Part 1

Cambodia 1975

“ch’kai!”

Blood splatters the machete wielding commander as he hacks the head off a man who used to sell cassette tapes in the market. A boy next to me pockets his glasses and squints back toward the mess.

“The dogs have been put down! A new era begins with you!”

The children around me chant: “Angkar! Angkar! Ankar!”

Kids at my school called me ch’kai because I grew up in the country. Most of those kids and their parents are dead now. I think I would be too if they knew that my aunt and uncle worked in the market, but I have the dark skin and blunt features of a country boy.

Even though I’m only twelve years old they tell me that I’m a vital part of Pol Pot’s army.

“You are strong! Cambodian men are strong. One of us is like ten of the Vietnamese soldiers. We fight for the Angkar (Establishment) to make the new Kampuchea great again. Angkar!”

They all chant, “Angkar! Angkar! Angkar!”

My name is Pannah, which means “wise.” My name is not ch’kai. Ch’kai means dog. The bloody commander continues:

“The metropolitan bourgeoisie are influenced by the Chinese… or the French… or are secretly Vietnamese in disguise! The new leader of Kampuchea, Pol Pot, loves and protects you now from foreign influence.”

I can’t see my aunt and uncle anymore in the crowd. They sold promotional movie posters out of the stall next to the now-headless man. The commander kicks the corpse at his feet and signals to his lieutenants dressed in black shirts and pants. They push us, like cattle, out of the city. The man they beheaded—the man I watched die in front of me as a twelve year old boy— was killed for hiding a tape in his bag.

I wonder what tape it was? What music was worth his life? I used to think music saved my life. It was only a month ago that I came to work for my family in Phnom Penh. I would go to the cassette stall and listen to so many tapes.

Now, it seems, music may get me killed.

Debut Album: You’re Such a F**king Dirtbag

Chicago, Late August 2025Set list:

* Let’s Stay Together, Al Green

My daughter and I walk to the van. It’s starting to get cold in the mornings; I can see my breath. She has headphones in, so the drive to school will be quiet.

Feeling spacey—one too many beers last night. I woke up today with one word in mind, surfacing like the murky fortune in an eight ball: “Dirtbag.” My older brother used to call me a dirtbag. Not the crème de la crème of insults, but coming from him—what I mean is, when he called me “dirtbag,” it felt like a curse—not a cuss—but like something a gypsy might do.

Stopped at a light, a dog walker crosses the street in front of our van. I look on in disgust. This guy, what am I looking at here? I swear, if I see another goldendoodle, I’m going to vomit. You’d never catch me dead walking a doodle. I crane my neck over the steering wheel as the impossibly handsome dog walker turns around the block and out of sight. I swear, these stupid f*****g dogs could make Hercules look like a pussy.

I steer my minivan into the schoolyard. It’s Monday, and I’m looking down the barrel of another hopeless week at work. I park and she steps out quickly. My twelve-year-old daughter is in her last year of middle school. To say she’s eccentric is a nice way of saying she dresses like a kid I would’ve made fun of back when I was in school. Today she insists on wearing a top hat… and a raccoon tail. I wonder what the teachers think of her. I guess I would know if I showed up to the conferences. I watch her walk toward a gaggle of equally weird friends.

Bye.

Okay. Out the lot.

I can’t help myself. I circle back.

Goddamn! Look at this guy walking this golden f*****g doodle! The dog-walker has a chin that could sink ships. He is white, but perhaps slightly Mediterranean, with effortlessly tanned skin and thick dark hair. Ray-Bans, a linen short-sleeve button-up.

I wish I had that kind of hair. All the men in my family end up looking like… well, like bald. We all have the same blotchy reddish skin under patchy beards, shiny foreheads, and receding hairlines.

Last Christmas my brother clapped me on the back, brought me in close for a hug, put his mouth to my ear, and whispered, “Oh, it’s so good to see I’m not the only one losing hair.”

That’s what he said.

A*****e.

I started wearing my knit hat more after that. I used to do that in college. I thought it was artsy, but I realize that I should’ve shown off my hair more then. Whatever.

Now that the kid is dropped off, it is time for my morning treat. Starbucks! Drive-through this time because I’m already late for work. I creep the minivan around slowly, peering through the windows into the coffeehouse lounge. I’m not really here for the coffee.

