by Lan Cao
A bad dream, I think, relieved. But I am startled when his body snaps upward, as if it were suddenly subjected to a powerful electrical charge. What is wrong, I ask. His eyes open. He looks aggrieved. I see the flutter of eyelashes and the flush of confusion. He says nothing and shakes his head. I reach toward him but feel the rejection of his recoiling arm. Finally, he whispers a soft “I don’t know.” A flush of color spreads across his face. I touch it and feel an emanating hotness against my palm.
Moments pass. Father sits still on the sofa, his forehead cradled in the palms of his hands. And then, without a word, he gets up and walks to the bathroom. I follow him. The dream is still with him, its implied threat, the whole of its weight lashed to his body. In an uninflected voice, he complains of a heaviness that haunts his body’s periphery. He mutters that something is on his chest and that he cannot breathe. His body must be carrying extra weight, he insists. He steps on the scale. We both see that he has not gained a single pound. How can that be, he wonders out loud. He is convinced something has happened to make him metamorphose into a man several times his actual size.
He allows me to take his hand and walk him back to the living room. What is the dream about, I ask him. But he shakes his head and smiles ruefully. Perhaps it is irrecoverable. Or perhaps he does not want to tell me. He licks his lips as if to erase the astringent aftertaste of something unpleasant. I make him a cup of tea. After dinner, we sit side by side watching the moon glide across the darkening sky. Cloaked in blackness, I can feel his weary spirit dissolve into the agitation of the evening.
• • •
Little Saigon is growing and a great big world has opened up for us. We congregate in one another’s houses and apartments to commemorate notable events. Weddings, births, Tet, are all openings that the Vietnamese in America use to channel the ragged immensity of their longings for things past. It is all about reconstructing and reclaiming what is gone. I accompany our father to these events, but my heart is not in them. I know he and Bao still occupy that past, its emotional nodes and swells, with doggedness and abandon.
Today I am at Uncle Somebody’s apartment, two doors down from ours. He has been made the head of our community association for overseas Vietnamese. The association is our way of making a familiar mark onto this shifting world, of organizing haphazard arrangements.
It has been a few months since his wife and son joined him after an arduous boat journey from Vietnam’s coast to a refugee camp in Hong Kong. They have not recovered from the tumbling chaos of their journey. The mother smiles but I can see the clenched jaws and tense facial muscles. Still, if you can catch her at the right moment, there is a fullness and a shininess to her essential being that is contagious. She is diminutive but she has made it across a vast ocean. Perhaps Mother might too. Something visceral moves through me. I see her as a prophetic spirit. I want her hard-spiritedness. Day after day she does the quiet work of maintaining the home where she is reunited with her husband.
From the day she first arrived, I have made a point of visiting her regularly. When I tell Father that she visited several Chinese in Cholon to find someone to take her and her son on a boat, Father also becomes interested. Bao too, of course. When she is in the right frame of mind, I am able to coax Aunt An into telling her story. Mother’s whereabouts might be unknown but somehow a story about Cholon makes her existence somewhere in Cholon more palpable to me.
Father encourages my visits to Aunt An, perhaps so I can have real company while he sits alone on the sofa at night and obdurately stares down his war memories. He aims to organize them into chapters and subject them to analysis by the American military.
Aunt An cooks from scratch, the way we did in Vietnam. Knives and spoons make percussive sounds against cutting board and mixing bowls. She lost weight on her boat trip, prominent collarbones protruding through her shirt’s neckline. She tells me she is one of these people who burn energy easily. I can see why. She moves about incessantly.
Today she and Uncle Somebody are organizing a birthday feast for their son’s one-year-old daughter. A pot of water boils, frothing over onto the stove. For the discerning carnivores among us, there is a roasted suckling pig of both lean and fatty flesh, still whole and uncarved, its bronze skin crisp with a pronounced char. There is also an eye-catching riff of miniature dumplings stuffed with crushed mushrooms and crabmeat, meant to taste good and to showcase the cook’s artistic presentation.
