She Weeps Each Time You're Born

by Quan Barry

  An disappeared under the water. Son could still see where the tips of his fingers had scratched at the surface. Afterward Son thought this must be how the bird finds the fish through the darkness. What it feels like. No time for thought. How the body takes over. He swam to the spot where the water had closed over An and dove. When he came back up, his father was retching in his arms.

  Ba, said Son. His father had taken on a new heaviness. It was all Son could do to keep An’s head cradled above water. Together they drifted downstream, the boat growing smaller and smaller. He wondered if the others would raise the anchor and come after them. He knew once they raised anchor they would stop for nothing. He could feel the half-healed cut on his face starting to sting. His father coughed. Please, An sputtered. Leave me. Son held on tighter. I order you to let me go. It was as if someone else were talking in his arms.

  Ten minutes passed. Son could have kicked them to shore, but he thought it best to stay in the water. For the second time in less than two weeks it was out of his hands, the Mekong charged with his destiny. If he thought about it, the one thing he’d want more than anything else these past few years had already come true. He was holding his father in his arms, the moonlight surging all around them.

  Son lost track of the time. An hour, minutes, weeks passed. They were flotsam in the river, an island of two. A beating heart sailing down a dark throat until it lands where it will.

  Later he would tell Rabbit that the stories were true. He could smell it before it surfaced. The animal’s breath like night soil, rotten and fetid from the heaps of garbage it ingested, teeth yellow as piss, each one studded in the mouth like a series of nails. Fishermen had cut open crocodiles to find bicycle tires in their stomachs, one with an entire French tea set tarnishing in its guts. Most of the freshwater crocs weren’t large enough to take a grown man, though they could take a limb and leave the victim to bleed to death. There was one said to have taken more than fifteen water buffalo in the last two years all up and down the river, though nobody had ever seen it.

  The women were almost five miles downriver from Cantho when they heard the drone of a small outboard engine. It was another few miles to the spot the doctor had chosen for them to board, a wide-mouthed inlet where the water was deep enough for the boat to draft. From there it would be another mile to the spot with enough shoreline vegetation for the men to hide until they could be ferried on board. As the little motorboat approached, Phuong gripped the sampan’s edges. Even in the dusky light, Rabbit could see her knuckles blanching.

  They were teenagers, just boys in makeshift uniforms, jackets torn at the elbow. Everyone else was off at the festival. Huyen muttered under her breath. The younger soldiers were the worst, many of them officious and drunk on the little bit of power that came with the uniform. If someone needed to be executed, it was often boy-soldiers who did the killing. His first night in Ba Nuoc, Rabbit’s father had told a story about a group of boy-soldiers on the front lines in Cambodia who had stomped a fellow soldier to death for snoring too loudly.

  The older boy was working the engine. With his free hand he made a brusque motion in the air. Rabbit could see a few stray hairs sprouting on his chin. Qui stopped rowing. The boat pulled up alongside. For a spell the two boys sat staring, Qui’s beauty like nothing they had ever seen. Then the boy at the engine took charge. Papers, he squeaked. None of them moved. Even though he looked older than the other boy, Rabbit thought he couldn’t have been more than fourteen.

  Maybe they all should have seen it coming. All day she had been working herself into a quiet rage. Sang smacked the water with her hand. The younger boy jumped. She looked him dead in the eye. Rabbit could feel the heat coming off the girl’s skin. This is my wedding night, Sang said, a coldness in her voice. She was a fifteen-year-old girl on the verge of becoming a woman. Even the boys knew they had only just scratched the surface.

  There were no men around, no one to save face in front of. The boys wouldn’t speak of it later even between themselves. The younger boy averted his eyes. A hundred years of happiness to you, sister, he said. The older boy kept his eyes on the engine. Qui took up the oar. Rabbit looked at Huyen. She could tell the old woman was doing her best not to smile. She wondered what would happen later when Sang realized the truth.

