the makcik weather

You cannot keep a secret in our kampung. I know, because I have tried, and because the makcik network exists.

The makcik network is Mak's friends. There are three of them. Never two. Never four. Three. They come the way the rain comes, without anybody sending for them, and like rain they are already everywhere before you have got the window shut. A makcik can tell you it is going to rain on Thursday. She can tell you who you are going to marry. She can tell you your auntie in Singapore had her baby, before the phone in your own house has even rung. All three will turn out to be true.

This year I decided to beat them.

I was going to keep one secret. One. A surprise for Nenek.

Nenek runs our whole house from a chair, gives everything away, and keeps nothing for herself. So for once Nenek was going to be the one who got surprised. Her favourite kuih, the green ones. All the kids on the porch. A banner. And Nenek not knowing a thing until she came out and there it was. A thank you for the one person who never lets anybody thank her.

The only problem was getting it past the weather.

"This is a covert operation," I told the gang, behind the surau, where nobody could hear. "From now we use code. Nenek is the Eagle. The kuih is the Cargo. Nobody says the real words out loud. Understood."

"Why is Nenek the Eagle," said Kavi, at a volume that reached the next kampung.

"Quietly, Kavi."

"WHY IS NENEK THE EAGLE QUIETLY," said Kavi.

"They already know," said Divya. Divya is my best friend and she does not waste words.

"They cannot already know. We are behind the surau. We only just started."

"thiae," said Divya. "They always already know."

I did not listen. A good Commander does not listen to the one person who is right.

I sent Hana to buy the green kuih. Secretly. From the far stall, two streets over, so the near stall could not gossip.

Hana came back with the kuih and a strange look on her face.

"Did you get it quietly," I asked.

"I did not say one word," said Hana, who cannot lie, so I knew it was true. "I pointed. I paid. But the makcik at the far stall put extra in the bag, and the extra was free."

"Why free."

"She said it was for the Eagle." Hana looked at me. "thiae. How does the far stall know about the Eagle. We made up the Eagle yesterday. Behind the surau. We are the only two people alive who know the Eagle."

I had no answer. So I tightened security.

That was my mistake, and I can see it now. Acting all secret and sneaky is the most exciting thing on the whole street, and an exciting secret is exactly the kind of thing the makciks love to sniff out. More code, more folded notes, more meetings behind the surau. I was not hiding a secret. I was making the best gossip in months and handing it, by hand, to the people who eat gossip for breakfast.

By Thursday a makcik stopped me at the kedai, smiled, and asked, very kindly, whether the banner was going to be green to match the kuih.

I had told nobody about the banner. The banner was that morning.

I went home and lay on the floor for a while, which is what I do when a plan has beaten me.

Then I got up and tried one last thing. A trap. I told only Hana, in a whisper, with the door shut, that the surprise had moved to Sunday. It was a lie. If the lie came back to me, I would know the leak was one of us.

By lunchtime a makcik stopped me at the gate and asked, very kindly, whether I had settled on Saturday or Sunday, because Saturday was better, the kuih would be fresher.

The leak was not one of us. The leak was the air.

On Friday it came apart in front of everybody.

I had paid Aiman to keep the Cargo cold in Pakcik's freezer. On Friday Aiman decided that storage was extra.

"Freezer fee," said Aiman, at the kedai, loudly. "The Cargo for the Eagle has been in there two whole days. That is two days of fees."

"Aiman."

"I will have to take the Cargo out early if the Eagle cannot pay."

"AIMAN."

Kavi, hearing the word Cargo, did what Kavi always does. He shouted.

"THIS IS NOT ABOUT NENEK'S SURPRISE," he announced to the entire kedai, which is the one sentence in the world that tells everybody it is exactly about Nenek's surprise.

Pakcik, behind the freezer, did the small wave. The small wave means Pakcik has known the whole story since last Tuesday and was only waiting to see how long I would take to find out.

By evening I was sure it was wrecked. The whole street had heard. The Eagle had surely heard. Somewhere Nenek was already in her chair, not surprised, the way she is never surprised by anything.

I almost called it off.

But Saturday came, and I went out to the porch early to take it all down before anybody could see the wreck of it.

The porch was already swept. I had not swept it.

The green kuih was there, fresh, more than I had ordered, on a plate I had never seen before, and nobody could tell me who had brought it.

Pei Pei arrived with the banner she had built out of a bedsheet and two broom handles, and we went to hang it, and the two nails were already in the wall. Exactly where the broom handles needed to go. I had not banged in any nails. I do not even own a hammer.

I stood there holding a banner that fit nails I had not made, and I started to understand that I had not done any of this.

Then the right kids turned up at the right time, without me sending word, exactly as if word had been sent.

And Nenek came out onto the porch, slow, the way she comes, and she stopped. She put her hand to her mouth. And she was surprised.

She was actually surprised. The one woman in Johor who is never surprised by anything stood on her own porch with her hand over her mouth. She looked at the green banner, and the plate of green kuih, and the whole yard of kids who love her. She had not seen it coming.

That was when I felt them behind me.

Three makciks, at the edge of the yard, where the weather waits. They had not come for kuih. They were not helping themselves to anything, which for a makcik is unheard of. They were just standing there, watching Nenek be surprised. One of them caught my eye. She winked. She did not say a single word.

Then the three of them turned and went, off together the way they came, already on their way to know the next thing before it happened. One of them, going past me, pressed a second green kuih into my hand. For me. Free.

Nenek cut the first kuih and gave it round. Smallest first. That is me. I already had a second one in my hand that nobody could explain, so I ate that one too, and I did not ask where it came from.