She finished cooking early and the guests have not arrived. “Tell me about how you planned your escape,” I prod. There is a brief faltering, but after a moment’s pause she closes her eyes and tells me to come closer. She remembers of course.
The Chinese in Cholon had organized a network of safe houses and boat captains and navigators. She was in a yellow room in the back of a villa hidden behind tall fences. Inside her was a tug of opposing emotions, the surge of nascent possibilities and a deep grief for her husband alone on foreign soil. Those in the room were all connected in one way or another to the Chinese organizer—friends of friends, friends of relatives. She recalls the evening clearly. The desire to escape compelled her to take all risks. It was a moonless night but the sky was overflowing with stars. The room was full. There was the strong odor of eucalyptus oil that caught in the nostrils. The house was a few blocks from Ngo Quyen Street, in the heart of Cholon, she adds, noting that it was not far from our own house. I picture the house as Aunt An positions herself in front of me and continues. They needed gold, four bars for her and four bars for her son. No bags or suitcases allowed. There was no particularly auspicious time, no need to study weather patterns. The trip would begin when the boat was ready, in one week, on such and such a date, first by bus or cargo train to the coastal town of Phan Thiet and then the escape by boat at night.
A week later, when they were ushered out of the bus after a journey that took longer than they anticipated, they were not in Phan Thiet but in Ca Mau Point, a remote coastal city perched on the southernmost tip of the country. Phan Thiet had never been the planned destination to begin with and the switch to Ca Mau was done to ensure secrecy and security. But Ca Mau had its own advantages. It was part of the vast Chinese trading network. Since the early 1880s, the Chinese had been coming to this area despite its isolation, navigating their cargo junks through the interconnecting waterways linking the trading towns of Hainan, Ca Mau, and Singapore. There are lush mangrove swamps on one side and a long line of seaboard on the other. Farthest from the capital and battered by sea winds and storms, Ca Mau natives are to this day sturdy, eccentric sorts used to throwing themselves into the elements. Its coast offers deep moorage for fishing boats owned by fifth- and sixth-generation fishermen already inclined toward deep-sea travel. A fierce, poetic sense of independence defines the very spirit of the town and its inhabitants as well.
Aunt An’s bus bounced on stretches of rough, uneven surface until it swerved onto a side road, stopping by a lone shanty at the edge of a dirt trail. The main road was no longer passable. The thirty people on the bus were told to disembark into the dreaded night. Three fishermen in charge of the voyage, all Ca Mau natives, were waiting for them. I know the details Aunt An will soon provide. I have heard this part before. Aunt An held her son’s hand. He was almost eighteen but she still wanted to protect him. She clung to him fiercely, the way she did when he was a child. Together they made their way through the slow slog of alluvial soil, up the soft foothills with errant underbrush, and finally down a slender path toward the beach. A sea-salt fragrance floated in with the breeze. They pulled each other forward, following the darkened outlines of those trudging tentatively ahead. Everyone held on to the person in front, each terrified of being left behind. Clusters of mosquitoes circled above. She cursed the fact that they were unloaded all at the same time and feared the presence of thirty people descending all at once onto these vast sandy stretches would alert harbor police and other officials.
A hard r
ain began to fall. Her eyes smarted from the sea salt. The surroundings were muted by the silvery-hued darkness and the mist of rain and fog. Rain, she thought, borne by these gusts of wind, could be a blessing in disguise, offering them additional cover from detection.
To her left, a woman tearfully bade her sister good-bye. “Take her, little sister. My daughter is now yours,” the woman said. To her little girl, no more than two years old, the mother said, “Call your aunt ‘Mother’ from now on, you understand? She is your mother now.” Aunt An tells me she could sense the failings of their circumstances, the narrowing of options, the act of last resort. She describes how the little girl clung to her mother and whimpered. As her mother turned to go back to the bus, the little girl ran after her, skittered, and fell. Her sandals had caught on something sharp and protruding.
