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The Black Shadow
ŠCHANPHAL SOK
This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, and incidents featured in this work are imaginary. Any resemblance to real events or person is coincidental. By Sok Chanphal
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The Black Shadow
SOK CHANPHAL
The Black Shadow Shadow
2012
By Sok Chanphal
4 The Black Shadow Liberty Association #53 CE0, St 242 Chaktomuk, Daun Penh, Phnom Penh Cambodia
Blog : khmerphnompenh.wordpress.com Public relation : Davith Bolin cambocanada@gmail.com
President of Liberty Association : Phalla Ker Editor : Santepheap Lim Writers : Vathana Serei Kanitha Neng Chanphal Sok Rachana Im Chanpahna Ma Sereirachana Meng Proofreader : Oudom Heng Website designer : Boeun Tim Public relation : Davith Bolin By Sok Chanphal
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The Black Shadow
By Sok Chanphal
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The Black Shadow
By Sok Chanphal
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The Black Shadow
I walk home step by step, reversing the steps I'd taken this morning when I walked out of my house to look for a job. For the entire day, I've eaten only one piece of bread and drank a few sips of water from the fountain water. I know that it is not good for my health, but I have no choice. I know that nobody will offer me a job because I am not a good looking person and I have no decent clothes to wear. What should I do? I don’t know how, how to live? I ask myself if I have been born in this life just to receive misfortune? I am poor! I have only my mother who is poor and sick. Even in my present job, my employer ran away. I did not get my pay. My sinful life prevents me from dreaming about becoming a wealthy man. Should I have money to buy food and medicine in order to extend my mother’s life, it would be good enough. From the day that my father passed away, I have never had any happiness in my life. I only wish to live simply, but I can never achieve this stupid goal.
By Sok Chanphal
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The Black Shadow
I don’t want to walk fast, I don’t want to go home; I want time to go slow, but I cannot control this. Only three kilometers left to go before home as I drag my fatigued body with tired steps to my small hut. I feel like I am walking on the way to hell. I have a feeling of fear about hell, because at any place, my life will still be lonely. When I think about my mother who is waiting for the day to die and then think about myself, I feel ashamed. When I look around at people, they are looking down on each other. My heart feels like death. The breath that I am breathing now, I am not sure when it will stop, and I don’t know what I am breathing for. Oh! Among the people around me, no one is my friend. I walk into a big company and ask a security man to see if there is any appropriate job for me, but the security guy makes nasty comments to me, “You are not qualified to work in such a big company. Get out quickly so you won't damage the beauty of this place!” As for humans in this world, not only do the rich look down on the poor, bur the poor also By Sok Chanphal
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The Black Shadow
look down on other poor people? I get to a restaurant where the car of a rich man is leaving the parking lot. The parking attendant, who is giving a signal to the driver, slaps my back very hard and yells at me angrily, “Hey! stupid, Don’t you see the car?” There may still be a few people who love each other; and among them, they only love others with some affinity. I personally knew this to be true until I became a disliked person. I know that human society has disgusting social divisions. I see a store that has put out a sign, “Help Wanted”. I ask the person there about it twice. He then turns to me and answers with an annoying sound, “The position is filled.” Decent people never want to speak to me. They look at me as if I were a fly. I start to hate human society. Anybody who hates me, I hate him or her the same way. I hate them to the point that I don’t want to live in the same world with them. I don't know anyone in this world who will count on me besides my mother. And my mother will certainly leave me soon. How will I live by myself? By Sok Chanphal
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The Black Shadow
I have a hundred meters to go before I reach my destitute hut. When I get home, I am sure my mother will ask me why am I so late tonight? And I will lie to my mother the same way I did last night. "Too busy, don’t worry Mom." Oh! Everything that I am doing right now is a mockery, a reflection of my own classless, low and cheap life. While standing in front of my hut, I try to pretend by attempting to switch my expression from hopelessness to hopefulness. I step slowly into my hut steeped in darkness. I think my mother is asleep. I light the lamp. The light that I just lit leads my eyes to the place where my mother sleeps. My body goes limp. I feel faint. My mother is not asleep, her soul has flown away to paradise.
By Sok Chanphal
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The Black Shadow
By Sok Chanphal
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The Black Shadow
By Sok Chanphal