by Lan Cao
• • •
Hours later, after the operation to remove the bullet from my abdomen, a star was pinned on me as I lay in bed recovering. I had been promoted from colonel to brigadier general by the premier, head of the current ruling junta. Phong, ubiquitous Phong, perpetually adaptable, capable of serving this junta general, then that, was his right-hand man. Again, it was Phong I saw as I came back from near death. I remember the moment well. With a smile, Phong informed me that Cliff and the second American adviser accompanying the First and Eighth battalions had submitted my name to the American chain of command for a Silver Star award. But what preoccupied me was something else. I wanted to grab Phong by the collar and ask him “Why?” or “How?” Why were we deceived by the scout? How could it have happened? Who was he?
Once again, I had been granted a miracle. I had survived but eight of my men died. I choked. The wound was tender and raw but it was the heaviness in my body that truly stung. Betrayal produced that terrible effect on one’s soul. In fact, the word betrayal itself instilled in me a new sense of distrust that attached itself to the world in general and to Phong in particular, even as he laid a comforting hand on my shoulder. But then a murmur of regret coursed through me. Phong was indeed guilty of betrayal, but he had betrayed President Diem, not me. In fact, he had saved my life, had he not?
Phong tried to pacify me. He said something about looking into the matter further and assured me the operation was successful nonetheless. It signaled to the enemy that their Cambodian sanctuaries would be attacked. “A great accomplishment,” he declared. A hard rain was beating down on the roof. The traveling water poured from gutters, cascading in broad sheets down the brick walls of our military hospital. Through the double glass doors, I could see, lying in the adjacent hallway, rows of canvas stretchers wrapped in white sheets. All around me were people who had lost arms and legs. I fixed my gaze on the dead and wounded lying inert and the many doctors working in brooding silence as the rain slashed with keening rage against the windowpanes.
Through the pearly gray surface of fatigue, I hear the sound of footsteps nearby. I am walking up and down the corridors of the apartment complex with my rubber-treaded walker. I pass Mrs. An’s apartment and call out to her through the warbling, hesitant emptiness of the hallway. The door opens. I make out the face of her husband, who beams me an awkward smile.
“You’re home today? Not at work?” I ask.
“I took a day off to help my son fix his car.” His answer comes out in a thin exhalation as he turns to his wife.
Mrs. An stands next to her husband. I keep up my pace and, not wanting to intrude on their common space, continue my daily constitutional down the hall. She pauses, and then responds with a quick wave of the hand, a little forward push of the palm through the air as she calls out for me. She is following me down the hall. I see the weary, aggrieved face masked by an exaggerated coding of musical pleasantries and smiles. But I know how it is. We carry our grief camouflaged and concealed but occasionally it pushes through the conjunctions of our mutual lives. Private sadness becomes public.
“There is a funny cartoon I saved for you,” I tell her in an uplifted tone. We walk into my apartment and I take it out of a drawer to show her. “You can’t help him? I thought you said you were a vet!” is the caption. The picture shows a man proffering a sick dog to a bedraggled and slightly stupefied man in uniform. “See? Vet? Veterinarian? Veteran?” I say, laughing. She laughs obligingly, layering over stifled sadness.
The words come smoothly out of me. “You are family. Here,” I say. My hand is poised and ready. I press a check into her hand and I put her hand to my heart. That money should at least tide her over for one more monthly rotation of the hui. I don’t want to prolong the moment for fear of embarrassing her and don’t want her to ask questions. So I grab my walker with alacrity and head into my bedroom and close the door.
11
Tet
MAI, 1968
Tet 1968, the Year of the Monkey, is not like any other Tet I have known in my life. Tet is the biggest celebration in Vietnam. It is our New Year. This is the first Tet I’ve had without my sister.
