THE SOLDIER NOT HERE

Yiey has filleted the fish and fries it in a skillet. She says that if you dream a baby, it means a baby will come live with you.

“The soldier not here,” she says.

I think of both the little Pol Pot boy with the ax and Luke Sanna at Rye Harbor. I shake my head. “He is not here.” I step away. They are both not here. I close my eyes. I stretch my body across Luke’s in my mind.

Yiey brings a piece of the fish to my mother, who has dark half circles under her eyes. She’s not sleeping. My mother breaks it into bites and slowly brings each bite to her mouth. My grandmother and I watch the movement of her hand and her mouth.

My grandmother pulls the red kitchen chair in front of us, sits with one hand on each of our thighs. Strong hand, patting.

“She is good karma, this one,” my grandmother says.

I feel the weight of her body press against my knee. “Me?” I say, surprised. “I have good karma?”

She cocks her head with her lips pressed slightly together.

“Maybe,” she says. “You help me remember when I was a girl and we catch magic fish.”

Because of Luke, I think, I could go on the water and bring back a fish.

I feel the ache of my arms from pulling against the water. My mother eats her fill of the fish, and I think of the doctor calling the baby “big boy.” He’ll probably grow up with a craving for sea bass caught in March from the middle of the river. Where is Luke? What do I do with the stories I told only him?