Apple and Knife Read online

  Contents

  Cover

  About the Book

  About the Author

  Title Page

  The Blind Woman Without a Toe

  Blood

  Doors

  Kuchuk Hanem

  Scream in a Bottle

  The Queen

  Vampire

  Beauty and the Seventh Dwarf

  The Well

  The Obsessive Twist

  The Porcelain Doll

  Apple and Knife

  A Single Firefly, a Thousand Rats

  Author’s acknowledgements

  Translator’s acknowledgements

  Copyright

  About the Book

  A dazzling and provocative debut story collection from celebrated Indonesian writer Intan Paramaditha, putting fierce and fabulous female characters centre stage in brilliantly funny and sharp twists on fairy tale.

  Inspired by horror fiction, myths and fairy tales, Apple and Knife is an unsettling ride that swerves into the supernatural to explore the dangers and power of occupying a female body in today’s world.

  These stories set in the Indonesian everyday – in corporate boardrooms, shanty towns, on dangdut stages – reveal a soupy otherworld stewing just beneath the surface. This is subversive feminist horror at its best, where men and women alike are arbiters of fear, and where revenge is sometimes sweetest when delivered from the grave.

  Dark, humorous, and vividly realised, Apple and Knife brings together taboos, inversions, sex and death in a heady, intoxicating mix.

  About the Author

  Intan Paramaditha is an Indonesian writer now based in Sydney. She is the acclaimed author of two short story collections, Sihir Perempuan (2005) and Kumpulan Budak Setan (2010, with Eka Kurniawan and Ugoran Prasad), from which the stories of Apple and Knife are drawn, as well as the novel The Wandering (2017). Her fiction writings have received awards in Indonesia, including the Kompas Best Short Story Award, Tempo Best Literary Fiction of the Year, and Khatulistiwa Literary Awards shortlist. She holds a PhD from New York University and teaches Media and Film Studies at Macquarie University.

  The Blind Woman Without a Toe

  Come. Come, child. Sit by me. Are you sure you want to hear how I became blind? Oh, it’s a scary tale, child. So much blood was shed, like when an animal is sacrificed. It was an awful event involving someone very close to me. You may know of her. I was butchered. Yes, you could say that. And I even butchered myself. My eyes were pecked out by a bird. They say it was a dove from heaven, but it was actually a black crow straight out of hell. I screamed. I begged it to stop. But my shrieks were drowned out by its caws. It got to the point that you could no longer tell what was flowing, tears or blood. The crow only heeded its owner and she wasn’t satisfied until my eyes were hollow sockets.

  Long ago, before I became blind, I lived with my mother and my two younger sisters. The youngest wasn’t my biological sister. She was my stepfather’s daughter. Her name was Sindelarat. You’ve heard of her, haven’t you? She is already legendary, so maybe you won’t believe what I’m about to tell you. Sin – that’s what we called her – was so dirty, she looked like she had powdered herself with soot. And she really did live in the attic. I won’t deny it (though I regret it, since that’s where she colluded with the thing that granted her powers). What I want to do is correct history. History has killed me off in favour of her, who people say lived happily ever after. You want to know the real truth? Sin is dead. I’m the one who survives.

  Yes, we were unfair to her. We ordered her to do the heavy work. When she wanted to go to the ball, we threw rice in every corner and wouldn’t let her leave the house until she had gathered all of it in a bowl. Of course, it was wasted labour, but at that point we didn’t know she was being helped by a spirit, that accursed Fairy Godmother. That’s the story you’ve heard? Well, now I’ll tell you something different.

  Our stepfather loved Sin very much. Before he died, she was sweet and gentle and innocent – at least, that’s how she presented herself. Father gave her beautiful dresses and a tiny tiara to sit atop her head of long gleaming hair. He admired his daughter’s long eyelashes, especially when she fluttered them. Meanwhile, we were given Sin’s old clothes. Good clothes, but hand-me-downs nonetheless. If he went on a trip, he would return home with a stack of presents for her, while my sister and I got a box of sweets. Our hearts burned with envy. How else could we have felt? A teenage girl’s greatest accomplishment is owning piles of fancy clothes.