The part that startles me each time Aunt An repeats the story will come next. It is always the same. Even though I know the story, I listen with the furious concentration of a child. In a tone of soft tenderness she tells me about how she knelt down to scoop up the little girl. With a disquieting sigh, the girl’s mother switched her story and assured her daughter with a long string of frenetic promises. I will join you soon. I will be with you, she said. In the meantime, stay with her, the mother whispered, pointing to her sister. Your mother loves you and she loves you, darling. She is your family, the mother assured even as the little daughter wept. I want my mommy, I want my mommy, the girl cried, extending her arm in a desperate attempt to make contact with the mother’s flesh. Her face wet with tears and rain, the mother turned and walked away. The little girl sucked air and shrieked as Aunt An put an indelicate hand over her mouth to cover the scream.
They took turns, the sister and Aunt An, carrying the little girl on their backs as they marched. They walked in silence. When the girl’s aunt tired, Aunt An took over. She could feel the girl’s fretful sobs against her back as she navigated the slick, narrow pathway that was at times dense with gnarls of ground cover and shimmering with the wetness of rain. When she needed to shift position, she carried the girl in the front, curled up against her bosom. As she walked she looked into the little girl’s face, touching its roundness, feeling the hair as soft as feathers and black like her fear. Intuitively, she worked to make her steps predictable. The child, she hoped, would be soothed and rocked by the march.
At last, from a small, sandy promontory, they could see the coast through the near-monochromatic blackness of water and sky. She could feel the pebbles against her shoes. The rain had abated but a mist, ethereal and light, hung above. The air was tinged with salt. Their steps quickened. Her son held out his hand to help her along. She stretched her body and felt the slow elongation of muscles on her back. The child had been handed off to her aunt. In the faint blue-hued light they could barely make out the boat. But she could tell. This wooden boat was designed to haul little more than fruits on the rivers of the country. They would have to put their faith in this ineffectual little craft.
I know what happens next. I don’t ask Aunt An to finish the story anymore. After five days at sea, the little girl died, her head cradled by her mother’s sister and her feet stretched out in Aunt An’s lap. Two days later, red itchy patches like insect bites appeared on Aunt An’s body. She sat on her hands to keep herself from scratching them and aggravating the redness. Bed bugs, she said to herself. She covered herself, concealing the red ugliness with a blanket wrapped around her body. But the spots moved to her face and soon formed pustules conspicuously filled with a clear liquid. They could no longer be passed off as bug bites. And she could no longer resist, especially at night when she pulled and scratched the severely inflamed areas until the blistered walls broke. Soon people moved away from her. There was no way to say “chicken pox” diplomatically. Once announced, the information fell heavily. She could feel the blisters on the inside of her mouth and the back of her throat. Her eyes were also covered by thick-crusted lesions. Only her son and the aunt of the dead baby stayed close by, protectively shielding her from the raw intensity of others’ glares. She felt herself slipping into a fever. Her entire body was emanating heat. She closed her eyes. Even in her wearied and light-headed state, she could make out the intonation of crisis; she knew what was being said through the agitation of clipped voices. She realized it was her very life that was being debated. Her son sobbed. She saw fear in his face. He held her hand. She tried to wrench it from his, worried that she could infect him. She understood what was happening. She was tainted. They were going to throw her overboard the following morning. She imagined it, her last moment, the harsh orange sun appearing, the blazing sky opening up to greet dawn’s arrival, the water vast and immense, swallowing her in its grip. Frothy swells slapped the sides of their little boat. She was not angry. She no longer cared. She looked into their faces. She saw their panic and the concomitant resolve to live. The last thing she remembered before drifting off into a dream was the feeling of sadness moving beyond her.
