The Iron Bridge: Short Stories of 20th Century Dictators as Teenagers by Anton Piatigorsky

eat. Sâr steals furtive glances at the almost closed partition and the enticing sliver of flesh that remains exposed. The girl is prostrate and submerged in some sort of dark reverie, her eyes open but empty, her mouth parted with a bit of drool pooling at the corner. He wants to say something but doesn’t know what. Between bites, Kiri half-heartedly sings the musical phrase that Sâr heard earlier through the door.
    Without his furious charge of desire, the dancers’ small home now feels dingy and overheated, stifling and depressing. He doesn’t want to be here. He grabs some rice and takes a bite, but his eating lacks joy. The young women have abandoned their perfect postures and atrophied into older figures, more slumping grandmothers than strong girls. Veata rubs her lower back and sighs. The diffuse opium smoke irritates Sâr’s eyes. He rubs them dry with the corner of his shirt. He feels like a captive in this stuffy room. When the silence grows too awkward, Sâr forces himself to speak.
    “I suppose,” he says, “you’ve been practising dances all day?”
    “All week,” replies Kiri.
    “All life,”
corrects Veata.
    Kiri chuckles bitterly. “Yes, we practise all life.”
    “Is it especially difficult to prepare for the New Year’s dances?” Sâr asks the question quietly, his eyes downcast, head barely raised, knowing full well the answer.
    “Of course,” says Veata. “Very gruelling. Your sister’s hard on us.”
    Sâr’s cheeks flush with shame.
    “But the New Year is not half as difficult as the Water Festival,” says Kiri.
    Veata groans in remembrance of last November’s dances.
    “I’m never more tired than I am each year after the Water Festival,” Kiri adds. “We sleep for a month after that. I mean, when we’re not practising.”
    Nhean chokes, coughing sharply, spraying droplets of breast milk all over his startled mother.
    “Aayh, Nhean!” Veata cries as she pulls him away. Kiri chuckles while the boy wails in his mother’s arms. Veata brushes off the milk, pats the baby on his back until he’s calm, and lets him return to his meal.
    “That sounds very difficult,” says Sâr. Each word sprouts thorns that torture his throat. His politeness feels grotesque—a trite and obvious dressing that can’t cover the crude purpose of his visit, the nakedness of his now-fulfilled desire. Sâr’s delicate hand reaches for another ball of rice in a gesture that feels forced, stupid, and obscene. He imaginesa machete falling, slicing the hand off his arm, the severed limb bleeding and pulsing beside the rice—he believes he deserves this fate. He scoops a ball of moist rice with his fingers and brings it to his lips, forcing himself to chew and swallow. The rice is thick and flavourless, a mass of glutinous paste, more like mortar in his mouth than food. The hunger he’s identified as his own feels remote and obscure. Nhean’s slurping makes him want to vomit. He has to get out of here.
    Saloth Sâr
. He can still recall Chanlina’s smooth voice, singing his name.
    There’s a hard rapping on the door. As the women widen their eyes and turn, Sâr’s body surges with adrenalin. Outside, Roeung calls to the dancers.
    “Girls! Open up!”
    Chanlina rouses from her drugged stupor and jolts up. “What?” she cries, blinking fast, trying to force her eyes to function.
    “Evening practice in ten minutes. Have you eaten? Open the door!”
    “The fan,” says Chanlina in a panic. “And the curtains!”
    “One moment,
Lok Srey
Roeung,” calls Kiri as she stands. She runs to the window, opens the curtains, tries to fan some fresh air into the room with her hands. “We’re just cleaning up.”
    Sâr stands, checks his shirt, and notices that it’s fastened incorrectly. He frantically re-buttons it while trying to slip on his clogs. Chanlina has managed to stand. She tucks her pipe beneath her pillow and works to tie her
sampot
. She represses all signs of intoxication; her motions