The Zenith

by Duong Thu Huong

  Many people whispered behind his back about his family’s mysterious misfortune; others were too afraid to talk about it. If you passed by Quy’s gate, you would see the three families sitting on a mat—no table—having dinner on the patio, entirely like a very poor rural family in days far past, looking puzzled, with a powerless gaze, without even the capacity to feel ashamed. During that time, Quy’s family became the very first family in Woodcutters’ Hamlet to eat rice mixed with cassava. Meanwhile the storm lamp still shone brightly over part of Mr. Quang’s large patio, a setting where neighbors were generously treated to chicken and rice as well as many other goodies. Nobody dared raise a concern. Their anxiety looking at such contrast twisted their hearts into knots so words froze at the tips of their tongues. Quy’s plan of “many children making grandchildren; plenty of good fortune” hit the wall of dire poverty.

  Dire poverty is a bad-tempered acquaintance, an opponent well deserving caution, giving its victims blows that can never be healed. Forever in the past, one relied on the reassurance that “paternal concern will prevail.” So it was expected that, sooner or later, Mr. Quang would reconcile with Quy so that there would be someone to hold the bamboo cane and wear the gauze mourning headband and mourning coat when he came to lie down for the last time. Quy never imagined that someday the man he called “Father” would look at him as no more than a passerby crossing the street.

  One morning, Quy and his two sons-in-law went up to the forest to cut firewood. In the early new dew, the air of the mountains was still rising thru the cracks, giving everyone goose bumps. The three men shivered in clothes that gave no warmth; they kept stepping on one another’s feet as they rushed forward. It was a steep climb and there were many large stones made slick by the dew that caused the path to be very treacherous, especially for those wearing rubber sandals. It was bad luck that Quy had left his old canvas shoes at home that day to wear light, six-strap rubber sandals. He slipped and began to roll down the ravine; midway down the stony slope, an old thornbush full of dry branches stopped his fall, saving him from death, but he broke four ribs. While he was held by the thornbush, waiting for his sons-in-law to rescue him, he suddenly looked up at the top of the slope. Mr. Quang was standing there, looking down into the ravine. For an instant, their eyes met. For the first time, the son understood that all was over—forever. He caught in the eyes of his father a terrifying coldness—the type of frigid cold brought by the north wind in December. He shivered and quickly closed his eyes.

  Quy was hospitalized for more than two months. During that time, he learned pointedly what it is to be dirt poor: how humiliating it is when you don’t have enough money for hospital expenses; how excruciating it is to have just a bowl of rice with plain watercress soup while others enjoy soup bowls full of chicken meat and drink milk; how injurious it is to one’s pride when you cannot afford a pack of cigarettes to tip the orderlies, or candies to give to the three-year-old son of the nurse who gives you injections or changes your dressings. His four ribs healed slowly due to his poor nutrition. When his wife and the family walked into the hospital room, he had the opportunity to look at them objectively—his own blood and flesh, the large army for which he had such vivid hopes. The army named Chien and Thang was not even a gang: they were disheveled, skinny, with privation showing on their faces. When they came and went among the bamboo hedges of Woodcutters’ Hamlet, their poverty was not that obvious. But it was a different matter at the clinic.

  When he got back from the hospital, Quy assembled his family and ordered a cease-fire:

  “Now it is more difficult to feed people than before; you should stop temporarily. When our family regains its prosperity, we can have babies again.”

  “Whatever you teach, Father, we will put into action,” the two sons-in-law responded obediently.

  The order from the head of the family came a bit late. Quy and his wife already had three sons: Phu, Chien, and Thang. Because of the saying “three sons, no wealth; four daughters, no poverty,” they therefore sought a fourth child. This time it was indeed a girl, but she died twenty days after birth from untreatable pneumonia. The daughters Mo and Man each had little ones on their backs and four-month-old babies in their wombs. They gave birth to these babies almost at the same time, but neither child ate adequately. Both mothers and babies were pale like green leaves. Quy’s wife was only seventy pounds, with skin folds on her neck. The two daughters were not much older than twenty but their cheeks were full of lines that looked like cat’s whiskers. For this large army, worrying about food was gut-wrenching. There was neither time nor money left to worry about pants, shirts, and blouses. Therefore, villagers chatted with disdain every time they saw the family:

  “Look there, the girls Mo and Man are now older than Miss Ngan by ten years.”

