the first durian

Atok says you do not pick a durian.

Atok is my grandfather. He sits in the yard with a radio. He believes the radio. He does not believe people. The one thing he does not ask the radio about is the durian tree. He just knows. A durian comes down when it is ready. Not one minute before. Atok knows when. He asks the tree. The tree tells him by saying nothing for weeks.

I did not have weeks.

The first durian of the year goes to Nenek. Nenek is my grandmother. She runs the whole house from a chair and never stands up. Every year the first durian off Atok's tree comes to her. She splits it and gives it round. Smallest first. Every year Nenek gives. For one whole minute after, she is not telling anyone to do anything. That is how you know it is the best thing all year.

This year I was going to be the one who got it to her. First. Before the makcik network. They can smell a ripe durian from three houses away. They come walking fast, like the smell sent them a message.

I went out to the tree to discuss the timing.

The durian was right at the top. Fat. Calm. Not interested in me.

"Belum," said Atok. He did not look up. He did not turn the radio down. Belum means not yet. I have heard Atok say belum to that tree my whole life. I think the tree likes it.

A durian falls when it is ready. This one had not fallen. So this one had not been reminded. I decided to remind it.

I took off one selipar and threw it. Good throw. It went up into the leaves. It did not come back down. Now the durian had a selipar up there. I had one selipar. One, on one foot, which is worse than none, because at least none is even.

This is fine, I thought. You adjust. I took off the other selipar and threw it up to knock the first one down.

Now the tree had two selipar and one durian. I had no selipar and a new problem. The durian had not even looked at me.

So I got Hana.

Hana is my cousin. She is always at the house. She does what you tell her and only what you tell her, like a broom does only the floor.

"You are the catcher," I said.

Hana put both arms out in a circle. She went and stood under the tree on the exact spot. She did not move off it. I had not said she could.

I shook the tree. I shook it with both hands and my whole body and my teeth. The tree did not notice. I weigh about the same as a cat. The durian looked down at a cat shaking a tree. It stayed where it was. One leaf came off. Somewhere else.

That was when Divya came to the fence.

Divya lives next door. She is my best friend. She is always right, which is hard in a best friend. She had her exercise book under her arm. Divya does her homework even when nobody is making her.

"It will fall when it falls," Divya said. "That is how durian works. Everybody knows."

"You are now Intelligence," I said.

"I am doing fractions."

"Intelligence can do fractions later."

"This is the answer," Divya said. "You are not going to like it. It is still the answer." Then she did her fractions on the fence. She had told me the thing. Being right was enough work for her.

So I got the rope.

One end goes on the branch. The other end goes on something stronger than a girl who weighs the same as a cat. The strongest thing in the yard that is not Nenek is Atok's motorbike.

I tied one end to the branch with the durian on it. I tied the other end to the motorbike. I cannot start a motorbike. I am nine. But you do not need to start a motorbike to make it go down a slope. You take the brake off. You believe.

I took the brake off. I believed.

The motorbike went. The rope went tight. The branch has been on that tree since before the motorbike was a motorbike. The branch did not go anywhere. The motorbike did. Slowly. With great dignity. Sideways. Into the longkang.

The longkang is the drain. We treat it like a kingdom. Now the kingdom had a motorbike in it. Lying down. One wheel still going round, thinking about it.

The rope, before it gave up, did one thing. It shook every small hard green durian off the tree at once.

They came down like the sky threw a handful. On the zinc roof first. The zinc roof is the loudest roof in Johor. Bang. Then bang. Then bangbangbangbang. The house sounded like something very big wanted to come in. On the chicken. She was crossing the yard with opinions. Now she had more. She said all of them. She ran in a way that helped nobody.

Nearly on the baby.

The baby is the smallest one in the house. The baby finds everything and eats most of it. The baby had appeared. The baby always appears. Nobody sees it coming. Then it is there, at the worst second. The baby stood in the durian rain and looked up with its mouth open. Not scared. Not even a little. Just very, very interested. Like it was going to remember this and try it later.

I picked the baby up and put it behind me. Behind a nine-year-old who caused the problem is the only safe place in a yard.

The first durian did not move. The fat one. The ripe one. The whole reason for all of it. It did not fall with the green ones. It stayed up there between the two selipar. It did not even swing.