I’m here to catch a glimpse of the clientele.

I swear, if I had a whole day to myself, I would just post up at S.B.’s and ogle the hot college girls going in and out. Wait—jackpot! A leggy brunette in a tight-fitting athletic-wear dress walks quickly across the street, skips up the curb, and enters the coffee shop. The car behind me honks. I raise my hand in a gesture of apology and pull out onto the high street.

What’s the deal with female fashion today? It’s like, in the past two months, everyone decided that dressing like a tennis pro was the sexiest thing in the world. More like tennis-ho. I chuckle to myself and merge on the highway. One part of my brain fires up the autopilot, effortlessly navigating to work, while the other part of my brain wonders if my wife would ever wear a tennis skirt like that. S**t, I really am late…

I guess my brother was right. I’m a dirtbag. Maybe that’s the problem. Maybe if I were more like him, I would have a record deal. Maybe I would be driving a new Range Rover instead of this shitty Dodge. I tell you what, no matter how much money I would’ve hypothetically made, I would never buy a goldendoodle.

F*****g doodles. Who is walking who, b***h?

F*****g biceps. I could go to the gym, but I’m not going to—because I’m late for work.

Everyone at the returns center is exactly the same. The small-talk is what kills me. It’s not the monotony. Moving numbers from one cell to the next, I can do that. If it were just me and four walls, alone, clock in, clock out. Do your time. Go home. I could do that, no problem.

No, the thing that makes the job unbearable is how disinteresting all these plodding lobotomites are. All they care about is b******t contest shows. Who gets kicked off what island? Who will be going home—gah, I wish you would. This knuckle-dragger is talking up a storm with the lady from I.T., whose face is as blunt as the broad side of a barn. Moooooooooooooo!

It’s all the same s**t with different wrapping paper. Get the net. Speaking of: I think about the suicide nets on the top of skyscrapers in Japan. I bet the guy who came up with it is super rich. I wonder if he ever felt like jumping before he had his billion dollar idea.

I smile at them–my co–workers– even though I hate them, which makes me hate them more. I hate them because they make me hate me. I feel like I betray myself on a soul-deep level every day by just responding to their standard salutations.“How you doing?” they say.“Oh, you know, hanging in there,” I reply, smiling like an idiot at the idiot parade.

No one here understands art. I bet none of these people have read a book in the past ten years. I mean, I don’t read books anymore either—I listen to podcasts—so I guess I can’t say anything.

Music is my true passion. I used to own a recording studio—back when I was cool. That’s when I met my wife, actually.

I’m sitting in the break room now. I let the moments tick by, making love to my plastic spoon. I finished the SnackPack long ago, and now I simply suck the plastic, feeling its curve on my tongue. I’m a million miles away. I’ve been done with my lunch for a while now, but if they give me thirty minutes for lunch, I am taking every goddamn minute of it for myself. Mercifully, no one is in here. I need to think. I need to strategize. I need to daydream about not being here, not doing this. I know that if I quit my job, it would worry my wife. It might mean we could not afford the city taxes and would have to move our kid out of her school. I wonder what she would think about that—not my wife—the kid. She seems to have some friends. Weird ones. But what if I broke out? What if I found a niche? What if I found a local talent I could cling to? What if I found someone I could make into a star.

I’m jittery—too much coffee. I need to get out of here. I “quit” smoking twenty years ago, but I always keep an emergency pack in the glove compartment. I’m walking down the stairwell to the parking garage when I hear it for the first time—singing. I have never heard singing so obviously pleasant yet subtly disturbing. The accent is unplaceable, the authority enough to bend the knees of kings. Where is this sound coming from?

The song is an oldie. A soul classic. The kind of song you never get tired of, whether you hear it perusing the aisles of a thrift store or watching someone at their wedding take their lover into their arms for their first dance. It echoes up to me from the bottom of the stairwell.

I scramble after the sweet sound, grasping the handrails, taking each step three at a time, looking down the center every so often to see if I can spy the singer.

The song stops at the sound of my clattering Rockports.

I reach the bottom floor. I gasp and watch the door shut its last centimeter and then clunk. I’m alone, with only the subsonic suggestion of that beautiful song bouncing off the merciless concrete.

Whoever it was is gone. I look at my watch.

My break is over.

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