—It will take time, she said. There are other orders I need to finish before yours.
I didn’t mind. She cut the fabric to my dimensions, pinning it to a mannequin. She worked with quiet concentration, methodically. Her name was Minh. Her presence stilled, a little, the turbulence I felt around Seb. I asked if she’d been born in Hội An.
She nodded and asked how old I was. We were both twenty-two. I was two months older, though she seemed the more adult, running a shop. She said it belonged to her family. I asked if she liked her work.
—I want to study in Da Nang, she said, but it’s difficult.
—Is it expensive? I asked.
—My father died, she said, but people think he took the wrong side in the American war, so there is a black mark, and my brothers and I cannot study.
—He helped the Americans, I said.
She asked if I was hungry and brought us two bowls of cao lâu, herbs, noodles, pork, and broth. She said her aunt made it—at a restaurant in the alley behind us. We ate and talked. She told me she was engaged to a man from Da Nang.
—New city, new ideas. New name. She smiled.
—New name—does that mean you can study?
—It depends. I have to work hard here, so if it does work, I can pay for it.
After lunch, Minh finished the dress. I took a picture of us together. I never do things like that. She took one, too. When I met Seb back at the guesthouse, he said the dress was gorgeous.
We journeyed on, farther south, skirting salt fields and rice paddies. We stopped to swim and to pick mangoes by the beach, and we slept in a bungalow by the South China Sea. We stayed too long in the seaside paradise we’d found, so there was no time for the Mekong Delta. Ho Chi Minh City would be the end of our trip. We were growing tired of each other and tired of traveling.
We arrived in the city at midday and napped through the heat of the afternoon, in a blue guesthouse room with a cherrywood floor. The whirring ceiling fan disguised the traffic noise and gave us some relief, for we’d grown unused to cities, to wearing shoes, to the structure of a day (voyage out, then home).
Wandering the streets that afternoon, we were like two boats unhitched from a mooring but still tied together. We banged against each other in our indecision. We studied the peeling paint on building façades as if it were something of beauty. We spoke of going to a museum.
We found crossing the flow of traffic, never easy in Vietnam, impossible after our time at the coast. We didn’t have the energy to calculate our course against the cars, bicycles, and motorbikes—what Seb called the “erratic tide of the human.” I hated him, desired him, changing course all the time. Bit by bit, without meaning to, we inched our way into a network of side streets, where a lone motorcycle kicked up dust in its wake, where there was almost quiet.
—Beer? Seb asked.
It was something to do.
Two more bends in the narrow road led us to a café with no sign. From a corner table near a cracked window, we ordered bia hội and set up a game of checkers. We slid the plastic coins across the board and slipped into the rhythm of our game.
The man behind the bar was tall and gaunt, drying glasses with a dishrag and replacing them on shelves. He had the look of waiting for someone he knew would never arrive. When he brought us rounds, he looked at Seb’s shoulder, as if he might rest a hand there, then went away.
For hours we sat, squaring off against each other. Seb resisted my moves, and I felt oddly satisfied by the slow accumulation of my chips on his side of the board. I was losing, but our glasses were full and the sky outside was inking blues. The bartender brought us two glasses of plum wine.
—On the house, he said.
We nodded our thanks, our bodies already tired, dried from the sun, the heat, and the beer. The plum wine was sweet and bitter. It tasted of fermentation.
In the hours we’d been in the bar, only a few other customers had passed through: solitary men who came, drank something, and then disappeared up a wooden flight of stairs. I wondered vaguely what could be up there, but my mind didn’t feel like puzzles.
Lights came on when it got dark. We would search out dinner in this part of the city before retreating to our guesthouse. The floor spun as I stood.
As Seb moved to put away the game, the bartender approached with the pitcher of plum wine. He asked if we liked it. Sitting at a table by the bar was a man with a fleshy face and a woman creased by wrinkles, her frail body swallowed in a large black dress. The bartender filled everyone’s glasses. We toasted.
The woman seemed older than the men and carried herself with a poise that made it seem as though she were looking down at us, though she came to the height of our shoulders.
—Your mother? Seb asked the bartender.
He laughed, clinking glasses with the fleshy man. The woman was impassive.
—You think I am a young man, the bartender said. Cheers to that! She’s my sister, he said, then put a finger to Seb’s chest, asking:
—American?
—No, Seb said, clearing his throat.
He hated being mistaken for an American.
—My brother, her husband, is dead. You look like him. All of us think so.
The woman didn’t smile. The bartender patted Seb on the back and went behind the bar.
—Papa in the war? the fleshy man asked Seb, motioning for us to join him at a table.
—Her husband was American, he reminded us, gesturing to the woman now disappearing up the stairs.
The bartender joined us at the table with a jug of amber liquor. Seb’s smile seemed to say, Let the games begin. We drank more. The liquor was strong. I got used to it.
After a time, the bartender put his thin arm around Seb and pointed at me.
—Your wife, he said.
—No.
—Aha, girlfriend! You have a wife at home, in Canada?
—Maybe you have a wife in Canada, Seb said, grazing the man’s shirt with his index finger.
Fresh laughter erupted from all sides.
