South Vietnam’s monsoon season begins in April, settles in during May, and continues through July. Dirty gray clouds edged in black formed in the South China Sea and brought in sheets of rain, usually in the afternoon. Back home on the Mekong, overflowing banks and floodplains meant everything slowed. Not in Saigon. When the streets flooded, sometimes higher than people’s knees, traffic persisted. People simply took off their shoes and sloshed through the water.
By the end of April, the refugee camp had degenerated into a huge mud pit. Water seeped into tents, soaking beds, blankets, and clothing. Mold grew on canvas walls and flaps. Women no longer cooked outside, which meant more desperately poor and starving refugees. Theft was a constant problem. Those who could afford locks bought them.
Thinking no one would steal their pots and sodden blankets, which they’d bought at Binh Tay, Tâm didn’t buy a lock. Two nights later when she got back from work, everything—blankets, pots, clothing, even their mats—was gone. When Tâm discovered the robbery, she squatted and hid her face in her hands. After all she’d done, all the sacrifices they’d made, she was crushed. The fact that everything had—again—been taken from them made her feel as dismal as if they’d been attacked by the Viet Cong. Although she normally wasn’t one to show her emotions, tears spilled down her cheeks.
Mai entered the tent a few minutes later. Tâm didn’t look up. For once in her life, she couldn’t summon up the words to admit that she had failed. As Mai moved around the tent, Tâm heard her sharp intake of breath. “Where is my lipstick? And my mascara?” Mai snapped in an accusatory tone. “Did you take them?”
Tâm didn’t answer. Mai crawled over to the back corner where they stowed their cooking and food utensils. “The pots are gone too?” She went to a loose drawer that held their clothes. Balanced on a cinder block, it was empty. “And our clothes?”
Tâm looked up. “We were robbed.”
Mai squeezed her eyes shut. Then she opened them and shook her head. “That’s it, Chị Tâm. I can’t do this anymore. We would be better off if we’d died in the massacre.”
Tâm rocked back, a sudden earnestness washing over her. “No. Never say that.”
“Why not? You tried. But”—Mai pursed her lips—“after a month we are back to where we started. We have nothing.” She squatted in front of Tâm. “I need to do things my way. Like I did with the trawler and Anh Phong.” She paused. “That was the only smart decision we made. And it was my doing.”
“Yes, it was,” Tâm acknowledged. “But they were in our path for a reason. Buddha tells us so. What if you hadn’t spotted them? What if you were asleep when they passed? What if—”
“Chị Tâm,” Mai said, “you sound like our parents. Buddha did not help us. Religion is for children and people about to die. I want to survive. And that means earning more than a few đồng from a Chinese restaurant.”
“You are still a child, Mai. How much money do you think you can make?”
Mai sniffed. “First of all, I will be fifteen soon, Chị Tâm. And second, I have been offered a job in Saigon that not only pays well but will give me a place to live.”
Tâm inclined her head. “What kind of job? You have been scheming behind my back.”
“It pays better than the stupid Saigon Café. And it’s easier than waiting tables.”
“What is this job?”
Mai raised her chin defiantly. “I’m going to be a hostess at the Stardust Lounge in District 1.”
“What is that?”
“It’s a bar and nightclub that many American GIs go to when they come to Saigon for R&R.”
“What is R&R?”
“Rest and relaxation. Their break from the war.”
Tâm folded her arms across her chest. “I see. You will become a whore.”
Mai’s cheeks flared. “No! You don’t understand. I’m going to be a hostess. I’ll talk to soldiers. Flirt with them. Bring them drinks. Encourage them to spend money. But I won’t have sex with them.”
It was Tâm’s turn to shake her head. “You believe that? Who told you about it?”
“Hạnh.” One of the girls she’d been hanging around with. “Her cousin, who is very pretty, got a job there. She says I am prettier than her cousin.”
“Have you actually gone there? Talked to the people who run this—this nightclub? Or is this just another fiction on your part? And your new friends?”
Mai’s chin quivered. “My friends are nicer than you, Chị Tâm. They care about me.”
Tâm let out a breath. “How do you know it wasn’t one of them who robbed us? Do they have jobs in a restaurant? Are they trying to earn a living? Or do they simply lie around all day and complain about their lives? Perhaps you should check their tents for our things.”
Mai folded her arms across her chest but didn’t answer.
“And now you’ll go to a bar where you are expected to speak English to American soldiers. You’ll flirt with them, get them drunk, but won’t have sex with them? Mai, even though you’re only fourteen, you can’t be that naïve.” Tâm shook her head. “And you’re doing this because your new friends said you are pretty? How are you going to talk to these soldiers? You haven’t picked up the English dictionary since we bought it.”
“Chị Tâm, you don’t know about these things. My friends do. And they are teaching me English.” She pointed to the phrase book, lying in a muddy corner of the tent. “Not words from a book that no one uses, but words that will help me talk to American soldiers.”
“Words like ‘You want good time, sweetheart?’ or ‘I make you happy tonight’?”
Mai’s face was scarlet now, her body rigid. “Chị Tâm, you never listen to me. All you do is tell me what to do. What to say. How to act. You don’t believe I can think for myself.” She waved a hand around the tent. “And where did it get us? This—this tent, this camp, this life? It isn’t a life. Sometimes I wish I had died in the massacre.”
For a brief moment Tâm looked stricken. The massacre’s devastation had stolen from them any sense of peace and security. The trauma of seeing their parents and little brother murdered would be with them for a long time, perhaps the rest of their lives. But they had to go on. They couldn’t allow the images of death and destruction to become a lodestone for their future. But to become a bar girl? Their parents would be ashamed. They would have blamed themselves for poor child-rearing.
“So you’ll bring dishonor and shame on our family rather than work an honest day?”
“Family? What family? I have no family, Chị Tâm. Neither do you. We are alone in the world.” Mai bent down to the drawer, saw nothing in it, and straightened. “Tell me, did the thieves leave us a toothbrush? A comb? A pair of chopsticks? Anything?”
“And what will you tell Cô Cúc? She gave us a chance. She’s expecting you at the restaurant tomorrow.”
“Tell her whatever you want. I’m done with you.” Mai turned her back on Tâm and marched out of the tent.