  Father didn’t scold or beat us, but he didn’t accept us either. At dinner, the only one whose day he would ask about was Sin. How is your embroidering coming along? How are the roses you’re tending? Is the chicken you’re keeping laying eggs yet? What about the finch you’re looking after, is its claw better? Has it healed? The cake you made is delicious! Oh, look, Sin is so productive! Meanwhile, Father treated us almost as if we didn’t exist, as if we were the remnants of a past that Mother had to lug around with her. His first wife had died and he needed someone to take care of him. He couldn’t live without someone else’s help. Someone to ready his breakfast, his clothes, his shoes. A companion to play around with under the mosquito netting. And he was crazy about Mother. She was a beautiful widow.

  Mother was the flower of her village when she was young. Even though she was poor, all the men sought her hand in marriage. Back then only girls from rich families could go to school, so to make a living she worked as a maid in the home of a regent. Wanting to improve her station in life, she approached the regent after his wife died. Two months after that it was official: Mother became his wife. He was our biological father, though neither of us remembers him because he died when I was only two.

  The people around us called Mother a harlot, saying she had used all the wiles at her disposal to get rich. Years later, they called my sister and me harlots too, when we were criticised for mistreating Sin. We got used to it, child. Our blood boiled like magma; we hated coming second.

  For a dozen years, Mother lived off the wealth that our father had left behind. She was strong enough to care for us alone, but the estate of her deceased husband would only last so long. When I was fourteen, Sin’s father, a close friend of my own father, grew close to Mother. People started gossiping about her anew. But once again, Mother didn’t care. She married Sin’s father shortly after his wife passed away. See, child, our family is used to making do with hand-me-downs.

  Our stepfather of course could never be our biological father, but we wanted his attention too. We had learned that, in this world, fathers reign over everything. So, we hugged him and longed to climb on his shoulders and ride them as if we were riding power.

  Sin, our stepsister, was an expert at putting on a sweet face. One day when my stepfather was about to go on a trip, he asked what gift we would like. Of course, because we rarely got nice presents from him, we said a beautiful dress. Sin said a rose would be enough. No wonder – even without Father travelling anywhere she got all sorts of extravagant treats. Notice how she wanted to play the part of a nice girl who isn’t materialistic? Feh! Such a phoney. If she didn’t care about money, then why did she insist on going to the ball to meet that filthy-rich Prince Charming?

  Yes, that’s how it was, child. Because we resented Sin, we made off with her beautiful dresses as soon as our stepfather died. We gave her our old clothes – which were her own clothes, gifted to us by her father, now returned to her once more. What was once yours is always yours, right? So began life without my stepfather.

  Years passed. We grew into flowers ready to be plucked. But who did the young men sneak glances at in the market and the town square? That damned Sin. Even though she no longer had such beautiful clothes, her face w
as beautiful. Her skin had a golden glow. Her hair was black with lovely curls. She had a slender waist and shapely legs. Her voice was soft, appealing. We, on the other hand, had inherited more from our father than our beautiful mother: we were big-boned and dark-skinned. We could only gnaw our fingernails as the neighbours constantly remarked on how perfect she was. How upset we were when we learned that every last one of the young men lining up at the front door had come to seek Sin’s hand! Mother tried to bargain, ‘Sin is still very young. How about her older sisters marrying first?’ But apparently that idea didn’t appealed to anyone. Mother was angry and frightened that we might become old maids, so she sent Sin to hide in the attic whenever guests came. When in competition, women need to eliminate rivals and be unsparing in their hatred.

  The ball was the climax of these events. We were merchandise in the market and Prince Charming was the sole customer. Of course, he couldn’t purchase everything on display. He had to choose the best to be his queen. He could have a thousand mistresses if he desired, but there could be only one queen. We felt threatened by Sin’s beauty that night so we did everything we could to prevent her from going. Sin whined that she wanted to attend, even though she had so many suitors already. Some were even sons of the rich! Why was she never satisfied?