  The river croc made its first pass. It was swimming high enough out of the water that Son could see the prehistoric ridges along its back. He imagined it was looking for the spot where it might seize them in its jaws and take them under, never letting go until it had drowned them. Son tried not to look at its yellow eyes. Depending on how far apart the eyes were, you could tell how big the animal was. His uncles said if you looked a river croc in the eye, it could hypnotize you. Some river crocs were said to have been medicine men in previous lives.

  The animal slipped under the surface. Son knew it would surface to attack. Once he had seen a small one take a dog in the death roll. He imagined how this one would take their heads in its mouth and begin rolling its plated body in the water, the sound of their bones breaking audible only to them.

  Under the water something brushed his leg. He had never felt anything so cold. Was it the animal or a piece of debris? He began to wonder if it would hurt. Of course it would, the great mouth studded with teeth, and the added agony as the dark water burned his lungs. It was almost too much to consider. If he were all alone, he might try and do like the ancient monks and just will himself to die.

  Then something was coming from out of the sky. A shadow crossed the moon. He could hear the flapping of wings. A bird landed on the water just feet away. It was a cormorant. The bird looked colorless, the long serpentine neck weaving from side to side. It seemed to be staring at Son with its bloody eyes. Son wondered if the bird sensed what was under the water. There was a possibility the crocodile might surface for the bird, pulling it under instead. From out of the reeds he could hear someone paddling toward them.

  The boat was sitting in the middle of the river. It looked abandoned. The doctor’s plan relied on the whole world being at the festival, all eyes on the moon. There hadn’t been any attempt to hide it. It was a fishing boat with a small pilothouse, its white paint peeling from the salt and the sun. Qui quickened her pace. Rabbit could feel the sampan surge forward with each stroke. They had to board without anyone seeing. If someone saw them, there would be no lying their way out of it. There would be no shaming two teenaged boys into letting them go.

  Qui rowed around to the far side away from shore. Bats were already wheeling through the air. Then Son’s uncles Hai and Duc appeared. Nobody said anything as they got to work. Rabbit felt herself being lifted over the side. On deck she watched as Hai jumped down into the sampan and lifted Huyen, the old woman light as seed. Sang was standing, her feet planted like pylons. The sampan started to rock. Sit down, Hai hissed. In the fading light Sang’s dress shimmered faintly. She stayed standing.

  Duc and Hai worked around her, unloading and storing things below deck. Phuong herself carried the clattering sack down into the hold. On board Qui was tugging Rabbit’s hand, but Rabbit wanted to watch Sang with her legs and arms akimbo in her red ao dai, colossal in her growing fury. Rabbit wondered if Sang had ever really believed she was on the way to her wedding. For a moment Rabbit could feel the girl’s loneliness like the pale yellow aura around the moon. Finally Rabbit let herself be led below deck.

  If she had stayed, she would have seen the moment when the fire burned out. Sang didn’t take the hands reaching out from on deck to pull her up. Her head simply dropped. She stood a long moment in the new light of the world. Then without uttering a cry she reached over and put her hands on the splintery lip of the boat and pulled herself up.

  It was a race and they were the prize. The crocodile was still somewhere under the water, its cold blood beating in the darkness. Son could feel his father growing heavier in his arms. He didn’t know how much longer he could hold on, though he was prepared to hold on forever. Across the water the sound o
f someone paddling toward them, each stroke like the ticking of a heart.

  It was almost worse this way. When the yellow eyes had been on the surface, Son had felt a terror beyond compare. But now that the eyes had submerged it was incomprehensible. There was no word for it. The idea that one moment you could be floating in the water and the next all sentience could be ripped from your body. Then Son could see a makeshift raft coming toward them out of the darkness. Ba, Son whispered, shaking his father.

  When the raft arrived, a hand swung An up out of the water first. Then Son felt himself being lifted. For a long time An lay heaving, water coming out of his mouth and nose. The man who had rescued them made a whistling sound through his teeth, and the white bird lifted off the river’s surface and floated up onto the raft. Lovingly the old man ran a finger down its neck, the tip of his long gray beard brushing the bird. The old man took off his non la. Son could see the moon reflected on his hairless head.