  “Exactly. Thus the grandniece-in-law is older than the step-mother-in-law. How extraordinary. The stepmother-in-law is prettier and younger each day. In the old days our elders compared an exquisite beauty to a fairy descending to our realm. A descending fairy is as good as it can get.”

  “They are so wealthy, why don’t they have more babies?”

  “I heard the wife wants to but he doesn’t. He said, ‘One little Que is worth ten other children. One can be precious; not many.’”

  “Yeah, you have a point. One piece of gold in the hands is worth more than ten pieces of lead in the pocket.”

  “That family is really happy: a beautiful wife, a handsome son, the husband maybe old but still good-looking. As the saying goes, ‘One eats white rice with a bird’s egg omelet.’”

  “The husband is handsome, the wife beautiful; they just need to look at each other and they are full.”

  No one could ever deny that Mr. Quang’s young wife was a living embodiment of this saying: “Mother of one; one for the eye.” Many villagers felt she had kept her childhood looks. After giving birth, Miss Ngan’s lips seemed redder and fuller than before, like a fruit full of juice, promising the taste of orange in her kisses. Her breasts were more ample, too, like two grapefruits hiding under a thin blouse. And her thighs, like the rest of her body, evoked an overflowing feeling of blooming flowers, full of love’s fragrance.

  On days when they went up to the woods to cut firewood or down to the fields to farm—tasks for men only—residents of Woodcutters’ Hamlet gossiped quietly with one another:

  “In our lives, only Mr. Quang is really happy. At best, a king could only wish for his wife to be that beautiful.”

  “Yeah…in Russian movies, many of the stars are her inferior. Mr. Quang was right to spend his money and wealth on a house for his parents-in-law. How many can produce such beauty in a child?”

  “I heard she is being selected for the national artistic troupes.”

  “What a pity. If she is in the national troupe so many will be washing their eyes.”

  “Stupid…to go national, then she will never want to set foot in this very remote place.”

  “Oh yeah…I forgot.”

  “Now, I want to ask you one thing: Suppose you could sleep with a beauty like her just once and the next morning go to the guillotine, would you do it or not?”

  “Of course I would do it. How long is one’s life?”

  “Oh, no, I am not that naive. Beautiful she is indeed. Before such a beautiful woman any man would drool, but there is too much else to take care of in life.”

  “Like what?”

  “Family, clan, grandkids’ futures, graves of the parents. It’s stupid to obey the tuber’s priorities.”

  Such conversations blew like gusts from this mountain to that, from one valley to another. And life in Woodcutters’ Hamlet continued on in the calm rhythm of farming communities. Villagers continued to see Mr. Quang’s horse cart coming and going to the fast tempo of jingling bells. Each time he returned, the light in his patio shone brightly and there was cheerful chattering blended with voices from the Suong Mao radio, sometimes the news, sometimes the high-pitched singing of
performers such as Thuong Huyen:

  “Quietly listen by the side of the stream, a birds flits from here to there…

  Quietly listen to my heart, it sings my love for you.”

  Dying away, winters called out to spring. Summers were barely over when shivering dew arrived to announce long and stormy autumns. Time went by and little Que turned five, the age when children in Woodcutters’ Hamlet must begin their formal schooling. The village had but one elementary school. But the upper, middle, and lower sections each had their own separate kindergartens, each with two divisions: a lower one reserved for kids three and four; an upper one for kids four and five. The five- and six-year-olds were put together in a starter class that taught writing and simple math, preparing them for the first year of elementary school. There, the children also learned how to dance, to sing, to draw in the sand and on the chalkboard. They learned the first lesson in relationships. For these good reasons, every village parent understood that kindergarten was in reality the most important class of all. In truth, little Que should have started school long before, but being an only and a precious child, both his mother and Mrs. Tu spoiled him, so he skipped the lower division of kindergarten. At home, the two women taught him words, how to count, and to add and subtract simple numbers. When he turned five, they had no reason to sequester him any longer in their loving arms.

