When the Elephants Dance (26 page)

“No, stop it. Please.” I slap and slap at the hands until I feel a strong blow to my face. My strength leaks out. My pride lies in a pool of sorrow with my clothes.

Their skin smells of sweat and smoke and the blood of my people.
My blood will join theirs
. I repeat this like a prayer, though the meaning of it I do not know.

Their laughter withers my skin. My legs are spread and held. I scream in anticipation of the soldier’s flesh. It comes like a shock, a stab; my stomach convulses in pain. It wants the intruder out. I taste blood on my tongue. I feel the weight of each of their bodies as they hover and grunt over me. They force kisses on my neck, they avoid my lips. A hand pinches my nipple, twisting it. Pinning my thigh with a thick knee, grasping at my hair at the last minute, then mewling like a baby before slumping over me entirely with heavy breathing.

I become detached from my own skin.
I am a virgin no more
, I repeat to myself. People will know this when they see me. I look into their eyes, but there is nothing, no hope, no compassion, only hate and blackness. I see the face of war.

Such an awful thing to happen to this poor girl. She is so alone
, and then I remember, the girl is me. The girl
was
me. I cry because there is nothing left for me to do.

The door opens and I hear them as they begin to pick up their clothes. I hear the jingle of belt buckles and the flapping of sleeves. I begin to drown in the darkness. In the hallway I hear the sound of running footsteps and then Feliciano’s voice as he swings open the door. He says, “Major, Major, that one is reserved for the commander.” He has to repeat this several times.

“Yes, me. I am commander here.”

“No, for Kurohiko.” Feliciano gives a name.

“Too late for Kurohiko,” the commander announces, and his companions laugh.

The laughter slices at my body like a whip, and I shudder.

Feliciano looks down at me, stunned. His face is stricken with disbelief. It would be comical really, if not for the situation. I feel like I will suddenly laugh at his face and scratch his eyes out at the same time. He helps me up, grabbing my upper arm tightly, pinching the skin.
“Dalaga
, time to take you to the commander. Come, come.” He touches me with his devil hands. I slap him again and again.

The leader gets up slowly and buttons his pants; he watches us with no
expression, then leaves the room abruptly. My legs are wet, drenched with their garbage.

I push Feliciano away.
“Hayop!”
I scream. Animal! I run to the window. The heat hits me like a fist, and the stench waters my eyes. I put my leg over the rail and stare down at the street below.
If I were to dive headfirst like when we visit the three waterfalls in the province, perhaps I would not feel it
.

“Isabelle,” Feliciano says. He runs to me and clasps my wrist, gently at first, then strongly. “My God, Isabelle, forgive me. Please.”

I pull my leg back in. My thigh scrapes against the cool metal. I shake so hard against the window frame that I can barely hold on.

“Monster!” I scream. I wrench free of his embrace. I feel my hand as it thuds against his head, his face, his eye.

“You must trust me. Trust me,” Feliciano says. “I did not know this would happen. I tried, Isabelle. I tried to bring you somewhere safe, but I was detained.”

“Traidór,”
I scream. Traitor! He lets me claw at his neck, gritting his teeth until he can stand it no longer. He grabs me by the wrists. I crumple to my knees with him still standing holding my wrists, my arms held above me.

He is encouraged by my submissiveness and places my torn blouse around my shoulders and keeps his arms there. “We must go now. I know a place. Soon it will be dark. The soldiers are tired and drunk. Fewer questions will be asked. If someone should stop us, you must let me talk. I will take you somewhere.”

I struggle away from him. He brings me my skirt. I see my undergarments lying on the floor.

“Shh, shh,” he whispers with his lips near my temple. Then he takes out his mask from his back pocket and pulls it over his head. He holds his hand out to me. I take the devil’s hand because I do not know what else to do.

How I wish to stab him. He enjoys this game of being my protector. He ushers me through the dimly lit hallways. A few of the rooms are open. My gaze wanders into a room as we pass. A girl is seated on the edge of the bed, and our eyes meet. Her hair is pasted to her neck from sweat. Her dress is torn. Her eyes have no life. I see my image in her. She is already dead inside. A soldier zips his pants and hurries out. Just as quickly another walks in and blocks my view; he glances at me as he unbuttons his shirt and kicks the door shut. We hurry down the hallway, Feliciano pulling me forward. He plays the Makapili again to his audience of filthy soldiers. They study us as we walk by.

