Sixteen

Mai saw footprints in the sand when they reached the crossing. The water level was low, and the sun had broken through the cloudy sky. A rainbow was arching its way across the horizon as if its brilliant hues had been placed there by a giant paintbrush. They crossed the water without incident, and hurried on to the main camp, where a line of people holding hands were wading into the sea. The supply ship was anchored far out because the wooden pier had been damaged by the storms. Mai spotted Lan and Kim in the middle of
the chain.

“Come on, we’ll have to go out too if we want to get our food.” Kien extended his hand to Mai and wading out in the water toward Kim and Lan.

A large wave lifted Mai off her feet, and she tried to hold on to Kien’s hand as the force of the wave pushed her under, dashing her against the coral. She gasped as she swallowed the salty sea, struggling to get her head to the surface. She couldn’t drown. She had to get to Hiep to see if he was all right, to make sure Sang’s ghost had been satisfied. Another wave washed over her, lifting her to her feet, and she moved her arms and kicked her feet, trying to swim out to the ship. A hand gripped her shoulder and pulled her up and she saw Kien, his shoulders popping out of the water, his feet cycling in the water.

“Hold on to me and swim,” he called, and together they kicked and swam out to the ship, where a pot-bellied Malaysian with a heart tattoo on his chest was tossing food into the water. Mai saw Lan swim up and try to catch a loaf of bread that flew over her head, landing in the water. A gray-headed man behind her grabbed it and handed it to Lan. Kim caught the bag of rice that came soaring through the air when she called her name to the sailor.

“Nguyen Mai, two people,” called Mai, then paddled up to catch her loaf of bread. A small bag of rice landed in front of her and she grabbed it before it disappeared beneath the surface. Then she turned to swim back to shore, where dozens of drenched swimmers were struggling out of the water with their bags of rice and loaves of bread.

Where had Kien gone? She could see Lan and Kim waving to her, but not Kien. She swam toward the beach, and as her feet touched the sand, she looked up and there he was, holding a bag of rice high above his head. They collapsed on the edge of the beach gazing at each other. Kien smiled and squeezed the bag of rice.

“Finally, something to eat. Are you as hungry as I am?” he asked, pulling off a hunk of bread from his loaf and offering it to her.

“Eat it, I have my own,” she said.

Kien stuffed a piece of bread in his mouth and wrinkled up his nose. “Ugh, it tastes bad. The sea water has made it soggy.”

Mai offered him a piece of hers. He shook his head. “That’s yours. I shouldn’t be so picky. There were many times in our village when we only had one bowl of rice a day. My mother often gave me her food and went hungry. I would ask her if she was going to eat, and she would smile and say she already had.”

Mai jumped up and looked around.

“What’s the matter, Mai? What are you looking at?”

“I’ve got to go see how my uncle is.” Mai picked up the rice and bread and turned to look at Kien.

“Wait.” Kien stuffed another bite of bread into his mouth, made a face, and stood up. Mai could see the profile of the doctor standing in the doorway of the clinic, talking to a short woman with an infant in her arms. Mai squirmed while he finished talking to the woman, then walked across the sand to him.

“Doctor, could I speak to you?”

“What is it? Oh, yes, I remember you.”

“My uncle, how is he?”

The doctor folded his hands. “We had to send him to the hospital on the mainland. He started to have convulsions.”

“How is he now? Can I go to the mainland to see him?”

“No, that’s not possible.”

“Is he going to be all right? He’s the only family I have here.” Why did I leave him?

“Please come inside and sit down.” The doctor motioned to her. Mai followed him into the clinic and sat on a low bench while Kien waited outside. She searched the doctor’s face. Hiep was all right, she was certain. Sang’s ghost had been appeased. She had made sure of that.

“I’m afraid I have bad news for you. We did all we could at the hospital, but your uncle took an unexpected turn for the worse.”

“What do you mean? Where is he now?” Mai’s lips quivered. No, it couldn’t be.

The doctor put one hand on the stethoscope around his neck and cleared his throat.“Your uncle died yesterday morning. I’m very sorry.”

