Syafiqah was not sure just where the old fragment of book came from, but she was bored and it was the only material to hand that she had not read. She had finished the American book about the teenage vampire, the slushy one that was made into a film, that one with that American girl whose father had been a mediocre country and western singer some years before. Therefore, as it was raining, she reached for the yellowing book, wiped the dust carefully from the first and last pages and the broken spine, sat on the corner of her bed and began to read.
In the golden morning kampong half-light, still slightly scented by a smoky mosquito coil, Amir Hussain, a bronzed, muscular young Indian stood in his newly laundered white dhoti, which lingered teasingly between the girlish curvature of his waist to a centimetre above his youthful knees.
Syafiqah noted that the book had no actual cover, only pages and a spine.
Several of the first stories, in what appeared to be a volume of short stories, seemed to be missing. All the information Syafiqah had about the book was in fine print at the top of the page facing her-page 62. This suggested that the book, when it was whole, had been The Best of Southeast Asian Erotica Volume 2, whatever that was.
She shrugged; the title meant nothing to her, but, a little intrigued, she began dipping into the story. At sixteen, with all the normal peculiarities of a mid-teen, Syafiqah readily found herself identifying with the main character, Farah, a Malay girl who, like Syafiqah, lived in a small rural kampong.
Eagerly, Syafiqah read on, but a little puzzled.
Shafts of Mediterranean yellow light pierced the musky ambience of the wooden lean-to’s interior. It revealed a fresh glistening moistness on Amir’s arms and upper torso as he strained to manipulate firmly resistant oiled dough, in preparation for making roti canai.
‘Shafts of Mediterranean’. Syafiqah had read about the Mediterranean.
It was in Europe, wasn’t it? Why were there shafts of European light coming into a kampong lean-to. Was it a kampong lean-to in Europe then? How odd.
With a combination of curiosity and the need to be engaged in something, Syafiqah decided that to enjoy the story, she must really put her questioning aside until she had finished reading it, otherwise there was no way she was going to enjoy it. So, on she read …
Small beads of sweat gathered at his brow, catching the sunlight as Amir toiled in the warmth of his father’s morning shop, serving to highlight the smooth, rich, dark, chocolate brownness of his skin. Carefully, he wiped the salty, oily sweat away, preventing it from falling into the dough he was kneading and tainting it.
‘Eee-yuk, sweat,’ said Syafiqah with a mock shudder, then ‘Mmm …
chocolate.’
Amir was customarily focussed, earnest about his task as he continued massaging the moist dough until it became pliant, kneading the soft, slightly resistant substance, feeling it, in its tenaciousness, bouncing back at the touch of his firm masculine hands. For a moment, just for a moment, the soft silky dough enveloped his hands in a supple oily caress. Busy, Amir did not allow the dough to linger, rejecting its touch and the promise of soft intimacy.
Ten-what? What is tenaciousness, is it like nine-aciousness, but with one extra. Syafiqah reached for her Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary and looked the word up. Ah, yes, okay. Well, why couldn’t they say that then?
she said to herself, frowned and once more began to read.
In the robust rhythm of his work method, Amir could feel the smooth slippery dough squeeze between his strong fingers like a gentle lover’s kiss, warm, soft yet irrepressibly elusive. Repeatedly, Amir touched the waiting dough, and the dough, though to all intents and purposes inanimate, touched him gently, lovingly back. Even when Amir was a little rough, the dough embraced his roughness, subsumed it into itself and gave pliancy in return, understanding that tough love often came before the needed tenderness.
When the initial pulling and touching were spent, when Amir understood that the dough, despite qualms, was truly ready, Amir would take firm hold of the oiled, manipulated dough in both of his strong, damp hands, lift the dough and toss it back firmly, almost roughly onto its oiled bed. He stretched the dough, massaged it, feeling it relax, become more submissively elastic under his sturdy, determined hands. Again, the supple dough would be lifted and thrust back, down onto the waiting surface, and again, and again, adding to its already acquiescent suppleness. A total of eight times, the now obedient dough would be lifted and returned, forcefully, manfully to the oily surface, its compliance subtly growing with each vigorous stretch.
Quickly, the dexterous Amir would flip the corners of the oily dough over, side by damp side and side over oily side into the centre, until all four sides of the griddle bread lay together at the centre of the dough, forming closely intimate layers. Then, the mass would be lifted once more and, deftly grabbing one side, Amir would gently pull it over the whole-a headscarf over a newly married woman’s wanton tresses, indicating her freshly found sensual status, binding the succulent, moistly accommodating layers together.
