Once We Were There

by Bernice Chauly

  I woke up every morning as if I’d slept with my eyes open. Omar and I no longer shared the same bed. He had taken to sleeping on the couch in his study. We simply avoided each other. Once we collided in the living room hallway, and I saw a look so haunted in his eyes, rippled with a kind of anguish I had only ever seen once before, on my father.

  He growled a good morning and shuffled quickly out the door into his car, as if I was a pestilence, a giant cockroach that had crept out of the crevices of the floor. I stood there in the emptiness of the house, the confounding silence thundering into my ears. I found half a bottle of vodka and drank it in three gulps. Then I emptied the drawer of knives, forks and spoons and started throwing them on the walls. Then I started throwing plates onto the floor. First just by dropping them from the top of my head, then a slight twist of the wrist sent it wobbling like a Frisbee a foot or more. Then I just started smashing them. First the everyday ones, the ones for simple meals, then the ones that we got for our wedding. Gold plated, embossed with flowers. Then the crystal wine glasses. Those were harder to break, the crystal shattering into miniscule screams.

  Then the heaving came. I shook as the tears rampaged out of me, coming out of my nose and mouth like truncated gusts of water from a fire hose. I writhed on the floor until I was empty, until I fell onto the couch like a limp doll after being ravaged by a starving dog.

  There was no news at all. After two weeks, my persistent calls to Inspector Awang could have been easily perceived as harassment. I called him the minute I woke up and almost hourly during the day. It was always the same.

  I am sorry, madam, there is no news. I will call you as soon as I hear anything, anything at all.

  I was deteriorating, marginally and minutely by sheer millimetres, but every day I got out of bed was a small victory. I had refused more interviews, and had blocked out all emails and phone calls from insistent reporters and bloggers. There had been so many false alarms and hoaxes, I thought it better to stay in the confines of limited Internet access.

  Papa called me every day to make sure that I was okay, and that somehow became my lifeline. Now I understood his grief and could finally comprehend the extent of his sadness. But I told myself that he had lost a wife—I had lost a child and a husband. But the fact that my father was there comforted me, somewhat. How does one even begin to measure grief? My father’s grief and mine were incomparable. There should be a way to denominate grief in the manner of physical pain. On a scale of one to ten, what is the level of your pain?

  Mine was off the chart. The only thing that would have sedated me would probably have been an overdose of heroin, or enough alcohol to render me inchoate. I suppose it pained Omar to see me like that. I knew that he too was in an unspeakable hell and perhaps we should have gravitated to each other more, but the chasm that had appeared between us became a vast, unknown terrain. The new landscape, this new terra firma had begun to leave interminable scars and neither of us knew what to do.

  When he was not at work or away, he would be at home, in the quiet of his study. We never went into Alba’s room any more. It remained shut. It became an unknowable thing, a doorway into a black hole of pain. The pictures of garden fairies on the wall, her cot with the overhanging origami mobile that he had bought in Tokyo, the changing table with organic lotions and a Winnie the Pooh bag which held diapers, the night light that resembled a moon, the fluorescent stars on the ceiling, the fluffy pink carpet she learnt to crawl on, the stuffed toys, shelves of books, a pink and white cupboard with unworn clothes, rows and rows of soft leather shoes, all silent, unmoved.

  Sometimes, I would walk past his closed door and wonder what he did in there. In his study. Was he working? Was he chatting online? Was he as lonely as I was? I did not know who my husband had become. Perhaps we had to start again, as strangers. I stood by the door many times, wanting to open it to say, Omar I need to talk to you, need to hold you, need you to hold me back and tell me that it’s going to be okay, they’ll find her, they will. Help me, darling, help me. Please. But I never did.

