The Ntag

You asked me to write an essay about someone that changed my life as my last term paper as a high school student. My story, my essay and how this girl changed my life will answer all that. Her name is Ntag Her; it’s strange how her name means the same as “sword” in Hmong. Now listen carefully because how she changed my life I don’t know how either…
I was the average Sophomore here in Highland Park Senior High School. Everyone wants to be someone, everyone is labeled, there were the jocks, the bullies, the nerds and geeks, the popular kids and the outcasts. Me? Well, I was more of the popular player and I spent my time with my group of friends talking about girls. It was the beginning of the school year and everyone seemed excited to see his or her friends—mostly the Freshmen. Anyway it was fall of 2005, I don’t know how it became so wrong but that you will shortly find out later. Anyway life to me seemed the same as usual, school, work, family. School and work is where I usually hanged with my friends and when I came home from my part-time job at McDonalds I spent my time with my family: my younger brother Teng Lor, and my mom Mai Yang. My parents got divorced when my 13-year-old brother Teng was only three or four years old. Teng can barely remember anything about my old man and I didn’t want to remember him at all. No matter how many times I see him watching me walk into school, no matter how many times he talks to me at work I will always hate him for leaving my mom. He had a second family of his own while still marry with my mom and I couldn’t care less if he was dragged to the pits of Hell by the Devil himself. Ying Lor is not my father because I have none.
When I first met her, my brother Teng had dragged her to our house for dinner. Of course like usual the boy had no shame. My mom did make some good food. After dinner the two went to work on their project due in a week from that night and with Teng the two needed all the time they could get.
“Argh!” Teng growled from stress on his homework. He and Ntag sat in the living room colored in a brownish like tan, connecting from the front door where the stairs were and to the kitchen. “I will never get this Ntag,” Teng whined, he sounded as if he was going to give up. Teng and Ntag weren’t exactly friends and they weren’t exactly enemies, they were just classmates doing what they had to do. The two 8th graders were partners in their science project on weather.
“…” Ntag seemed as though she couldn’t reply to Teng at all. Ntag went back to her work on the project but Teng sat their totally clueless. And wondered what was with Ntag and why she seems to never answer anyone.
When I first met her I knew exactly what type of girl she was. She was the shy type, secretive and all. But when I actually talked to her it was different. Ntag was shy and all but if I think about it I wouldn’t had really met her if my brother hadn’t have to go to the hospital. Teng and his lame self was allergic to raw meat, his stomach can’t handle it uncooked. Apparently my mom that night had made a raw meat dish for us to eat. I remember Teng tried to show me he could handle spicy food because he had a sensitive tongue and shoved half a plate of that dish in his mouth. After some time he had began to feel dizzy and seemed like he was going to die so my mom took him to the hospital. I was left with Ntag because we couldn’t have our guest at the hospital when this was her first time here.
“Ntag, what’s your last name?” Khang had asked her so the awkward atmosphere that shouldn’t even be there would leave. But it seemed Ntag didn’t want to respond to his question. Khang looked into her eyes and saw something he only saw in his mother when he got into big trouble. Ntag’s eye at that moment when I tried to make contact showed me weakness. A strong woman like my mom never cried—or at least I’ve never seen or remember her cry. My mom, Mai, had always had those eyes when I get into trouble as big as ever. It showed she was afraid, worry, and very, very uncertain about things. It made me wonder if Ntag was scared of me or she just wanted to go home.
“Are you scared, Ntag?” Khang asked her. I was never the Hmong speaker as I grew up. So I always talked in English but with my mom I tried hard not to use a lot of words she doesn’t know yet. Ntag was a normal girl I guessed. What she showed me when she didn’t answer me right away was that she was a Hmong girl that didn’t like to be influence by people. It made me wonder: if you aren’t influence how do you have friends? But Ntag did answer me though; she nodded and said that she wanted to go home since she finished her part of the project. So I asked her where she lived and walked her home.
While Khang was walking Ntag home he asked her something, “Do you like Teng or did he just dragged you here like he does his other friends?” He wondered for a while if it was rude to ask but he doubt she would answer him back anyway.
“He… drags his friends here?” Ntag questioned him rather than answer him. Of course that meant Teng did the same thing to her. Surprising how she starts talking now but as long as he responded Khang was good—awhile. He doesn’t know what will happen next at most point but he’ll just keeps going his way anyway.
“Duh,” Khang responded with a smile trying not to laugh. “He’s a loser Ntag or haven’t you noticed?” Khang told her being the older brother they always see their younger brothers as lame. “His friends at school are “too cool” to come to our home so he drags them here,” joked Khang although that sometimes happens.
Ntag tried not to laugh and gave a smile. When Ntag smiled it was innocent. No smile that I’ve ever seen was that innocent like hers and it made me thought about how she could be so innocent. Then I remembered that she was the type that didn’t like to be influence so she didn’t have any friends. If she did had friends she wouldn’t have gotten dragged by Teng to my house. But then it made me thought… was she innocent because she had no influence and that meant she had no friends to corrupt her goodness by betrayal and jealousy? I couldn’t answer that and I knew she probably couldn’t either or more likely she probably won’t.