These infinitely smooth layers of kneaded dough and oil would aid the bread to become crispy, comfortably hard when heated on the sturdy flat griddle, separating them out, giving the roti canai its traditional crusty layered texture and deeply delicious flavour. Amir would manhandle each roti canai in exactly the same way, resolutely stretching and pulling, grasping and caressing until the whole batch was ready for the griddle and, ultimately, the ecstasy of gratuitous consumption by some waiting, welcoming, mouth.
Mmm, this is making me hungry; I wonder what Mak is making for lunch. Syafiqah tried to ignore her growing hunger pangs and returned to the text.
Most days, in the glow of the early morning and in the failing roseate light of evening time, Amir worked hard for his father-making roti canai at their rural wooden lean-to and making money by selling the crispy, slightly oily, unleavened griddled breads to their eager regular customers.
Through his ardent toil, Amir gained in stature both in his family and in the local community. The heroic Amir’s hard working diligence was the talk of the kampong. He was regular, punctual, and served the best-made roti canai for miles around. Everyone knew this, everyone appreciated this.
For the few idle female customers-those with nothing better to do than to dream, sigh over young athletic men-and the few heavily breathing male customers too, it also helped that Amir was devilishly handsome, with sharp, aesthetically pleasing Indian features. For he was as close as the kampong dwellers would ever get to the uncommon beauty of an Indian movie star. No doubt, Amir being comely added more than a frisson of spice to the kampong dwellers daily lives and to their purchasing of the layered breads, knowing that, inevitably, Amir was there waiting, silently servile to service their pleasure.
Because of Amir’s youth, his gentle, yet firm mannerisms and his obvious beauty, he seemed to attract many admirers, young and old. Early in the morning, every morning, as the kampong awakened from another hot, sultry night of insect orchestrations and firefly illuminations, before too many other kampong dwellers were abroad, two mid-teen schoolgirls-Farah and Mira-would be sent by their mothers to collect roti canai for their respective father’s breakfasts. It had become their daily routine.
Along the worn kampong track, between the roundly, curvaceously pendulous papaya and the firmly erect banana plants, past shadowy tall coconut trees blessed with hirsute rotund fruit and scented curry-leaf bushes, the two friends would walk, perhaps a little too eagerly, heading in the scant morning light towards the wooden lean-to where Amir, the kampong’s master baker, created roti canai.
A short time ago, shortly after Hussain’s son Amir had taken over the making of the much desired roti canai from his father, the two girls had discovered, quite by accident, a loose board at the rear of the lean-to where Amir wrestled with dough. At first, the loose board, hanging limp and uninteresting, held no interest to the two girls, but when Farah, the slightly elder of the two, approached the misplaced plank, it seemed somehow more erect. She managed to peer through the gap its displacement had made, and practically melted at the sight of the golden Amir as morning shafts of sunlight played across his hard-working form.
Hastily, guiltily, Farah wanted to replace the board. She blushed. She momentarily had been tempted to keep the discovery to herself; however, at Mira’s insistence, she let her friend gaze through the hole-into wonderland.
That adrenalin-pumping, pubescent hormones-raging morning, the two girls, now more than a little excited, giggled all the way back home and, later, giggled all the way to school on the banana-coloured bus. At school, they kept their warm, dark secret until it was time to catch the ancient yellow bus back home once more, then giggled and fantasised all the way back to their homes.
It was at that point that there was a knock on the door. ‘ Adik, what are you doing in there? You are so quiet.’ Self-consciously, Syafiqah dropped the book fragment to the floor, giving it a little kick so it slid under her bed-she was worried that her mother might catch her reading unsuitable material.
‘Nothing Mak, just tidying.’
‘Okay. Don’t forget that I will need help with the laundry later.’
‘No, Mak,’ said Syafiqah. Her mother had not entered Syafiqah’s bedroom, so, when she considered it safe again, Syafiqah got down on her hands and knees and dragged the tomb out from where it rested-under the bed amongst dust and black-and-white house lizard debris. With a tinge of excitement now, she began to read on.
The following day, each girl dared the other to spy through the gap in the wooden boards, but neither dared to as they were frightened that they would be caught-and what could they possibly say in their defence, if they were caught. Their secret remained between them, as tangible as the breasts that began to strain their blouses.
Some days and some warm, dream-filled nights went past, with the longing to spy on Amir becoming greater with each passing day, until Farah, untypically alone, stopped while walking to the lean-to for her father’s breakfast.