  I had never felt more unwanted and unloved in my life. I had stopped putting on make-up, my extra weight had become familiar folds, my eyebrows stopped getting plucked and teased, my pre-pregnancy clothes all lined the wardrobe like a rack in a store. The green silk dress I had worn when Omar had proposed to me hung like a shroud, a pre-wedding relic of a life I could no longer have. I looked at myself in the mirror and started laughing hysterically, the ample woman with fleshy arms and a protruding belly was who I had become. The revulsion I had for myself filled me like hot lava, I tore my clothes off, and strutted like a deranged woman in the room, I pouted like a supermodel, then stuck out my belly and breasts, turned around and posed with my derriere pointed at the mirror. I tied a sarong around my chest and ruffled my hair. I picked up a glass half full with vodka and as I turned around I realised who I had become.

  My mother.

  Finding a private detective was not difficult, as Omar discovered. He’d heard that many were ex-police, specifically Special Branch officers who got tired of being on the corrupt, yet meagre gravy train. The upright ones who refused to take bribes were eventually shunned by the endemic racism that devoured many in the service. A quick scan in the yellow pages and one phone call later, PT Raja met Omar in the lobby of the Regent Hotel.

  Omar had grown gaunt, his face thin from worry and lack of sleep. Work was the only thing that sustained him and he worried about the new contract, a controversial new road that would cut through the heart of the city. The Regent was on Jalan Bukit Bintang or Star Hill Road, KL’s fashion boulevard, where malls like KL Plaza, Starhill Gallery, Lot 10, Sungei Wang and BB Plaza converged to give shoppers access to whatever their purse strings could afford. From diamond-encrusted watches in Starhill Gallery to fake Louis Vuitton bags in Sungei Wang, the street was a hub for locals and tourists, especially those from the Middle East who opened Persian and Arabic restaurants, introducing kebab, falafel and hummus to locals. Thousands of tourists from Dubai, Oman and the Arab states poured into KL in the summer: men with wives in full-black hijabs dotted the street with sweaty children in tow, mingling with street beggars and pungent smells that emanated from rat infested gutters.

  A few hundred metres from the Regent, there were plans to build another mall on the site of the Bukit Bintang Girls School, one of the oldest all-girl institutions in KL. There were virulent protests and petitions from ex-students, but all fell on deaf ears. There was a price for progress, and Omar was beginning to know that more than anything else. He was seated on a leather sofa, in deep thought. He barely noticed the tall Indian man who strode confidently across the hotel lobby to stop two feet from him.

  “Encik Malik?”

  Omar sat unmoving, his shoulders hunched. PT Raja cleared his throat and spoke again. This time Omar heard and stood up quickly, almost dropping his handphone.

  “PT Raja, good to meet you.”

  The private detective nodded, sensing a fatigue in Omar, and sat down on the far side of the sofa when gestured to sit.

  “Call me Raj, please.”

  Omar handed him a sheet of paper and said, “The police report. She has been missing for three weeks now. We still know nothing.”

  The detective glanced at the document quickly and looked at Omar intently.

  “Thank you, sir. I have also done some research, right after you told me about the case. I still have friends in Bukit Aman and I saw the case file. Inspector Awang is in charge, yes?”

  Omar nodded, then sighed, “After all this time, do they have anything at all?”

  The detective sat back in the couch and crossed his legs.

  “No sir. This kind of case is extremely difficult to solve.” He continued, “I won’t lie to you.”

  Omar sank deeper into the leather sofa and heard it squeak under him, “But you will do your best to find my daughter.”

  “Yes, of course.”

  Omar tried to shrug off the image o
f Alba he’d had since he sat down. Alba on a swing in the park. Her hair bouncing. A pink dress with small flowers and yellow jelly sandals. Her tiny hand in his. The smell of her cheeks, her laugh. He cleared his throat and stood up.

  “Shall we go for a drink?”

  “Go ahead, sir.”

  They walked across the hotel lobby to the lift. They passed tourists as well as business types. As they waited for it to open, Omar felt a tap on his shoulder. He turned and saw Marina, who exclaimed, “Omar, how are you?”

  Omar kissed Marina on both cheeks, and then turned to introduce Marina to the detective.

  “PT Raja, this is Marina, friend of my wife's.”

