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“Lintang is busy with examinations… Is Dimas there?”

Vivienne heard a long sigh.

“ Pourqoui? What’s wrong with Dimas?”

“He’s not feeling well, is all.”

“Nugroho…! This is me.”

Vivienne waited for an answer.

Finally, one came: “He’s sick but I don’t know why. Maybe his appendix, maybe something intestinal, or it could be his liver. Last night he was throwing up…”

“Is he still drinking?”

“Yes, but how else are you going to keep warm in this freezing country?”

“And I suppose he’s refusing to see a doctor. Is that right?”

Nugroho chuckled. “Oh, Viv, you know him better than anyone. What happened is that he collapsed at the Metro and we took him to the hospital. There they put him through a series of tests…”

“And he has yet to pick up the results…”

“Well, that’s our Dimas.”

“I know, but the hospital called me.”

“Oh,” Nugroho coughed. “Sorry about that, Viv. That was my fault. I’m the one who filled in the admissions form. I just figured that it was more likely that he’d listen to your advice than anything we said.”

“It’s OK. I called Lintang.”

“Oh…”

“Where is Dimas now?”

“Still asleep. He had a bad stomach again last night, so I brought him home and stayed here with him.”

“Thanks, Nug. OK, just tell Dimas that I called.”

“Will do, Viv. Give Lintang a hug and tell her that all her uncles at Tanah Air miss seeing her.”

“I know…” Vivienne answered, very slowly.

Just a week before the brouhaha about Dimas’s health, Lintang had come to visit and to borrow my Encim kebaya . That night, I decided to cook one of her favorite dishes: spaghetti alle vongole. For our family, the Dimas Suryo family, food was always medicine for the sad soul. And even though I knew a number of Indonesian recipes, particularly the ones that Dimas used to make when we were still together, I still lacked the confidence to cook them on my own. Having a husband who was a good cook was, for me at least, a lucky thing. With him doing the cooking, all I had to do was choose the wine and music and then put my feet up and wait for the meal to be served. Dimas didn’t like me interfering in the kitchen anyway; the kitchen was his kingdom and he didn’t like anyone messing in it any more than I liked someone going through my office or library. As a result of this situation, with her father making all sorts of exotic dishes, Lintang grew to be a girl with a palate for a million tastes. Because she liked to tail her father in the kitchen and watch him when he was preparing his spices for whatever dish he was making, she always knew if a dish was lacking in spices and which ones were deficient.

That night, when she told me about her professor’s comments and his suggestion for her final assignment, I immediately detected anxiety in her voice. I also heard notes of confusion and worry. To make a documentary film about her father’s homeland and a part of its history that the Indonesian government had buried wouldn’t just be difficult; it would be mentally taxing for even the soundest of minds. I didn’t know where she would find all the materials she needed to properly research the subject of September 1965. From what little I knew, so much of the available literature contained as many questions as answers. And besides all that, my hardheaded former husband and my equally stubborn daughter were not even speaking to each other.

Just as I had suspected, when I went into the kitchen and returned to the dining table with the platter of spaghetti alle vongole I had made, a happy look instantly appeared on Lintang’s face. She smiled as she inhaled the scent of clams cooked in white wine. I had thought of putting on Led Zeppelin music — that really would have made the evening complete — but I didn’t, because I knew that Lintang would mock me for it and think that I couldn’t let go of my memories with her father. Instead, I put on a CD of music by Ravel, her favorite.

Lintang closed her eyes when she tried a spoonful of the sauce. Good, she liked it. But Lintang would not have been Lintang had she not then dropped a bomb into the midst of calm.

“To do the project, I’ll probably have to go to Indonesia…”

There it was: the first shell shock. It took my breath away. I stirred the spaghetti and handed Lintang a bottle of white wine for her to open.

While she uncorked the bottle and poured the wine into our glasses, I busied myself dressing the salad, without saying anything.

“Maman…”

“Does Professor Dupont know that this is what you want to do?”

“He was the one who suggested it, who said that I should look at my own history.”

“But did he say anything about you having to fly off to Jakarta?”

Lintang ignored my question and dug into the spaghetti. Every bite she took seemed to make her more enthusiastic and she began to talk about what had happened at the Indonesian ambassador’s residence earlier that evening.

“Just imagine it, Maman, when Nara and I first arrived at the reception, nobody paid much attention to me. There were so many people and so many kinds of food… Oh, the food was delicious! You should have tasted it. I bet if Ayah had had been there he would have praised the pastel , the beef tongue, and the iced lychee. I don’t know where they managed to get it, but they even served iced young coconut.”

“But then…?” I cut in. Lintang and her father definitely had at least one thing in common: whenever the subject of food came up in conversation, they immediately turned their attention to that until they lost the focus of their story.

“What is it that makes you feel the need to go to Indonesia now? What subject do you intend to address in your documentary?”

“I’m not sure, Maman. At first, when Professor Dupont suggested that I look into Ayah’s history, I thought of focusing on the fate of the victims of 1965 here in Paris, the families of political exiles. But then, I went to that Kartini Day party at the Indonesian ambassador’s residence and…”

“And you saw another side of Indonesia.”

“Just a glimpse, un petit aperçu , but one so very different from the one I already know. It made me ask myself whether they, too, might be victims?”

“ Victimes? ”

“Yes, victims of indoctrination! You’ve got to hear what happened to me,” she said breathlessly. “All because of my presence at the reception, some of the people there started to panic, didn’t know what to do. They were so nervous. I could see the questions running through their minds: How are we supposed to react to this daughter of Dimas Suryo? Are we supposed to be friendly, polite, engage her in small talk, or keep her at a distance? What would the Home Office say? The Home Office bans us from eating at Tanah Air Restaurant but it shouldn’t be a problem for her to be here, should it? But wait a minute… What about the ‘ bersih lingkungan ’ policy. What do such terms as ‘a clean environment’ and ‘political hygiene,’ even mean? Just imagine, Maman, for people like me who weren’t even born at the time of the September 30 Movement and live far distant from Indonesia, they still require a prescription for what to think.”

By now Lintang had wiped her plate clean. There was an excited look on her face, as if she had taken some kind of stimulant. Though I knew her animation didn’t come from the alcohol, I circumspectly moved the bottle of wine to beyond her immediate reach.

“Maman,” she said, drawing a breath, “I’ve decided it’s not enough for me just to listen to stories from Ayah, Om Nug, Om Tjai, and Om Risjaf. It’s not enough to interview people at the embassy either. There’s a historical context I need to understand — how the absurdity of this part of Indonesian history even began.”