A durian comes down when it is ready. That is why there was a motorbike in the longkang. I know that now. I did not know it before. I had tried it three other ways first.

Then the makcik arrived.

The makcik network is Mak's friends. They are never one person. They come as a group. Nobody sees them set off. Then they are just there, knowing everything already. Most days they help themselves to Mak's kuih before anyone has said it is kuih time. One of them looked at the motorbike in the longkang. Then at the two selipar in the tree. Then at the chicken, still going. Then at me. No selipar, a baby behind me, green durian everywhere. She did not ask one question. The makcik network does not ask. They had not come for the why. They had come for the rest of it. This time they helped themselves to nothing. There was nothing yet. They waited, the way you wait for a kettle you can hear starting.

Kak Long had been in the yard the whole time. Kak Long is my big sister. She is sixteen. Her phone is part of her hand. She had not looked up once. Not for the motorbike. Not for the hail. Not for the chicken. The phone rang. She answered it without looking at any of it.

It was Syafiq. Syafiq is my cousin on the Singapore side, across the Causeway. He is the most pleased person alive. That family hears everything and counts it. I only got the loud part. His family bought a durian that morning. In a mall. In Singapore. A man weighed it. You took a ticket. There was a receipt.

A receipt. For a durian. I did not know you could get a receipt for a durian. Syafiq could.

"He says theirs opened fine," Kak Long said. She said it to the yard, not to me, like reading out a sign. "He wants to know how yours is going."

Then Kak Long looked up. At the motorbike in the longkang. At the selipar in the tree. At the green durian and the chicken and the baby and me. She took the phone away from her ear. She did not put it back. She did not say anything into it. From Kak Long, that is the loudest thing there is.

I had run out of plan. The motorbike was in the longkang. The selipar were in the tree. The chicken was in a mood. The baby was behind me taking notes. Everywhere I looked was a thing I had done.

So I sat down in the longkang. Next to the motorbike. It was the only place left to sit that was not a problem I had made. It was a problem I had made too. But I was already in it.

Then Atok came across the yard. Slow. He looked at his motorbike in the drain for a long time. The wheel had stopped. He did not shout. Atok does not shout. He looked at the motorbike the way you look at a friend who has made a choice.

"Belum," Atok said. He said it to the motorbike. Then he went back to his chair and turned the radio up. Same as any other day.

And the durian fell.

By itself. Soft. The exact second I sat down and stopped. It came down with no sound. Past the first selipar. Past the second. It landed in the mud by my foot. Gentle. Like it had been up there the whole time, waiting for me to be quiet.

It was very late. The sky had gone dark while I was busy. I had not noticed. Nenek sleeps at nine. The durian was hours past nine. It did not care. Nothing about that durian was ever on anybody's clock but its own. Nobody handed Nenek anything first. I had wanted to be the one. I was sitting in a drain.

The makcik looked at the durian in the mud. Then they went home, the way they came. The rest of it had happened. There was nothing more to be there for. They would tell everyone about the motorbike before breakfast.

In the morning the durian was on the table by Nenek's chair. Washed. The mud off it. Atok must have done it. He was already in his chair with the radio when I came out, like he had never moved.

Nenek came slow to the door. She is the smallest grown-up in the house. A little bit bent. She stands in the door frame, not on the steps. The steps are for children. She looked at the durian for a while. She did not ask where it came from. She knows everything that happens in this house, even when she is asleep through it.

"Jatuh sendiri," I heard Atok say. To the radio. Not to me. It fell by itself.

I did not give Nenek the durian. The tree gave Nenek the durian. I only carried it the last few steps, after it was already down.

Nenek opened it herself. With her thumbs, the way she does every year. It did not want to open. It held on. Then it did not. The smell came into the house all at once. She split it and gave it round. Smallest first. That is me. Before she took any. The first piece of the first durian of the year. Into my hand. From Nenek.

Nenek did not say anything. She looked at the piece in my hand. Then she looked at me. A moment longer than she had to. The corner of her mouth did a small thing, once, and went back. It could have been the durian. It could have been me. With Nenek you do not get told which. You do not ask.

Hana was still under the tree with her arms out in a circle. Nobody had told her to stop. She had caught nothing, all night, beautifully. She was still ready.