Eka Kurniawan - Beauty is a Wound

Then they were lifted onto a truck that was waiting across the river. Everyone crouched along the sides except Dewi Ayu, who stood leaning against the wall of the truck taking in the view along the familiar journey to Halimunda, next to two armed guards. After two years in the camps, almost all of the young women already knew each other well, but no one seemed to want to talk, and they were amazed by Dewi Ayu’s calm demeanor. Even Ola didn’t know what she was thinking, and presumptuously decided that Dewi Ayu didn’t have anyone left to worry about — she wasn’t leaving anyone behind.

“Where are we being taken, Sir?” Dewi Ayu asked a soldier, even though she knew that the truck was headed to the western edge of the city, or maybe beyond. The guards apparently had been given orders not to speak to the women, so he ignored Dewi Ayu’s question, and instead kept talking to the others in Japanese.

The women were brought to a big house with a sweeping yard full of trees and bushes, a big banyan tree in the center, and alternating palm trees and Chinese coconut trees lining the fence. When the truck entered the grounds, Dewi Ayu guessed that there were more than twenty rooms in the two-storey house. The girls got down from the truck dumbfounded: from a vile and gloomy prison camp they had come all of a sudden to a comfortable and even luxurious mansion. It was so strange — the orders must have gotten mixed up or something.

In addition to the two guards, there were more soldiers patrolling the expansive grounds or sitting playing cards. A middle-aged native woman appeared from inside the house, wearing her hair in a bun and a loose-fitting gown with the belt untied at her waist. She smiled at the women standing in the yard like peasants too nervous to approach the king’s palace.

“Is this your house, Miss?” asked Dewi Ayu politely.

“Call me Mama Kalong,” she said. “Because like a kalong , a fruit bat, I’m much more often up and about at night than during the day.” She came down off the veranda and approached the women, trying to lighten the bleak expressions on their faces with a joke and a smile. “This used to be a vacation house owned by a Dutch lemonade factory owner from Batavia. I forget his name, but it doesn’t really matter because the house belongs to you all now.”

“What for?” asked Dewi Ayu.

“I think you know what for. You are here to volunteer for soldiers who are sick.”

“Like Red Cross volunteers?”

“You’re smart, kid. What’s your name?”

“Ola.”

“All right, Ola, invite your friends inside.”

The house interior was even more amazing. There were many paintings, most in the Mooi Indie style, hanging on the walls. The whole structure was still intact, made from intricately carved wood. Dewi Ayu saw a family portrait still hanging on the wall, a group of people from what looked like more than three generations all squeezed together on a sofa. Maybe they had successfully escaped, or maybe some were living in Bloedenkamp, or quite possibly they were all already dead. A large portrait of Queen Wilhelmina was leaning over in one corner; maybe the Japanese had taken it down. This all made Dewi Ayu realize that she herself must no longer have a home: probably the Japanese had it, or maybe it had been blown to smithereens by an off-target shell. But every little thing was diligently cared for, maybe by Mama Kalong, and when she walked into one of the bedrooms, she felt like she was entering a bridal chamber. The big bed had a soft, thick mattress and a mosquito net the color of a red apple, and the air was fragrant with roses. The armoires were still filled with clothes, some for young ladies, and Mama Kalong said that they could wear them. Ola remarked that after two years in the prison camp, it all seemed like a dream.

“What did I tell you,” said Dewi Ayu. “We are on an excursion.”

Each girl got her own room, and the luxury didn’t end there. With the help of two servants, Mama Kalong served them a complete rijsttafel dinner, which, after starving for months on end, was the best thing they had ever tasted. Still, the memory of those they had left behind in the camp made it impossible for most of the girls to enjoy these indulgences.

“Gerda should be with us,” said Ola.

Dewi Ayu tried to comfort her, “If we don’t end up getting sent to do forced labor in a weapons factory, then we can go get her.”

“The woman said we were going to be Red Cross volunteers.”

“And so? What’s the difference? You don’t even know how to dress a wound, so what would Gerda do?”

It was true. But they were all already enchanted by the idea of becoming Red Cross volunteers, even if it meant working for the enemy. At the very least, it was better than dying of starvation in the prison camp. They became all abuzz discussing matters of first aid. One young girl said that she had been a member of the girl scouts, and knew how to staunch a wound, and not only that, she also knew how to treat less serious illnesses like diarrhea, fever and food poisoning, with wild plants.

“The problem is, the Japanese soldiers don’t need diarrhea medicine,” said Dewi Ayu. “They need someone to amputate them at the neck.”

Dewi Ayu left the group and went into her room. Because she was the calmest among them, even though she wasn’t the oldest, they had come to consider her their leader. So the nineteen other girls followed her and gathered in her room, some sitting on top of her bed, and resumed their conversation about how to amputate a Japanese soldier’s neck, just in case their heads were wounded and no longer useful to them. Dewi Ayu paid no attention to their foolish chatter, and instead chose to enjoy her new bed, like a little child with a new toy. She massaged the mattress, stroked the blanket, rolled back and forth, and even jumped up and down to make the mattress jiggle and her friends bounce.

“What are you doing?” one of them asked.

“I just want to see whether this bed will collapse if it’s given some hearty shakes,” she replied while jumping.

“There’s no way there will be an earthquake,” said another girl.

“Who knows,” she replied. “If I am going to end up falling onto the floor while I’m sleeping, I’d rather just lie down on the floor to begin with.”

“Such a strange young girl,” they said, and one by one they drifted off to their own bedrooms.

After they had all left, Dewi Ayu walked to the window and opened it. There were thick iron bars and she said to herself, “There is no way to escape.” She closed the window, climbed into her bed, and pulled up the covers without changing her clothes. Before closing her eyes she prayed, “Well hell, you know that this is what war is like.”

When morning arrived, breakfast was already prepared: fried rice with eggs sunny-side up. All the girls had bathed but they were still wearing their old clothes, which resembled foul dishrags that had been used and washed and set out to dry one too many times. Their bloodshot eyes showed the traces of tears cried all night long. Only Dewi Ayu had brazenly taken the clothes from her armoire, and was wearing a short-sleeved cream-colored dress with white polka dots and a belt that cinched her waist with a round buckle. She had powdered her face, applied a thin layer of lipstick, and the faint scent of lavender perfume wafted off her body. She had found everything in the drawers of the vanity table. She looked elegant and bright, as if it was her birthday, quite out of place among the gloomy girls around her. They looked at her with accusatory gazes, as if they had caught a traitor red-handed, but after eating breakfast they all ran to their rooms, quickly changed their clothes, and admired one another.