“No, no, you said he would be all right. Remember? You gave him the shot.” Mai started to sob. She had failed. The ghost had won.

“Sometimes the shot doesn’t work. We’ve had many people die from hepatitis.” The doctor looked around uneasily. “Is that your friend with you?”

Mai nodded her head between sobs. The doctor walked over to the entrance of the tent and said something to Kien. He nodded solemnly and walked over to Mai and touched her hair. The doctor continued. “As I said, we did our best.”

Mai peered up at the doctor through her tears and several strands of hair that fell across her eyes.

“I want to see him. I want to give him a proper burial,” she said, her arms folded across her chest. She thought of Hiep, alone, dying, and felt as if she would die too.

“He’s already been buried in the cemetery on the mainland. We didn’t know where you were.” The doctor sounded as if he had spent enough time with her and wanted to go.

“We were trapped on the south end of the island. We just got here.” Mai kept sobbing.

“Come on, Mai. There’s nothing we can do now.” Kien picked up Mai’s rice and bread, which she’d dropped at her feet, and touched her hand. Mai followed him, her feet moving as if they were made of wood. They sat down under a palm tree and Mai stopped crying.

“I was too late. Sang’s ghost had already punished him before I even got to the well. It’s all my fault. I should have gone there sooner. Small Auntie would not let Sang be appeased. She made him kill Hiep. That’s why she took my gold bracelet. It was our good fortune and it was protecting Hiep. I should have gotten the gold bracelet back.”

“Mai, it’s not your fault. Just like Sang’s death was not Hiep’s fault. I’m so sorry your uncle died.”

Kien was trying to comfort her, but she didn’t want to be comforted. She was angry and she was afraid. If Sang’s ghost had been able to kill Hiep, what was going to happen to her? She needed to get her gold bracelet back from Small Auntie before anything else happened.

A voice blaring from the loudspeaker in Vietnamese broke through her thoughts. “The following people please report immediately to the Red Cross tent for immigration.” A list of names followed. Perhaps today would be the day her name would be called. She tilted her head toward the loudspeaker. Twenty names shot out of the metal horn. Hers was not among them, but Small Auntie’s was. How could this be? She had to get the bracelet back.

“I’ll meet you back at camp,” she said to Kien. He looked at her in surprise. “I have something I need to do. You go on.”

Shrugging his shoulders, he headed off. Mai raced to the Red Cross tent and almost stepped on a small boy sitting cross-legged in the sand.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she said. She looked down and saw the somber face of Minh.

Mai’s first impulse was to grab Minh and demand he take her to Small Auntie, but her anger at Small Auntie was temporarily forgotten in her joy at seeing Minh again. Since that day at the market when he’d told her he was not allowed to talk to her, she’d only glimpsed him from a distance. She missed the way he used to skip ahead of her when they went looking for firewood and the funny little smile he gave when he thought she wasn’t looking.

Minh scowled when he recognized her. He started to move away from her, but she put her hand on his shoulder.

“Don’t go, Minh. Please.” Mai was surprised at the tears that welled up in his eyes when he turned to look at her. “What’s the matter, Minh? Why are you unhappy? I just heard your name called. You’re leaving, getting out of here.”

Minh wiped the tears trickling down his cheeks with the backs of his dirt-streaked hands. “I don’t want to go without my father. I’m afraid.”

Mai felt sad and guilty at the same time. She had been so worried about Hiep that she hadn’t realized what effect Sang’s death might have on his children. How would his family survive in a strange country without him? How would they find a place to live? Would Minh be able to go to school or, as the oldest son, would he have to find a job support them? Who would protect them? She thought of her own fears and the thought of going to America without her uncle. She hoped Third Uncle in Chicago would still want her. But could she make the journey across another ocean by herself? She was alone now too.

“Don’t be afraid, Minh. I’ve heard that America is a wonderful place. They give you a place to live and food to eat. You won’t starve. And you can go to school for free.” Mai especially liked hearing that school was free. How she missed school.

Minh stopped rubbing his eyes. The look on his small round face told her that he didn’t believe her.

