Authors: Thanhha Lai
“Maybe.”
“Before I forget, SAT word for today, conundrum, c-o-n-u—”
My finger somehow holds down
OFF
. Oops.
That’s it. I’m on an SAT revolt, erasing all five-dollar words from my cobwebby mind. Expunged, good-bye. Wait, is
expunge
an SAT word? Probably. Rewind. How about
zapped
? Zapped, good-bye. It’ll kill Mom when I come back espousing the vocabulary of a middle schooler, which I am. Wait, is
espouse
SAT? I’m going to have to be vigilant.
Vigilant?
OMG, Mom has completely warped me.
I keep the phone off, ostensibly to save the battery. But I can’t handle Mom just yet. She will try too hard to help and will drive me batty. No one, not even Mom, can fix my gargantuan problems. Other than flying home right now and rolling Montana in a rug and stashing the rug in a garage, I don’t know what anyone can do. I don’t even know if HE likes her, or me, or someone else, or anyone at all. It doesn’t help that I’m stuck in a mosquitoey swamp on the other side of the world. Where is that quack detective?
Of course it’s pouring. We would have to visit during the rainy season, when, in addition to being hot and muggy, which mosquitoes love, there are also downpours to provide puddle nurseries. Every time one mosquito sucks a hint of my blood, she has the nutrients to have zillions of babies. So glad I could help.
Bà and I and Ông’s Brother are in the front room, drinking tea by the window, watching arrow-like raindrops puncture the cement courtyard. There’s no talking. We sip and stare, sip and stare.
I’m supposed to call him Ông Thuận. Bà wrote down the name and pronounced it over and over. But I can’t simultaneously pucker my lips, twist my tongue, push the vowels front to back really fast, flip my intestines, and close my throat. So I keep calling him “Ông’s Brother.” Predictable, but how inventive can I be when I’m this distraught? When all I can think about is how often has Montana’s butt bow been menacing HIM? And how long has Mom known about HIM?
We’ve had three refills when Ông’s Brother starts talking. Startled, I nearly spill scorching tea on my lap. That’s all I need to make this day perfect, a third-degree burn.
Ông’s Brother points to a huge wooden block mounted on a thick tree stump. He tells us that long ago Ông built this square birdhouse, each side carved with four perfect circular nests, which have never been empty of doves.
“Years ago, I took a pair of doves to the mountain on my yearly search for ginseng,”
Ông’s Brother says.
“I released them, thinking they would crave the wild, but they returned before I did
.”
“It’s impossible to forget the core of one’s being.”
“Even if lost, I sensed they never would have relinquished finding a way home.”
“Unless something intruded.”
“He would have returned if he could.”
“What might have prevented him?”
“Even without knowing, we can provide him with a proper place to rest.”
“Rest?”
“His spot in the family plot still awaits, as yours. I myself have rested a son there. His body was lost in the war, but his spirit I buried at home.”
“How did you know the moment to release waiting?”
“After the war ended, I hoped. Every day I looked into the horizon for his frame. Soldier after soldier returned, on feet shredded like cloth, on bicycles of dented wheels and without tires, they returned from the lowest tip of the South. Each year fewer came home. By the third year, I saw nothing but dust in the horizon. Day after day. Then his mother stepped into the next life and took him with her, side by side.”
Bà nods. Ông’s Brother looks deeper into the horizon. They return to silence. I understood every word, but somehow the meaning is as impossible to hold as each drop of rain.
As quickly as the rain slammed down, it suddenly thins to brushstrokes. Bà stands up and walks toward the birdhouse, her head uncovered, striding with purpose. She will get damp, enough to chill her. I scramble after her. Right then, the doves fly out of the birdhouse, and by some invisible cue, they hover above us with white wings wide, creating a feathery, rhythmic umbrella.
Bà traces each circle on the birdhouse, sixteen in all. I know she’s thinking Ông’s own hands had carved these circles. Somehow, that makes him more real to me. Ông walked this village; he slept in the blue goddess room; he ate grapefruit from the garden tree. I trace each circle too.
Bà starts a long, murmuring chant. I listen, not to actual words but to their undeniable weight.
I’m all set to hate it here, then something magical has to happen.
I
’m pinching myself to stay awake. Twenty-three more minutes until midnight, which will be 10:00 a.m. the day before in Laguna, the time Montana should be up but not yet at the beach.