—Your sister? the fleshy man asked, flicking his eyes from Seb to me, appraising. She can work here? he said, rubbing his thumb across his fingers. The money is good. For you, too.
He laughed.
My face felt hot as I waited—enraged by my passivity—for Seb’s response.
—Light-haired girl, the man said, very popular.
Seb’s hand flew to his face. He was laughing.
—Come upstairs, the bartender said to Seb, as if he’d been thinking of something else.
Seb stopped laughing long enough to ask the fleshy man:
—How much? He motioned to me. More or less than Vietnamese?
In the roar of laughter that followed, the room ballooned with sound and contracted, swallowing Seb and his guide up the narrow stairs. Heat rocketed to my face. I stayed rooted to the chair, my back very straight, hand spreads across the table. The fleshy man rubbed his eyes, tearing from laughter. I wanted to follow Seb up the stairs and grab him so that he’d have to face me. I wanted to strip out the streak of cruelty that wasn’t him.
The expression of the fleshy man was biting into me like an unpleasant odor. I pushed back my chair. The floor spun. Fleshy fingers clamped my thigh as I tried to stand. I was pinned. Rocking the chair back, I fell to the floor, freeing myself. As I scrambled up, the room spun again, more violently. I made for the door. Think, I urged myself. Seb was wearing the satchel with all of our things—phone, wallet—all that I hadn’t wanted to carry in the heat. I’d run until I found a busy street, then—I remembered the blue room but not the name of the guesthouse! We had been there only hours.
—Don’t do that, the fleshy man said, sounding sober and authoritative.
—Why? I asked, pausing in the doorway.
—It is not safe for you, he said calmly.
He stooped to pick up my overturned chair. I gripped the door frame, prickling with terror but not wanting to make a scene. Were these threats? If I
ran up the stairs, it was possible that I wouldn’t find Seb, that I would get lost in corridors that flowed through the whole city.
The screen door banged as I ran into the alley. The night was humid, hot, and wet. It must have rained while we were inside. Other alleys branched from where I stood. I feared they would dead-end. In the empty street, I paused, unsure which direction to take. Then, finding a crevice between two buildings, large enough for a person, I slipped in and tried to silence my breath.
Stung by Seb’s complicity, not knowing what he was doing, I thought how stupid I was to have depended on him. I would have to wait until he came out, then follow him back to the guesthouse.
The door of the bar swung open, then slammed. Sharp sounds in Vietnamese. Bartender’s voice. Labored breathing of the fleshy man. Sweep of a flashlight beam. I considered running. But if I chose the wrong alley … I listened to the lights and sounds fade in the opposite direction.
—Ella!
Seb must have come out of a different door. I emerged from my hiding place.
—Ella, what are you doing?
He rushed toward me. His shoulders collapsed in relief as he recognized me. He gripped my elbow, and a swell of tears conveyed my fear, my disgust.
—C’mon, he said, stop it.
I couldn’t stop the tears but tried to smother them away with my arm.
—Shhh, Seb said, and pressed me to him.
I let the side of my cheek rest against his chest. Then he took my hand and we crossed the alley, going back the way we’d come that afternoon. Streetlamps lit our way. The terror I’d felt moments ago had gone. Gathering strength, I pushed him hard with the palm of my hand.
—What is it? he asked, startled. What’s wrong with you?
—You left me alone with them! I whispered, anger making it hard to speak.
We walked through patterns of shadow, Seb’s face visible only in little squares.
—I’m sorry? he offered.
—What did you do?
—Hmm?
—Upstairs. When you went upstairs.
—I used the toilet.
—You’re lying—
Tears threatened again. My breath came in gulps.
—You’re crazy. It was a few minutes. When I came down, no one knew where you’d gone. They said you took off running. What the hell?
—You came out another door.
—Yeah, there’s another door. I checked the house to see if you’d disappeared that way. No one had any idea where you were—
—You were … My voice faltered.
—What?
—It was a brothel, I finally managed to say. The upstairs, and you were …
Seb’s body collapsed in laughter. He put a hand on my shoulder.
—Ah, how could I possibly—He laughed again. I was gone less than five minutes. Is that really what you thought? He was showing me a picture of my American father. Remember? They thought I looked like some brother or husband or something?
I studied Seb’s face in the darkness. His sigh made me feel ridiculous.
—It’s a family. What did you think—that they wanted me to deflower their daughter?
—I thought you were with a prostitute, I said quietly.
—Jesus, he said. It happened once. Get the fuck over it. I let them show me the photograph and I used their toilet.
Seb’s tone was stern and logical and fed color to the sick world that had enclosed me moments ago. Things around us began to seem more normal.
—Did he look like you? I asked.
—Hard to tell in the photo. He was next to a plane, in a military uniform.
—It was a family?
—Of course.
—It wasn’t a brothel?
—What do I know? Seb shrugged. Upstairs it looked like a family home.
—It was a family, I repeated numbly.
—If it makes you feel any better, I thought that, too, at first. Seb laughed a little. They were worried about you—
—They wanted to sell me as a prostitute! I said, but it seemed funnier now.
