The Weight of Our Sky: Chapters 1–3

“An interjection cries out HARK! I need an EXCLAMATION MARK!” our teacher Mrs. Lalitha declaims, gesturing for us to follow, pulling the most dramatic faces...

And as we peruse our geography textbooks, my mother is stabbed repeatedly by robbers, the wicked blades of their parangs gliding through her flesh as though it were butter.

She bounces away through her days, dispensing ready smiles, compliments, and high fives to all and sundry, while I trail along in her wake, awkward, vaguely melancholy, and in a constant state of semi-embarrassment.

Saf can fool a lot of people with those good-girl looks and that demure smile.

Whenever she leans too far forward, she quickly jerks her head back, her eyes opening for a split second, her face rearranging itself into something resembling propriety.

In the distance, Saf pulls monstrous faces at me, and I stick my tongue out at her in return, trying my best to quell the panic rising in my throat, threatening to choke me.

I make a face, even though I know she can’t see me; Mak Siti is our neighbor, and dinner with her means rice, a meager slice of fried fish, and a watery broth filled with wilted vegetables, all eaten to the accompaniment of the meowing of five cats and a litany of complaints, criticisms, and grouses.

I make a face, even though I know she can’t see me; Mak Siti is our neighbor, and dinner with her means rice, a meager slice of fried fish, and a watery broth filled with wilted vegetables, all eaten to the accompaniment of the meowing of five cats and a litany of complaints, criticisms, and grouses.

I pick up the receiver again, the plastic still warm from my hand, my fingers poised to dial.

I walk away on leaden feet, trying my hardest not to look back.

If I make it home from the bus stop in exactly twenty-seven steps, then Mama will have made my favorite bubur cha cha for tea, sweet and hot and laden with sweet potatoes and yams and bananas.

The air is thick with a pungent mix of odors: the delectable aroma wafting from the famous shredded duck buns on the one side...

...the mysterious smells that emanate from the jars and boxes that line the shelves of the Chinese medicine hall...

...the heady, overwhelming cologne that trails behind the college boys swaggering down the sidewalk in their ill-fitting drainpipe trousers, combs stuck in their back pockets; and everywhere, a faint undercurrent of stale sweat and cigarette smoke.

Or maybe they really are happy and contented, with minds that tick along from one thought to another, without taking any meandering detours, or getting lost on highways with no exits, or going round and round in unending loops.

“Absolutely,” she says airily, tossing her ponytail and making a beeline for the air mata kucing stall a few feet ahead of us. “Should’ve seen the look on your face.”

Mama chokes on a bite of her tiffin lunch and falls to the ground writhing and gasping for breath, her face a mottled purple blue, and I reach up, ostensibly to smooth back a hair that’s escaped from the braid that hangs down my back, but really to tap quickly three times on each side of my head.

Mama chokes on a bite of her tiffin lunch and falls to the ground writhing and gasping for breath, her face a mottled purple blue, and I reach up, ostensibly to smooth back a hair that’s escaped from the braid that hangs down my back, but really to tap quickly three times on each side of my head.

Our neighborhood is the largest Malay enclave in the city, and pig flesh is the ultimate insult for devout Muslim Malays, who view pigs not just as meat we’re forbidden from eating, but as the dirtiest of animals, unholy, unclean.

And so we went for a while, our meals greener than ever, our evenings spent gamely sending the shuttlecock flying over the gate, which acted as a makeshift net.

Badminton made the Djinn inordinately happy.

I pressed my right ear against the wall that divides my room from the kitchen, trying to ignore the instant, indignant buzzing that demanded I finish pacing.

Then Mak Su’s reedy voice piped up.

The Djinn lives inside me, and he feeds on my rituals. As long as I meet his demands, he’ll keep my mother safe. When I try to resist, frustrated at being in constant thrall to the numbers, he sets off another chain of deaths in my head, then laughs at my horrified reaction.

Records occupy almost every available inch of space; what doesn’t fit in the rows of shelves ends up piled high on tables, stools, and various other surfaces, all arranged in a haphazard system that only the aged proprietor seems to know.

Music spills out from its tiny confines onto the streets, anything from traditional Chinese operettas to the latest Pop Yeh Yeh numbers; Uncle has eclectic tastes.

Before long, we’re immersed in records new and old, swaying and dancing, mouthing along to the plaintive yeah-yeah-yeahs and nodding our heads as we browse the aisles.

Then, giggling, we head for the Rex, its walls plastered with hand-painted posters emblazoned with the impossibly beautiful faces of the stars du jour.

PAUL NEWMAN IN A HELL-OF-A-RACING-STORY! they scream in black on lurid red.

As the lights dim and the roar of racing engines begins to fill the air, Mama slips in the darkness and breaks her neck with a sickening snap, her body lying limp, limbs akimbo like the rag doll I used to cuddle to sleep.

I have to smile at Saf’s exuberance, her determination to squeeze the joy out of every moment, her willingness to hurtle through life by the seat of her pants.

From where I stand, enmeshed in a cage of numbers and secrets, it looks a lot like freedom.

He pauses and looks back, taking in my turquoise school pinafore, the half-filled cone of kuaci still in my hand.

The gangly youth in the red usher’s uniform looks at me sternly over the top of his spectacles.

Minutes later I’m back at the door, ticket in hand, and the usher, now puffy with self-importance at having completed his task, makes a grand show of examining it carefully and tearing the stub before opening the door with a flourish.

Inside, the theater is already dark, and he walks before me, shining his flashlight along the rows until at last, we spot Saf right in the center of the hall, staring at the screen in rapt attention.

As we make our way out of the row—“Finally,” a voice behind us mutters—I feel a relief so palpable it almost makes my knees buckle.

Suddenly, just as Paul Newman stoically receives a kiss on the cheek from a blond beauty queen, the movie stutters to a stop, and the screen goes blank.

“We have to try and get out,” I whisper to Saf, who is visibly pale and shaking imperceptibly.

The Djinn howls, flitting from my stomach to my chest and back again, sending my insides roiling.