“It’s true,” she said.

“I don’t care about school. I want my father.” Minh shoved his hands in his pockets, biting his lower lip. “Mother says it’s your uncle’s fault he’s dead.”

Mai shook her head. “Uncle Hiep is dead now. I think your father’s ghost killed him.”

Minh’s mouth dropped open.

“My father’s ghost. What do you mean?”

“Your father’s ghost has been haunting us. I thought I had made peace with him, but when I returned to the clinic, my uncle had died of hepatitis.”

“But how could my father be a ghost?” Minh’s eyes grew as round as the coconuts that hung on the palm trees above them. “My father wouldn’t kill anyone. Your uncle was the bad man.”

Mai sighed. She knew that she could not argue with Minh. He missed his father just as she missed hers. “Where is your mother? I need to see her.”

Minh studied the hangnail on his thumb and didn’t answer. Mai clenched her teeth and waited for his reply. She was not afraid of Small Auntie anymore, or Sang’s ghost. The worst had happened. Hiep was dead. Her only chance now was to get the bracelet back.

“Did you hear me, Minh? It’s very important that I find her.” Mai’s bangs slid down her forehead.

“She’s in there. We have to see the doctor before we can leave.”

Minh pointed to an opening in the tent. Mai walked over and peeked in. A bald man who was slouched at a small table stopped writing and peered up at her over large wire-rimmed glasses perched on his broad nose. That face. He looked like Third Uncle. But, of course, he wasn’t. Third Uncle was in Chicago waiting for her to come. Third Uncle was much younger.

“What do you want?” the man asked in Vietnamese, his open mouth revealing several gaps where teeth had once lodged. Mai shook her head and backed out.

Minh stood with one hand in his pocket, glaring at her. “My mother should be out in a minute, but I don’t think she wants to see you.”

“Minh, I don’t know how to tell you this. My gold bracelet. Your mother stole it from me. I want it back.” Mai kicked sand into the air with her toe.

Minh frowned and pulled his hand out of his pocket. In his palm he cradled a thin bracelet, finely tooled with delicate flowers and round as a pomegranate, its color a deep burnished gold.

“Is this it? Mother asked me to guard it while she saw the doctor.”

Mai spoke carefully. “That looks like it. May I see it?”

Minh shrank back and closed his hand around the bracelet. “Mother told me to take good care of it.”

“Just let me look at it. Does it have the initials NL inside?” The bracelet had been a wedding present to Mai’s mother from her father, and he had engraved his initials inside it: NL, Nguyen Loi.

Minh hesitated for a moment, then held the bracelet close to his eyes and squinted. “It does,” he said. He looked at her, the bracelet shaking in his hands.

“Minh, you have to give it to me. My mother gave it to me for my good fortune. Your mother stole it from me. It will only bring you bad luck.”

Minh stuffed the bracelet back in his pocket. “My mother will be very angry if I give you the bracelet.” He gave her a cold stare.

“But it’s mine. She took it from me. You can’t keep it.” Mai reached out her hands, palms up, her lips were quivering. “Do you want to have bad fortune? Give it to me and tell your mother you lost it. She’ll believe you.”

Minh hesitated, peered toward the tent, and then pulled the bracelet back out of his pocket. “Here. I don’t want any more bad fortune.” He dangled the bracelet in front of Mai, who grabbed it, shoved it in her pocket, and gave him a hug. He shrank back from her.

“Thank you, Minh, thank you,” she said. “You’ve saved both our lives. Don’t be afraid to leave the island without your father. He would want you to go. There’s no life here. It’s just a place to wait for life to begin again. Life will begin.”

She said the words to convince herself as much as Minh. Would life begin again for her? She hoped so. She had been on this island for almost half a year, yearning for a new life. When Hiep had heard from another refugee that everyone in America drove a car, his eyes had glowed with excitement.

“I’ll drive a Mercedes,” he had said, slicking back his hair behind his ears and puffing up his small chest.

