Sea by Heidi Kling Read Free Book Online Page B

smoke.
    “It’s pollution, and from burning garbage and rice fields,” Dad said when I asked him why. “They don’t have air pollution laws like we do in California,” he explained.
    An empty cab finally pulled up, and an enthusiastic driver hopped out, a cigarette hanging from his mouth. Dad spoke to him in Indonesian and we all squeezed into the backseat, which reeked like melting plastic and BO. Dad sat next to him, shotgun. He pulled out the address and gave it to him. I was impressed by Dad’s grip on the language. Though I didn’t understand a word of what they were saying, I listened to them talk as the driver lit up another cigarette and blasted off into traffic.
    At first I didn’t think about the immediate danger as I rolled down my window to avoid the secondhand smoke. The hot air felt good on my face. I could have called it wind, but the air wasn’t moving enough to earn that definition. Then I realized how fast we were zipping through traffic. And the fact that there was nothing strapping me into my seat.
    “Remember that scene in Star Wars where Han is zigzagging his ship through the asteroid field?” I said in a shaky voice. “This is just like that.” I was trying to be cool and breezy like Tom. Trying not to think about our heads splitting open on hot black asphalt.
    “Arrrr.” Tom pounded on his chest, a terrible Chewbacca imitation. Everyone did it except me and the driver. The driver probably thought we were insane.
    “Don’t distract him! He needs to concentrate on the road!”
    “Live a little, kid,” Tom said with an obnoxious grin.
    I rolled my eyes as the driver jerked the car to the right and then a sharp left to avoid crashing into rows of outdoor market stalls. I imagined the baskets of fish and fruit and brains splattered all over the streets.
    Live a little. Okay, fine.
    “I’ll give him some credit. He must be very good at video games,” I mumbled.
    Tom cracked up and then pointed past me. “Check that out!” We whizzed past a booth selling funky wooden clocks in every shape and size you could think of veiled by a kaleidoscope of blankets blowing in the breeze. “I’m going Christmas shopping while we’re here for sure. Look at those bamboo cooking supplies!” Tom said.
    While I was worried about our body parts being splayed all over the road, Tom was dreaming about playing Santa.
    What had I gotten myself into?

DAY ONE
    THE PESANTREN
    A short, shoeless man stood beside a booth at the top of a driveway, a cigarette dangling out of his mouth.
    “Are you sure this is the right place, Dad? Where are all the kids?” I asked.
    I stepped cautiously out of the cab, and noticed the thick air had turned into drizzle.
    This was the orphanage?
    The man said something to Dad in Indonesian and then held open a decrepit white gate for us as the taxi driver unloaded our bags.
    I hung back by the cab, clutching my backpack to my chest.
    “Vera? You sure you guys gave him the right address?”
    Cats were everywhere. Skinny feral cats: on the cracked tile porches of the dying square buildings I saw through the gate, on the mostly dead lawn and now, rubbing against my pant leg.
    I was more of a dog person.
    “Sienna, come on,” Dad said, coaxing me away from the cab. “We’re here.”
    When the taxi skidded off, shooting wet dirt into the air, I resisted the urge to run after it.
    And then boisterous yelling rang through the silence. Some boys about my age were messing around across the way. Dressed in grungy T-shirts that looked more like dishrags than clothes, they were pulling aluminum cans out of a filthy river.
    “Are those the orphans?” I asked, wincing a little as I said the o word. “I mean, are those the kids that live at the pesantren ?”
    “Street kids, probably. Collecting cans to sell,” Tom said.
    “The street kids don’t live here?”
    “No,” Dad said. “Some might be runaways, some orphans.”
    “If they don’t have a home, then why don’t they