special page for Alba on Malaysia Times and was coordinating all media releases and statements.
After 24 hours, there was nothing. No SMS, no email, no call, nothing. We waited for another six days, sitting at the phones, waiting, but there was nothing. Our days and nights had been put on hold, Inspector Awang came and went several times a day. The case was now being handled by D9, which was the Major Crimes unit of the Royal Malaysian Police, and we had to trust them, we had to let them do what they knew best.
On the seventh day DSP Wong, the head of D9 herself, came to see us, and she assured us that they were doing all they could, but the week was up. When the cops moved out with all the phones and wires and tables and chairs, the apartment felt like a tomb.
The shops in the shopping centre were checked again and again. Policemen and women ripped into every nook and corner, every cardboard box, every dumpster, air-con vent, every toilet cubicle, every conceivable space that could hide a child. Cars leaving the parking lot were stopped. Drivers had to step out, car boots opened, torches flashed into every cavity. Bags opened, seats unturned.
The CCTV cameras showed nothing. There was footage of Alba and me walking into the supermarket and then we walked into a blind spot. I felt cursed. The spot where I left her was undetectable. Footage of me running, walking, shouting, but nothing of her. She had simply vanished. When Omar arrived, I was already sedated by a paramedic. My eyes were glazed, fixated upon an invisible spot two feet tall above the ground. He hugged me tightly for all of three seconds then let me go, roughly.
What happened? Del, what happened?
I started shaking. Again, the same story. Recounting it for the tenth time. Then Sumi, Fairman, Papa, the police. All there. Standing together in an awkward line. More police. More statements. They wanted a picture of her. Omar gave them one. I had one in my purse, but he decided the one he had was better, more recent. I could not look at it. That was the beginning of the pain. All I wanted then was a cigarette, so I walked to get a pack from the supermarket. I was in shock. The lady at the counter averted her eyes, as if afraid. I strode out to the entrance and felt all eyes on me. The murky humid night hit. I lit it. As I inhaled deeply I felt my legs give way and I crumbled ungraciously to the floor.
A small child forms a physical attachment to her mother. And vice versa. Alba was like an appendage, a part of my body, like an invisible limb that was hand, leg, nose and mouth combined. She had become a part of me, the smallness of her fitting into the curve of my tummy and my chin when asleep, the weight of her on my chest when she suckled. My limbs felt limp from missing her, from not touching her, feeding her, bathing her, changin
g her diaper, combing her hair. Her body had occupied mine, and now I was lost.
My breasts leaked milk for days; I refused to pump them because I wanted to feel some measure of pain, until I woke one day and could not move my arm. My right breast had swollen to the size of a small melon, it was taut and hard and my nipple looked a giant prune, ready to explode. I latched on the pump and winced in pain as the milk spurted out into a milk bottle, which I then put in the freezer, next to the other frozen bottles of milk.
My days were empty. Omar was kind, he tried to be, but I was silent from shame, remorse. I waited for those words—Why did you leave her? But they were never said. The papers dug into us. The fact that we were activists once, that we campaigned for Anwar and Keadilan, the fact that I was a journalist for The Review and Saksi, had all come under scrutiny. I knew Omar was on the verge of bigger government contracts. So, he threw himself into work, as men do in time of crisis.
One day we sat and listened to each other, and I told him over and over again what happened, I told him of my exhaustion, the fact that I went to get “those biscuits”, the fact that I was planning dinner in my head, the fact that that goddamned supermarket was the safest in town! The fact that I had left her for less than a minute, and that she was there, right there, how could she have disappeared?
He sat head in his hand, then stumbled into her room and started hurling things around. Her pillows, her toys, clothes. Why? Why? Why? The whys weren’t a concern. Was she still alive? Who had her? Was she hungry? Was she safe? Was she afraid?
Those were the questions that drove me to the verge of a cliff so high, with winds so bitter and strong, and the abyss that loomed below got deeper and more sinister by the day. I was sinking into a place that was inhabited by creatures of the id, so dark and impermeable that my waking hours were trolled by images of the most gory of demons to inhabit the human mind. I spoke to no one for days. Unanswered calls from Sumi, Marina, my father, all went to voice mail, my handphone beeping endlessly with its flashing eye and then going silent.
Until one day, the doorbell rang, and rang, and then came a series of furious knocks.
Hello! Puan Delonix, tolong jawab pintu. Ini Polis Diraja Malaysia! Tolong bukak pintu!
The cops were at my door. The day before, I had sat at the Deputy Superintendent’s office, waiting for news. Watching them put out citywide alerts, then nation-wide alerts again. I watched them on walkie-talkies, handphones, go in and out of endless tea breaks. I had become a pest. I questioned and harangued them, a miasma of busybody-ness and persistence, an embarrassment perhaps. But I didn’t care. My daughter was gone and it seemed that they were doing everything, but after one week, there were no leads. They had found nothing.
I opened the door and the first thing I heard was this—We need you to come with us to the station, we just need to ask you some questions. So they took me away in a police car, just like that with enough time to send an SMS to my father, Papa they’ve come to take me, they think I am a suspect, help me.
* * *
I remember the time when Alba had bronchitis. She was four months when it started with a terrible cough. I remember trying to give her medication, She keeps spitting it out, Omar what do we do? We tried antibiotics in a syringe, slipping it into her tiny mouth, in teaspoons, miniscule amount after amount, nothing worked, she kept spitting it out. Her little lungs kept getting more and more clogged up and we had no choice but to take her to emergency in a late-night panic.