She didn’t want to have to bear the news to her family of his death. Life had been sad enough. But what would become of her now? She would have to travel to America by herself. If she got to go. She felt the gold bracelet deep in her pocket and rubbed it between her thumb and forefinger for luck. She’d better get away before Small Auntie discovered the bracelet was gone.

“Goodbye, Minh. I hope you have a good life.” Tomorrow, or the next day, Minh and his family would be gone on the early boat to the mainland, and then Small Auntie would not be able to take the bracelet away. Mai would have to hide until then.

“Goodbye. Maybe we’ll see each other again.” A smile crept across the solemn landscape of Minh’s face.

The sun splattered over the fine white sand as Mai re-turned to their camp, her chest heaving. Pushing back the hanging rice bag, she entered the section of the tent that Hiep and she had shared. His hammock hung limply between two poles, a brown plastic bag dangling from one, his few possessions in it.

Mai removed the bag from the hook and opened it. A crumpled white T-shirt and a tan pair of shorts lay on top. Underneath was the shiny metal can opener with the black handle her uncle had traded three cans of peas for at the market, and a deck of cards. How Hiep had loved to gamble. It had taken Mai a while to discover that he went to card games when he stayed out late at night. She hadn’t minded. At least he had found something to entertain himself, and he had no money to lose. Sometimes he’d even won extra food for them.

Mai’s gaze went over to her hammock. Four small cans for drinking and eating lined the edge of a small bench. Next to them, the oil-filled can Hiep had fashioned into a candle stood by the two halves of a large oil can he had cut for cooking pots.

She reached up and ran her fingers across her red bag. The zipper whined as she opened it and pulled out the red blouse and the pair of black pants. She smoothed the wrinkles in the cotton blouse and thought of the day when she would wear this outfit to America. Mother had sewn them just for that. Underneath the outfit lay her plainer blouse and pants, along with her notebook, pencil, yarn, knitting needles, and the lumpy scarf she’d made. Mai sighed, folded the outfit, and replaced it in the bag. Unfolding and folding her “going to America” clothes had become a morning ritual with her. Sometimes she even slipped them on and pretended she’d heard her name over the loudspeaker.

She stroked the bracelet deep in her pants pocket. When it was dark and no one was around, she would bury it in the sand under her cooking fire. She should have hidden it there when she first came to this camp instead of carrying it tucked in her waistband, but she wanted it close to her so that she could feel its power. Now she wanted to gaze at it, the bracelet she had nearly lost. Mother, I have not failed you, she thought.

She edged into a corner of the tent, then slid the bracelet from her pocket and held it to the light with both hands, admiring the deep glow of its burnished gold. She pushed it on her wrist, its power warming her fingertips and sending a rush of heat through her body. Her ears tingled and her knees trembled. I shall never let you go again, she promised it. Mother gave you to me to help me through this journey and I will hold on to you with all my might. Folding her hands around the bracelet, she prayed to Buddha for strength and wisdom and then solemnly returned the bracelet to the dark folds of her pocket.

When the crimson cast of day kissed the horizon with its last beams of light, Mai listened to the singsong voices gossiping near the water’s edge, the cry of a soaring seagull, the creaking of the tent poles, the clang of pots being hung up to dry, the whoosh of a tent flap being lowered, the pattering of feet on the sand, someone snoring in the space next to her, a gentle laugh, and the beating of her own heart. Alive—this was how it felt.

She listened until the voices from the water’s edge retreated to their tents, and then she crept over to her cooking fire, three large rocks arranged in a triangle. Reaching down and lifting the ashes from the hole in the center, she dropped them on the sand, then dug a deeper pit within the fire hole. She placed the bracelet, wrapped in a small corner of rice bag, in the hole. The briny dampness invaded her nostrils as she patted the sand over the bracelet and scooped the ashes back in the fire hole. Gleaming beacons on the far-off Malaysian mainland and the blinking lights of a fishing boat on its way to harbor were her only witnesses.

The mainland. That’s where they had taken Hiep to die, and then buried him. What it was like, lying in a hole covered by earth? Did he feel anything? Had he known he was going to die? What had he thought about in those last moments? Had he been afraid? Had anyone been with him to hold his hand as his spirit left his body? He had died so far from home. His spirit would not find rest.