  The detective smiled courteously at Marina. He did not like transsexuals; he knew that Marina’s kind were often shunned and discriminated against and were forced to work in the sex trade, but he found no time to sympathise with them. They were an aberration of nature, and he found their deep voices and synthetic breasts distasteful . The lift dinged and opened. All three strode in. PT Raja pressed the button for the bar and then Marina said, “Top floor please.”

  Omar smiled at Marina and said, “You look nice.” Marina was in a sleek black number, hair teased into a french twist. A classic pearl necklace adorned her neck. Marina chuckled and pouted her red lips and mouthed, “Thank you.”

  PT Raja stood stoically and fought to raise a solitary eyebrow. This was a high-class booty call and she was getting top dollar, more than what he made in a week. Marina glanced at him and immediately felt his displeasure.

  “How’s Del?” she asked quietly.

  “Not good,” Omar shook his head as the door shuddered to a slight stop. The doors opened and the two men walked out. “Send her my love, please, she is not answering my calls,” Marina pleaded as the lift doors closed with a muffled click.

  There was a sudden uncomfortable shift between the two men. Omar cleared his throat and said, “My wife is in terrible shape, as you can imagine, and she…well, she always used to come around, but not recently. My wife does not want cheering up, as you can imagine. She just wants our daughter back.”

  Omar led the way to the bar. It was empty save for the bartender busy polishing wine glasses, who nodded and smiled at Omar, who then walked towards a corner cubicle and lowered himself onto the dark green couch. The light was low and he felt safe, unseen. The waiter asked for their order.

  “Beer?” Omar asked. The detective nodded.

  “Two Tigers please. Draft.”

  The beers arrived in tall frosted glasses. The bartender was a young Chinese boy, in his early 20s. “Will that be on your tab, sir?”

  Omar nodded. They clinked their glasses and Omar let out a long sigh.

  “Ah, nothing like a cold beer.”

  The detective agreed.

  “So, am guessing that you don’t get cases like this often?”

  The detective took another sip of his beer and nodded, “It’s mostly domestic cases. You know, wives checking up on their cheating husbands, or vice versa.”

  “Typical.”

  “But it can get very nasty, you know. At the end of the day, it’s always about money—or children.”

  “Kidnappings?”

  “Only once, sir, a boy was taken by his father. Custody issue. The kid ended up in Australia.”

  Omar drained the last of his beer and gestured to the bartender for another. “Can you help us? I know what you did before this.”

  The detective took another sip of his beer and cleared his throat. “In Special Branch—”

  Omar interrupted, “Yes I know what you did in Special Branch, my wife and I were activists, so we know. Do you have inside leads? Who would do this? Why haven’t we heard anything? Why?”

  The detective sensed Omar’s impatience and felt compelled to not say any more. Omar’s second beer arrived and the detective felt that he was not going to escape the penetrating questions that Omar had probably lined up in his head. He was a careful man; being in the police force had taught him many things about human nature, and he had become more observant and instinctive over time. He felt Omar’s quiet desperation, his confusion, his grief at not knowing where his child was. He wanted to help this man, but he knew that there were forces in the city that were not to be reckoned with, not by a common civilian.

  But the beer had loosened him up. Omar was friends with a sex worker, his child had been taken, this was an unusual situation and he felt comfortable. They were in a classy bar, Omar had already finished his beer and was probably on a mission to get drunk. So PT Raja took a deep breath, and started.

  “KL is divided into gangs, territories, numbers. For instance here, Bukit Bintang, this is where all the action happens. Drugs, prostitution, your friend for example, she would not normally be in a hotel, she is a streetwalker, but things are changing. Now they can come into hotels, bars, not like before. The trannies can move, not like the others. You have some who are locked up, sex slaves, drugged, all kinds now. Girls, young girls as well.”

  Omar turned away. This was not what he wanted or needed to hear. “Go on.”

  “I was in vice before, so I know the issues. The problem now is because we have so many refugees, but because they are illegal many of the women are turning to sex work. So the demand is higher now. And sometimes, they sell their children to the pimps, because they cannot afford to raise them. These kids end up on the street, as beggars, or they’re sold into the sex trade.”

  “And what are the police doing about this?”