  Twenty minutes later the raft rounded a bend. The boat was sitting in the middle of the river. It looked empty. Son wondered if the others had been caught. His father lay still. Son didn’t know what to say. Everything was out of his hands. Silently the old man rowed up to the boat. Son shook his father. Ba. His father began to stir, his blue eye almost invisible in the moonlight. We’re here, he said. Nobody came out to greet them. The man boosted Son up on deck. Before he even had a chance to look for his uncles, the man was already hoisting his father in the air. He turned and helped pull An on board.

  Something stirred in the pilothouse. Cautiously Duc and Hai appeared like animals creeping out of the night. There were gasps of amazement. Son could hear his mother crying as one of his uncles carried him below. He could hardly breathe, it was so hot, the air like stagnant water, the whole space a crawlway, the hold no more than three feet at its highest and running the length of the boat. How did you get here, someone asked. A man picked us up in the river, Son said. What did he want, someone asked. Hai came bustling back down the steps. There’s no one out there, Hai hissed. Son raced back up the steps. He looked in all directions, but it was true.

  When you are called to make the passage, just open your mouth and remember the sutra. It will feel like light flowing out of the body. Even if you are just a child, do not fight the temptation to remain. All forms are impermanent. What the world is trying to teach you: the only permanence is impermanence.

  ONCE THEY’D RAISED ANCHOR, THEY MADE IT TO THE OCEAN in only a few hours. Duc left the motor off and let the currents carry them along. The Harvest Moon was still in the sky by the time they arrived at the sea. Dark cliffs ringed the bay like turrets. For the most part the boat stayed in the middle of the river as far from shore as possible. From time to time the river narrowed. When it did, they passed floating villages, villages much like the one they’d left behind, houses floating on matted river weeds and fifty-gallon drums, each house soundlessly bobbing in the water, the people off celebrating in the city. Only Duc and Hai in the pilothouse could see their good fortune firsthand.

  Duc was surprised by how smoothly it had gone—no patrols, no stray fishermen following in their wake demanding to be taken along. In the pilothouse he watched the bay open before them. At the back of the boat Hai began prepping the motor. The tides were right. There was no reason to hesitate. They slipped into the dark waters of the bay as if it were a lake. The setting moon wavered on the waves. Then the engine turned over, the land steadily growing smaller and more distant. Within the hour it was gone.

  Hai came down into the hold. He left the door open. Rabbit could feel the heat rushing out, fresh air pouring in. We’re at sea, Hai said in a quiet voice. They could come up out of the darkness. The sting of the salt felt welcoming those first few hours, their throats tingling with each breath.

  For the first time since coming on board, Son could see how many people there were. Bodies on top of bodies. He didn’t know how they’d all fit. In addition to his own family, there were the Cambodians plus Rabbit and her family. As people began to pour out of the hold, he noticed the doctor gathering a woman and a young girl to his side. The girl was smaller than Rabbit. One of her feet was laced up tight in a thick black shoe. Together the three of them held hands and bowed their heads. When they were done, they touched their faces and chests in the same pattern. Son had never seen the woman or girl before, but he knew who they were by the way the doctor gripped their hands.

  Son and Rabbit spent the rest of the first night on top of the pilothouse. In the sea air the deep scratch on his cheek was beginning to dry. Nobody cared that the two children had stationed themselves on the roof. It meant two fewer people on deck. The boat wasn’t built to carry them all. There were four other families related to the doctor. The men of the families were lawyers and engineers, men who had been to university and were forced to work as cyclo drivers and che sellers after reunification. Son knew that all over the river delta, professionals like these men were now doing the same backbreaking jobs as his uncles. Southern society had been turned upside down. People were dying in hospitals because the northern doctors shipped down to replace the “capitalist sympathizers” had received their medical certificates in less than six weeks.