My Chinese grandmother wakes me up. I can tell by the way she tries to scoop me up that there is urgency, there is dread. I am half-asleep and find myself inexplicably with people in a room downstairs near the kitchen. There are our visitors, Mother, the cook, and the chauffeur, in varying degrees of dishevelment—unbrushed hair, each still in pajamas, with blankets twisted around shoulders and legs. Our mother looks startled. Aunt Number So-and-so holds her child against her. She pulls a diamond ring from her finger as she searches the house for a place to hide it. The adults spill their concerns and together their fear becomes frightening. I can feel a panic that is moving too fast to comprehend. I hear a tumult of gunshots and rockets. The clock ticks and with each second the sounds of a battle being waged get closer and closer.
We lock all the doors, close all the windows, and draw the curtains, just in case. It creates a semblance of sanctuary that hides us from the shrinking sky. Our father has gotten word to us to stay inside. Cholon is under siege. I hear a barrage of shells. The Tet cease-fire has been breached. The external walls that enclose our house are thick—brick, cement—but the portion that runs along the far side of the garden has already crumbled, according to the chauffeur. I close my eyes and squeeze them shut. Little shapes, spirals, corkscrews, circles, dance behind my lids. Galileo hops from chair to table, then back to me. “Tet, Tet,” he says, and whistles. “Happy Tet,” he croons. He nuzzles against me and lets out a loud call for Cecile. He looks at me with questioning eyes. “Cecile? Cecile?”
One of Mother’s friends silences him with a “sh, shhh.” Galileo stretches his neck and strikes a pugilistic pose. “Sh, sh,” he mimics. “Sh, shh.”
The woman becomes assertive. “For heaven’s sake, will you keep that bird quiet?” she says to me in a peevish tone. She uses a word for “you,” may, that allows her to be offhand and dismissive and signifies at the same time my lowly status as a child. I pick Galileo up and gather him into my arms. Mother sits still; she is elsewhere, in a darkness down deep. My Chinese grandmother comes to me and caresses Galileo’s head. That is precisely what my sister would have done if she were here.
No one is hungry but food is served anyway. I look at it but the thought of eating does not appeal to me. I know the grown-ups all have red envelopes with crisp new money to hand out to us children but none will be passed out now. I have an urge to leave. I disengage from the gathering, from the thick, trapped sensation that threatens from above. My chest tightens as I walk back into my room upstairs. I say a few words to Galileo to see if my voice has failed, even as little explosions of hurt churn in my stomach.
That day and that night and the day after, I stay in my own room. My Chinese grandmother comes in and out to bring me food. She lets me stay in my own private space, knowing I will be able to keep myself occupied with my bird and cricket. I sit in front of both and open my favorite storybook. “Cecile,” Galileo chirps. I have accepted it as a pet name bestowed on me by him. From within the pages of the book, it is easy to dream, as if Scheherazade has a life beyond these very pages.
I see the Tigris River as it rolls placidly from Kurdistan and winds its way past Baghdad before flowing into the Persian Gulf. As it rises and ebbs it continues to look for its twin, for it knows it is destined to meet the Euphrates and together the two will form Shatt al-Arab, where lush gardens cup enchanted stories in their palms. Somewhere Scheherazade talks to her sister. Where will the next story come from to save them both?
• • •
On the third day of Tet I find myself walking down the back staircase into a hallway leading to the garden to avoid the evident tension in the common area. I intend only to stand inside the house and look out. But when I see the mango tree we used to hide behind, I have to get myself to it. I go to the
next one, the star fruit tree with my sister’s and my initials carved on it. Its branches spread leisurely outward, gathering the sky within its grasp. Vines and tendrils coil around my ankles, holding moisture in the bluish veins of their leaves. I want only to hug the tree and press my back against its bulk, its collected days. The future was once written here. I sit on the ground at the bottom of it. I am aware I need to go back inside, but my eyes are drawn to the dedicated movements of a column of leaf cutter ants. The brick walls surrounding the perimeters of our house still stand. For the moment it is quiet enough, except for the sounds of rockets exploding at a distance. The attacks come in waves and crescendos. And then there is quiet.
I look at my watch. Soon, my Chinese grandmother will come to my bedroom with a tray of food. It has been only ten minutes, a harmless few minutes more should be fine. I sit still. The sun shines directly above the vaulting, open sky. Drifts of yellow hoa mai petals fall to the ground. The earth smells fresh, but a smoky scent blows in with the wind.