  “This year, little Que has to go to class like all the kids in the village,” Mr. Quang ordered.

  “Yes, I thought about it,” Mrs. Tu said.

  Miss Ngan was silent, but she opened the cupboard and handed Mr. Quang a brand-new bag full of books, notebooks, pens, and chalk…all the necessities for Que’s first day in class.

  Year had followed on year—life had flowed on like a large river ever shoving forward its sediments, trash, and foam. It seemed as if Miss Ngan had almost forgotten the terrifying, brutal events that had occurred after she had first set foot in Woodcutters’ Hamlet, forgotten those people who had stood in the dark shadow of her husband’s past. And them? For sure, they remembered her, because those who stand in dark shadows usually see very clearly those who stand in the bright light.

  When the day came for the beginning of kindergarten for children in the upper section, each mother had to bring her child to school. Not only the children, but also the mothers were nervous. That day, with excited hearts, mothers held their kids’ hands to take them out of family territory and entrust their care to people under another roof, turning them over to strangers, like a mother bird pushing her babies out of the nest in order to teach them forcefully how to fly—with hearts a bit torn, a bit worried, a bit hesitant, but, in the end, full of hope.

  As there was only one building in the entire section for the initial learning and starter classes, an encounter between the two hostile families was unavoidable. The school sat on top of a hill, under the cool shadow of an old, spreading elm, with its leaves green and birds singing cheerfully. In front, there was a large yard with a fairly smooth gravel surface, in the middle of which was a tiny flower garden surrounded by grasses. At recess, the children were free to play and roll. The side of the hill slanted down to a row of eucalyptus. That row of trees ran along the country road, where mothers would arrive from two directions, corresponding to the two resident quarters of the upper section—one to the north and one to the south.

  That morning, Miss Ngan fed her boy earlier than usual, and gathered with the mothers of children from the north quarter. More than ten mothers and almost twenty little students formed a happy group. As soon as they passed the row of trees and saw the top of the hill, the children all ran up. Those from the south quarter had arrived first. The air filled with smiling chatter; mixed with the singing of birds, the happy sounds deepened the hue of the blue autumn sky.

  As with the other mothers, the excitement of that first day of school made Miss Ngan happy. Like them, she also talked and laughed excitedly and ran after her boy. The kids were always faster than the mothers when they wanted to escape encircling arms. Miss Ngan finally got hold of young Que when everyone was in the school yard. Before them the teacher, Ton, stood properly with glasses on the bridge of his nose, a shirt with buttoned collar, the opened registration book ready in his hand. On each side were two young lady teachers, each one proudly wearing a fine, flowered blouse with a ribbon in her hair. The three of them stood according to their class: Ton taught the initial-learning class in the middle room; on the left was the lower kindergarten class and on the right the higher class. The three classrooms were separated by brick walls whitewashed and adorned with red cloth flowers. On the main wall hung a poster of honor with large letters that read: “Smart students, well-behaved children.”

  Every mother’s eyes focused on the pair of spectacles sitting on the bridge of Ton’s nose; he was the most important person: the one who would lead their children in their first, tentative steps toward adulthood. Ton had taught the initial-learning class since he was a young man. War, revolution, resistance war, land reform, then rectification of errors in land reform, division of rice fields, then reassembly of plots, division of rice fields, then reallocation back to one party, confiscation from one party to divide some land into “100 percent family ownership” because of the threat of hunger—all those changes had not touched one hair on the legs of Teacher Ton, which was very strange. Some said he had led a moral life and therefore was protected by a good spirit, but others said that in every generation people want their children to become good and so must respect those who teach the young. So even the stupid, wicked, or the most cunning when they rose high enough during the period of enforced land reform to become this lord or that lady dared not humiliate or maltreat someone like Ton, who was looked upon as the embodiment of the spirit of responsibility and love of youngsters. As school started that day, all glued their eyes on the pair of glasses sitting on the bridge of that nose, with respect and utmost attention. The slender and stern old man waited for everyone to gather; he looked at the four sides to survey for the last time whether anyone was not ready to pay attention. Then he lifted the registration book to his eye level. The calling-out of names began, alphabetically by first name. Given the place of the letter “Q,” Miss Ngan knew her son would be among the last called. But she paid attention to the names of other children because they would be her son’s classmates.