  As you well know, our efforts to discourage Sin that night failed because the Fairy Godmother considered her such a paragon of virtue that she waved her magic wand. Sin came to the ball. She was like a goddess sent from heaven and conquered Prince Charming by dancing flirtatiously with him. But the next day, news came that the prince had somehow lost his true princess. All that was left of her was a single slipper. The prince searched for the shoe’s owner at every house, including ours.

  Mother, still dreaming we could find a match of royal pedigree, made Sin hide when my sister and I took turns trying on the slipper. But the slipper was too small. I tried to force my foot inside. Alas, my toes were so bulky! My big toe was larger than most. Mother handed me a knife. ‘Cut it off. You don’t need it. If you become queen, you won’t be doing much walking.’ I took hold of the knife, bit my lip hard and amputated my toe. I tossed the first morsel of my flesh into the trash so that stray dogs could eat it. You would do well to know, child, that this world is filled with poorly fitting shoes that only accommodate the mutilated.

  Once I had sliced off my big toe, I managed to squeeze into the slipper. I limped, grimacing. The slipper chaffed against the wound. Still, Prince Charming carried me off in his coach. I glanced at the dazed face of my future husband. He didn’t look happy. He must have thought he had drunk too much the night before. How could the beautiful girl of his memories be me? He said nothing during the trip, until the chirps of a bird sounded:

  Lo, behold this girl who lies

  Bloodying her slipper until it dries

  That bird – the crow from hell – pecked at the coach, desperate for its augury to be heeded. My husband-to-be ordered me to take off the slipper. He bellowed, almost fainting at the sight of my butchered flesh. He said nothing, asked me nothing. Without further ado, I was dispatched back home.

  The tragedy was repeated. My younger sister was asked to try on the slipper, but her foot was too large as well. Only this time, her heel was what wouldn’t fit. Like me, she carved off part of her foot with the kitchen knife. Like me, she stepped up into the coach and, down the road, was serenaded by the same snitch bird.

  Prince Charming returned home, rage casting a shadow on his face. ‘Don’t you have another daughter?’ he asked, furious at my mother for fobbing off rotten fruit. He wanted an unblemished apple. His viceroy ransacked our home, and found Sin in the attic. More precisely, Sin was waiting to be found; her sobs could be heard from outside. She was no less calculating than we were.

  Yes, of course the slipper fit her foot; it was hers. Prince Charming lit up when Sin came down the stairs. He knew this was the woman from the ball. A woman who would make herself up every morning for him, who would anxiously await his return from the battlefield, who would bear his children. He immediately brought his beautiful princess home and they lived happily ev—

  Wait, not yet. They didn’t live happily ever after yet. Mother fell ill. She was depressed about my sister and me; we still hadn’t found husbands. And butchering our feet had made our prospects even more dire. The townsmen looked away when we passed. Mother’s illness worsened. She wrote to Sin but received no reply. Maybe Sin knew she wanted to borrow money. Finally, my sister and I went to see her in Prince Charming’s magnificent palace. We arrived as she was enjoying her breakfast in a garden full of roses, jasmine, ylang-ylang and dahlias. The gurgling fountains were music to our ears.

  Sin asked us to leave but we refused to do so until she gave us money. We also demanded to be mistresses to her husband, but of course thousands of beauties had already lined up for the position. Suddenly, that damned bird appeared, the same bird we had encountered on the road. It went after our eyes, stabbing at them with its beak, a knife weighted with vengeance. Again and again it stabbed. Sin, my stepsister, looked on. The last image I have of the world is the sight of her not lifting a finger to help, snacking on grapes.

  Since then we have become the stuff of legend: Sin, the virtuous girl who wed, and we, the sisters, better off dead. We lived in poverty thereafter, supporting our ailing mother. She died with her eyes wide open. Until the end, she refused to accept the insults of those around her or the fact that we would forever be old maids. I left the village and now live as a wanderer with my sister. Two blind, useless women who survive by making music on street corners. My sister plays the harp and I sing. We must, for we have no Prince Charming, no Fairy Godmother.

