Anom Inem in the Land of The Goddess

The black mud sucked at Anom's calves. It felt slippery and cold, like slime that didn't want to let go. He stood frozen in the middle of the drainage channel, ignoring the diesel fumes burning his lungs every time he breathed too fast. Up above, the roar of tires from thousands of fancy cars speeding on the elevated toll road sounded like thunder that never stopped. That sound was the background music of his life. A constant reminder that there was a world moving very fast up there, while he stayed stuck down here, held down by the crushing weight of poverty. Anom pulled his worn-out nylon net very slowly. He didn't want to create too many ripples on the water surface, which was covered in a rainbow-colored oil slick. Every move of his hands was a gamble. If the net got snagged on a rat carcass or a sharp piece of copper wire, his patched-up tool would tear completely. That net was his lifeline. He had sewn it himself using leftover fishing line of different colors, which he had found in the trash at the main market. He squinted, looking toward the giant concrete pillar number thirty-four that held up the toll road. There, among the hanging roots of wild banyan trees crawling down the cracked cement, he saw something strange. A pile of ragged cloth that he had thought was just garbage left over from the last flood suddenly moved. Rhythmically. A very subtle up-and-down motion, like the breathing of a living creature that was dying. Anom stopped pulling his net. He stood still, letting the warm sewer water flow between his toes. Anom tightened his grip on the net handle. His leg muscles tensed in the mud, ready to explode into a run if that pile turned out to be a threat. Under this toll bridge, the most dangerous thing wasn't ghosts. It was desperate people. He moved his blue plastic bucket...already cracked along the edge...a little further away from the pile. The bucket held two Plecostomus fish he had caught after three hours of standing in the water. Their condition was bad. Their bodies were covered in wounds, and they moved very slowly. "They're thirsty," a voice came from behind the pile of cloth. The voice was thin and cracked, like two dry leaves rubbing against rough concrete. Anom froze. He didn't answer right away. His tongue felt heavy because he had barely spoken to anyone in the past two days. He just stared at the two Plecostomus fish in his blue bucket. The fish were floating sideways. Their rough mouths were gasping in the black, oily water that smelled sharply of detergent. "Sewer fish don't need to drink, Miss," Anom answered after managing to steady his uneven breathing. He kept his distance, about three meters from that concrete pillar. "These fish need clean water. Something that doesn't exist in this drain. They're just waiting to die." The pile of cloth slowly opened up. A woman crawled out of the darkness behind the banyan roots. Her movements were very slow, almost silent on the ground covered in debris, instant noodle wrappers, and broken glass. Anom stayed where he was, alert, watching every inch of movement from the figure whose face was covered in thick grime and dried oil, making it look like a black mask. Her clothes were nothing more than rags held together by dirt, sticking tightly to skin that looked very pale underneath all the dust. Her hair was no longer strand by strand. It had clumped into one stiff, hard mass, like dried swamp grass at the end of a long dry season. But when the woman lifted her head and looked directly at him, Anom felt something hit his chest hard. Amidst all the filth and stench, this woman had a pair of incredibly clear eyes. Dark, but with a depth that didn't make sense. So clear that Anom felt like all the secrets of his poverty were laid bare right there. The woman stared at Anom without any fear. No suspicion or anger in her eyes...the kind of looks that outcasts usually gave when a stranger entered their territory. She just stared at the plastic bucket with a strange intensity. As if those two dying Plecostomus fish were the most important thing in the world right now. She reached out her thin hand. Her fingers were long, with blackened nails from years of built-up grime. Her trembling fingers slowly moved toward the water's surface in Anom's bucket. Anom jerked back instinctively. His foot almost slipped in the slippery mud, and he nearly swung his nylon net to block that hand. He didn't want his things touched by a stranger who looked even worse off than him. But that hand was too fast for how weak it looked. The tip of her finger touched the black, oily water surface. The diesel smell that had been choking Anom's nose suddenly disappeared in an instant. The sharp stench of the sewer and the piss smell from the concrete pillar seemed to get swept away by a wind carrying the scent of rain-soaked soil from the countryside. The