“Hurry, the commander is waiting.” Feliciano shoves me. “You have kept him waiting long enough.”

I almost fall when he does this. I have no strength left in me. Again the
corridor of endless hands and endless rooms. We walk downstairs, through more passageways that twist and turn like a snake. I close my eyes. So good to just sleep.

“Isabelle, stay alert.” Feliciano nudges me. He pulls my hand, and I try to keep my eyes open. Suddenly I feel the outside air hit me, and I take a deep swallow. The scent of rotting flesh and smoke fills my nose. It is evening now, maybe eight o’clock. Was it just this morning I left Domingo? When was the last time I ate? I look away to the side street just as Feliciano tells me not to look.

There are bodies of women, one piled atop another. The bodies are bloody and stiff. I walk slowly forward. I have to see. My eyes focus on a hand with a pale circle around the ring finger. I recognize the bloody olive dress of the woman who gave me her ring.
What was her name?
I turn and heave, but nothing comes out. I stumble forward. I must give her back her ring. I must put it on her finger. Feliciano grabs me roughly and shakes me. “Come, come, do you want to be just like them?”

“I
am
just like them.” I stomp my feet. “And you, you are just like them.” I point back toward the building. Something changes in his eyes at my words.
Does he flinch a little? Are those tears? Does he pity me now?
He clenches his jaw, but I see he is crying.

“How dare you cry for me!” I tell myself not to say these things to him, but I am helpless to stop myself, just as I am helpless to stop this storm of madness. I am a moth caught in a downpour.

Before this, I was so proud, so confident. I was on my way to medical school. My friends and I would gather after class and talk about the studies and cases that made our blood pulse, that opened our eyes. Now, all I wish is to close them. I am a stray dog, unsure which outstretched hand to trust.

“Get down, sniper.” Feliciano points to one of the rooftops of the buildings. “Stay close.”

I break free of Feliciano. I look in a daze for the sniper. Amerikano or Japanese? What difference does it make? I step out into the street and open my arms wide to embrace his bullet.

“Gaga!”
Feliciano shouts. Stupid! He grabs for me.

Lightning streaks the sky, and the thunder joins the sounds of gunfire. I wonder where my family is and if I will ever see them again. Each step I take, no matter the direction, feels as if I am moving farther and farther from them, irrevocably. I run and glance down at my legs, as if they were separate entities from me, moving, while I am just a passenger watching.

Feliciano puts his arm around me. I resent this. He is taking liberties where he would have never done so before. I resent even more the way I clutch his hand tightly and the way my other hand grips the back of his shirt. We are running through back streets, through narrow spaces, crawling under fences, tasting the gutters. Everywhere I look there is complete madness. Death is on the ground. In the sky the planes fall like angels. The ground rumbles from the Amerikano tanks. Buildings are on fire. The long wide streets of Manila are straightways for the big guns. There are dead babies on the streets, as common as bird droppings. I see a little girl crouched in between two small houses, with gunfire so low that it almost shaves her head. She sits on her haunches, hugging her legs. I stop and Feliciano drags me forward with the momentum of his running.

“We must not stop. Cannot stop for anybody. Too many,” he shouts.

My heart aches for my people. I don’t understand why God gives more power to some and less to others.

We go many kilometers without stopping. Buildings are crumpled on the ground, others left standing like metal carcasses. We leave the city for the outskirts.

“Here, here, see?” Feliciano points, but all I see are fallen palm trees, a dry creek bed. We are on the outskirts of the Malate district. Then I see it, a small abandoned house. We rush into the house, and I pause. I look to the heavy wooden roof. It has the feel of a death trap. Feliciano lights a candle and ushers me in. He singes his hand and drops the match. I take pleasure to see pain cross his face. He notices my smug expression and says gravely, “I would take any pain away from you if I could.”

“Don’t say such things.”

“Before the war I had plans to court you. To ask permission from your father.”

I place my hands over my ears. “Stop it. Do you think I could care for you still?”

