The Rent Collector (10 page)

I am kneeling on the floor in the corner to clean the ashes out of my cooking stove when our canvas flap lifts open and Lucky Fat scrambles inside. I am about to scold the boy for not calling out first, as I may have been undressed, but the fright in his eyes waves away my concern. He glances back before speaking, all while sucking in panting breaths.

“Please, Sang Ly . . . I need your help . . . Come quickly!”

“What is it?”

“My friend is hurt . . . bleeding. I don’t know what to do.”

Lucky’s voice cracks as his urgency pulls me to my feet. I brush off my hands and reach for Nisay’s shirt. While dressing my child, I pepper Lucky with questions.

“Where?”

“At my place.”

“What happened?”

“I’m not sure.”

“You said he’s bleeding?”

“Yes.”

“Let’s get Teva. She can—”

“No!” Lucky blurts out. “You must come alone!”

I don’t understand the boy’s fear and it makes me nervous, but I nod my agreement, gather Nisay in my arms, and head out the door.

I insist we stop briefly at Teva’s, but just to see if she can watch Nisay. All the while Lucky waits, terrified, as though I may slip, share the news, and cause disaster. I say nothing.

Lucky lives directly across the dump, on the far perimeter, and currently there are two paths that lead to his home. The longer one weaves around the base of the trash, making a wide circle that is flat and easy to navigate. The shorter path switches up two separate mountains of garbage, across a dipping plateau, and down the opposite side. Lucky doesn’t hesitate as he climbs up the hill. Though the boy is known for being fat and happy—not fast—today I must scramble to keep up.

Like nearly everyone at the dump, Lucky lives in a small hut fashioned from an array of bamboo poles, weathered boards, cardboard, and tin. His place is smaller than most, but for a boy living alone, it suits him fine.

He stops in front of the hut, hesitates, scans around yet again, and then motions for me to step inside. I pull open the door cautiously, creep through the opening, and glance toward the floor.

From what little Lucky has shared, coupled with his nervous hesitation, I expect to find an injured orphan boy, possibly bleeding from wounds caused by working too close to the trucks. As my eyes adjust, I indeed see a quivering child. However, the pleading, coffee-colored eyes staring back belong to a panicked girl. She is lying on the floor in the corner, as if she’s afraid to move, yet her body trembles. Tears roll down both defined cheeks, and the puffiness in her features tells me that she’s been sobbing for some time.

She is perhaps just a year or two older than Lucky, eleven or twelve at the most, and her appearance is striking. Her ebony hair flows out from beneath a faded denim sun hat that is pulled down around her ears. She wears a cotton shirt that was probably white once but is now decorated with a spattering of tan, brown, and grey stains.

And then I see the blood.

She wears dark cotton pants that are soaked nearly black around her pelvis and thighs. As fear lurches in my chest, I drop beside the child, praying that my concern is misguided.

“What’s happened? Are you in pain?” I ask as I take her hand.

“My stomach hurts,” she whispers.

“It’s okay. Breathe deeply. What’s your name?”

She continues to tremble and so I gently stroke her arm to calm her down, as I would do to assure my own child that everything will be okay.

After a moment, she softly answers. “Maly.”

“Maly? That’s a beautiful name,” I reply. “It means
blossom.
”

She nods, confirming a fact she already knows.

“Maly, has someone hurt you? Has someone touched you?”

I expect her to look away, but instead she shakes her head back and forth. “No one has touched me.”

I turn to Lucky for confirmation. “Can you tell me what happened?”

“We were picking at the dump and all of a sudden she just started bleeding. She got really scared and began to cry—so I brought her here. We didn’t know what to do.”

As the true nature of the situation comes into focus, I am so very thankful.

“Maly, do you have a mother?” I ask, though I can already guess her answer.

“Mother is dead.”

“And your father?”

She shakes her head again to let me know he is also either dead or out of the picture.

“I am sorry. Where do you live?”

Lucky interrupts. “She lives with her older brother. They haven’t been here long.”

I turn to the boy. “Can you get us some water? And do you have some clean rags?”

