"One day when her son was twelve years old, all three of them piled onto the family scooter to visit relatives in Bandung. But her son was difficult, laughing at passing truck drivers, squirming about, distracting her husband who was concentrating on the traffic. In hindsight, she wonders whether she should have asked her husband to stop at the side of the road while she disciplined their son. As they rode up the steep hill to Bandung, her husband suddenly swerved to avoid a bus. They were not travelling very fast but he still lost control and they all toppled from the scooter. The next thing she remembered, she was next to her son at the edge of the road, with passing motorists taking care of them. They had only minor grazes and bruises. Her husband wasn’t beside them. At first, she did not see him. Then she saw him lying on his side in the middle of the road. He was still moving a little, slowly beckoning with a loose arm in her direction. She watched several cars manage to miss him but then a large truck didn’t see him until it was too late."
Excerpt from A Girl & a Guy in a Kijang in Kemang, a story in We Rose Up Slowly
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This story was previously published in Eastern Heathens by Ethos Books in 2013. Thanks to Amanda Lee Koe and Ng Yi Sheng for publishing this anthology of subverted Asian folklore.