Rofik and Teguh exchanged a long glance, their eyes flickering with the unspoken tension that hung between them, before settling once more on Havi, who now sat squarely between them like a thread from another world woven into theirs.
At length, Rofik broke the silence, “Well then, speak, Havi,” he said, his voice edged with suspicion, but not without restraint. “What favour is it you’ve come to ask of us?”
Havi drew on his cigarette, then released the smoke with unhurried grace, his expression calm
A faint smile lingering on his lips, not quite a smirk, not quite a sneer.
It was the kind of smile that spoke of knowledge unshared, of a card yet to be played.
They had guessed as much.
A visit like this, the casual offering of cigarettes, no, it wasn’t some idle gesture of goodwill.
There was purpose beneath it all, and they could feel it like a current beneath still water.
In a voice low and deliberate, as though unravelling a secret, Havi answered, “A favour? Yes... there is something I need.”
“Then out with it, Havi,” said Teguh, his tone softened now, though the tension remained, a quiet crackle in the air, like thunder looming just beyond the hills.
Havi gave a slight nod, as though weighing each word before it left his mouth.
Then, with a calmness that almost unnerved, he said, “Tell me! Have either of you found work lately?”
Rofik and Teguh arched a brow apiece, their movements near-synchronous, a silent duet of scepticism.
“Work?” Rofik echoed, casting a sidelong glance at Teguh, as though to verify he hadn’t misheard the absurdity.
Havi inclined his head, more firmly this time, “Yes. Work.”
Teguh took a long drag from his cigarette before responding, smoke curling languidly from his lips.
“Have you… suffered a knock to the head, Havi?” he asked, his head tilting slightly, eyes narrowing with something between incredulity and amusement.
Havi chuckled softly, the sound light yet guarded, “What are you implying?” he returned, voice edged with a jest that didn’t quite reach his eyes.
“You know full well we’re unemployed,” Teguh said, his tone lower now, as though dragging weight behind each word. “Our only profession, if you can call it that, is crime. The whole of Loban knows it, and so do the neighbouring villages.”
His final words were enunciated with careful disdain, the word crime lingering on his tongue like a threat half-swallowed, a warning not to trifle with men like them.
“I’m aware,” Havi replied coolly, not a flicker of fear crossing his features.
His voice was even, measured like a still lake concealing a treacherous depth, “And that is exactly why I’ve brought you an offer.”
Rofik’s mouth curved into a wry sneer, “And what noble profession might you be dangling before us, then?” he asked, a sardonic lilt in his voice.
“I’m selling your reputation,” said Havi, plainly.
No flourish. No humour. Just the bare, glinting edge of the truth, laid down like a blade.
Rofik and Teguh started as though stung.
“Our reputation?!” Rofik barked, leaping to his feet with a force that sent his chair scraping backwards across the floor. He strode forward, placing himself squarely before Havi. “What are you playing at, eh? Explain yourself!”
Teguh, no less incensed, stepped in. His face had darkened, jaw set like granite.
In one swift, unthinking motion, his hand shot forward, gripping Havi by the collar just below the throat.
“I’d advise you not to toy with us,” he growled through gritted teeth, menace clinging to every syllable.
Yet Havi did not flinch. A ghost of a smile tugged at his lips.
Calm, measured, infuriatingly serene as though he were witnessing the tantrum of children rather than facing the fury of two hardened men.
At that moment, Mrs Suharti emerged from the back of the warung, her hands still damp from rinsing dishes.
The scene that greeted her stole the colour from her cheeks.
“Rofik! Teguh!” she cried, her voice slicing through the tension like a whip. “What do you think you’re doing to Havi?!”
Without hesitation, she rushed to them, her ageing hands trembling as she tried to prise Teguh’s fingers from Havi’s shirt.
“Teguh, let him go! Let him go, I said!” she shouted, breath short with panic yet unflinching in resolve.
Faced with her determination and the unmistakable maternal fire in her eyes, Teguh hesitated, then finally released Havi with a grunt of displeasure, his hands falling to his sides, fingers twitching.
“I’m quite all right, Mrs Suharti,” Havi said softly, as he calmly straightened the collar of his shirt.
His voice carried the calm assurance of a man entirely in control of the moment.
“Now what’s all this about?” she demanded, her tone sharp, almost accusatory. “Someone tell me clearly for once!”
Havi inclined his head respectfully and replied with quiet ease, “I merely offered Rofik and Teguh a job.”
Mrs Suharti turned on the two young men with the withering glare of a woman who had seen too much and forgiven too often.
Her voice, though not raised, struck with precision.
“You ungrateful boys. Havi comes here in good faith, extending a hand to lift you from the muck, and this is how you repay him?”
“Mrs Harti,” Rofik interjected quickly, a defensive edge to his tone. “He was making fun of us. We asked him what kind of work he meant, and he said… he said he wanted to sell our reputation!”
“That’s why we lost our temper,” Teguh added, his voice still taut with indignation, though tinged now with a hint of shame.
Mrs Suharti slowly shook her head, her expression one of quiet, weary disappointment.
“Do either of you even grasp what Havi meant when he said he wanted to sell your reputation?” she asked, her tone sharp with frustration, yet tinged unmistakably with concern.
Rofik and Teguh exchanged a glance half confusion, half hesitation before both gave a small shake of the head.
It was clear they hadn’t the faintest idea.
“What was he on about, then?” Teguh asked eventually, his voice losing its edge, replaced now by a tentative curiosity.
Mrs Suharti let out a long, deliberate sigh, “This is exactly why I always told you not to skip school,” she began, her voice rising, not out of spite but love stretched thin. “Look where it’s brought you. Cutting classes, dropping out halfway, and now, what are you? Village ruffians? Petty criminals with no direction? Marked as youths without a future!”
The words struck not like daggers, but like the scolding of a mother who had long since run out of ways to show she cared.
And instead of anger, Rofik and Teguh merely grinned in that sheepish, boyish way reserved only for those who had known both rebuke and affection from the same voice all their lives.
They had always seen Mrs Suharti not just as a neighbour, but as something far dearer, a mother figure whose scorn, they knew, came only from love.
“Well then, perhaps you’d be so kind as to explain, Ma'am…” Rofik said with a crooked smile, still chuckling under his breath as though the years had peeled away.
Mrs Suharti drew in a deep, steadying breath, gathering her words like a seamstress gathering loose thread.
Then, in a tone both resolute and maternal, she declared, “Then you’d best listen carefully.”
Her eyes moved deliberately from Rofik to Teguh, and then lingered on Havi.
The air in the corner of modest coffee stall seemed to still, as though even the wind outside had hushed itself, waiting for what she would say next.