Things We Lost to the Water: A Novel

by Eric Nguyen

  “Hey, Handy!” said Sáng, testing out the name in his thick accent, which made it sound like “Hon-dee.” He twirled his Heineken bottle to see how much beer he had left. “Hon-dee, come over here. Hon-dee, go run this over to Quang.” Everybody giggled.

  Tuấn lifted his bottle to his lips. Already, he could feel his cheeks heat up and redden. He rubbed at the scruff on his face—an attempt to look older—to hide his blushing, though he was sure the beer made him glow.

  They were in Quang’s laundry shed behind his house. The three of them gathered around a roughed-up coffee table with ring marks from sweaty bottles and cans and cups while Thảo was out getting more beers. They were all under twenty-one, but Thảo could sweet-talk the toughest of them; Thảo always got what she wanted. The washing machine was going, banging itself against the concrete floor, so Tuấn got up and kicked it a couple of times, which did the trick.

  When he sat back down, Quang, the King of the Southern Boyz, placed his empty bottle on the table and leaned back into his chair.

  “But, Tuấn,” he said, his voice becoming serious, “you still have to prove yourself. Do something for the team.” The way he said “something” made the word sound heavy and foreign. Quang took a drag of his cigarette. He held it like a Vietnamese man, or so he claimed, with three fingers instead of two the way they did back in the Motherland, though none of them had seen Vietnam in a very long time. “Then,” he went on, “you can be part of the gia đình.”

  That word. Tuấn noticed it every time. Quang never called them a gang, though they were that and a notorious one, too. (They even made it to the front page of the Times-Picayune—twice. Once for arson and another for a home robbery down in Uptown, both before Tuấn’s time with them.) Quang never called them a gang; it was always family. And soon, Tuấn saw it was true. They took care of one another. They were there for one another. If someone messed with you, you just tell the Boyz and they’d nod and they’d grin and you know you could consider it taken care of. Sure, they fought and argued sometimes, but what family didn’t? He felt at home in Quang’s laundry shed more than in his own apartment, where his mother was always tired, annoyed, or dissatisfied (something was always wrong: his behavior; the obnoxious tourists in the Quarter, who she felt invaded an otherwise decent city; the other people who lived in Versailles—including those who moved away, abandoning their apartments and letting vines grow on the walls and bricks turn green, making a place where hooligans from all of New Orleans East trespassed to get high), and his brother lazed around, reading books while sprawled out on the bed with a blank, bored look on his face—a type of dissatisfaction of life in itself. And then there was Vinh, his mom’s boyfriend. Tuấn didn’t know what to do with Vinh. He was supposed to stay with them for a week but then ended up just staying. He felt like an extra organ on a body, like a third arm or an additional leg. The man—his habits, his ideas, his being—didn’t mesh with the rest of their family. To add to that, Vinh stayed home day and night, becoming a persistent presence that made home feel less like home.

  Tuấn was through with all of that. The Southern Boyz offered the opposite of that—meaning camaraderie, family.

  “Do something,” Quang repeated and picked up a bottle cap from the table. He began flipping it in the air. Three throws and he let it fall to the floor, where it bounced off the concrete and went rolling in a circle before settling.

  “What?” Tuấn sat up in his chair. His pulse raced. To be part of this family, to get that tattoo—the crescent moon–shaped outline of Vietnam with SBZ written vertically—Tuấn knew he would do anything. “Anything. Nói đi,” he said.

  “Wei Huang Market,” said Quang, “on Bourbon.” Just then the door opened.

  “Trời ổi,” said Thảo. “Hôi quá. Smoke outside, y’all. How many times have I told you?”

  “It’s my place,” Quang said. “I do what I want.”

  Thảo coughed. With a case of Heineken in her arms, she walked over to Quang and grabbed his cigarette. She took a quick drag before throwing it on the floor and crushing it beneath her cowboy boots. The leather was as thick as Tuấn imagined it would have been if it was freshly cut from a cow; its deep brown color reminded him of dry blood. “Help me with this, will you?” she said, tapping the box with her fingers.

  “Good haul,” said Sáng, reaching for the case.

  “I got a discount,” she replied.

  * * *

  —

  The story from Quang is, the Southern Boyz, as it is now, started in 1975, when the first Vietnamese refugees were just settling in the States, to protect them from being taken advantage of in their new home. But if you wanted to really understand the Southern Boyz, Quang said, you had to know its full story, and it starts during the American War. “Which is what we call the war over there,” said Quang, who liked to tell this story around a bonfire when the whole family was over on summer nights.

  “The Americans were leaving our Motherland behind. And the Communists, they were coming, you see? So these men, they set up a militia of their own to protect the women and the children, because it is always the women and the children. These men, they called themselves Lực Lượng Miển Nam. The Southern Force. They watched over Saigon and all the other Southern towns. But the thing was, they pretended they were like other people. No special uniforms or anything. That way, the Communists didn’t know who they were, and when they least expected it, they attacked.

  “But, of course, they had to leave like the rest of us. Still, they promised no one would ever hurt their people again. This I heard from a man on the boat, Chú Long. He came to New Orleans with us, too, where he continued the Southern Force, but with a new name.

