The Trafficked

39

Wednesday had not slept. She lay on the piece of hard-board that was her bed and watched the dawn filter weakly through the cracks in her cardboard house. She heard the children outside getting ready for school. She heard the baby crying opposite. She knew that right now she would usually be watching Maya sleeping soundly beside her, and she would get up first and light the stove ready to make them tea and heat water for rice. There was only work for Wednesday to get up for now. Her eyes were sore; her breathing hurt in her chest; her stomach ached for her child. Her whole life was pointless without Maya. The love for her child was the only love Wednesday had ever known. She did not remember the mother who had sold her to the Colonel. She had no memories of any affection. She had grown up sitting on the Colonel’s lap, sleeping in his bed. She was like a lap dog. One night the rage overtook him and when Wednesday awoke the sheets were covered in her blood and her stomach was agony. He had drugged and raped her. From that moment on she was no longer his pet. Wednesday was sold to a Japanese man with tattoos all over his body. He had been horrible to her-he had shouted at her and beaten and raped her until she learned what she had to do. She had to crawl on her hands and knees to him and tell him that she was his dirty little Filipina, she was not worthy of him. Then he would show her some gentleness.

After the Japanese came the old Caucasians, the young ones, the blacks, the whites, the Asians, and anyone else who could pay. Wednesday lost count of how many she had sex with and she lost all hope…until the day when Father Finn banged on the Dutchman’s door and rescued her from his bed. Until that day Wednesday had thought her heart was dead. But when Father Finn had picked her up and marched out of there with her under his arm, he had changed her life forever and showed her what it was to care for another person, to risk for another and to open your heart and love another. On the first night she had sat with the other children at the refuge she had known her life was just beginning. It was the happiest she had ever been. She learned to play. She learned to laugh. Father Finn was her world. He was a hero to her. He taught her to read and write. He told her how smart she was and made her believe she could be anything she wanted. The Father was always telling her she could stay at the refuge as long as she liked, and she would have done, had she not discovered she was pregnant. She had no idea who the father might be. She had only just begun to have periods and had not known to use contraception. She felt her stomach grow hard and become round and she knew she could not spoil it all now. She felt the shame of it. She had to get rid of it. She knew the Father would never agree to an abortion. She knew he would want her to have the baby. But this was Wednesday’s chance of life. She had to get rid of the baby. She ran home to Davao, to a woman in the Barrio Patay whom everyone knew as an abortionist. But Wednesday’s flight was in vain. When she lay on the woman’s floor, her legs open and the woman’s fingers inside her, she felt the baby flutter. Wednesday knew it was too late for an abortion now. The baby was calling to her. It knew it had a mama and Wednesday knew she was it. Now she prayed with all her heart that Father Finn could be her hero again and rescue her baby.

She sat on the edge of the bed. It was then she heard the clamour from outside in the alleyways. Someone was calling her name. A small boy that she knew as Pepe was standing at her doorway.

‘What do you want, Pepe? Is it washing for your mama?’

He shook his head. ‘I have a message for you.’

‘Who from?’

‘A man stopped me-a Kano. He said I was to tell you something.’ Pepe hovered at the door. ‘He told me I was to say that you must go to Angeles, the Colonel is waiting and he has your daughter.’

‘Aye!’ Wednesday clutched her fists to her chest. ‘Maya? He has Maya?’

Pepe nodded.

‘What else did he say? You must try and remember everything, Pepe, please…’

The boy rolled his eyes skyward as he tried to recollect word for word what the Kano had said.

‘He said tell her to come alone-no priests. If you come with priests he will slit her throat.’