“You… aren’t scared of me, right?” Khang asked Ntag in an uncertain kind of way. They stared at each other for a minute walking down the sidewalk. Ntag’s eyes that stared at his were as if they were searching. My friends knew me as the master of girls, but when Ntag looked into my eyes and searched them I hesitated with my next move. I didn’t know what she was searching for, was she looking for an answer or just trying to identify me? Something was surely awkward with this girl, even the worst of a tomboy I could make blush but she just… repelled from her emotional feelings. It’s like she held a barrier guarded 24/7 around her feelings, something must be happening in her life to make her hold away all emotional feelings like that.
Ntag smiled liked before and shook her head to answer Khang. Khang still felt like she was searching him in another type of way. Khang kept his hands stuck in his jean pockets and asked her, “What’s with that notebook you keep holding with you?” Khang pointed at her writer’s journal she always had with her.
“Mmm…” Ntag looked down at it staring endlessly as if she was deciding on answering or not. “IIIt’s”, she held the word’s “I”(e). “…My writer’s… journal”, Ntag answered holding her book close to her chest as if it’s her baby like she was protecting it.
“So you like writing,” guessed Khang. It was pretty easy to see that she’s shy. And once I thought about it she wasn’t as different as those shy girls I met. Every girl whose shy has a way of speaking out that doesn’t really involve them speaking out. Some use poetry, reading, school but what seemed most common even for normal people who aren’t shy was writing. A way of defining themselves in their own emotional view was writing about themselves.
Ntag nodded meaning yes and then said to Khang, “I… don’t write, I just come up with the ideas”. She seemed happier than she was when she was at Khang’s house. Could if have been because she was uncomfortable there or just because they were getting closer to her home? Well, Khang was glad that she’s not hiding a lot anymore and that was a good thing.
“Ideas like what?”
“Um…” Ntag hid herself in her shell once more as she thought about it. It seemed that when she looked down to think of the answer she hid inside her shell, was it because she wanted to hide from me. She was like a beautiful pearl inside a clam that took years to create just the one. I realized that since she was the pearl that the clam, her shell, would protect her. But maybe she was the clam and her fragile emotions were the pearl. I shouldn’t be the one to answer that but at that point she clearly showed she was the pearl inside the shell.
When Khang returned home he was tired and went up to sleep, he didn’t even bother to go take a shower. Khang lay in bed and closed his eyes, for that moment when his eyes were shut he remembered Ntag’s innocent smile. He opened his eyes rapidly and thought to himself, ‘Why am I remembering this now?’ Sighing Khang turned on his stomach and pulled his thin blankets over his shoulders. He tuck his hands into his pillow, laid his head down and closed his eyes this time falling asleep.
I didn’t know why but for so long not only did I feel like my old man kept watch of me when I was at work but also by Ntag. I come into work and there she would be sitting at the right corner with fries or a burger writing in her writer’s journal. I had a night shift with my manager Feng Her this one time so I glanced over and she was still there drinking her sprite writing in her writer’s journal. I stared out the window and saw Lilly Fang, one of the girls I was fooling with.
Khang walked to Ntag and sat down across from her. “Ntag, why are you here?” he asked her.
Ntag looked up at him and smiled. “I wait for my dad here after school,” she replied with her smile. Ntag stared back down a bit saddened as she remembered why she had to wait there.
“What’s wrong?” asked Khang in concern. Whenever a girl look so sad as that something was wrong or something had hurt her in a way. Ntag seemed as if she was refusing to tell him what was wrong. She gave out a little sigh to take off the hold of her shoulders.
“They’re… divorced, that’s all”, she said to him in a sad like way. That night I talked with Ntag. My manager Feng had some customers at the drive-thru and thought I had already left. Ntag told me that Feng was her father, her parents got divorced. She lives with her mom but sadly she has to spend time with her dad Feng Her. I ignore Ying no matter how many times he stays after and lectures me. But… Ntag wasn’t down about having to struggle with two fakers. In her condition she didn’t care. What she was down about was the divorce. They’ve been divorced since her birth and maybe that’s why she’s so different from other girls. It was because she learned not to let the worst of the two influence her. I’ve always wonder did she had it worst because she never really knew her father in a father way in childhood, or did I have it worst because the childhood with Ying… was shattered by his betrayal?
“That I can relate to…” Khang responded back in a bit softer voice. “What are your parents like Ntag?” he asked her even though he knew she would probably not answer him back. “But… if you don’t want to tell me it’s okay. I know how hard it is,” he added before she would answer.
“It’s… okay,” she shuddered to answer him. “It’s… not hard really,” she looked down after looking up at him. “I just have to go into my world,” Ntag explained with a little, little grin.
“Your… world?” confused Khang asked her. Her world, when she explained what she meant she ask me if everyone else have their own world. I guess she might have been pretty lonely because it seemed she was the only one in her world but she told me that really she wasn’t. She explained that her world unlike everyone else’s was full of ideas and characters. When she was in her world it was the greatest and happiest place there was. “Must be great in a world like that,” looking down a bit down about his family life Khang envied her.
“Kuv… leeg tsiv saj li ntawm,” for the first time Khang heard her talk in Hmong it was a nice thing. Was Ntag really happy to have met him or just being nice to him? I never understood Hmong that much since I talked so much in English, but when people talked to me in Hmong like that I understand some of what they meant. All I know is that she was being nice and telling me she didn’t mean it like that. “I… daydream about the stories… I have in my mind,” she smiled her innocent smile but more cheerful than the first time he saw her smile. Her barrier seemed to be breaking and Khang wondered if she was beginning to trust him or just felt safe with him for this short while together.