And then it all returns—as if in an interlocking reflex of events. A siren goes off. Streaks of light flash above, in front of me, and everywhere. The windowpanes of the house shatter. Our trees try valiantly to wave away the rattle of gunfire. A large branch jumps and snaps. As the sky shrinks I taste bile in the back of my throat. Blue and purple dots hang in front of me, becoming more agitated as I hold my head to steady a pang of dizziness. I run toward the door to the house but a loud noise is unloosed from above. The sky is speckled with flecks of red and awash in murderously opalescent silver. I duck down in animal panic and lie still while the air crackles all around me.
Consciousness begins to slip out of me. I feel the fleeting burden of two selves separating, like gritty shadows against a dimming light, my sister and I, conjoined and then suddenly not. I watch and am watched at the same time. I am startled by this possibility. A child’s tiny voice whispers in my ear.
What was that? My sister? Khanh? Spirit? Ghost?
And although I would like to be able to say more about what happens next, the truth is I do not remember. I black out. After it is all over, I can only feel the snapping aftereffect that is lodged deep inside my chest.
• • •
I have somehow made my way back to my bedroom. It is the mynah bird who wakes me. Black eyes peer through tufts of feathers. Head reared back, wings quiver and flap. Two wiry feet stomp this way and that on the floor. His sharp beak slowly comes toward me, nudging against me as if it were a paw. A feathery face stares at me with a crinkled look of wonder and befuddlement.
I surface once again into my own consciousness and feel a newness all around me: a looming presence like a mountain’s sense of the inert and elemental.
Again and again, I feel something moving inside, bleeding a strangeness into my being. I try to clamp it down, to keep it locked inside, but it cannot be contained or controlled. I feel its stealthy, fretful movement.
My mynah flaps its wings. “Cecile?”
The sun is still suspended directly overhead. Galileo sits on my shoulder as I walk through the house to look for Mother and my Chinese grandmother and the rest of the Tet visitors. I feel his sharp claws through my shirt. A plane flies overhead.
“Cecile,” he says over and over.
I shake my head. “Sshh,” I say to hush him. “Sshh.”
“Cecile,” he persists.
This is hardly a time for games. “Stop it,” I say, exasperated.
He hops from my shoulder and rushes off with wings that flap in a vain attempt at flight. I chase after him, down the stairs and toward the kitchen, where the guests have been congregating these past few days. There is only an odd mix of emptiness and an air of phantom imbalance in the house. Everyone has left. The bird comes to a quick stop before hopping into the comfort and familiarity of his cage, which has been set on a table far from its customary place.
The cage door is slightly open. He can easily push it ajar if he wishes to leave. But something ominous has overtaken the room and he senses it. The windows rattle. Through the bamboo bars, I see his ragged wildness reduced to beak, claws, and feathers, a rabid energy that swoops and squawks. He has shut himself in there. I turn on more lights. It is clear that no one is in the house.
I hear another siren, a whistling menace. I run from room to room looking for Mother or my Chinese grandmother. I hear my own voice, loud and delirious, calling out, “Ma, Ma.” “Ngoai, Ngoai.” A part of me believes they will suddenly emerge from shadowy corners and pull me into their well-concealed hiding place. But the other part of me knows I am all alone.
I find myself outside in the garden again and there is an explosion from the shabby, disreputable neighborhood behind our house. More come in succession. On instinct I count on motherhood to do its part, even though I know my mother was not able to scoop my sister out of harm’s way. As I climb into the cistern to hide from the line of fire, I still believe my mother will come back to look for me and take me with her to safety.
Gunshots pop and echo. I am thankful this giant clay jar is partially hidden by a row of thick, fleshy hedges. I hear street noises, human voices, the sounds of cartridges loading and of hundreds of boots striking the sidewalk. Then I hear rapid conversations and quick movements. Looking up from my safe haven, I see rooftops, red-orange tiles, chimneys. A white kite is caught, its tangled line looped around a chimney’s neck. I cannot help but stare at it. My eyes follow its arc, its plummeting flight until the wind buffets it back up. There are movements on tin rooftops behind our house, dark gray disturbances Father warned us about, among the warren of hovels and shacks and the occasional shabby high-rise. The air crackles and hums with electrical sparks.
