Through the gap beneath the bedroom door, I watched the shadows of large feet pacing back and forth. The debt collectors had no interest in Mother's explanations. Since there was no money, they began eyeing the belongings inside our house. The television—our only source of entertainment—the old radio, even Mother's valuables were taken by force as collateral.
Mother could only sob helplessly, trying to stop them, but her strength was no match. Beneath the bed, I clenched my thin fists. My chest ached watching her humiliated in her own home while Father was nowhere to be found.
After the collectors left, taking with them a portion of our home's soul, a painful silence settled in. Not long after, Father appeared through the back door with a face that seemed either innocent—or too ashamed to admit guilt.
"Where have you been? Our things are gone! Your children were terrified!" Mother cried, her voice raw from weeping.
Another fierce argument erupted. That night, it was not only material possessions we lost, but also my respect for the man who was supposed to be my shelter. At such a young age, our minds were forced to mature too soon. We learned that the outside world was cruel—but betrayal from within one's own home was far more devastating.
In my silence as a ten-year-old boy, I often stared at Father's increasingly hunched back, trying to understand what filled his thoughts. Did he feel like a failure, cast out from Pelita 4? Was gambling his escape from the reality that his voice had never mattered in his extended family?
He was like a man who had lost his compass. On one side, I understood his wounds. On the other, anger surged within me. Why did we have to be the sacrifice? Father seemed to forget us—and worse, he seemed to forget his God. The prayer altar in our house gathered dust. There were no more sincere prayers, only cigarette smoke and piles of lottery slips he treated like scriptures of salvation.
The Principal's Office: A Prison Behind a Desk
The bitterness seeped into school. While other children feared math exams, my siblings and I feared summons to the administration office.
"Your school fees are three months overdue, Raymond. Where is the money?" they would ask with suspicion.
Sometimes teachers looked at us as if we were petty thieves who had spent tuition money on snacks. We swallowed our shame. We could never say that the money had vanished at Father's gambling table. My siblings endured the same humiliation. Each day we returned home with lowered heads, confiding in Mother whose chest was already tight with worry.
Mother, with what courage she had left, always came to school. I saw her pleading with the administration office, offering promises of payment she herself did not know how to fulfill. At school, I became painfully quiet. I was afraid to socialize, afraid that conversations would drift toward my private life.
The pressure sometimes exploded into uncontrolled anger. There was Johanes, a popular but mischievous boy from the same clan. One day, he and his friends cornered me after school.
Usually silent, I suddenly felt all my anger toward Father and the debt collectors surge into my fists. I struck Johanes so hard his lip bled badly. The next day, courage abandoned me. Johanes returned with a group to beat me up. Thankfully, a classmate who knew them stepped in and mediated.
"Enough. Leave him alone," he said.
I was spared, but my spirit fractured further. I felt like a stranger both at home and at school.
My only escape was the afternoons in Mandala. Though Mother insisted we nap so we would not wander, I often stole time to join the neighborhood children.
We played in extreme places—the unfinished Mandala toll road construction site. Mounds of dirt and massive slabs of concrete became our playground. We slid down the rough concrete slopes as if they were slides.
"Come on, Ray! Faster!" my friends shouted.
I slid freely, wind slapping against my thin face. For a moment, I forgot about unpaid school fees, forgot about Father gambling, forgot about debt collectors. But when I landed, a loud ripping sound echoed.
My only decent pair of trousers tore at the back.
When I got home, Mother saw more than torn fabric. To her, it was another economic burden she could no longer bear. She scolded me loudly, her voice clashing with Father's murmurs in another corner as he discussed lottery numbers.
I stood frozen, staring at my ripped trousers. At ten years old, I realized my life was much like that fabric—torn apart by circumstance, yet still forced to cover the family's unending shame.
In Perumnas Mandala, reputation was a luxury we could not afford. As Father's gambling worsened, neighbors gave him a degrading nickname: "Si Teleng," implying someone crooked or unbalanced. The consequence? We, his children, were labeled "the Gambler's Kids." Each time the name reached my ears, it stung worse than Mother's punishment ever had.
Father had changed completely. Once, he was a neat and meticulous civil servant. I still remembered how he polished his Vespa motorcycle until it gleamed, intolerant of even a speck of dust. Now, the Vespa was gone. Father stayed silent whenever we asked. We suspected it had been handed to loan sharks or sold for gambling money. Other motorcycles came and went, each disappearing mysteriously.
One day, the house tensed when an Indonesian Army officer arrived with his wife. My heart pounded—usually, visitors meant more chaos. But this time was different. After Mother tearfully explained that we knew nothing about Father's debts, the soldier's expression softened.
He looked at us—small children who had not tasted a proper meal in a long time. Instead of anger, compassion filled his eyes. He left briefly and returned with a package of uncooked stick noodles.
"Cook this, Ma'am. Let the children eat," he said gently.
Mother, flustered and unfamiliar with the dish, tried turning it into mie gomak. I watched from the kitchen with hope. When it was served, I quietly thought, This doesn't taste like it should. It was strange, disappointing. Yet the soldier and his wife sat with us, eating Mother's imperfect cooking with sincere smiles. They even forgave Father's debt entirely.
That day, God sent us protection in uniform.
The miracle did not stop there. In the darkness of our lives, there was also Mr. Sarumpaet, a police officer and Father's close friend. Though Father had lost his way, Mr. Sarumpaet still showed humanity.
When Eid al-Adha arrived and our kitchen was empty, he came with a package of sacrificial meat.
"This is for you. Eat," he said simply.
Mother's eyes sparkled. It was a luxury we had not felt in a long time. While Father neglected his duty as provider, God used the hands of strangers—a soldier and a police officer—to ensure we did not go hungry.
Those moments awakened something in me, Raymond. Even though our name was stained with the label "the Gambler's Kids," God's grace still reached us through the kindness of others. Hope remained—no matter how large the hole in my torn trousers, or how bland Mother's mie gomak tasted.