The Zenith

by Duong Thu Huong

  But his son will never know where that ancestral hometown was, and nowadays no child would play with fireflies. The nation is at war; instead of the twinkling lights of stars, bullets blaze the night sky red, making a light that spreads terror and death.

  “War, war, war…A history thick with one war after another, thus leaders become obsessed with victory, seeking one more with this war. A war without end—both in mobilized efforts as well as in all the blood and bones. What a stupid war. A war carried out as the punishment of a people, a colossal meat grinder for a bloodbath of brothers, a thousand times more terrifying than the ancient two-hundred-year conflict between the Trinh and Nguyen clans!

  “What can I do now that the game is lost? When I must become a hand-carved wooden puppet for these murderers? All my traitorous brothers: Why did they purposely turn their backs on conscience—because competition for power gives more pleasure than does ensuring the happy fate of a people? Oh, ambition and glory…the kind of people with whom I can’t eat, can’t sleep, can’t be close—but they have frightening power to destroy, not just individuals or factions, but an entire race.

  “But for what reason do I still passionately care for and still suffer for this nation? The nation that needs my life as if it needs an animal to sacrifice to its gods. The nation that smiles aimlessly but with satisfaction; that cheers for me as it would a great king; that admires me as officers admire a fabulous marshal who has never lost a battle, and does not understand at all the nagging suffering of my heart, and does not have enough goodness to bestow upon me even a tiny bit of happiness? For what reason do I tear myself apart for this selfish and uncaring nation, though mine it is?

  “Damn: always the masses are no more than a gust of wind, a wave, a tornado, a hurricane, a fire. The mass is nameless, senseless, and takes no responsibility for what it does. So I have no grounds to complain. Whether wanted or not, this people remains my people.

  “It is the meaning of my life. My heart’s most painful suffering is because of it: a people doomed.

  “Because we are born in this land, a muddy, unhappy acre of dirt. Because the thin, resonating cord of the nation’s soul vibrates in mine as a thousand years of humiliation penetrate all my cells—from my skin, my blood, and my bones to the way I want to live. This is where I am permanently condemned to suffer. From here I must repay the mountains and rivers, which have lasted a thousand generations!”

  Therefore all paths lead him back to the hell that is himself. There is no escape…

  The president moans but immediately stifles it for fear that the two guards will hear. His heart begins to thump; he can feel each laborious contraction.

  “Would that instead of having a human heart, a person could use a pump for the blood, a tool to maintain circulation but cause no pain. What if I had such a different heart, and a totally different mind: Would I live in tranquility?

  “Why do I bring on myself such endless turmoil and nagging regrets?

  “Why can’t I just put it out of my mind? Does not the dredging up of memories just bring me before the most supreme court to hear its verdict?” Hearing a soft laugh by his ears, he opens his eyes. The man with the banana-colored skin is again standing with his back against the wall, looking dapper in a suit of his favorite ivory color. He still remembers his excitement the first time he had had enough money to have a suit like that made for him in Paris. His first stylishly impressive suit, and now this guy is wearing one, too; turning the collar of the shirt as he had and tying in the same old-fashioned way as he had the same tie of navy blue with white polka dots. But this is not a young man, rather someone in his fifties, appearing as a carbon copy of what he would have looked like at that age. Once again, he recognizes his double, the man he could have become.

  Leaning against the wall, slow and mannered, hands in the trouser pockets, eyes looking straight at him attentively, the double says, “Aren’t you crying?”

  “Excuse me?” replies the president. “I don’t like your question.”

  “If you feel like it, just cry a bit to lighten your soul. I am rather tolerant of weak people.”

  “I am not as weak as you think.”

  “We’ll see.”

  “That comment is meant for someone young. I am more than seventy. What you say has no meaning for one like me.”

  “Even if you return to your ancestors tomorrow, that comment is still germane today.”

  The president remains silent because the guy is right. But he cannot acknowledge his failure; it’s best to keep quiet. He looks up at the dark ceiling.

  The guy smiles and continues: “At your age you are still trying to answer existential questions. That is to be commended.”

  “People can be tormented by such questions until they go to their graves,” says the president. “That’s why searching for answers is so natural.”

  “There are thousands of questions to which humanity never finds the answer, because the heart of life is a guessing game and a challenge. This determines where humans are in the natural order and their relationships both with other groups of people and with other individuals, one on one. Look to your past: you will see many empty spaces, weaknesses, splinterings, and defeats. These things happen when people lose the ability to control what drives life itself.”

  “I will offer some evidence for your deduction.”

  “Don’t try. Just turn your head and look at things more objectively. The evidence lies all spread out over the road behind you.”

  “I always try to analyze things objectively. That is the most important demand to be made of those in power.”

  “That most important criterion usually is what is lacking among those who make decisions. The collapse of regimes, the disappearance of dynasties, all occur because of the lack of objectivity. I have come back to show you the greatest shortcomings of your soul. Thus, I can help you attain liberation. I will pull you out of this hell.”

  The president is quiet; it is true that he was genuinely waiting for help from this other man, and that fact is humiliating. Finally, he musters the courage to ask, “Yes, I am waiting to hear what you have to say.”