“You’re really shy aren’t you?” asked Khang. I found after that point that her life was worst than mine. Ntag’s mother was nice but she’s heartbroken inside because of her father, Feng. And her father doesn’t spend much time with her at all. He lets her hang with him at work and sends her home. Personally, I think he wouldn’t care if she were doing drugs and all of that. Ntag hated it when her parents meet at some point and yells at each other out of nonsense. It’s very so often since he sends her home anyway. She grew up great to me so was it really that bad between her parents, did they hate each other that much—mostly what puzzle me was why. “You want me to take you home Ntag?” concerned Khang offered Ntag a ride.
“Tsiv ua-” she was going to deny it but Khang shook his head and said, “It’s okay. My friends are just waiting outside for me anyway,” he then pointed outside to Lilly Fang and other girls without looking back behind him.
She stared outside behind him through the window and saw only girls. “…Girls…?” Ntag whispered. Suddenly she felt really shy all over again. Something in her told her to go but she felt like staying, her body trembled in fear. ‘Wha… What’s with my body?’ wondered Ntag, her body has never trembled this way before; it was never scared like this. It was a new fear she was receiving something she’s going to have to endure as well as everything else.
“Looks like they’re not here yet,” Khang said turning his head around to only find Lilly and her friends. “Are you scared of girls Ntag?” he asked her wondering why she was shaking so. I didn’t notice that she wasn’t afraid of girls she was afraid of losing what might be her first real friend. I only noticed when I looked into her eyes that she was holding her tears back.
“No…” she said finally tearing up. She covered her eyes including her face trying to wash away her tears, trying to force them to stop. Ntag didn’t want to seem like a baby and it was embarrassing to cry in front of someone she didn’t know that well. “Ka… huff…” Ntag took a deep breath from crying. “Sniff…”
“Ntag, are you okay?” I remember asking her that right away when I saw her cry. Something in my heart just tore apart when I saw her cry. Was I worried that much about Ntag, why did this feeling feel so painful to me? Sometimes when I think back about that feeling I think that I might have felt the pain that Ntag felt herself. I ran over and sat by her side. Ntag was washing the tears from her eyes and didn’t want to reply because she felt embarrassed about crying in front of me. Something must have pierced through her to make her just cry and that might had been when she thought she would lose her friend, me.
“T-T-Thov… txiv…” she apologize finally letting her tears run and putting her hands down. She stopped her attempts to force her tears to cease. Ntag still felt the shaking around her body and the trembling in her heart, what was that she felt? Then Ntag felt a hand around her and found herself embraced in Khang. I never knew why I held her maybe it was a sign that I cared about her. Although it was only our second time meeting something inside me kept telling me that she was someone I should really connect with. I never did understood what my mother had meant by “follow your heart” until that point, I guess. Now it’s like the good and the bad of my faith are intertwine together than far away from each other.
“What for…?” asked Khang embracing her tightly as if she was something he didn’t want to let go of. Khang couldn’t help but want to protect her from what she was going through. But that was Khang Lor; he is the boy who’s popular but also in a way caring more than ever. So was it wrong to want to hold her and protect her as his? No. It only meant more that he was more human than most people thought him to be. “It’s corny in one way…” he said to her and added, “… but I want to see you smile all the time.”
I still think back and wonder why I ever did that, I never knew why I held her so close. Maybe having a life as mine may seem to others as if it’s a dream come true. But to me, my life was never fulfilled until I met Ntag. Well, no one ever really completes you but she didn’t complete me because I was already completed. Ntag finished up the puzzle of my life not me because I was completed and knew who I was already.
Her tears are like an angel’s sadness and her smile is like the sweetness of a goddess. You can call me greedy but I would never let her go for anything not even for my reputation. Even though we never knew each other that much I wanted to know more about her and it seems clear to me that she wanted to know the life of a high school sophomore. I spent my time when I hanged out with my friends to hangout with her. Ntag was in middle school at Highland Middle School so I had a chance to talk to her once in a while at school. And it was always great that I had the time to talk to her at work on my break. Somehow my friends disappeared from my life, it seemed we only talked at school but Ntag was always first in my mind. So… was that what they called a ‘best friend’?
I remember this one time Ntag asked me something when I was at work with her. She was writing in her writer’s notebook like usual but stop a moment to ask me something. “Um…” Ntag stumbled on the question she was going to ask. “K-Kh-Khang,” she nervously took his mind off from wondering. “Kev hlub… zoo li cab?” finally asking Ntag felt embarrassed.
“Love…?” Khang seemed stumped himself. How was he suppose to answer Ntag about how love is, was she crazy? Why would she ask Khang who’s only fooled with girls but never loved them?! She has got to be kidding! Was she trying to torture him or just testing how much he hates his personality? ‘What’s wrong with her? She knows better than to ask a player about love, love’s not in my experience!’ Khang panic, his heart thumping like crazy trying to think of how he should answer her. “Um… why ask me?” Khang replied seeming in a cool temper. Was he really though? In his mind that was the only way he could answer her but he didn’t think his heart was the one that would answer her. Khang just kept drinking his pop.
