By Yin New Ko
IN THE early part of the night, some words come from the bedroom.
“Show us again, Grandad!” Two young voices shout in unison.
“Well... I shouldn’t. It’s a secret, you see,” says Ah Ba Saw. Glassy-eyed, he speaks slowly, running the words together, and holds a finger to his lips.
“Aw... please!” says Su Lay. Six years old, she’s the youngest and most curious. Zaw, who is eight, says nothing, but his big eyes are fixed on Ah Ba Saw’s arm. Both children are meant to be in bed, ready for school tomorrow.
“OK, just this once,” says Ah Ba Saw. “But don’t tell your dad. You know he doesn’t like it.”
Ah Ba Saw pulls the shirt back from his right arm to show a long, pale line of pink skin.
“Now, did I tell you where I was when the lion attacked me?”
“Lion?” says Zaw, looking confused. “But you said it was a bear.”
Ko Kyaw Kha doesn’t get home until 11:30 pm, his eyes are burning from lack of sleep. He’s been working extra hours at the warehouse to help pay the bills. Costs keep rising and being a single dad to Su Lay and Zaw means there’s no one to share the costs with him.
He finds his father in front of the TV, snoring gently. An empty glass beside the chair. Ko Kyaw Kha picks it up and sniffs. He wrinkles his nose in distaste.
The room looks as if there’s been a break-in: toys, cushions, pizza boxes, and chocolate wrappers everywhere. Ko Kyaw Kha starts to clear up. He takes a cold slice of fruit cake from one of the boxes and eats it in a couple of bites. He finds the remote under one of the chairs and turns the TV off. As if by magic, Ah Ba Saw’s eyes open. “Took your time,” he says.
“Have you been drinking?” asks Ko Kyaw Kha. He hates asking Ah Ba Saw to babysit, but no one else was available at short notice.
Ah Ba Saw gives him a look. “Stop it,” he says.
When Ko Kyaw Kha goes upstairs to check on the children, Zaw is asleep, but Su Lay’s wide awake. “Bad dreams?” he asks, strumming her dark hair. She nods. “A lion attacked Grandpa,” she says. “It hurt his arm.”
Downstairs, Ko Kyaw Kha finds his father standing in the hall.
“I phoned for a taxi,” says Ah Ba Saw.
Ko Kyaw Kha picks up his wallet to pay for the fare, but Ah Ba Saw puts a hand on his arm. “Keep it.”
“Thanks for helping out.”
“Right.”
Ko Kyaw Kha smells the whisky on his father.
“You’ve got to stop telling the kids those scar stories, Dad. And you can’t come here and drink.”
“Ah, it’s just a tipple. And they love my adventure stories,” says Ah Ba Saw.
“Su Lay’s been having bad dreams. Again. You scare her. And Zaw. Why do you have to show them that thing anyway?”
“That ‘thing’, as you call it, is part of me, part of this family’s history.”
“Why can’t we just leave it behind, Dad?”
“You were late.”
“The bus didn’t come. I walked. You could have come to get me,” says Ah Ba Saw.
“You were late. So, we started our journey late...”
“You were speeding. You were angry.” “She was angry with you. Remember?”
“That’s not true,” says Ah Ba Saw, thinking, why do we do this? He can feel the old wounds opening.
Just at that moment, Ah Ba Saw’s mobile rings.
“Taxi’s here,” he says, opening the door, pulling his collar up against the rain, and walking down the footpath towards the waiting car. He doesn’t wave or look back.
Ko Kyaw Kha shuts the door and goes to the kitchen, cleaning up and making himself a fried egg. He can’t sleep, not now. He takes the fried egg with a slice of bread through to the living room and watches a late-night film. He wakes up at around three with a stiff neck and his head filled with images of his mother. He can see her in the front of the car, turning to smile at him. He hears her voice, like an echo inside of him. Outside, he can see the rain falling.
Sitting on the living room floor, Ko Kyaw Kha looks through old family photo albums. There are plenty of pictures of Su Lay and Zaw when they were growing up, of him and Ma Thu Zar when times were good – before she left him for a new life and a new husband. He doesn’t see his father in many of them. He makes a cup of coffee and then looks at one of the older albums. Black-andwhite photos of Ah Ba Saw and his mother in their 20s. Some pictures of the three of them: Mum, Dad and him. He’s never smiling. Was I such a difficult child? Ko Kyaw Kha wonders. It’s what his father always tells him.
Everyone thought that Ko Kyaw Kha would follow his father in the family law firm. But he didn’t. He became a joiner. He loved the feel and smell of wood, of the tools, and the way they produced something tangible. And with each year that passed, he and Ah Ba Saw had less and less to say to one another. Their only connection now was the children. But his experience told Ko Kyaw Kha not to trust Ah Ba Saw around the kids.
He was 14 years old when it happened. His father was driving, tight-mouthed, and in a bad mood. His mother was in the passenger seat beside him, trying to calm things down as she always did. Their car sped past a caravan as it came to a corner. A lorry had been coming the other way. The distance closed far too fast. He could hear his mother scream.
Ko Kyaw Kha suffered whiplash and bruising from the seat belt. His father’s arm was cut open by the impact. And his mother? A shattered windscreen and an empty seat. She died instantly, the police said.
If only I hadn’t been delayed, thinks Ko Kyaw Kha, as he al ways does, maybe we wouldn’t have been speeding. He looks at a photo of his mother and him, in which Ko Kyaw Kha is probably Su Lay’s age, tucked up in bed, his mother reading him a story. Outside, he hears bird-song and the first traffic of a new day. He vows to himself things will be different.
Later that day, the warehouse manager calls Ko Kyaw Kha to ask if he can work another night shift. He says no. One job is enough. Somehow, they will manage. He finishes work at the joinery firm early and picks up the kids from the after-school club. He cooks some instant noodles for tea, which the children both love. Afterwards, they play a game on the console together, Su Lay and Zaw laughing and fighting good-naturedly. Then they sit and watch a game show on TV. Afterwards, as they get ready for bed, Ko Kyaw Kha tells the children that he has a special story to tell them tonight.
“Is it about lions?” asks Su Lay.
“Nope,” says Ko Kyaw Kha. “Nor bears. It’s about your grandmother,” he adds. And he thinks how she must have ached with love for her son, just as he does now for his two beautiful children.
Su Lay releases a heavy sigh but Zaw is smiling.
Reference: Spotlight 2022