  His double smiles with the debauched seductiveness of an Yves Montand. Looking deep into the president’s eyes, he says, “I will start with that never-ending torment of yours: the death of a beloved woman. When Miss Xuan was murdered, what did you do?”

  The president is quiet because he does not know quite how to answer. That day, he had phoned General Long, but when the general came, they had only discussed international relations. He had waited for General Long to raise the killing of Xuan, but though their meeting had lasted for longer than four hours, he did not bring that subject up. And he himself had not dared to open his mouth. He had understood that, at the time, only General Long held enough power to put a stop to Quoc Tuy’s intolerable abuses. All the generals and the Defense Ministry were at his beck and call. But like the others in the Politburo, General Long, too, had wanted the president to be just an old father of the people, with no hint of a personal life becoming public. This acting as a living saint fostered indifference throughout the entire machine of power, since no one ever declines a tasty morsel that comes with having power and prestige.

  “You did nothing and your mouth was closed like a clam, right?” says his double, knowing full well that the president lacks the courage to answer.

  “To tell the truth, you were expecting General Long, your closest ally, to act. And you, you didn’t raise your voice, because in your mind, you were afraid that history would condemn you: your emotional weaknesses had brought havoc upon the nation. Everybody had realized that the only way out of it then was to have the military seize Quoc Tuy, while simultaneously stripping Sau—your foremost betrayer—of power. But if that had happened, there would have been blood. And you feared for your name not being recorded in the nation’s history books as an immortal hero of the people. After all, it was you who had authored this romantic mantra:

 
Unite! Unite! Great Unity.

  Succeed! Succeed! Great Success.

  “Your idea was beautiful and indeed effective. But only for a certain time; only for one set of circumstances; a virtuous ideal only for those living deep in the mountains and jungles with babbling streams and chattering monkeys. You did not understand that such a mantra was no more than a slogan for guerrilla warfare. Once the power machine was institutionalized, your lofty idea became only a pretty bird that was not allowed to sing or fly because it had been stuffed and mounted. Your mantra was fit only for the vehicle of resistance and could not apply to the workings of a dictatorial party in power. You were too enamored of your pretty words and your ideas and you did not understand that language—like all things in this world—has not only life, but death, too. Power is power and can’t get along with beauty or morality. The strike on your young wife was indeed a dagger aimed at you, a very serious challenge to consider. Because you tied your hands then, later on, your opponents stomped all over you.”

  “But I couldn’t possibly have asked General Long to strike. That would have led to the shedding of too much blood. The country had just gone through nine years of war; the people had not yet enjoyed any peace and happiness.”

  “Well: so you wanted to avoid bloodshed. It is still flowing. On this planet has there ever been a cease-fire? The current war is the most atrocious in our people’s history; a war that makes the demons cry from sadness, because the dead will be more than all those sacrificed in the struggles against the northern invaders from the Mongols and the Ming dynasty to the end of World War Two. Am I not correct?”

  “You know I did everything to prevent it. But…”

  “But—you fell off your horse in the middle of the front line. Let’s consider this scenario: after your young wife was murdered, you had organized a counterattack but instead of putting your opposing subordinates in a make-believe prison, you had imprisoned them in a real one. Who knows but that you could have avoided this catastrophic war and preserved so much blood of a good people?”

  The president sighs quietly, while the man shrugs him off and continues:

  “Never mind; let’s not consider ‘ifs.’ That word is candy for three-year-olds. Let’s return to your family drama. And this time I am not using ‘what if’ but confirming that General Long kept silent then because he wanted to take advantage of the game in which you played the role of a living saint. By keeping under the shadow of the saint, how many got their allotment of pressed sweet sticky rice? And the one who got the most was he himself. Your name was connected to his in the Dien Bien Phu battle. Thus, this general also wished to confine you forever in a temple. Well, playing a saint is the nastiest game of all: a one-way street that can go up but provides no way back down. One who assumes sainthood is a cadaver standing on his own pedestal; dead in the cold and stormy wind; encased in absolute and permanent loneliness; lifeless forever in the form of a statue, not able to be buried like others. It is a very fatiguing death; a death that does not allow for lying down, which is a tiredness that extends over many generations. A fantastic punishment of the creator. Am I not right?”

  He starts laughing, mockingly. The president’s face is hot but his whole body turns to ice.

  “You were completely paralyzed, because you had no clear idea how to direct an action at that time. You wished to fight back against your enemies but dared not mobilize your close friends. You had forgotten the decisive principle of self-protection leaders had used for a thousand years:

  Those who touch my left and right cut my feet and hands;

  Those who touch my blood kin reach to the pupils of my eyes.