“Well…” Ntag blushed in her shy way. “I know how love is… but I never experience love before so I wouldn’t know how to explain it. And if I can’t then that means I shouldn’t know what love is like. Right?” explain Ntag but she didn’t make eye contact. Ntag was too embarrassed or shy to tell him eye to eye so she kept her head down.
Well, she had a point when she told me that. I mean, how can you know how love is like if you never experience it before? But it made me wonder how she could say that and not have experience love before? It’s either she knows and experienced love or don’t know it at all. “If you never experience love before then how could you know how it’s like?” Khang asked her. “I think Ntag, that you have experience love… just not in the right way… or at least you don’t know love already came to you,” he explained.
“So… you do know,” she looked up at him and smiled. Again her smile impressed him on how innocent she was. It seemed her attitude wasn’t affected by being friends with Khang, but her shyness was. But her guard was beginning to open up for him. Maybe now he would know if it was her who was the pearl inside the clam or her emotions that was inside the clam. Soon he would find out but he never expected that only friends with her for some months now would make her so different from before.
“I…” Khang panic again. ‘Why do she always have to think I’m in love with someone when she sees me kiss them?’ complained Khang in his head. Being a girl wasn’t hard I guess, but then again being a guy isn’t either. Mostly when you’re me, for me I have to paint this picture to everyone that I’m this hot guy that’s a man. But girls always dream for a guy like me, and what they dream is if I were ever with them that I would say those three words. And hope that it’s from the bottom of my cold-hearted heart. But, at that moment it seemed I was someone else. I suddenly told her these things I never thought I would ever say and I couldn’t believe my friends walked in either. “Um… Ntag,” Khang turned to face Ntag from staring out the window. It was about time that his break was over but something kept him there. There was something that told him he had to tell her it or he probably never will. “See, kev hlub yog something koj feel in koj lub siab. Not something in your mind, love shouldn’t be searched for no matter how much you want it. Why do you think I kiss girls and always tell?” he smiled and gave her a wink. He wanted to explain to her that to him he doesn’t want to search for lover like the others, because to him love meets each other on the other. “Besides, Ntag you shouldn’t be worrying about love. If you do you would probably end up like Lilly, Michelle, and Shoua… and all the girls I’ve fooled with. I don’t think you want that and if you turn out that way I don’t think I would hangout with you,” added Khang then he got up and left back to his register. Ntag looked up at him only to nod at what he had told her before he left. But she wondered if he saw her as a younger sister or as a friend.
“Did I just see what I thought I saw?” Yeng Yang, Khang’s friend asked Kong Khang the other friend when they walked in. Those three were homies since grade school (aka K.Y.K.) and not once have they ever seen Khang act so nice and innocent.
“Khang hasn’t been himself this since school began,” Kong explained. “Dude started getting girls more often and worst of all he seems like he’s hanging with girls more than boys these days,” said Kong to Yeng. The two were both freaked out about their friend talking to Ntag, a girl that way. At least they never saw their friend talk like that—ever, something has gone totally wrong here.
My friends that night came over and asked me about Ntag. When Teng over heard he blurt out laughing with his friends but one kid didn’t. He seemed mad when he heard I was hanging with Ntag and just kept quiet. I think his name was Tou Thao, maybe 14 years old. I didn’t know what his problem was but he had some serious issues with me because he stared at me like he was going to strangle me to death. “Shut up Teng,” Khang smack his younger brother in the head. After Teng stopped laughing his friends laughed at him because he got hit in the head.
“What are you two laughing at,” Kong and Yeng yelled at their younger brothers as well. Since the three were friends of course their younger brothers would be friends. And when the two gave their brothers the angry stares the two zipped their mouths like it was sewed closed shut. “You better explain why you hanging with a girl now Khang. You with her so much you miss out on all the stuff we had plan this year,” Yeng said he had always been the serious but prankster type. The two buddies needed answers and they were bound to get it one way or another from Khang.
“What’s with this kid?” ask Khang nodding over to Tou still looking at him weird. “Boy staring at me like he’s planning my funeral,” Khang told them seeming a bit freaked out at the gawking. What concerned Khang most was why they were confronting him about hanging out with a girl until now, he spent time with girls back in the past and they were never worry.
“Tou likes her, duh you idiot!” blurted Teng. “You’ve been spending so much time with her at work and at school you haven’t noticed that I’ve been trying to get you to leave her alone so he could ask her out!” Teng yelled at Khang pointing to Tou talking about Ntag. “If you weren’t so selfish with girls you would know,” Teng told off his older brother like a crazy guy possessed.
<Doorbell> Ding-dong! “Get the door you idiot,” Khang pushed Teng over to the door. They were all standing in the hallway next to the stairs staring at each other in the awkward atmosphere.
Teng opened the door and asked the person standing in the shadows, “Can I help you?” Like Khang, Teng never spoke Hmong either. Teng never knew his father and he never understood why Khang and Mai never told him about his father. Whenever he asked Khang, Khang smacks him and told him never to ask. When he asked his mom she would only try not to cry and when Khang sees that Khang smacks him with a stick. Teng never knew it but Khang had always tried to be a good influence to Teng not doing drugs and everything. The only thing wrong was that Teng was stubborn as Ying, his dad.