“I have two shirts.”

“That will help.”

Lucky gathers the shirts from a box in the corner that is surrounded by Buddhas, and then retrieves a bucket that he’s filled with water from the jar outside. He sets it down and watches nervously.

“Lucky, would you mind waiting outside?” I ask. “I need time with Maly . . . alone. There are a few things I need to explain to her.”

Lucky doesn’t move, but instead fidgets with his fingers so he won’t have to look me in the eyes. “Why? What things?” he asks.

“It’s woman talk. I don’t believe you’ll want to hear it.”

“But I need—”

“Just go. Please!”

Lucky leaves with a disgusted sigh, though I suspect he’s listening just beyond the hut’s thin walls. While I don’t yet have a daughter of my own, I’m thankful that he’s brought me here today, and I promise silently not to let this girl down. First, I try to calm her fears. With an equal mixture of clarity and concern, I do my best to explain to Maly the cause of her bleeding, what it means, and why there is no reason to be afraid. She listens quietly, nods often, and says little.

Next I help her to clean up. We rinse her pants as best we can, and then I wring them out and hang them up inside to dry. I let her bunch up one of the shirts to hold in place between her legs to capture any more bleeding. Then I rummage through Lucky’s box and find a pair of shorts that fit well enough for her to use temporarily.

“You are experiencing what is called
rodow,
meaning
season,
” I add. “It’s a moment to celebrate in a girl’s life, not to fear.”

“But not everyone is sent away when their season comes,” she whispers in a voice so tender and timid I can barely hear.

“Sent away? Maly, what are you talking about? You won’t have to go anywhere. Just explain to your brother what has happened—what we’ve talked about. He will understand.”

At that moment Lucky screams from outside. “No, Sang Ly! He won’t . . . she can’t!”

He storms in through the door and plants his hands on his waist in a defiant stance that declares he’s not leaving again.

“I was trying to tell you!” he says. “Her brother has joined a gang. Now that she’s . . . well, a woman, they’re going to take her to
Tuol Kork.
”

As the boy’s words sink in, I comprehend the trembling, the fear, the child’s tears. This stunningly innocent and beautiful girl of no more than twelve is going to be taken by her brother to the city’s red-light district and be sold to a brothel as a child prostitute.

The notion is unthinkable to anyone civilized—but in Cambodia, it happens all the time. Usually the family is poor; sometimes the parents or relatives may even be unaware. At the suggestion of a distant cousin or an acquaintance, a man arrives and offers to pay the family a large sum of money, usually about $200, with the promise of a job for the child as a waitress in the city. But there is no restaurant, and by the time the frightened girl realizes what is happening, it’s too late.

To the right customer, a week with a virgin will sell for more than the amount paid for the child. After that, she’ll become one of hundreds of enslaved child prostitutes, forced to carry out unspeakable acts for as little as $2 a session. If she refuses, she’ll be beaten. No matter how hard she works, her debts for room and board will always add up to more than the money she is able to bring in.

Unable to hold back any longer, Lucky’s distress finally transforms into tears. He turns to hide his face, but as he does, his eyes pause on the girl—and for the first time I see her features brighten. His concern is instantly clear. When he turns back toward me, his plea is also unmistakable.

“Sang Ly, we can’t let it happen. We’ve got to do something, and we’ve got to do it now!”

*****

For as long as I can remember, there have been gangs at the dump. They prefer roaming Stung Meanchey over the streets of the city because the police typically refuse to patrol here on account of the horrific smell—and also because those who live at the dump are too poor to pay the policemen’s bribes. The thugs are usually young, children in their early teens, often abandoned or without parents—at least any who care. Their crimes are mostly petty, but aggravating nonetheless. If they catch you alone, they will circle you and
ask
for money—theft by intimidation. If the buyer happens to be closed after a day of gathering and you forget to take your bag of recyclables inside, it’s unlikely you’ll find it waiting for you beside your house in the morning. At other times, the kids cause mischief just to be cruel—tipping over water jars, cutting slits in canvas recycle bags, dumping human waste in front of doors so that you step in it first thing in the morning (though considering we live at Stung Meanchey and encounter human waste all day long, I’ve never understood that).