water inside the blue plastic bucket...which had been thick and pitch-black with waste...suddenly turned clear. The process was so fast, like crystal water that had just been poured from an expensive bottle. It became so clear that Anom could see the small cracks and thin layer of moss stuck to the dull bottom of his bucket. The two Plecostomus fish, which had been gasping and nearly dead, suddenly jumped hard. The splash was loud, hitting the plastic walls and spraying water onto Anom's face. Anom's wrist trembled hard as he held the bucket, which suddenly felt many times heavier. He touched the water spray on his cheek with a shaking finger. Cold. It felt like mountain water that had just melted from ice...a sensation that burned his hot, sun-beaten face. "What did you do?" Anom whispered, his voice now full of real fear. He looked at his own hand, then at the woman. The woman didn't answer. She pulled her hand back, as if that one movement had sucked all the remaining energy from her body. She curled back up, leaned her head against the cracked concrete pillar, and closed her eyes. Her breathing was short and heavy. She seemed unwilling to even move her lips, letting silence take over the bridge again. Anom looked into his bucket again. Those fish were no longer the dull, river-fungus-covered Plecostomus. Their scales were shiny and clean, reflecting the morning sunlight that barely slipped through the gaps in the concrete with a shine that looked like precious metal. They moved with incredible energy, slamming against the bucket walls as if trying to break the plastic container. Anom could feel the vibrations all the way up to his shoulders. He rubbed his eyes over and over until they turned red, trying to convince himself that he wasn't dreaming. He dipped his finger into the clear water. It felt real. Very cold and refreshing. He washed his face with that water, and immediately the sting from the road dust disappeared. His mind suddenly became very sharp, as if the fog that had been covering his brain from lack of food had been completely wiped away. He looked back at the woman. A feeling of pity suddenly appeared in his heart, pushing his fear to the side. He knew hunger could make people do crazy things, but this woman had just given him something. Anom reached into the pocket of his shorts, which had a hole in it. He pulled out a cheap, slightly squashed pack of bread. That bread was his only food for the whole day. What he got from helping porters move vegetable boxes at the market yesterday afternoon. With hands slightly shaking from hunger that was starting to attack his own stomach, Anom moved closer. He placed the bread on top of a pile of wet cardboard near the woman's feet. He didn't dare touch her, just placed it at a respectful distance. "Take this. Maybe you need it more than I do today," Anom said. He tried to smile, though his dirty face made the smile look like a strange grimace. The woman slowly opened her eyes. She looked at the bread without any spark of greed. She tore off a tiny piece of the bread's edge with her long fingers, then, with a careful movement, she dropped the bread crumbs into Anom's bucket. The fish inside the bucket went even wilder, fighting over the crumbs. As if those cheap bread crumbs weren't just flour and sugar, but some kind of powerful life potion. Anom could only stand there, frozen, watching the scene. He felt something shift inside him. He lifted his plastic bucket again, feeling a weight that now felt much more solid in his hands. He had to leave this place quickly before this madness attracted someone's attention. He started walking along the edge of the rusted train tracks, leaving the gloomy bridge behind with quick steps. But after walking only about a hundred meters, Anom stopped. He looked back toward the banyan tree where the woman had been. The view there was empty. A pile of ragged cloth. A stack of cardboard. No sign that anyone had just been curled up behind those banyan roots. Just wet ground and the dark, damp shadow of the concrete bridge. The wind blew, carrying the usual smell of mud, and the scent of wet soil he had felt earlier was completely gone. Anom looked into his bucket one more time. The fish were still there. The clear water was still there. He didn't know who that woman was. And he didn't know why his black world had suddenly gotten a splash of clear light like this. He only knew one thing: he had to get to the market right now. Pak Haji had to see this. Anom started running. He ignored the pain in his bare feet as they stepped on sharp debris and train track pebbles. He ran away from the darkness of the concrete bridge, toward the morning sun that was rising higher at the end of the road. Inside his head, the woman's thin voice kept echoing...whispering something he couldn't yet understand, but sending a strange vibration through his long-numb soul.