“Teng… koj hlob tuam zoo heeg,” the voice said to Teng. Teng made out the figure was a Hmong man in his mid-ages maybe. And he didn’t understand a word he’d said. Teng was of course just an English speaker after all.
“Um… what?” Teng asked. “Khang, some guy’s here,” he called his brother over to help translate.
Khang came over and turned the porch light on. There he saw the man he hated the most, more like the jerk he hated the most. Ying Lor, his so-called father. “Teng, go to your room and tell mom to lock herself in her bedroom,” Khang told his younger brother as he turned his confused face to an angry and serious face. He clutched his fists to hold back from jumping out of the house and killing Ying with his bare hands, well, at least attempt to.
“What for?” Teng protested.
“NOW!” Khang bolted in anger at his younger brother. The look Khang had scared Teng so much he followed what he was told. When Khang was sure Teng had done what he told him he ask rudely to Ying, “What do you freaken want at my house?”
“I can’t see my son Teng after ten years?” Ying asked Khang still standing on the porch.
“Khang, what’s up?” Kong and Yeng came over to see what the commotion a moment ago was about. “Oh, you need any help?” Yeng asked Khang the two also knew the deal with Khang’s father. And even though a moment ago they were arguing they always had each other’s back no matter what. And it seemed Khang might need their support but knew he was capable of doing it on his own now.
Khang ignored the two and said to Ying, “Teng barely remembers you and it’s a good thing, ‘cause what you done to mom and me is bad enough but appearing out of nowhere and telling Teng who you are is worst. You get him excited but you know sooner or later he’s going to find out the truth and I don’t think I can handle something that bad in my family. Go to your own family and be a father there Ying, you aren’t welcome here.”
“At least-” Ying was going to reason with Khang when Khang interrupted him, “Go! Don’t make me send you to jail, remember that if you ever step foot here again and don’t leave when told or is ever near my mom you will go to jail in an instant. Now freaken go before I have to kick you ass out of my property!” Khang was mad and he held a grudge that would never be gone—ever. That night couldn’t have gotten worst and since Ying had refused to leave I got the police to come and Teng was there to hear it all. And when they were taking him Ntag had come over to drop something off for me. I remember Ying had said something in anger to me because I wouldn’t let him see Teng before they took him.
“I will make sure you are the most depress man on this earth for not letting me see my own son, Khang!” Ying threatened Khang. He was going to kill someone close to Khang, but would he just to make his own son feel worst than he already does? With someone like Ying involved it might just happen. Ying was never that good of a husband as he was a father but it was better than him cheating even though he did.
“You can try Ying, but the depression you left this family burdens me more than anything else you can ever do! And if you dare try to hurt this family again old man, I’m going to make sure that you freaken die!” yelled Khang straight back at Ying without fear or regret in his eyes. It seemed the only thing holding Khang from brutally hurting Ying was the police and Teng. His mom wasn’t leaving her room until Khang came up and told her that Ying left. Mai never wants to see Ying again nor be brutally abused by him again.
As the police drove off with Ying, Teng slowly walked down the stairs traumatized by the event. He saw only the back of Khang but he could tell Khang was pissed off more than he had ever been. It seemed like nothing could cool him down, he was burning with rage both physically and emotionally. Then, Ntag slowly walked over to Khang as he had sat down on the porch. ‘She’s gotta be crazy to talk to him after he argued with Ying,’ Kong thought knowing and thinking that Khang was going to do something outrageous.
“…” Ntag couldn’t bring herself to talk to him. She was scared of him as much as everyone was but even more. The fright reached through to her conscious that told her that the pain in her heart she felt the day she thought she would lose him was even worst. The pain felt worst than it had before in her heart. She wasn’t sure if she was really going to lose her friend to this angry guy that came out of nowhere. Teng stood at the stairs staring at the two outside on the porch and he didn’t know what to do now. As much as Ntag, Teng wanted to do something but couldn’t. He was 14 years old now too, almost a man and he still can’t be responsible like his older brother or as strong as he was.
“What do you want Ntag?” breaking the silence with a question Khang looked up. He didn’t notice either that Lilly, Michelle, Shoua and some of their girlfriends came to see what had happen. News carried fast when it’s about him for some reason. When they noticed he was talking to a young girl they stop in their tracks to watch as Khang stood up.
She was frightened, scared of me at what she saw. It was the same to Teng but she was scared of me and was scared that she would lose me. It was the same the night I saw her waiting for Feng but what I wondered was why she was here and how she got here in the first place. Then I saw in her hand her writer’s notebook and a present. I had forgotten that night was also Teng’s 14th birthday. I had her hold my present for me and return it to me so I wouldn’t forget.
“Here… I forgot about it so ran here with it,” Ntag handed Teng’s present to Khang. She tried not to make much eye contact. Ntag was scared that if he looked into her eyes he would see what she really was afraid of. Even though she didn’t know either whenever she was scared the thing she fear most hurts her heart.
Khang set the present down on the flat wooden railing of the porch. “Thanks, I guess. You… didn’t see anything did you?” he asked her. He hoped she didn’t anything like what Teng had saw but she did and she nodded in response. Khang took a look at how she kept her head down and knew exactly that she was holding her tears back. “Ntag, look at me,” Khang told her and she soon began to cry. She was breaking down in tears from her own fear.