—It was a joke! Kind of flattering, he said, teasing me.
I started to smile but remembered how afraid I’d been. My anger returned.
—How long did you leave me there?
—Five minutes, if even. You’re upset, okay, but there was really nothing to worry about.
He patted my back as we walked.
—It’s funny, he said. The man they kept saying was my double looked nothing like me.
—You said you couldn’t see his face.
—Yeah, but even so, you know …
I nodded, and the events at the bar seemed very far away, almost unreal as we snaked our way through the tiny streets. We found a brightly lit snack shop and stopped for rice bowls with flavorful sauces. The food and the light made the events recede even further, and Seb and I did what we should have done earlier: retold each other stories from the trip. We delivered our tales with new animation and energy. The veterans at the bar became another episode, my brush with prostitution a diverting detail. The Belle du Jour of Saigon.
After leaving the restaurant, we descended back into the streets, walking on, both drunk, not minding the stench of the night—a smell like rotting meat, garbage overflowing bins. The pavement seemed to steam before us, humid. Part of the alleyway was decorated with mosaic and mirrors. It made me think of mazes. We were looking for another drink, though it must have been late. I was on the point of asking Seb if he knew where we were going, but part of me liked being led through the tangle of dark streets with no sign of a major road.
I reached for his shoulder, ahead of me, his skin warm under his T-shirt. He turned and in a single gesture twisted my arm against my back, pinning me, his mouth hot against mine. There was the warmth of him, excitement, and the pain shattering through my arm, all together. A scream came on its own. Then his hand was across my mouth, smelling of the spices at dinner. His body pressed into mine, flattening us against the wall of the alley. Mosaic pieces pricked my back. My arm was still pinned, but no longer hurt. Seb found with his free hand the place on my neck where my breath would stop if his fingers pressed even a little bit harder. Consciousness flickered, and fear shot through me. Before I could say anything, his fingers relaxed, as if he knew my limit. But he was looking behind him, his collarbone level with my lips. I gulped in air, dizzy. There was confusion and only his smell in the dark before I followed his gaze, lifting my chin over his shoulder. There seemed to be figures in the shadows, a cry, shrill, quickly muffled. Four men, maybe more. One girl, struggling, between overturned bins.
Fear surged back with near-shattering force. How many minutes passed? I shut my eyes but couldn’t keep out the sounds, amplified by the narrow walls of the alleyway: half-stifled cries, words among the men, grunts, slaps of skin on skin, banging of bins. Seb’s eyes glittered in the dark. Then there were no more cries. Only a raw smell of semen and rotting garbage, Seb’s heart beating fast against my chest.
A car passed on a nearby street, and its beam of headlights flashed across us. Everything was as if underwater. Would they leave her like that, between the bins, her legs bent under her? I could smell her horror, her shame—smell it on my body as if it were mine. Seb guided my elbow, urging us to move. I resisted. What if she was hurt badly? How could we help her? Then I heard the footsteps of the men returning. One hoisted her over his shoulder. I strained to see her face, or any sign of life. In the shadows, only her long dark hair fell across the back of the man who carried her.
We returned to the guesthouse in slow motion, my mind lingering far behind my body. I felt walled in by glass, thick shards. Mix of shock and the strange liquor. Seb’s slow step and hunched shoulders. Our large key turned in the lock.
We had booked one room to save money. We would share the large king-size bed, like brother and sister. The bed was flanked on one side by a low bureau, on the other by a chest of drawers, on which someone had set a glass vase of
white orchids. Seb put his wallet and passport on the bureau. The sheets were wrinkled from our siesta. A book with its spine broken lay open on the bed. I felt calm, lucid even, in the dim light.
—We should talk about this, I said reasonably.
—You okay, yeah? Seb said kindly, pulling my ponytail.
I flung away his hand and crossed the room. We glared at each other across the huge bed.
—You asked me to, he said, defensive.
—To what?
I was worried about the girl, wondering if and how we might contact the police. Before I could say anything, Seb shoved the bureau with the back of his hand. It rocked against the wall.
—We don’t have to talk about it, he said. Do you want to or not?
—Yes.
—So talk. I’m listening. But I’m tired, so—
—Maybe we should—
—I told you, he said, cutting me off, not listening. I said it wasn’t a good idea. You said, Really good ideas never seem like it at the time.
Seb tried to speak with his hands, then looked around, as if for a way to escape.
—Are you pretending not to remember, is that it? he asked me.
—No, I remember. Of course I remember.
—Okay, he said, relieved.
—How could I not? It was horrible.
—For fuck’s sake!
His hands searched for something to tear apart. He grew anxious. I missed his calm but was pleased to have caused agitation. I was so used to crashing against his indifference.
He took a long breath. His voice became rational again.
—You said to do it. You said to get it over with—so it wouldn’t be between us. You said you didn’t want anything more. You said—
He went into the bathroom. I heard the tap run. He came back with a paper cup of water. He drank it in one gulp, shook his head, as if he could make me disappear. He spoke slowly, enunciating each word:
—You promised it wouldn’t be a big deal.
He looked at me meaningfully, as if to implant a memory of things I didn’t think I’d said.
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