She remembered the young woman cast into the deep on her sea journey. The sharks had eaten her. What would happen to Hiep’s body? Her parents had never discussed these things in front of her, preferring her to remain innocent and naïve, trying to protect her from life. Now she had to learn on her own.

She crawled back into the tent and stood up, her soul awash with fear and grief. Lighting a tin can candle and placing it on her bench, she tried to focus her eyes in the dim light, but the bamboo tent poles wobbled, her hammock started to sway, and the ground tilted to the sky. The tent rocked like their ship in the stormy sea.

Hold on, hold on, she cried to herself. “Cha, Father, help me.” She could see her father’s face, with a cigarette drooping from his mouth, exhaling a puff of smoke and smiling at her. She reached out for him, but he was not there. No one was. Kien, where was Kien? “Kien!” Her cries echoed into the darkness.

A soft, petal-like voice called back to her. “Mai, what’s the matter?” A hand caressed her aching back with a touch so gentle she thought it might be the wing of a butterfly. She lay on her stomach in her hammock with her eyes closed, afraid to move, afraid the soothing strokes would stop. How wonderful it would be to lie there forever, adrift in this sea of peace. Then the voice spoke again, a voice she knew.

“Don’t cry, little one. Whatever it is, I’ll help you.” Lan, her eyes filled with love, stroked her hair. Mai peered at her through teary lashes.

“Where is Kien? I need him,” Mai said, wiping her nose on her sleeve.

“He didn’t come back to camp this evening. I don’t know where he is. What’s wrong?”

“It’s Uncle Hiep. They took him to the mainland. He’s, he’s … ” Mai held her head in her hands and started to wail.

“He’s what, Mai? Tell me.” Lan caught her breath.

“He’s dead, Lan. He died. I didn’t think he was that sick. If I’d known, I wouldn’t have left him.” Mai swiped her tears with the tips of her fingers, leaving a dark smudge across her cheekbones. “I just came back to get the tiger pictures so Uncle Sang’s ghost wouldn’t harm him. And then Kien and I went to the well.”

Mai stopped, realizing that the trip to the well was a secret. But what did it matter now? Hiep was dead. Nothing had worked. Sang had won. Her hand froze in midair and then fell limply to her side. She reached for Lan and clutched her in her arms. She could feel the beating of Lan’s heart, hear her sobs of anguish as they welled up from deep within her.

Mai began to sob in rhythm with Lan, and together they cried out to the unfair universe that had robbed them of the fair and handsome Hiep. They sat clinging together on the bench, comforting each other with their mournful sounds, as if they were the only two people in the world who had loved Hiep.

Lan had loved Hiep. Mai had noticed Lan’s shyness around Hiep, and the way she would blush when he spoke to her, but Lan’s wails made it clear that her love had been true. Just like in the Chinese operas. The fair maiden dying for love, but in this case, Hiep had died, and Lan, the fair maiden, was left to mourn. Why hadn’t Hiep declared his love for Lan? She drew her arms back from Lan and looked at her. Lan, her face damp with tears, lowered her eyes.

“Lan, why didn’t you tell me how much you cared for Hiep?”

Lan folded her hands delicately in her lap and did not answer, though a crimson blush crept across her cheeks. Mai thought of Kien and her own love for him. She had not told Lan her secret. Maybe it was better not to tell, but she wanted to share these feelings with someone. Mai enjoyed listening to the girls whisper about their crushes to one another as they sat together in their knitting circle.

She thought of her parents and their marriage. Shuddering, she remembered the time she asked her mother if she had loved her father when they’d gotten married. Her mother, emotionless, had shaken her head.

“My parents arranged the marriage through a matchmaker. Your father’s family was very important and very rich,” Mother had said, a far-off look in her eyes.

“But they couldn’t make you marry him, could they?”

“They were so happy to have me marry him. What could I say?” Mother whispered.

“Was Father handsome? Did he love you?”

“He had good features, but he had only seen me once. We did not marry for love,” she sniffed.

“But do you love each other now?” The answer was important to Mai.