Carefully, she walked to the back of the wooden lean-to and, looking around to make certain she was not being observed, prised open the already loose board. The gap was ever so slight, but large enough for Farah to see what she desired to see. Cautiously, guiltily, she put her almond eye right up against the opened crack, and gazed into the musty depths of the wooden lean-to.
The beautiful young Amir, with his back to the intently spying girl, was intent upon kneading the soft dough for roti canai. Farah, dressed for school in her light blue-and-white uniform and carrying the payment for her father’s roti canai in her hand, had crept to the rear of the lean-to as carefully as she could, so as not to make a sound. She had prised open the hanging loose plank, making a gap between the wooden boards. Wary not to mark her school clothes, Farah had pulled over a discarded piece of paper to kneel on and gleefully nestled down to, once again, watch Amir.
Surreptitiously, enthusiastically, Farah observed the sweet morning light as it playfully kissed Amir’s toned body, lightly caressing him and alternately revealing his skin-golden in the morning shafts of light, then warm chocolate as he moved slightly into shadow. Amir stirred, pulling and pushing at his bread, his hard shiny muscles flexing and relaxing as he energetically twisted the dough before him.
Good grief, said Syafiqah to herself … and continued.
Next door, but a fluttering heartbeat or two away, the kampong corner shop was beginning to stir. The gnarled, ancient owner could be heard treading the wooden floorboards, almost dragging his slippered feet with his aged step, then unlatching the shop door from the inside, there was a sharp
‘clink’ as the rusted metal arm hit the top of the protective metal sleeve and
‘clunk’, as it fell.
Frozen with anticipation, Farah could hear the store owner moving back inside his shop, heading towards the now whistling kettle blowing its head of steam into the waiting morning. He needed to tend to the preparations for his customers’ morning tea, as soon, if Farah dallied too long, the shop owner’s customers would be milling around inside and outside of the kopi shop, too close to where she knelt for her comfort … and her reputation.
Sleek Amir breathed a little more deeply at his work. Flexing his slender, toned arm muscles, Amir plunged his strong brown hands deep into the resisting dough, pulling and stretching at the dough for as hard and as long as he could last.
Without pause, he pummelled the dough with practised, energetic fists, elbowing the dough with swift strong motions, twisting and manipulating the dough until, eventually, he was forced, momentarily, to stop, to take breath, glowing like a wrestler, sweat running in tiny rivulets down his smooth back.
Turning on the electric fan for a little air, Syafiqah eagerly read on.
Amir straightened to ease his back muscles. Suddenly, he thrust his head back, tensing, then releasing, tensing, then releasing the taut muscles at the back of his neck. Just for a second, Farah fantasised about Amir’s head movement, imagining it as mimicking that of an Indian starlet’s as she whipped her wet black hair back in an arc, the slight sweat in Amir’s hair resembling water spraying in some passionate, romantic South Indian film, to the weighty rhythm of a Tamil music director. Amir’s neatly cropped hair, however, was not the luscious tresses of a film starlet. But to Farah’s eyes, his gesture echoed the sheer poetry of the filmi moment perfectly.
Next, putting his hands on the top of his dhoti at his waist, thumbs to the rear while his fingers faced forward, Amir leaned backward and pushed gently but firmly against his back muscles, then repeated the same exercise forward, then to the right, and to the left, stretching and easing his muscles as he did so. There was a feline grace and choreography to his movements, and somewhere, deep inside, he was no longer Amir, son of Hussain, maker of roti canai, but the sprightly satyr Prabhu Deva dancing to the lyrical strains of ‘Urvasi Urvasi’ by the maestro A. R. Rahman.
Prabhu Deva ? Ah yes, Mak used to like him, but Michael Jackson was better. Syafiqah continued reading.
Witnessing the beauty and grace of the young Amir’s movements, breathing in achingly short gasps, Farah’s budding teen chest rose and fell in helpless excitement. She pressed her young soft hand against her moist mouth, tasting the saltiness of her fingers as she tried to stifle her little involuntary cries, terrified lest the object of her awe hear her. Farah, inextricably caught between the wantonness of her nascent desire and her very real need for caution, found that she was unable to tear her eyes away from the movements of the exquisite Indian.
Guiltily, Syafiqah turned towards the door, checking to see that she had bolted it. She was excited, but a little wary too, lest her mother see what she was reading. Syafiqah had the distinct feeling that her mother would not approve. She turned her eyes back to the page she was reading.
