My name is Bambang Sastro.
I'm 68 years old, and for 35 years I ran a construction company that built half the buildings you'd recognize if you walked through certain parts of Bandung.
I'm not saying that to brag. I'm saying it because it matters later. These days my life looks nothing like that. I wake up around 5:30 every morning whether I want to or not.
Old habit. When you spend three decades getting up before your crew does, your body doesn't just forget that. I make coffee. One cup, not two, though. Sometimes I still pull out two cups before I catch myself.
That's been 5 years now, and it still happens. The house is quiet. Too quiet if I'm honest. It's a good house. Classic architecture, high ceilings, the kind of place people used to compliment when they visited.
Now it's just me rattling around in it. Ramy used to be the one who filled it up, not with noise exactly. She wasn't loud, but with presence. She'd hum while she watered the plants on the veranda. She'd argue with the radio like it could hear her.
Small things. You don't realize how much space someone takes up until they're gone and the space just stays empty. Every morning after my coffee, I do the same thing. I open the drawer by my bed and I take out her watch. It's an old thing.
Not expensive, not fancy. The leather strap is worn soft and the second hand doesn't move anymore. Hasn't for years. I don't wear it to tell time. I wear it because when it's on my wrist, it feels like some part of her is still here with me, still keeping pace with my day.
I know how that sounds. My friend Tony told me once I should let go of these habits, that it's not healthy to hold on this tight. Maybe he's right, but I figure a man's allowed a few things that are just his, especially at my age. Nobody else has to understand it. I spend most days now doing small things.
I tend the garden. I read the newspaper, the actual paper, not on some screen. Sometimes old colleagues stop by, though less and less these days. People move on. That's just how it goes.
My son Adrian calls maybe once a month, sometimes less. He's busy. He runs his own property development business now. Something I helped set him up four years ago back when he was just starting out and needed a push. I don't hold that against him, the not calling. Everyone's life gets full of its own noise.
I understand that better than most. Still, some mornings I catch myself staring at the phone a little longer than I should, half expecting it to ring. That particular morning started like any other. Coffee, the watch. The garden needed some attention.
I'd been meaning to trim back the bougainvillea for 2 weeks and kept putting it off. I was out there in my old gardening clothes, hands in the dirt, when I heard the house phone ring from inside. I don't move as fast as I used to. So, by the time I got to it, wiped my hands on my pants and picked up the receiver. I almost missed the caller ID flash across the little screen.
Adrian. I just stood there for a second looking at his name lit up on that screen. It wasn't the third of the month. Wasn't his birthday. Wasn't mine.
There was no reason for him to be calling on a random Tuesday morning. For half a second, some old instinct in me, the same one that used to sense trouble on a job site before anyone said a word, made me hesitate before I picked it up. "Hello, Pa. It's me." Adrian's voice was formal, almost business-like, the way he sounds when he's talking to a client and not his father. I switched the receiver to my other ear and leaned against the wall.
Adrian, this is a surprise. Yeah, well, a pause. Papers shuffling somewhere on his end. Listen, I don't have a lot of time. I've got a meeting in 20 minutes.
I'm calling about the anniversary thing. Mine and Cisca's 25 years. Silver anniversary. I said that's right. It's coming up.
Your mother would have loved that you're celebrating it properly. Right. Yeah, he said it fast. Like he was checking a box. So, we're doing something for it.
A dinner, family, some business contacts. I wanted to make sure you had the date. I felt something warm move through my chest. Hearing that, it had been a while since Adrian invited me to anything that wasn't a holiday obligation. Of course, I said.
Just tell me when and where I'll be there. Should I bring anything? I could ask around, see if the old caterer your mother liked is still around. No, no, it's handled. Everything's handled.
He cut in quick, the way people do when they're steering a conversation somewhere specific. It's at the Grand Preanger, the ballroom there. I stood with the receiver against my ear for a second, not saying anything. The hotel, I said finally. Not the house.
Pa. It's a big event. Family, investors, some of Cisca's business partners. The house isn't really set up for that many people. That was true enough. Our old family gatherings were maybe 15, 20 people crowded around the dining table and spilling onto the veranda.
Nothing that needed a ballroom. How many people are we talking about? I don't know, Pa. Maybe 150. Look, I really do have to go.
150, I repeated. That was a number for a wedding, not a family dinner. But I let it go. Times change. Adrian's world was bigger than mine ever was.
Bigger than the one I built for him. You'll come, right? There was something underneath his voice when he asked that. Not quite pleading, more like he needed to hear yes so he could check it off and move on to whatever was next on his list. I wouldn't miss it.
I told him, Adrian, 25 years, that's something. I'm proud of you two for getting there. Thanks, Pa. A beat, then muffled like he'd pulled the phone slightly away from his mouth. Yeah. One second.
I heard Cisca's voice in the background. Then I couldn't make out the words clearly, just the tone of it. Clipped, impatient. The kind of voice you use with someone who's running behind schedule. And it's your problem now, too.
"Adrian?" Cisca called in the background. "Yeah, I'm coming," Adrian said away from the receiver. Then back to me quicker now. Pa, I have to go.
Details will come. Okay, just be there. 7:00 Saturday the 12th. Adrian, I really have to run. Talk soon.
The line clicked dead before I could say anything else. Not even a goodbye, really. Just gone. I stood there holding the receiver for a moment longer than I needed to. The dial tone humming in my ear before I finally hung it up.
150 guests, a hotel ballroom, business contacts I'd never met at what used to be a family occasion. I told myself it didn't mean anything. Things change when your son runs a real company. When his wife comes from a family that does things a certain way. I wasn't going to be the old man who complained that a party got too big. Still, I found myself standing in the kitchen a good 10 minutes later, staring at nothing.
Turning the conversation over in my head, not the words so much, the way he'd said them. Rushed, rehearsed, almost like he'd practiced the invitation before dialing. And that voice in the background. I picked up my coffee, found it had gone cold, and drank it. I went back out to the garden that afternoon, back to the bougainvillea, I still hadn't finished trimming. My hands were busy, but my mind wasn't really on the work.