In the morning she heard voices through the tail end of her dream. Orders were being issued in a foreign language. Her arms and legs were sunburned. The boat shook. She saw sun-darkened faces, fissured and creviced. A group of men thundered on board, pointing in this and that direction. She saw their knives and guns, smelled a sour blend of beer and sweat. She knew. Pirates. She heard more voices, tearful pleas, and fitful cries. A woman and child were thrown across the boat. A man stepped forward and slapped them back and forth with the palm and back of his hand. She saw the child’s split upper lip. The man lowered himself astride the woman’s chest. Men were clubbed and thrown overboard. Aunt An closed her eyes. Things were being thrown about, and then she felt everything come to a sudden stop. A big shaft of light was beamed in her direction. She closed her eyes, shielding them with cupped hands. There were decisive gasps and deep raspy voices. Their eyes roamed her face. She looked and saw exaggerated frowns and raised eyebrows at the edge of her vision. Then there was quiet and only the sound of quick-booted steps leaving. A frothy wind stirred.
It was she who had driven the pirates away. It was the very sight of her. Her limbs and body were themselves bursts of hot red. She carried the intrinsic threat of contagion.
No one spoke. A child asked meekly, “When are we going home?”
Later that very same day, as she lay curled inside herself, a ship appeared. On its side, she saw the words USS Francis Hammond (FF 1067). She knew they would be rescued this time, and they were.
Her story has a happy ending but grief has nestled deep inside her. There she sits at the kitchen table, stilled by its undercurrent. Her husband, the same Uncle Somebody who had escaped much earlier, comes toward her from their bedroom and puts a sympathetic hand on her back.
The first time she told me the boat story, she had mentioned a man who had only one leg who was in the house in Cholon when their escape was planned. He was there to contemplate throwing in his lot with the Chinese. Aunt An was never introduced to him but apparently many in that house in Cholon knew him. She remembered the twitches of his severed limb, the puckered, irregularities of the flesh. She remembered the way he appended his prosthetic, fashioning adjustments, tightening and loosening the hinges toward the end of the evening. How would he have managed the long journey, practically speaking? To her bewilderment, she found herself staring at his blatant, defiant misfortune. There were many amputees in Saigon but this man was well-to-do, crisply dressed, and sitting within arm’s reach of her.
I asked her his name when I first heard the story. She did not know.
She still cannot recall it when I ask her again. Did he have a scar on his jawline? She is not sure. As Aunt An says, there are many men without limbs in Saigon. How can I be sure, she asks?
Is it possible he is Uncle Number Two? If Uncle Number Two contemplated escape, surely he would have involved our mother in the plan. My heart leaps.
I am like a detective who wants the witness to ret
ell the incident, hoping that the act of retelling will help the witness remember a new but crucial detail.
I ask if the man with one leg was alone or with someone but Aunt An does not know. I ask if anyone in the vicinity called him by name but she has no recollection.
Later in the evening, I am allowed to greet guests at the door, fetching them drinks and offering them spring roll appetizers. Uncle Somebody and Aunt An cut through the crowd and nudge our father toward the table to eat. Strangers mingle solicitously with one another, each bound to the other by an old complicity to keep the country we left behind in the center of our collective memories.
The little girl, Aunt An’s grandchild, was born at nine in the morning the Year of the Goat, a fact that is scrutinized so that predictions about her life can be made. In Saigon of course grandparents from the mother’s and father’s sides would be present, as would hundreds of relatives. Here the baby is surrounded by friends culled from her parents’ connections to this or that shop in Little Saigon. She is dressed in a bright red ao dai. Her father and mother take turns holding her on their laps as cameras click. She is clearly unaware of the little storm of emotion surrounding her rite of passage. She sits on a patch of blanket, mouthing unintelligible words, reaching for objects, deliberately placed curiosities that include a mirror, a pen, a dollar bill. Will she be drawn to beauty, education, or finance? Before she is able to confront the unlived future and make her selection, her grandfather shoves all three objects, the entire scattering of surprises, before her, exclaiming that his granddaughter will have it all.