I huddle against the cistern’s hard bottom in mute fear. The voices from outside our garden wall are coming closer and closer. I listen intently. Someone screams out an order for a full frontal assault on a nearby house. It is an unrelentingly South Vietnamese voice. There are Southerners in the Vietcong, our Uncle Number Five, for example, so the South Vietnamese accent alone does not comfort.
“Forward. Go in,” a male voice orders. I hear the shuffle of troops. “Regroup in three units. Move.”
It happens quickly. There is a sudden swift pop. Amid the frenzy, the man who has been shouting orders must have been shot. A turbulence of noises, voices, metallic racket, follows. I am soaked in fear and confusion.
“The lieutenant is down,” someone shouts. I hear a rush of boots scud past. “Remove the weight. Take the flak jacket off,” another yells. Their voices carry. “Give him something, quick.” There is a moment of quiet as it sounds like help is gathering around the fallen man, and then again, a surprising pop, clean and direct and seemingly on target. Someone screams that another has been downed. “What do we do?” The voice is mournful, urgent. “Stay calm, stay calm.” I hear the frantic response and then a series of incomprehensible back-and-forth dialogues in a tone of clenched rage and terror. “He’s going. He’s not going to make it. God. I’m not a medic!”
I try to visualize the area where the soldiers are congregated. The tamarind trees that could provide them cover are nowhere near. They are exposed in the street.
“Do it. Do whatever it takes. Put your hand on the wound.”
“Press down. Take my shirt.”
“Up there, somewhere up there,” a voice screams. On instinct I too look up. There are scattering movements along the stretch of tin rooftops. But from where I am inside the jar, I am able to see what others cannot. It is all behind the brick chimney, one among a row of similar chimneys, not by the line of galvanized tin roofs. Behind the chimney with the tossing white kite is a crouching figure. I am sure of it. My pulse quickens. I see the black barrel of a gun as it vanishes from the chimney’s edge.
“Where?”
“It’s gone.”
“Where was it?”
“I’m not sure. With
all the noise, it’s . . .”
“You useless little nothing. You can’t even tell where the snipers are?”
More bullets skitter in sharp bursts. I keep my head down to hide from the flicker of illuminated fire. My chest bucks in surrender, squeezed by sharp little contractions.
“Where are the Thirty-third Rangers? They were supposed to be here hours ago.”
My heart does a little lift. Rangers. They must be government troops. They will help me. The enemy is on the roofs but safety is within reach, right outside the garden walls. I know where the sniper is. A clotted weight, large and bloated, sticks deep inside my throat. I raise myself and kneel up toward the jar’s opening to peek out. One of the shuttered windows is now slightly open, as if the room itself were asking for more air. I don’t move. I see a thin figure in a black shirt move briefly past the roof edge to the window’s opening. The voices outside get closer. The troops are outside our garden’s gate. They seem to be settling in, using the area as a makeshift base of operation.
“Get the radio and call for reinforcement. Ask about those rangers,” a voice commands. I hear someone yell, “This is company . . . We are at . . . Assistance requested for . . .” and then I hear a loud hollow pop and the voice is abruptly cut off. I hear the immediate thuk thuk thuk of rapid return fire directed at every direction. The government soldiers fire indiscriminately. I hear the sounds of bullets flying, up, down, here, and there. The sniper retreats furtively, calmly waiting for the next propitious moment. The chimney is long and wide and provides perfect concealment.
Then there is silence. I press my ear against the jar. I hear the wheels of a car, no, by the rumbling of its engine, a jeep. I hear the granulated click of gravel on our rutted road. I hear the click of boots and then a “Stop here. Here.” A lightness rises from me, in reassuring waves, as if his were the voice of life itself, strong and righteous, an invisible burnished presence that promises solace and deliverance. I can imagine him, square-shouldered, determined, as he walks through the clamor of danger and dust.