All night I’ve planned as much as possible, channeling efficient Mom. I borrowed a pair of Bà’s pajamas, saying I want to be comfortable, and they are supercomfortable, but really I need to cover as much skin as possible so I can talk outside without bloodsuckers devouring me. I practice sounding light and fun, like I’m calling to check in. I have to make sure I do not slip and mention HIM, even though I hope Montana will refer to HIM in an offhanded, flighty way. Montana doesn’t have Mom’s power to X-ray thoughts, so my secret is safe.
I do feel guilty having missed Mom’s call at 10:00 p.m., the phone vibrating like a silent scream. Mom texted and texted, but it was a perfectly believable time to be asleep. Bà was. Mom must be worried, her mind automatically imagines the worst. I don’t know how long I can avoid her. But she would have interrogated me, plucking out each little bit about HIM. The sad truth is we barely have bits. We know who each other is and have said hi, that’s about it. HE’s always been around, but I didn’t notice HIM at school until a few months ago when HE talked about a love poem in class. HIS face softened to reveal a look of longing I grew up seeing in Bà.
It’s time. I crawl out with Bà’s socks on. That leaves just my hands and face exposed. Surely, I can jiggle to protect three little areas. I rush past the birdhouse, all the way to the grapefruit tree at the farthest edge of the garden.
I punch 001 before Montana’s number, harder to do than you’d think while jiggling. She’s supposed to have memorized my number too, in case an earthquake happens and we have to call from someone’s phone. But I have a feeling she memorized as far as the area code.
“Mont, it’s me.”
“Is it really you? I can just die. It’s been so weird without you. I can’t believe it’s really you. You have no idea how wrong my life is right now. Like yesterday, Hadley was over, and I could not for the life of me teach her the lobster tail. Then she just put on my favorite lip gloss, without even asking, then she was all ‘I don’t like the smell.’ Can you believe that? She’s shuttling in any minute and I swear I’m done, like done done. I think she likes that boy in English class, you know, the one who talked about that poem . . .”
I know exactly which boy, my boy. The familiar tidal wave of nausea. I fight it by pacing. Forget standing still and jiggling, I’ve got to pace to buffer against mosquitoes and dread. “You can’t be at the beach already, with Hadley?”
“Yeah, I said I didn’t like her but you always have, so I’m, like, fine.”
“You know I’m calling from across the world. You know I didn’t call to talk about Hadley.”
“Guess who’s here?”
“Why are you at the beach at ten in the morning?”
“It was supposed to be so awesome, a huge pod of dolphins was spotted really early, but by the time we got here . . . Hey, you can’t be leaving?”
“Me? No.”
“Not you. I’m talking to Poet Dude. Hadley is all wrong for him, don’t you think? Hey, come here, stop walking away, talk to Mia, she’s calling all the way from Vietnam, that’s where she’s from. . . .”
I didn’t think it was possible, but I feel sicker than I did just a minute ago. I’m clutching the phone so hard the veins on my hand pop. I pace, fast. Montana is telling HIM what a great idea my trip is, as if she could last a day here. She’s babbling, meaning she’s nervous. We have that sad trait in common.
“Talk to her, talk to Mia,” she keeps saying, like she’s in sales. Her breathing gets louder. She must be running after HIM.
“Hey.”
I stop pacing, knowing that “hey” well. There’s no mistaking the speaker.
“Hey,” I manage. That came out dry and pained, as if an army of ants were crawling down my throat.
“What’s it like there?” HIS first sentence directed at me, ever. What a beautiful sentence.
“Hot.” Have the ants eaten all my words? The mosquitoes sure are. Jiggle, jiggle.
“Here too. We’re in the middle . . .”
I hear scratchy noises, then we’re cut off. Why, why, why? HE was talking to me. And I was getting ready to talk back. I redial and get voice mail. I call again. Voice mail. I text. Wait. No response. Being across the world sucks.
How can a conversation lasting 2 minutes, 12.8 seconds leave me this jittery? What just happened?
HE and I exchanged words. Excellent.
HE was trying to walk away from Montana. Good.
Montana was nervous, that means she’s plotting for HIS attention. Dangerous.
Hadley likes HIM, that means Montana will try even harder. Dire.