  Sin didn’t live happily ever after. She died giving birth to her sixth daughter. Before that, she was pregnant almost every year because the kingdom needed a crown prince. Her thighs grew chubby and her stomach turned as flabby as bean curd. Excessive blood loss did her in, a fitting conclusion for this tale of gore.

  Sin is dead. But, ah, who will listen to a blind, mutilated woman?

  Blood

  On goes the light. The new LCD has just stopped projecting. We’re sitting around a table complete with laptops, BlackBerries, cell phones and half-finished coffee.

  ‘These are the ads we made last year for Free Maxi Pads,’ explains my boss, a woman in her thirties. ‘We’ll continue the series with the same theme. Menstruation as—’

  Revenant. Monster.

  ‘A very uncomfortable condition,’ she says, then emphasises, ‘without Free Maxi Pads.’

  She asks everyone to put forward an ad concept. Sort of a writing contest but with no prize money. The winner has the honour of developing the idea with a team, of leading a small group. There may even be potential for a promotion.

  ‘Why don’t you start by brainstorming. Let’s get some thoughts on what a woman feels when she’s having her period.’

  ‘Cramps,’ a copywriter responds.

  ‘Pimples.’

  ‘Good. But try to connect your ideas with our client’s product.’

  ‘Moist. Soaked. Smelly.’

  ‘Dirty.’

  ‘Nah!’

  ‘Your turn, Mara.’

  I think hard.

  No, no, not now. Those were the words in my head when my first period came, during Ramadan. My mother had died giving birth to my sister the year before. Neither survived. All Mum left me were scraps of advice.

  ‘Every woman will go through it, so you have to know how to use a sanitary napkin. It’s not hard.’ Mum demonstrated in front of me. I stood with knitted eyebrows, as if observing an alien’s mucus. For me, it wasn’t just the pad that looked strange but my mother’s body, so unlike mine: full of grooves, streaks of white, veins of purple, hair like weeds. How many years before my body would fill with marks too?

  ‘Don’t look at me like that. It’s no harder or stranger than tying shoelaces.’

  I felt a budding pride. I’d been initiated into kn
owledge of what happens to a woman’s body and how to handle it. I knew of important mysteries long before my friends.

  But adulthood turned out to be closer than I imagined. It came when I was still too embarrassed to buy sanitary napkins at school, when I was in fifth grade. Other girls didn’t get their first period until sixth grade, or even the second year of middle school. Why did my childhood have to end so soon?

  After debating with the voices in my head, I settled on a small towel that I’d brought for gym class. A clever enough solution for the moment. May you feel proud in your grave, Mum.

  ‘Well, Mara, your fast can never be one hundred per cent perfect again.’ So said the ustadzah, my Qur’anic recitation teacher. We sat on my living room floor, the both of us pressing our thighs tightly together. She didn’t like me to sit cross-legged.

  ‘Why can’t it be perfect?’ I looked down. My words were more an expression of regret than a question.

  I’d never managed to fast until six in the evening for thirty days straight. But now my fasting would be riddled with holes, like a grater, like an overused rag. I hated incompleteness.

  After Mum died, Teacher came to our house often – so often that I thought Dad would replace the photo of Mum that hung on the family room wall with Teacher’s picture. But two years later, Dad married again and I realised that Teacher would not be replacing my mother. I never got close to my stepmother but at least she didn’t make up stories about how my mother went to heaven, in contrast to the wicked, who are tormented in hell. I didn’t believe Teacher because once, before my mother died, she told me that heaven and hell were as dark as shadows. Sometimes heaven and hell perch on your head like a butterfly, she said, sometimes they disappear. Even though you are unaware that death is upon you, they appear to us in turn, as close as your breath.

  When I told Dad about my period, he just commented awkwardly, ‘Oh, I see.’ Teacher’s lecture came the next day. Dad and I were like a human and a wandering spirit. He needed a medium to reach me. Someone to act as a psychic. First Mum, then Teacher. He must have told her. Traitor.