“She’s crying?” they all shrieked when they saw her trying to force back her tears. “That’s the oldest trick in the book!” one of Lilly’s friend yelled thinking Ntag was trying to steal Khang away. Like she was competition he kept secret. As if she was faking tears, what they didn’t know was that she wasn’t a girl he was fooling with, she was the friend he never had.
“Ntag, I told you to look at me,” Khang still looked down at her. His face was neither mad nor sad he was just worried. His voice was soft and sweet. Waiting Khang stood there in the porch as everyone watched the two.
‘How’d he get so tamed?’ thought Yeng surprised that Khang was so disciplined and not so short-temper. Everyone else was surprised he had a soft side and was for that matter lenient. Khang on the other hand still waited for Ntag to look up at him, to stare him in the eyes to search for the answers to the questions unasked.
“Sniff…” Ntag finally given up on trying to stop her tears by force, she was going to have to let it run out on it’s own. She still looked away from Khang and left her tears running. ‘I’m just too naïve about friendship…’ thought Ntag feeling bad that she thought she could really trust anyone at all. If Khang was like this then she was scared on how he would be in friendship with her. Mostly she was just scared because of her true fear that shook her heart.
Khang took his hand and set it on her cheeks, he washed her tears away and made her look up at him. They stared in each other’s eyes for a moment and Khang gave her a small smile. “C’mon, I’ll walk you home,” he told her as if nothing happened there at all. But she wondered why he was treating her so differently from when he usually did. He talked to her differently too, something in his smile seemed pure and true. His eyes when she stared at him as he took her hand and led her to the sidewalk weren’t irritated or bold in a high school kid way. His eyes were soft and carefree, somehow he seemed chivalrous and cool to her. She felt like her world was unfolding into the mind of Khang and he was becoming the character she created that was base on him just better.
I wasn’t sure what I saw in her eyes when I stared at them. I just saw sadness and fright, heartbroken I guess is the word or description I’m searching for. Really, when I looked into her tearful eyes I saw this innocent girl crying. That’s all I saw, I saw who she really was inside… her. I didn’t know why all of a sudden I felt happy and cheerful, I was at peace about who I was and who I was going to be. I felt like being who I wanted to be then so I smiled and led her home. I felt great, my heart felt fulfilled and content it was the best feeling I had in my life. The way she stared at me that night as I ran her home was the same way I stared at her when she first smiled at me. Something I done must had really surprised her but I was glad to see her happy with me again, I never want to see her sad… it’s a heartbreak to me because I feel like I’m the one that made her cry. As long as I can’t prevent it whenever she cries I feel responsible.
Well, months past on even more and we knew each other well. But maybe three or four months later after that day I was outside of school talking with my friends. We were about to leave when this guy I never met about my age just jumped me with his friends. “What the hell!” Yeng shouted as he and Kong jumped into the fight. Yeng pulled one guy up would punch them once and go back in digging for Khang. He didn’t seem to notice that they were trying to stop him from getting to Khang.
Kong did the very same thing, but when he felt someone grab him from behind he’d elbows the guy and begin digging for Khang again. “Shit, Yeng what’s going on?” Kong called back to Yeng as other kids from the school began to help. Many other kids began jumping Khang from another school. They came with the gang that was jumping Khang. “Yo, that kid got a bat!” Kong pointed to a guy behind Yeng.
“What the-” Yeng turns around and got smack with the bat on his back. “Shit!” Yeng broke down on his knees. “What’s the deal, we didn’t do shit to you people,” Yeng said struggling to get up.
“Get out of the way, we aren’t here for you,” the guy with the bat told Yeng. “Unless you want to die then c’mon.”
“That a threat bitch?” Yeng said angrily. This time he was going to be serious. I’m not sure what happened that day much, or at least at that moment. Yeng was a grade older than us and he was more of the daredevil than me. He used to be a blood too but it took him almost a year just trying to get out, when they heard he had to get marry after graduation they let him go. But all I remember was being jumped and trying to get out of the bunch and the two trying to pull me out. The other students helped out. The other school’s students just kept piling up on me. Then I black out and woke up in Yeng’s car.
“Khang, you alright boi?” Kong asked when he noticed Khang awoke in the backseat. Kong looked back to face Khang. “We lucky to come out without a scratch,” he meant they were mostly okay and there were no traits that showed they were in a fight.
“Damn… what happened man?” Khang sat up with a major headache. He was still too weak to be moving but he had to sit up and lean back.
“Look like your dad, Ying had a son your age too. Guy got pissed you tried to lock up Ying and brought the crips from Harding to jump you,” explained Yeng. “Man, this bullshit.” Yeng was pissed off already, mostly because his name sounded exactly like Ying’s so it was hard to tell when they were talking about him or Ying.
“Ying’ s not my dad. He’s just some old man thinking he can be slick and get into my life again. I ain’t got no dad,” said Khang angrily. “Man, yo Kong call work and tell them I’m sick today. Don’t feel like going in today,” Khang told Kong throwing him his cell phone.
“What about that kid?” Kong asks already beginning to dial the number. “You were lucky she didn’t see you get your ass jump or she probably gone cryin’ again.”