Montana didn’t ask one question about my trip or say that she misses me. Rude.
If only I could confide in Montana and get her to fish around for HIS feelings for me, but that’s never going to happen. Depressing.
So many emotions are crashing into one another that my whole body hurts. I run into the house. Things will clear up when I’m rested and energized. They have to, right?
T
ense voices wake me up. Bà’s and a man’s. Not Ông’s Brother. Definitely not Anh Minh. Not Dad’s. I wish. OMG, it’s our detective.
I scramble out of the net, which is harder to do than you’d think, and run into the front room. He’s here, as leathery and wordy as ever. I’ve only marked four days off my Trip of Torment calendar. This man is a genius. I will be at the beach blocking HIM from Montana’s butt bow very soon, la la la. Then I look around. Wait, where’s the guard?
I look at Bà with a desperate expression that surely conveys, “Where’s the guard?” but Bà just frowns.
“Please forgive my granddaughter, she has not awakened enough to employ her manners,”
Bà says to him. To me,
“Your clothes?
”
As if her pajama-ish matching silk set looks that different from my real pajamas matching silk set. But I obviously do not possess the magical powers to tell loose day wear from loose night wear. I go change, returning in proper mosquito-bait capris. Bà shakes her head just the slightest bit. I get it. Go outside, away from adult conversation.
Not to worry, I have major spying skills. They’re talking in the front room, so by squatting outside under the open window I can hear everything. I used chopsticks to place a rotting banana under the window. In position, plastic bag in hand, I can always say I’m catching fruit flies for you-know-who.
I only understand Bà’s part of the conversation. When the detective talks, his words float away then pop like bubbles. He, unfortunately, does most of the talking. I have to bounce while squatting to keep my legs from going to sleep. I do realize how weird I look.
“You have located the guard in Hà Nội? Why isn’t he here?”
Pop, pop, pop.
“I will not go to him. I need rest. He held my husband captive; he must come to me to release his past.”
Pop, pop, pop.
“This man is pointing at the sun when the answer resides at his feet. No one will think he is profiting from the war. Every detail, every drop, means . . .”
More pops. Ugh!
“Tell him I’ve waited through the war, through the maturity of seven children, through a foreign world, waited for the day when someone can reveal how my husband absorbed the air without his family beside him. Tell him we will not talk of war. It simply was. Better yet, tell him I want to listen, no more.”
The detective takes a long breath, as if to slow down his whole being.
“I will explain your story again.”
Wow, I understand him! He is capable of normal talk. Maybe Bà should numb him more often with the facts of her life. But where’s the guard? That’s the question I want the answer to.
“Miss, what are you doin’?”
I jump and wham my head under the half-open shutter. Double OOOWWWW! My translator is the coolest ever, but I could use some alone time, thank you. He’s going to ask why don’t I use the bathroom instead of squatting and bouncing. If I ran into me right now, I would ask exactly that. Quickly, I hold up my pathetic bag imprisoning three fruit flies. Those tiny things rarely need to land.
“Surely, you are not goin’ to all this trouble for Frog? He is so enormous we are all fearful he will have a heart attack. Can you imagine the catastrophic response from Miss Út?”
I make a big show of standing up and releasing the captured three, for the sake of obese pets everywhere.
Now Bà and the detective are in front of the house. I oh-so-casually ease my way over there. Sly, that’s me.
Bà nods and heads inside. I smile really big at the detective, pretending mega interest so I can find out the deal with the guard.
“Chào Anh,”
I say, and bow toward the detective, so proud I can greet him all by myself.
Anh Minh laughs. “Miss, he is your grandfather’s age so you must address him as Ông.”
“I thought my Ông is called Ông.”
“When you say ‘Ông’ alone everyone knows you mean your grandfather. But when you address someone of the same generation you must say Ông plus the man’s first name.”
The detective clutches my hand and says,
“Ông Ba nắm chặt tay con, dù cho chiến-tranh đã chia rẽ nhiều người, dù rằng nhiều tim đã thành miểng đá, Ông Ba từ lâu đã quyết-định rằng. . . .”
What is he saying about my grandparents?
My translator steps in. “His name is Ông Ba. Ba means three, thus he ranks as the third son in his family. Different from Ông Bà where your tone goes downward for Bà.”