He stands very still. “But you
did
care for me?”

It is enough, my pause, the denial that does not come quickly to my lips. “I grow tired,” I say.

“Let us rest. It is safe here for the time being.” He acts suddenly like the host.

“Of you. I grow tired of you.” I imagine myself twisting my words like a knife into his chest, but instead of pleasure I feel only sadness.

“Of course.” He nods. “Rest now. I shall watch over you while you sleep.
Right here—” He points to the doorway. “I shall be seated with my back to this door. I will not fail you again. I would die first.”

I leave his promise hanging in the air between us. I give him one last look, then walk to the other end of the empty room and rest against the wall. We sit facing each other, and though I am afraid of what nightmares may lurk the minute I close my eyes, I find I can keep them open no longer. I close them with a sigh. Though I resist, an image comes to me. A proud-faced young man. I remember how Feliciano looked that last fall before the war broke out. Showing off with the other boys in school. How he strolled up to me in front of everyone in the courtyard and announced that he needed a tutor in mathematics. He had heard that I had gotten a near perfect score in the last exam. Would I be available? He would pay me, of course. I remember being surprised because he was the highest-ranked student, but my ego had readily accepted his request. Of course I would tutor the smartest boy in school. I remember his eyes, the way they had bordered on mischief, but I was not quite sure, for he kept a straight face. So different now from the eyes I feel studying me. A hundred years those eyes have aged in their steady observation of me. I see no trace of the boy in them. I fall asleep wondering if he still sees the girl I once was.

T
HE DREAM, WHATEVER
it was, was pleasant. It lingers, and I try to hold on to the feeling, but it eludes me. I wake with a smile on my face as Feliciano shakes me gently.

“Listen to me, Isabelle. I must go back, or else they will notice I am missing. You must stay here and not stray. You will get yourself killed if you leave. Do you understand?”

My body rebels at the familiarity of this situation.
Stay and be raped again. Leave and be raped again
. I do not answer him. I notice the scratches I have left on his face. I follow the lines from his eyes to his neck. They are deep lines. I feel the urge to trace them with my fingertips.

He talks gruffly to me the way Father does when he is trying to infuse me with courage. “It is up to you. If you want to live, you must stay here. If you want to die, then you need only open the door.” He eyes me to see if he has made his point. I stare back at him without feeling. A coldness has crept back into my body. I do not answer him. “It is up to you,” he says. He stares at me for a long time as if he wishes to say something. The lines of his brow crease deeper, then he turns suddenly, opens the door, and leaves.

I watch him through the window of the house. Something in me screams,
Don’t leave me here!
The lightning lights up the streets, and his shadow is swallowed by the night. I am stunned. I cannot believe he has left me alone. I scour through the house, through the kitchen, afraid of what I might find, hopeful to find anything, anyone. I pull open kitchen drawers and find nothing, just emptiness. I find an overturned armoire in one of the rooms. It is heavily laquered with ornate handles. There are clothes scattered on the floor. These people are dead, I tell myself.

I am surprised to find clothing. Despite the heat I pick up two sweaters and put them both on. I find no food, but there is a knife, an empty flask, and two bottles of beer. I am so thirsty that I break the bottle and drink. I put some in the flask and place it in my pocket.
Has he really left me alone?
I peek through the broken windows. My eyes scour the dark. The sky rumbles and explodes in a shower of rain. I throw open the door and set out running.

I am a rabbit broken loose from the jaws of a snake. I throw my head back, letting the rain drizzle into my mouth, and laugh. I laugh until my whole body shakes with the tears I shed. I run farther away from the sounds of fighting to an open field. I do not know where I am going. All I know is that I must continue north to get back to Domingo and my family. I run without thinking. The rain has eaten at the dirt, turning it into mud. It reveals something beneath the dirt. The ground every few feet is filled with gopher holes. I run a few feet, then stop suddenly. I feel my bones shake against the cage of my skin. I look down slowly, I see a piece of metal in every hole. These are not gopher holes. My mouth falls open, the way my youngest brother’s does when my father hits the back of his head and tells him to spit out whatever bad thing he is eating. All around me, dozens of land mines.