At the hospital, they wrapped her up tightly into a cocoon and thumped her little chest with cupped fists—thump thump on her back, thump thump on the side and front in cycles, hoping to loosen the phlegm. And when it got really bad, they stuck a tube down her throat and sucked up the mucus that looked like old porridge, the oats yellow and thick from exposure. She had to be put on a nebuliser, her little face covered by the plastic mask, covering her nose and mouth, her breathing sounding like a clogged, gurgling sink. It was horrific. I stayed with her in the hospital for three days. My birthday was on the second day of the hospital stay and Omar showed up after work with some cheese, crackers and a bottle of wine.
We ate brie and drank the merlot quietly while she slept in quiet submission after screaming her lungs out when the tube went down her throat. It’s good, it’s good, don’t worry, it’s loosening up the phlegm. When the mucus was drained for the final time, she fell into a deep sleep and Omar and I snuck out, found the rooftop and shared a cigarette.
Happy birthday, darling, sorry it had to be like this!
I was woozy from the nicotine and the wine and swung drunkenly into him. I had slept only hours so I was giggly and dazed. He kissed me back and then pushed me against the wall.
I want you now, Del, god I want you.
I wasn’t ready for him, I couldn’t even remember when we last made love, but there, I gave in. I had felt so helpless watching Alba, to see her like that, so small and vulnerable and us there on the roof I felt like a little revolt.
The night was clear, and the glare of the city comforted me, and in a gust of wind he took me from behind, groaning into me, and pressing me into a corner. I felt his hot breath, the taste of cheese and wine mingling into my neck and hair, my cheek being pushed into a concrete wall, his hands on my back, pushing and pulling my hips in and out of him. I thought of Alba in her little bed while Omar came, spilling his seed into me and onto the floor of that hospital roof.
For six hours, they interrogated me in a room with no windows.
State your name.
Age. Race. Religion.
Address?
Where were you educated?
What are your parents’ names?
When and how did your mother die?
You have no other siblings?
Do you support the opposition party?
Are you a friend of Anwar Ibrahim’s?
Is your father a friend of Anwar Ibrahim's?
What does your husband do?
What are his parents’ names?
What was the last time you saw your daughter?
What dress was she wearing?
Are you a good mother?
Why don’t you have a maid?
Have you been suffering from post-natal depression?
Have you ever been arrested?
What is your Muslim name?
Do you fast?
Are you and your husband practising Muslims?
Do you drink alcohol?
Have you ever done drugs?
State the names of all your previous employers.
What did you study in Canada?
How long were you there for?
Did you commit any crimes when you were in Canada?
We need the names and contact numbers of your closest friends.
Do you know that in most cases, parents are the ones who kidnap their own children?
Did you sell your child?
Are you and your husband on good terms?
Is there a reason why he would kidnap your child?
Have you or your husband any known or unknown enemies?
Why is your father not the lead counsel for Anwar Ibrahim?
Where is your mother buried?
Do you have friends in Israel?
Do you support the state of Palestine?
What is your political affiliation?
Have you ever read the Communist Manifesto?
Why did you not support the government of Mahathir Mohamad?
Please recite the NegaraKu.
Please recite the Shahadah.
Have you ever been to Cuba?
Do you know any political dissidents from Malaysia?
Are you aligned with any terrorist organisations?
When was the last time you went for a holiday?
How would you describe your relationship with your daughter?
How would you describe your relationship with your husband?
I answered everything. As best I could. And at the end, they
let me go. I went home, drank a whole bottle of wine, took four Xanax and woke up two days later.
There is a very fine line between the world of the dead and the living. The notion of what is life and what sustains it can be debated, as it has been for centuries. By scientists, philosophers, artists, writers. All life embodies breath, form and matter. A building also encompasses that. It breathes, and it excretes waste in many forms. But some human beings don’t do either. There is a young man in Nepal who has not eaten in years, he has only lived on the air that surrounded him, beneath the Bodhi tree that he has meditated under for years.
In life we are expected to be heroic, as buildings are, in the very desire to make ourselves be seen. A building has to extend itself into the sky, a monument of pride, exuberance. Human beings are expected to do the same. The verticality of life has to sustain itself in all that we do—to strive upward, to go forward, to not look back, to go into an uncertain future with bravado and strength. With restraint, so as to not offend or condemn, to be humble, to do good. For the world, for humanity. To love all mankind as your own. To contribute to society, to be heroic. Heroes, heroines. The world needs them, otherwise there would be no salve. Who would save us from ourselves?
The übermensch, the man that was more than human. The hero’s journey, where man has to go in order to grow, to experience the “dark night of the soul”, to face the abyss and then climb upward to the light. Mythology colliding in an age where it was impossible to be good in a bad world. Why do good when only bad prevails? Why live when all we face is death?
I grappled with these questions, vacillating in between the desire to slash my wrists with every knife in the kitchen, creating a splattered painting, and running screaming into the streets, and checking myself into a psych ward. I did not know what to do. I could not articulate anything without lapsing into a crippling silence. I no longer knew how to behave. I no longer understood the notion of humanity, when the child I had birthed into the world had been taken from me. Taken.
Once We Were There Page 21