The Reader and The Tea Drinker

Kassian Cephas. Yogyakarta, 1880. 

There was not a piece of furniture in the room. Only a mat spread out on the floor. On it was a teapot filled with hot tea. A few books on a corner shelf.

I was here five years ago. The situation is not much different now. Only additional curtain to the other room inside. Surely Amir needs more privacy now, after he has a wife and in this village he is known as a teacher who is often visited by people. His wife, Hafsah, is said to have been the first child of the head of the village. I've never met him after he got married.

The host was out. We waited, sitting cross-legged on the mat. Nothing can be done. The journey to come over here has worn us down. Five hours on foot, change to a horsecart, then walk again. Almost took the whole day. If it weren't this seemingly important invitation, we wouldn't have bothered to come.

We served ourselves. Opening the supplies we brought from home that only left a little. It felt presumptuous to go into the kitchen and find out something to eat. I pour myself a cup tea. My brother took a book on the shelf and read it sitting on the mat.

"Your fate hasn't changed much, Amir," I thought. Even though in your youthful ambition you used to say moving to this village would make you famous and prosperous. A merchant, or a preacher like your father, you said.

From outside the window I could still hear Aris chanting, the insane boy who was shackled by her mother in the back room. Still the same as before. Five years ago the situation was like that, the song he sang was still that old Javanese tune in high shrieking voice. The neighbour's duck rooster spurned the screams of goats in the shed.

The scent of ripe jackfruit from the tree next to the house reminds me of the days when we worked day and night in the village, we together cooking in the soup in the kitchen before the village head election. Komar win the election, while our candidate lost. Komar mobilized his men to drive the opposing group out of the village, including Amir, who had been his  nemesis since elementary school.

Amir moved here soon after that. I visited him once, when he was very ill and had to stay bed for nearly six months. It was my first time here. When he married Hafsah three years ago, I could not come because I was on duty on the neighbouring island.

Three days ago the invitation came. Delivered by the regular postman. He invited me and my brother to come here today. Important, he said. Just come in, though maybe I'm not at home. The door is unlocked. That's the message.

Two hours has passed. My brother still sat on the mat, already changed the book he is reading three times. This time he read the Koran. His voice stuttered reading the first surah. I've had my third cup of tea. Silent prevailed. Suddenly, the door opened. Amir burst in. "A boy!" he gasped. His face beaming.