  Just before dawn there was a commotion in the hold, the sound of someone shouting. Together Rabbit and Son peered over the edge of the roof. One of the Cambodians came scrambling up on deck, Phuong trailing behind him beating his back with her fists. Sang appeared in the doorway. She was still wearing the red ao dai, the dress’s train flapping in the wind. Phuong was screaming about the man having his hand up Sang’s dress. Nobody paid much attention. Even An was more embarrassed than concerned. Everyone knew who had started it. Sang in the blood-red dress was still furious. The doctor’s wife shook her head.

  The sun would be up within the hour. In the pilothouse Hai was still muttering about Hong Kong. If they were refugees in Hong Kong, it would be easier to find work while they stayed in a transit camp. Ever since the government had started harassing the three million ethnic Chinese who had lived in Saigon for generations, thousands of people had escaped the country by boat. There were refugee camps all over Southeast Asia. Hai had heard that in Hong Kong they let you out during the day. In Malaysia the people were Muslims. He had heard of the prohibitions there against pork and alcohol, even cards prohibited. Back in Ba Nuoc, Phuong had teased her younger brother. For you it will be worse than Vietnam, she said. No, Hai said, blowing a stream of cigarette smoke out through his nose. Nothing could be as bad as not having a future.

  Rabbit was lying on her back and looking up at the stars. They were winking out, the sky lightening in the east. What’s wrong, said Son. Rabbit glared at him, her freckled face scowling. There was so much wrong. Forty people packed on a boat built to hold a handful, the engine already starting to stutter. Rabbit turned on her stomach and peered over the edge. She located Qui among the crowd squatting on a mat, Tu sitting next to her. They weren’t touching, but Rabbit could tell by the distance between them that they were aware of each other. In the wind Qui’s hair tickling Tu’s shoulder.

  From the roof of the pilothouse Rabbit and Son watched the sun rise in the east. Each sliver poured over the horizon smooth as gold. The day passed without incident. By mid-morning it was overcast. The sky threatened rain, though none came. By noon everyone began to realize they could still sunburn even under the clouds. People took to shielding themselves with pieces of clothing. Some went back below deck. Toward evening Qui and some of the wives came around again with the rice they had cooked in advance. There was seven days’ worth on board along with enough uncooked rice for another week. The doctor had decided only the men doing hard labor would get what little of the dried fish they had. Everyone else would have to make due with just the fish sauce and whatever else they’d brought with them.

  By day’s end the sun broke through the cloud cover. It was hanging low in the sky when Son spotted a plume of water spouting in the distance. It’s good luck, said one of
the doctor’s relatives. People began to clamor for a glimpse of the whale. The doctor remained seated. He held his little girl in his lap, her foot laced up tight as if in a trap. The only good fortune is in Him, said the doctor.

  Just then there was a loud bang, and the engine seized up. Cái thằng con heo! said Hai. The doctor scowled and pulled his daughter closer. Duc came out of the pilothouse. Together the brothers waded through the people to the back of the boat. Most of the engine was underwater. Duc tried to tilt it up, but somehow it had become locked and wouldn’t budge. A few of the men began to gather. One of the engineers reached under the water and touched something. Instantly he pulled away and put his fingers in his mouth. Thing’s hot as pig shit, said Hai. It’s burning oil.

  Duc used the bottom of his shirt to unscrew the cap. It was a modern-enough motor that there was a separate reserve just for oil. They had chosen a motor with an oil tank rather than a two stroke because they wouldn’t need someone constantly feeding oil into the gas. The engineer began to explain what might be wrong. He spoke using a lot of technical jargon. Shit, said Duc. Just tell us what we need to do. It was only their first day at sea, and already it was starting. Basically you need a whole new engine, said the engineer. Fuck that, said Hai. This is Vietnam. Nothing’s new.

  An argument broke out, but the doctor didn’t get up from where he was. One of the Cambodians slipped below deck and found the man with one sleeve. He was sitting upright under the stairs in a spot with no more space than a crate. The Cambodian began to explain the situation to him. The man with one sleeve nodded and squeezed himself out. As always, there was a small smile playing on his lips.