Lately, however, the gangs have been getting more aggressive, more brazen, and nearly deadly. It is an interesting irony. It’s because they are getting violent that Ki insists something must be done. For the very same reason—fear of violence—many of those living here refuse to get involved, and I can’t blame them.

During the Khmer Rouge revolution in the mid to late 1970s, more than a million Cambodians were slaughtered by the vicious dictator Pol Pot and his government. Since that genocide, those who managed to survive have raised an entire generation of children who have been taught that to stay alive in the world, it’s best to lie low, mind your own business, and let others do the fighting.

I walk to the plateau above the trucks to meet Ki so that I can tell him about Maly. However, he’s been talking with some of the men at the dump about the gangs, and when he finally meets me he’s too angry to listen.

“They are cowards,” Ki hollers as we walk home, gesturing back at the men still sitting beneath the shelters.

“Try to understand,” I say.

“I do,” he insists. “I understand that the gangs almost killed me. I understand that if we don’t do something soon, someone else will be next. I understand that if we just sit around—”

“Okay,” I interrupt. “I get your point.”

“They are thinking only of themselves!”

“And how about you?” I ask.

“What do you mean?”

“Are you protecting your family, or is it something more?”

“What are you asking?”

“I’m asking are you really wanting to protect others—or are you simply seeking revenge?”

He doesn’t answer. I wait until we are far enough away that I’m certain no one else can hear.

“There’s also a little matter that I need your help with—okay, a big matter.”

I explain to him how I helped Maly, including her young age and her fear of what might happen if she returns home. When I tell him her brother is one of the gang members, I see Ki’s muscles visibly tighten.

“What kind of animal would sell his own sister?” he asks in utter disgust.

“I don’t know,” I answer. “The real question is, how do we handle it?”

“We?”

“Yes. We have to help her!” Ki knows I’m right, though his hesitation raises a valid concern.

“How, exactly?” he asks. “We live in the same dump they do. I mean, we can try to hide her, but if her brother is in one of the gangs, he’ll have them all looking for her. She’ll never be safe if she stays here.”

“We could try the police?” I suggest, already knowing his answer.

“For the right price,” he confirms, “they will haul her to the brothel themselves—after they’ve had a turn with her.”

“What do we do, then?”

“I don’t know, but until we figure this out, tell Lucky to keep her inside. And be careful who you tell . . . people talk. If the wrong person finds out, one thing is certain.”

“What’s that?”

“It will be too late for the girl.”

*****

Sopeap arrives, but we do not discuss literature or learning. Instead, she spends her time once again listening to me read while she crouches in the corner and scribbles notes from her books.

Though I am worried about Maly, I try to act as if nothing is wrong. Still, I must sound ridiculously impatient as I read because when I pause, she answers a question I haven’t verbalized—at least not in the last twenty minutes.

“Your reading is coming along well,” she says, “but if we dive into the pool before it’s full, we’ll hit our heads.”

“Is that a literature lesson?” I ask with a hint of sarcasm.

“No,” she replies curtly. “That is a common-sense lesson.”

For someone who insisted that we discuss literature
quickly,
she is taking her own sweet time. Sopeap also won’t say why she is leaving the dump, just that she’s been planning it for a while but has yet to finalize her timing. Whenever I press her further, she gets belligerent and calls me foolish for asking questions that are
none of my damn business.

“Are you ready?” she asks out of the blue as she shuffles her notes.

“Yes,” I answer, not sure to what I’m agreeing, but ready anyway.

“Fine. I’ve taught you how to read. Now let’s teach you how to see.”

She takes pages from her notebook and hands them to me.

“In time, we will learn from stories that come from all around the world,” she announces. “Today, we will start with a few of the most basic stories ever written, timeless stories that come originally from Greece.” Sopeap gestures to the papers now in my hand as she makes the introduction. “Sang Ly, meet Aesop, writer of countless children’s fables.”