The mesmerised girl watched the delicious boy as xanthous yellow light played across his graceful, sensuous, moving body. Pressing her eager eye against the hole made in the wood, as silently as she was able, Farah observed as Amir fluidly glided to music of sensuous beats obviously sounding only in his own head. Farah, if she had not been delectably awestruck before, was now as her eyes drank in Amir’s all but silent dance performance.
Ignoring the fact that ‘xanthous’ was not in her English dictionary, Syafiqah skipped over the word intending to look it up on the Internet, at school. She did not want to stop the flow of her reading worrying about strange, exotic-sounding words.
The minute sounds of Amir’s naked feet on the floor, a gentle whoosh of air as his arm swept, in waves, in circles, was all the accompaniment there was to his satyr dance, and all Farah needed to be caught by his beauty and style. For those few minutes, she was in the thrall of glamour, beguiled by the Indian, fascinated by him.
Farah did not understand her feeling of longing. It had never been a part of her repertoire of feelings; until now. After sixteen and a half years, her body had reached puberty (and beyond) almost before she had realized what was taking place. It was only the obvious tell-tale signs of needing to wear a towel at certain times of the month, a little extra down in personal, private places, and the blossoming of her breasts which alerted her to her changing status.
Now, noting Amir’s silent dance, Farah felt warmth expanding inside her, changing her, perhaps forever. It was only while looking at this young Indian that Farah had any inkling of the woman she may yet become, sometime in her future.
If it had not been so embarrassing, the sudden warmth she experienced between her thighs and the unexpected tightening of her chest beneath her school uniform might have overwhelmed her as she watched the perfection of Amir’s silent dance.
As it was, her cheeks coloured with a blush, she felt her face become heated. Slowly, Farah tentatively put one hand beneath her school uniform to see if she bled; she did not. The sudden warmth was not that of her monthlies, so her fingers came away clear … but sticky, as she involuntarily sighed a world- changing sigh, tingling a little with a small tremor of aftershock.
Syafiqah stared at the book page, and then read the paragraph over again. ‘Coo,’ she said quietly to herself. Then she read it for a third time, just in case she had misread it the other two times. ‘Phew,’ she said as she read on.
To Farah, her sensations were not at all unpleasant, just inexplicable.
She had neither the words nor the experience to describe what she was beginning to feel. She was certain that she no longer felt like the child she had been, but something else. Farah watched, and as she watched, she grew.
As she watched, she gasped, a soft almost sensual gasp, a pretty gasp entirely suited to her young, inexperienced years.
It was a sharp intake of breath, a brief moment of inhalation, which in itself was paltry but summed up all her feelings and sensations at that very moment in time. That gasp reflected Farah’s myriad of feelings, thoughts, sensations, all new, all unnamed, awaiting her recognition. The gasp was the recognition.
Syafiqah stared at the book. Her heart was racing; she was scared and excited, scared to be caught reading such material, but also more than a little excited by the words. Once more, she checked the door, then turned to her bedroom window and made sure that the curtains were closed. With her heart sounding in her ear, she read more.
Catching his breath from his labours, Amir patted the dough with hands shining like gold in the lean-to’s brightening light. Then, when he was ready, he turned towards the rear of the shack and smiled a broad smile right to the spot where Farah was watching.
Farah, shocked, embarrassed, but with a small charge of excited electricity shooting through her body, shyly moved back from her spy-hole.
As she did so, she stumbled and fell. Farah’s careless tumble caused the loose plank to fall, and the one next to it also. Ungracefully, Farah tumbled into the half-light of the wooden lean-to, her skirt in distinct disarray, revealing the curvature of her calves. A breathless, panting Farah landed almost at Amir’s feet. To him, as he gazed at her, it was as if Aishwayra Rai herself had tumbled magically into his domain. Smiling, the glistening Amir reached a hand down to her …
That was it.
As Syafiqah read, she noticed that the page opposite the one she was on had been torn out. The numbering jumped from page 82, the page she was on, to page 85. It was obvious to her that the story ended somewhere between those pages, and there was more than a little disappointment showing in her face with this momentous realisation. With some annoyance, Syafiqah sellotaped the yellowing fragment of book to the base of her bottom drawer in her chest of drawers, believing it to be safe there.
Later, as Syafiqah was at the back of the kitchen, helping her mother place the pinching pegs out onto the rinsed washing, on their makeshift washing line, she turned to the older woman.
‘ Mak,’
‘Yes Adik,’
‘Where can I get a copy of an old book?’