  The detective continued, resolutely. “It’s very tricky, sir. The top guys, they’re all involved, politicians, taikors, you know, the triad bosses, they are all working together. It’s a business, big business, and everybody protects each other. It’s like, you don’t touch my turf, I don’t touch yours. And you pay protection money. That’s how you can do business here.”

  Omar shook his head and whispered, “Yes, I know all about that.”

  The detective took another swig of his beer and said, “You have no idea, sir. The corruption is very bad. This is also why I left the police. And young children, sorry to say…but they go missing all the time. So many, hundreds… every year.”

  Omar turned and stared at the detective pointedly, rattled by what the detective had revealed. “So do you think you will find my daughter?”

  “I…”

  “Be honest, tell me the truth.” Omar said quietly.

  “Hard to say, sir. And I am so very sorry for you.”

  I had stopped sleeping. Stopped taking the pills, they made me feel paper-thin when I woke up. My mind wouldn’t stop, it churned out images of Alba, morning into night and then into nightmares. A never-ending film reel of Alba. I was going crazy. My mind would not stop. I did not know how to make it stop. I made coffee, and sat a cup at the counter and waited for dawn to spill into the sky. I thought of the times I sat there with Alba waiting for the sun.

  Alba, look darling, it’s morning.

  We would sit and watch television in the mornings; starting with the Teletubbies, Tinky Winky, Dipsy, La La, Po, Teletubbies, Teletubbies, say hello! then Bananas in Pyjamas, then Barney the purple dinosaur, then it would be nap time.

  Morning, Del.

  Omar strode into the kitchen. The TV was on, and he could see that I had been watching cartoons, like I did with Alba every morning. He came to kiss me, but I moved away, my eyes still glued to the prancing figures on the screen.

  You need to talk to me, Del. I want to know what’s going on with you. We need to try to get through this.

  I kept silent.

  I met a private detective last night.

  I shrugged. And. So?

  Look, Del, we can’t give up.

  Who says I’m giving up?

  Pull yourself together… Can you try? Please?

  I don’t know how.

  You have to try too. I am trying, Del, but why won’t you?

  The police can’t find anything, what makes you think he
can?

  This guy is ex-Special Branch. He can help, he’s well connected.

  I giggled. SB. God, how we used to hate them. Good luck, I chirped.

  He slammed his fist on the counter, then grimaced in pain.

  Damn it, Del, damn you! Why do you have to make it worse?

  I pressed the television remote, silencing it. Then I turned to him and in a voice that had been haunted by weeks of anguish, I said this.

  I just want to die, Omar. I lost our child. I left her for thirty seconds and now she is gone. I feel worthless, I am in hell, because I put myself here. And all I feel is guilt, shame. Guilt. Shame. Every second, every fucking day. I blame myself. I cannot live with myself. I cannot do what you do. I cannot hope any more, because she will never be found. And you, you are making it worse, because you think she can be found. Alba is gone, we will never see her again. You know this, I know this. She is gone. And I have no hope left. So you can hope, but I cannot. So just let me rot in this hell.

  The look that he gave me was one of remorse, then anger, then cruelty. Without a final glance, he walked out the door, and I knew that it was the end of our love. My marriage was over.

  The Backroom had not changed in five years, but Karin had. She was gaunt, and her eyes were hollowed out. Her hair was teased with hairspray and mousse into an updo, and she wore an inch of make-up. She still looked good though, with a heroin-chic kind of elegance. I had been clean for five years, and it showed. Karin looked me up and down in my ill-fitting black dress, which curved over my tummy and stretched tightly over my thighs.

  Babes, you put on weight lah.

  No Karin, I haven’t lost it all. Shut up.

  Sorry babes, just saying, you know. Haven’t seen you in so long… And you know I don’t know what to say about Alba. I am sure the cops will find her, but you gotta stay positive, okay?

  Her eyes flashed with concern, and I knew she meant it.

  Yeah, listen, I don’t want to talk, can we just party tonight?

  Sure. How many you want? I got everything you need here.

  Give me three.