  She was startled suddenly when the teacher called the name: “Lai van Chien.”

  The frail voice of a woman replied, “Please, my son is here.”

  The teacher continued to read: “Lai van Thang.”

  Having read this name, the teacher looked up at everyone and explained:

  “Student Thang’s name starts with the letter T, but his family requests that he be assigned to the same row of chairs as his full brother, Lai Van Chien. That is a legitimate reason, which is why I skipped the proper order to please the family. Is student Thang here?”

  “Yes, he is here,” the woman with the frail voice replied, but no one saw where she was.

  Someone spoke out: “Bring him to the front row. Why be so awkward?”

  The mother remained silent. Then Miss Ngan realized that the woman with the frail voice was Quy’s wife and the two kids whose names had been called were her sons. A whole set of people emerged from the foggy past. The darkness she thought she had left behind, then returned. Lai Van Chien, Lai Van Thang—branches connected to the root: Lai Van Quang. Those branches were pulling at her beautiful son: Lai Van Que. And later for sure, these little men carrying the family name Lai would run and jump together, tumble down the side of the hill full of grass or frolic in the shadow of the elm tree. That thought was both obvious and strange, making her puzzled for an instant. Then she saw Ton adjust the glasses on his nose, his eyes looking around:

  “Will the two brothers Chien and Thang step up to the front row so the teachers can see you clearly? The two of you will sit in the same higher class of kindergarten, right?”

  “Please, teacher, let them b
e in the lower class. The older brother is only one and a half years older. I kept him at home to play with his younger brother so that they could go to school with each other.”

  “That is all right, it’s convenient. Now, bring them up here,” the old teacher answered, smiling. Those standing in the front silently stepped back to permit the mother to come forward holding her sons’ hands. Then, Miss Ngan recognized Quy’s wife and immediately a shivering overwhelmed her like an electric shock. Before her was an emaciated woman looking like a bag of rags, with a face shrunken like that of a bird with a pointy beak.

  Dark rings under her eyes gave them the appearance of a pair of faded brass death coins. Her eyes resembled those of one inflicted with the white blood disease when the last breath is inhaled. Her complexion was almost that of a cadaver, with wrinkles along each temple in long lines like the folds of a fan. There were dark spots from her forehead to the base of her ears. No one could believe that she was a woman of just over forty. She seemed even older than a woman in her sixties, because over that devastated face was a flock of dry hair with patches of gray.

  Miss Ngan must have voiced some startled cry or made some gesture, because everyone turned to look at her. Then they remembered that Miss Ngan had not been witness to the agonizing decline of Quy’s family. The others had seen the decay growing day by day, week by week, month by month. They had seen Quy’s wife and daughters void their strength with childbirth and hunger; had seen their children grow swollen bellies from lack of nutrition. For the villagers, those images were so familiar they had been stamped solid; only Miss Ngan had stood outside this reality.

  As she noticed that everyone had turned around to look at Miss Ngan, Quy’s wife was forced to lift up her head and glance at her nemesis. One look met another. Miss Ngan uttered a sound that seemed equally one of shock, fright, or pity. Then tears flowed over her lashes. The young woman bit her lips, trying to control the shock to her emotions, but finally burst out with a rush of crying. At the other end of the yard, Quy’s wife was also shaking like a heron in a storm; she also cried loudly, bending her head down, doubled over in pain and humiliation. All looked squarely at the two of them. The women’s eyes were red. Some girls sniffled and wiped their noses. Ton stopped calling out names. The young children went silent. In that space, suddenly, was only the sound of wind accentuated with the melody of unconcerned birds singing.