Ais Kacang Surprise

I always remember my uncle’s ais kacang.

He didn’t make it often; maybe once every two months. But when he did, it was wonderful. My uncle would top his bowls of shaved ice with heaps of condiments, finishing with a torrent of syrup. And he was generous with his atapchi. Each bowl would have two of them. His atapchi was delectable, round and squishy, with juice that burst in your mouth when you bit them. No one else’s ice kacang had atapchi like that. Me and my siblings adored eating them.

A year ago, my uncle was arrested. Beneath his house, policemen discovered a cellar with at least 60 human bodies. They had all had their throats slit. While in various states of decay, the corpses were mostly intact. Each of them, however, was missing the same body part.

The eyeballs.

*Atapchi - the squishy translucent stuff