“Ours was the largest wedding the village had ever seen. Over three hundred guests.”

Mai remembered the framed photograph of her parents on their wedding day, standing in front of the family altar, their hands at their sides, staring at the camera unsmiling, flanked by their friends and parents. Her mother had not answered the question. Mai had not asked it again.

“What’s the matter?” Ngoc stepped through the partition, followed by Kim.

Mai’s chin trembled, and her voice cracked. “Uncle Hiep’s dead.”

“It can’t be true,” Ngoc gulped, grabbing Mai’s hand, tears welling in her eyes. She looked over at Lan, who was wiping her tears with her hair. “What happened?”

Mai related the events of the past few days and Ngoc nodded, her jaw dropping in disbelief. Kim shook her head.

“I want him to have a funeral, but the doctor told me he has already been buried,” Mai said.

“Did you ask if he had a funeral?” Ngoc replied, pushing a strand of hair out of Mai’s eyes.

“No, I didn’t think of it. Do you think they might have given him one?”

In a proper Chinese Buddhist funeral like her grandmother’s, which Mai remembered, Hiep would have been ushered into the next world by chanting monks and his family’s prayers while fake money was burned to ensure that he would not want in the afterlife. When his coffin was lowered into its grave, the mourners would have turned their backs to it and stifled their tears so that his spirit would not wish to remain on earth. Then there would have been forty-nine days of mourning, and visits to the temple once a week to pray for his spirit.

“We could pray for him,” Lan said. “I’m sure our ancestors would hear us.”

She knelt on the ground and put her palms together. Kim, Ngoc, and Mai knelt down next to her, the sand gritty on Mai’s bare knees. Lan chanted softly for Hiep’s soul to be received into the afterworld and for it to rest in peace while the three girls followed along, bowing three times before Hiep’s hammock, their heads touching the ground each time, their chants seeping through the dangling rice bags and off into the night. Lan’s sounds broke off into sobs and she buried her face on the ground. Mai, desolate, stopped and placed her hand on Lan’s back.

“Thank you, Lan. I’m sure Uncle Hiep’s spirit will be welcomed into the afterlife now.” Mai could feel Lan’s body calming under her touch. Oh, how she wished Kien were here. Where was he? She needed him now. Lan stood up and hugged Mai.

“We can’t do anything else now. He’s gone. Go to sleep, Lan. You’re tired,” Mai said, thinking of the last time she had seen Hiep, lying on that cot in the clinic, his feverish body draped with a mosquito net. How she wished she had stayed with him. She would never forgive herself for leaving him.

“Mai, come and sleep with us. You don’t want to be alone tonight,” Ngoc said.

“Yes, come with us,” Lan urged.

“I’ll be all right here. You don’t have room for me.” Mai wanted to be alone, to grieve by herself, to pray and meditate and ask Buddha to forgive her for neglecting Hiep when he had most needed her, for letting him die alone. Did the girls wonder why she had left him?

“Good night, then,” they whispered. “Come get us if you are lonely,” Ngoc added as the sisters slipped through the hanging rice bags.

Mai crawled into Hiep’s hammock, burying her nose in its mesh, smelling him, his musky odor. What if they had gone to the clinic sooner? If only a Chinese doctor had seen him. Father said Chinese medicine was the most powerful. What kind of medicine did these Americans have? She folded her hands and prayed to Great-grandfather’s spirit for release—release from this island, release from her anger—and for forgiveness. An offshore breeze wafted through the tent, gathering her cares in its wings and carrying them out to sea, dropping the seeds of sleep on her as it passed by. Her lids closed, her hands folded in supplication.

A cry pierced the night. Mai covered her ears and wriggled deeper into the folds of her blanket. Another cry followed. She pressed her hands even harder against her ears until the side of her head started to throb from the pressure. No more ghosts. No more ghosts. Go away and leave me alone, she thought. I’ve had enough of you. How many lost spirits roamed the island? So many dead. Away. Away.

Lifting her hands from her ears, Mai waited for another cry, but all she could hear was the sound of her own breathing. And then she slept.