  “You should have pointed out the danger to General Long and his faction—that, if he were silent before Sau’s abuse of power, then, after this exploratory blow, he would be the first big tree that would have to be cut down next; that someone who steals an egg today will steal a rabbit tomorrow, and a cow the day after that; that power walks only down its own path and never looks back to reflect or to regret. If you had been wise enough to realize all this, I am sure all your followers would have immediately lent you their hands, without any hesitation or uncertainty. At all times, people act swiftly when they feel their fate being threatened. Selfishness is an old instinct and humanity’s strongest motivation. But instead of acting with all the force of reason, you were silent, waiting for some repressed understanding from your followers. That silence did not necessarily mean that you were entirely stupid, but that you were caught between clarity and obscurity. That blurred state of mind paralyzed you. There were two ways of looking at it: on the one hand, you were embarrassed and so you did not protect your beloved, because she was too young and too beautiful, a delectable taste in an old king’s mouth; and that was why, even when your heart was churning with love, you were shy and dared not openly defend that love. In this instance you were infected with unfortunate emotions. If not this, then there is only one other explanation: you were ecstatic playing the inspiring role of a living saint, that game satisfying your pride, therefore you had to give up a normal man’s enjoyments; you had to sacrifice her, the woman you loved most. In this instance, you were…”

  The man goes on, but by now the president’s ears are ringing and all he can sense is the sound of rain falling somewhere, noisily, on a corrugated roof, perhaps the roof of the port prison. Fits of angry rain. Above the roof is the sky; sometimes light blue, other times dark with storm, then thick with smoke and fog. Heaven: only those imprisoned can understand completely changes in the sky’s appearance. So many days, he had looked at the skies over the port to remember those of his hometown. Then suddenly she appears on the corrugated roof, looking at him with a young and innocent smile; exactly like the nineteen-year-old girl she had once been, sitting on a branch eating fruit, in the woods of the north, two rows of teeth white and shiny like pearls and lips stained with the juice.

  He calls out to her but his mouth is glued shut by some kind of sticky sap, and his tongue can’t move.

  “Is it possible that I have died and they sealed my mouth with this sap?” he thinks, but then he hears the sound of cards being turned outside his room. When he opens his eyes, he sees clearly the blue night-light.

  “No, I am here…I am on top of Lan Vu. Opposite this building is the temple complex, where the Abbess with shiny black teeth lives with her disciples. Clearly I just went to visit there and they treated me to ginger tea and rice porridge, the kind that is soft like ripe bananas.”

  He composes himself, and looks around the room one more time. The elegant guy in the ivory suit has disappeared. Where he had leaned his back against the wall is now the black-and-white photo that he likes a lot: cherry blossoms. That picture had been a gift from her when they had their daughter. There is not a day when he does not look at it. It is all that is left of her; all that remains of her in this vast and isolating world. Cherry blossoms. Messengers of spring. Cherry blossoms. An undying reminder of a love short lived.…

  He tastes a saltiness. Are they his tears or lost seawater returning?

  “Oh!…my youth…the old song…”

  He begins to remember that song, then another one returns, churning within him down to painful longing:

  Even though separated, my heart does not stop remembering…

  The singing resonates inside him, digging down into his every cell; it makes his body and soul dissipate like grains of sand. He feels the waves whip him as his flesh and bones are ground down and mixed with the troubled air of the storm. He knows he is no longer himself, because he sees himself bobbing on the tips of the waves; a cluster of sea foam longingly clinging to the moving seaweed of hatred and desperation.

  There is a loud knocking on the door, which then opens. The electric light outside is bright. He hears the doctor’s voice:

  “Mr. President, please allow me to see you. The guard heard you, so he called me over. Please stay in bed.”

  He is silent. The doctor listens to his lungs and
heart. He shivers when the stethoscope touches his skin. But the doctor’s fingers are very soft and warm. The touch of this man provokes secret thoughts:

  “Warmth is the best substance for life. Warmth both shapes and sets borders to the fire of passion. My life’s most passionate desire was to ignite the flame of revolution. But that revolution did not bring happiness to people. A smaller fire of passion burned in my heart for her. In the end she was destroyed by the fire of that hell. Oh, how sad to see a useless waste of human striving. My life erupted like a savage fire, a misplaced fire, an insane use of energy. I am inferior to any normal person, like this doctor, for example. He can use his energy to warm up patients, to warm a woman’s body or to sing love songs.”

  “Mr. President, you seem to be fine but full of troubled thoughts, therefore your sleep is not calm. Will you agree to take some sedatives?”

  “Oh no. Losing sleep is part of old age. And talking in your sleep is for the young. However, in old age, people tend to dream, a symptom of dementia’s onset. Tell the truth: Do you find me starting to be confused?”

  He laughs, and so does the doctor: “Well, that is funny.”

  The president continues, “I hope I don’t become confused before I get into the coffin. But now, go back to your room and resume your sleep. Don’t worry too much about me. I no longer have the right to eat fully or to sleep soundly.”

  “You will be tired with little sleep.”

  “Tomorrow morning I’ll make it up. Tell them not to wake me for breakfast.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Don’t worry; go back to sleep. And you, you have the right to sleep late tomorrow because you had to get up in the middle of the night. What time is it now?”

  “Three twenty a.m.”

  “Very good. There is plenty of time for more sleep.”

  “Good night, then!”

  The doctor closes the door. He hears him telling the two soldiers to move the table and chairs to the other side of the main temple so that their voices will not be heard so clearly. He suddenly remembers his surprise at hearing the doctor sing; his voice was sweet and the words pierced his heart with brutal strokes: