Eka Kurniawan - Beauty is a Wound

She almost never appeared in public, but was only occasionally glimpsed passing by inside a rickshaw at dusk, heading for Mama Kalong’s, or returning home in the morning. Aside from that, she might be sighted taking her young girls to the movies, to the fair, or dropping them off at school. Sometimes she went to the market, but that was very rare. Strangers to the city would never have guessed that she was a whore, dressed more modestly than anyone else and walking as daintily as a palace maiden, with her shopping basket in one hand and her parasol in the other. Even in the whorehouse she wore a thick warm gown that covered everything up, and preferred to sit reading travel books in a corner of the tavern. She never tempted men in public: that was not her way.

Her old family home was in the colonial section of the city, right at the foot of a small mountain facing the sea, behind the remaining cocoa and coconut plantations. She had bought it back out of a longing for the past, but now the nostalgia was killing her. A new housing complex was being built on the banks of the Rengganis River and she had already reserved a house there, hoping to move in the following year.

That afternoon the preman came to call, not long after the lady of the house had woken up and bathed, and he was greeted by a little girl, about eleven years old. She introduced herself as Maya Dewi and told Maman Gendeng to wait in the front room because her mother was drying her hair. The child would be as beautiful as her mother, that was already obvious, and she brought him a glass of iced lemonade, and when the preman took out a cigarette, the girl rushed to place an ashtray on the table. Maman Gendeng decided the house’s neat and orderly appearance must be the young girl’s handiwork. He had heard from Mama Kalong that Dewi Ayu had three daughters, and he was curious to see how beautiful the girl’s sisters were. But it appeared that Alamanda and Adinda were not at home.

Dewi Ayu emerged with her hair left loose and shining in the afternoon sunlight. She told her daughter to leave them, woke up a kitten that was curled up sleeping on her chair, and sat down. All of her movements were slow, graceful, and deliberate. She leaned back, crossing her legs, in a long gown with large pockets on both sides and a ribbon that tied at her throat. Maman Gendeng could smell soft lavender and aloe vera in her hair. Even though he had already slept with her and seen her naked, he was still struck by her intoxicating beauty. Her slender hand was as white as milk, reaching for a packet of cigarettes in one of her pockets, and then she joined him smoking. For a moment Maman Gendeng could only bumble awkwardly, unable to look anywhere except at her feet and her pair of deep green velvet slippers slowly rocking back and forth.

“Thank you for coming,” said Dewi Ayu. “Welcome to my home.”

The preman already knew why he had been invited, or at least he could guess. He realized that he couldn’t justify his claim, but he had fallen in love with the woman. He had finally been able to forget all his pain, forget Nasiah and forget the Princess Rengganis, enraptured by this incredible whore. He did not want to be hurt again, so if he could not marry her then at least he would be the only man to sleep with her.

The whore’s composure, surely due to her intelligence, was truly extraordinary. She exhaled evenly, and her eyes followed the floating smoke like a thinker mulling something over. Her imported cigarette smelled crisp and light, without cloves. She had emerged carrying her own glass of lemonade and after she had finished her cigarette she drank a little and gestured for the thug to drink from the cold glass set before him, and awkwardly he did so. In a distant mosque a child beat a drum, so it must have been around three in the afternoon.

“It’s sad,” said the whore. “You are actually the thirty-second man to try and own me.”

That didn’t surprise the preman , he already knew what she was going to say. “I will either marry you,” he said, “or pay you every day for your exclusive services.”

“The problem is that I can’t have sex every single day, so I’d often be receiving money for nothing,” she said with a little laugh. “But I would like it because, at least I’ll know who the father is if I get pregnant.”

“So you agree to become my private whore for the rest of your life?”

Dewi Ayu shook her head. “Not for quite that long,” she said, “but for as long as your dick and your finances allow.”

“If you’re not satisfied, I can use my finger or a cow’s hoof in place of my dick.”

“I’m sure your finger will be just fine, as long as you know how to use it,” said Dewi Ayu chuckling. She fell silent for a moment and then murmured, “So this is the end of my career as a public prostitute.”

She said it almost nostalgically. Over the years there had been so much sadness, but there had been some good times too. “Really every woman is a whore, because even the most proper wife sells herself for a dowry and a shopping allowance… or love, if it exists,” she said. “It’s not that I don’t believe in love, actually it’s the complete opposite, I do all of this with the utmost love. I was born into a Dutch family and was a Catholic until I recited my syahadat and became a Muslim on my wedding day. I was married once and I was once a religious person. Just because I have lost all of that doesn’t mean I have lost love. I feel like I have become a Sufi and a saint. To be a whore you have to love everybody, everything, all of it: penises, fingers, and cow’s hooves.”

“Love has only made me suffer excruciating pain,” said the preman .

“Well, you are free to love me,” said Dewi Ayu. “But don’t expect too much in return, because expectation has nothing to do with love.”

“But how can I love someone who doesn’t love me back?”

“You’ll learn, Tough Guy.”

To seal their agreement, Dewi Ayu extended her hand and Maman Gendeng kissed her fingertips. The arrangement pleased them both, and even though they did not live in the same house, they began to seem more and more like newlyweds. When Maman Gendeng met the prostitute’s other daughters, who had inherited their mother’s perfect beauty, Alamanda was sixteen and Adinda was fourteen. He proclaimed, “I will kill anybody who bothers those girls.”

They began to be spotted out and about as a family, going to the movies together and spending Sundays at the beach, fishing or swimming. The rest of the time the preman met Dewi Ayu at night at the pavilion behind Mama Kalong’s tavern. When morning came she no longer hurried home, and they would relax in the orange grove chatting.

But one night, weeks after Maman Gendeng’s arrival, he didn’t visit Mama Kalong’s whorehouse. No one else dared touch Dewi Ayu, so she was passing the time reading travel guides when, flanked by his bodyguards, another man showed up: Shodancho.

This was his first visit to the brothel. Overjoyed, Mama Kalong came rushing out to greet him herself, ready to serve him anything he wanted. Shodancho didn’t want anything except the most beautiful whore in the place. He turned toward Dewi Ayu and without hesitation he pointed straight at her. Onlookers trembled at his choice, and no one dared say a thing when Dewi Ayu shook her head no. This was the first time Dewi Ayu had ever refused a customer, but Shodancho was not a man to be defeated by a mere shake of the head. Brandishing his pistol he walked toward the prostitute and ordered her to toss her travel guide aside and come along to bed. For the first time ever, she was forced to walk to her room without being coddled and carried, and this filled her with resentment. Shodancho followed her to the pavilion while his bodyguards sat in the tavern.