“Shut up bitch,” Khang said angrily. He suddenly remembered about Ntag and thought about going over to hers later that night to tell her why he didn’t come in. He was supposed to take her somewhere after work but he didn’t feel so good after a knock out and wanted rest. Khang suspected that everything should be okay but he didn’t know why he was really beat up so he didn’t try to come in to work.
“Shit, you that piss?” ask Yeng when he heard Khang curse. “You haven’t talk like that since middle school. What gotten into you?” he was curious.
“Nothing.” Khang exhaled and asked the two, “How far we from my place?” He felt like lying in his bed and rest or sleep, or something so his mind wouldn’t be spinning. His held felt like it was going to explode if he stayed in the rustling car any longer.
“Just hold on, I need to park,” Yeng explained. When he did park Kong helped Khang up and out of the car. The two took Khang quietly up the stairs so his mom wouldn’t hear them come in. But she did and asked them what they were doing here. The two took Khang into his room and Yeng said to her, “Nws mob tobhaum.” Was it wrong to lie that he had a headache when really he was jumped and didn’t feel that well? Well, though it was his mom would have gone crazy mad thinking that Khang was in a gang. And Yeng knew exactly how a mother acts when their son is in a gang so he thought better to tell her he had a headache instead.
“Oh, O.K.”, she said with the accent she uses to try to speak English. Although she was getting better pronouncing the words and learning newer ones she still had that accent. She wasn’t a native speaker so of course she couldn’t speak it as well as Yeng could.
Teng came over to Yeng and said, “Isn’t he going to work?”
“No,” Yeng told him with a quick answer. ‘Guy just got beat up, didn’t you hear kid?’ was the addition he was going to give Teng but decided to keep it to himself. It wasn’t that nice to go talking like that in someone’s house unless you were really mean.
“But what about Ntag? He told me that he was going to take her somewhere after work so I should keep Tou away from them,” explained Teng just trying to get so juice out of Yeng.
Yeng looked at him awkwardly and said, “Your friend stalks her?”
“No, he just doesn’t like Khang talking to Ntag. Guys get jealous when their girl’s talking with another guy,” shrugged Teng. As if he was the expert on girls and their behavior. It almost made Yeng punch him straight in the jaws.
“How would you know? You too lame to even have a girlfriend,” replies Yeng pushing him back by grasping his forehead for a moment.
“You know, she probably wouldn’t expect him to show since everyone already knows he got jumped at school,” said Teng wondering about it. “Hey, so I can send Tou there now,” said Teng trying to annoy his brother and Yeng “kill two birds with one stone”.
“Hey idiot,” Yeng called to Teng and Tou as he came out of Teng’s room. “Unlike you two Khang knows what Ntag feels. So why don’t you two tell her that Khang’s coming tonight. If I know Khang he probably wouldn’t show up in the day, so, shows up at night. Just tell her to wait at home,” Yeng went into Khang’s room after informing him.
I’m not sure about that night either. I remember that I forgot that I couldn’t take my mom’s car at night because she worked at night but Yeng offered to take me to Ntag’s house. Strange because it was like the guy knew I wanted to go there that night. But, we were friends since grade school so he knows me pretty well already. I’m just glad he stood by me so all three of us went to Ntag’s house. What came next though, I never expected at all. See, when we got to her house, as we stood at the door waiting for the answer no one answered. I ranged the doorbell again and finally began hearing door locks from the other side being unlocked. Ntag’s mom answered the door in tears and my first thought was about Sword, my best friend. [Sword=Ntag]
“Khang… yog koj loj?” her mom Gao Lee asked Khang in tears. Something terrible must had really happened. Then Yeng began to wonder what happened that Teng and Tou never called back to tell him that they told her because Teng always had done that.
“Yog kuv, ua cam?” Khang struggled to response in Hmong to her. “Did something happen to Ntag?” he asks her in concern.
Then Teng and Tou came to the door ghost like and sad. “Hey, you two saw who did this?” Yeng grabbed Teng by the collar. Somehow Yeng knew exactly what had happened and was maddened. “Answer kuv nab!”
“Someone came to rob the place… and she was told to collect the money…” Tou said soulless.
“But it wasn’t that guy…” Teng told Yeng the same way Tou talked. “That guy got caught but after that… when the police left… he came in.” Teng felt and was the same way he had been when he heard about his dad.
“He? I’m not asking for the story I’m asking who did it,” yelled Yeng. “Freaken answer me dammit!”
“Ying…” respond Tou staring up at them finally. “ He took her and Feng didn’t do anything he just watched. We went asking for help but he had a gun and no one wanted to die… Then in the back of the ally we heard a gunshot. When we went out to check, she was dead…”
“Ntag’s dead…”
“What?” Khang said hoping it was a joke. “Ntag…”
“Didn’t you guys call the police?” Kong asked them. Something in him also missed her. He felt sad about her death. Kong never thought that none of them would ever be on the news that way. He never wanted their names on Hmong Times this way either.
“We did but there’s nothing else we can do… He’s already in jail,” explained Teng.
I felt like crying that night but I didn’t want to seem weak to Teng. I stood there wondering why they would pick Ntag out of everyone I knew. After the court hearing I wished that Ying would have to stay in jail for the rest of his life. Instead he had 40 years sentence. I still didn’t understand why they picked Ntag of all people. Was it because she was the closest person I had to me? Her funeral was a month later but I couldn’t believe she had so much family members and not one really knew her the way I did. The one person I didn’t see there was Feng, her dad. Even Kong and the others came with me not because of the food but because she was the only girl that they knew was that close to me in not a high school way. Anyways my last words I remembered telling her when she was alive were, “Just wait for me…” and I still wonder if those words were right for me to have said. But I guess in the other world she’ll keep waiting for me them. For sure because she’s someone I care for too much.
When Khang came into work the day after the funeral he saw Feng acting as if nothing had happened. Khang held his fist in anger and walked over to Feng. Feng was going to ask him what he wanted when Khang punched him. “You’re a jerk, you know that?” Khang yelled at him angrily. “Your daughter’s funeral was yesterday and you have the nerve to go smiling like she was never alive?” he questioned him. Khang was so maddened he almost couldn’t sustain his anger and punch Feng.
After that day I somehow fell back to my life I had before I met Ntag. The only thing different was that I felt like I shouldn’t be that guy anymore but then who should I be? I walked around depress, what Ying had done really made me the most depress man of this earth. And now all I can do is feel worst than ever because I wasn’t there for her. When my Junior year as school began just a week after my 17th birthday I felt this feeling I haven’t felt in a long time. It was as if she was with me, as if Sword was close to me again. This feeling I had when I saw her smile came back to me and I felt happy. Then I look over and saw my brother Teng he was a freshmen and he seemed happy as well. When I came home that day to change and head off to start my first day at my new job I met a young man, a high school graduate from ’06. He handed me two notebooks and a present.
“Do… I know you?” Khang asked the guy awkwardly.
“My sister really must had liked you…” the guy replied. “ My mom and I were cleaning out her room and found that. She probably planned to give it to you last week on your birthday. I brought her writer’s notebooks with me because it’s better you have it. I’m Pao by the way, Ntag’s older brother.”
“She never told me she had an older brother,” said Khang. ‘Now that I think about it, I gone over to her house hundreds of time and never seen him at all. Is he one of those thug kids that Ying used to be and never seems like he’s home at all too?’ questions ran through Khang’s mind.
“That’s because she never knew she had an older brother. When she was born remember our parents got divorce so she wouldn’t remember me. I was in custody with my dad and I was planning to come meet them after I turn 18 but when I came to meet ‘em my mom told me that she already died. My dad never really had a childhood with Ntag so he never cared much about her and I was forbidden to ever meet them,” Pao explained. “Mom’s pain would never go away”.
“Pao… tell your mom I’m sorry it happened to Ntag,” Khang looked down as Yeng and Kong came by to pick him up.
“What do you mean?”
“The man that killed her… was related to me. I never expected Ntag to get caught with my problems so I never worried about her getting hurt,” Khang kept his head down regretting still that he wasn’t there to protect her. ‘Why was it Sword though? Why did he choose to hurt her?’ those questions ran through his mind once more.
“My dad told me about Ying. I told my mom about it but she said she wouldn’t hold you against it; you were jumped to prevent you from coming to help Ntag. Ying saw Ntag as your weakness, besides he’s paying the cost of her death with his own life in jail. Don’t put yourself down about it, I’m sure Ntag probably wouldn’t want you carrying a life wondering why they went after her,” explained Pao. Somehow he knew how Khang felt.
That night I read her writer’s notebook and it seemed I finally understood her world. It was so amazing no wonder whenever I asked her why she didn’t feel lonely she said because she had her characters. Each character had a wonderful life, great adventures, hard times and pure hearts… like her. Each idea had the most outrageous conflicts, and every thing I read from her writer’s notebook flowed into my mind. It engaged me, made me wish she had carried out and write the actual stories. I felt when I read each entry as if I was being guided into the heart of Ntag herself.
Remember when I said that some people define themselves in certain ways. And that most people commonly define themselves in writing, well, that was Ntag all right. You probably wonder why I would use Ntag as the person that changed my life. Well, that’s because she did. I finally understand how she changed it too; it wasn’t just the personality she changed but the mind itself. I think more differently than I did before, I’m more focus on the things I want in the future all thanks to one 13-year-old girl. Oh, I also forgot to mention. The present she was planning on giving me was a book she written about me. She explained everything she saw in me, the time she saw how I looked when I was taking her home after I argued with Ying. And best of all, the last part told me how she felt about me…
“Kev hlub yog qhob koog koj tsiv niv tiag.” (Love’s something you shouldn’t search for)
“Vim rau qhob tus koj lawm hlub tus nyob tau koj lawm.” (Because the one you’re going to love is already with you)
Now, here are my last words to conclude this essay… What does Ntag mean? In English it’s translated as Sword, a sword is strong and stiff, its swift and well cared for. And that’s exactly who Ntag is to me, she’s strong since she grew up without the bad influence of her parents arguing, stiff because there are the painful things she’s taken and could have sent back. She’s swift to learn new things and she’s always been well cared for. But there’s something that describes her better than all this, she’s honest, pure, and mostly too innocent to ever been involved with my problems. Ntag’s the one person in my life I probably wished I had said this to… “Kuv hlub koj…”
The end