  “Remember a couple of years ago,” Quang continued, “when Ông Nguyễn the fisherman and his men were vandalized: CHING CHONG GO HOME? Remember what happened to those three white fishermen?”

  Everyone nodded. Everyone knew. One night, after a successful haul from the Gulf, the fishermen went to a bar in Bayou St. John. They were so drunk by the time two o’clock in the morning came, they were stumbling out onto St. Philip Street. It was when they turned the corner, down a street without light, that they were attacked. The fishermen were found lying out on North Lopez Street the next morning, bruised and bloodied; one was missing a front tooth.

  “It was a sign to these men,” said Quang. “Don’t fuck with us!” Here, you can imagine Quang squeezing the rest of the lighter fluid into the fire and the flames jumping wildly and the bottle itself dropping into the heat, where the white plastic melted. He lit up a cigarette. “Can you imagine how life would be if we weren’t here? If men like Chú Long never came to New Orleans with us? What kind of world would this be? That kind of world is the kind of world I don’t want to live in.”

  Tuấn nodded. Yes, it was something to believe in. Yes.

  When Vinh told him the Southern Boyz were bad news, Tuấn told him this history with pride as if it were his own. Vinh laughed in his face and called him gullible. “Those boys don’t know anything,” Vinh said. “Just a bunch of kids playing. You want to know the real story about Vietnam.”

  “I know the story,” Tuấn said.

  “But you don’t,” Vinh said.

  * * *

  —

  Wei Huang Market was one of the last Asian grocery stores left on the 500-block of Bourbon Street. It was where Tuấn’s mother went because it carried the rare Asian foods she couldn’t find anywhere else: fish sauce, lemongrass, sticky rice. In its small space, it seemed to have everything.

  Madame Wei, a seventy-something-year-old woman who wore her gray hair in a bun, ran Wei Huang by herself even after all the Chinese shops on Bourbon Street left. The business was her father’s. Her brother had inherited it, but he left. So did everyone else. Everyone except Madame Wei. If it had not been for the Vietnamese coming, Tuấn had heard her say
, years ago when they started shopping there, Wei Huang would be out of business.

  But Wei Huang was bad for the Vietnamese of New Orleans, said Quang. Though it was in the Quarter and they were out east, people are creatures of habit and would continue to buy from her despite the Vietnamese-run groceries right in their backyard. This was why Tuấn was sent. To give her a message so violent that she would pack up and go away. Sayonara, China Lady—or whatever it was they said.

  “Người Trung Quốc don’t like us anyway,” Quang added. “Know our history,” he said. “Know your history.” The Chinese, Tuấn learned, occupied Vietnam for a thousand years. Then came the French.

  The next week, in the afternoon, Tuấn walked down Bourbon. Wei Huang sat between a liquor store and a shop selling souvenirs. As he came up on it, Tuấn slowed his pace. With his head down, he moved his eyes toward the window. The shop was empty, except for Madame Wei, who stood reading behind the counter at the front. The loud teenagers in the souvenir store next door made Wei Huang look and feel emptier. He walked into the souvenir store—the Fleur de Lis Gift Shoppe, one of maybe four in the Quarter—and pretended he was interested in the spinning rack of bike license plates. All of them had names not like his: Ted, Tom, Tommy, Tony. The teenagers giggled some more.

  Quang told him to first scan out the place during the daytime. Then, later, at night, when she was about to close, come in with a weapon. Threaten the old hag. Knock stuff to the ground. Smash her window. Tell her to give you money. And when you’re done, tell her who you are and where you’re from and what you’re about. Tell her all of this so she knows, that old woman, that this isn’t her territory. Not any longer. Tuấn pictured himself yelling at Madame Wei, who was shorter than he was and who wore wire-frame glasses.

  “Not anymore,” he would say. “This is not your place anymore. Out!” he’d screech. “Out!”

  It would be easy, wouldn’t it? He’d fought younger, stronger guys before. Big Black boys with bulging muscles. Sweaty Mexicans who thought they were big shots and sprayed over the SBZ signs across town. An old lady? He would only have to scream and she’d run.

  A white man with a neat haircut came up to him then.

  “Having trouble finding your name?” he asked. The man wore a name tag. Tuấn didn’t see his name, but he saw Co-Manager. “What’s the name?” the man said. “We can see if we have it.” The man bent over to inspect the license plates. “Is it Tommy? You might be a Tommy. You know, we have other names in the back, too. I can check. You can’t leave New Orleans without a souvenir!” The man smiled.

  “No,” Tuấn said. He shook his head. “Never mind.”

  He walked out of the store and past Wei Huang again. The neon sign on her window didn’t light up anymore and there were oily handprints on the glass. Inside, Madame Wei was now eating lunch next to the cash register. Then, out of the corner, a familiar figure came toward the counter with a two-liter bottle of Coco Rico soda, the kind his mother used for cooking. Vinh. He stopped at a case and grabbed a bag of bean sprouts. He said something and Madame Wei laughed. As she began ringing him up, Vinh took out a pen and a small pad and wrote something down or crossed something out. His eyes scanned the store and stopped at the window.

  Tuấn began running as Vinh came to the door.

  “Tuấn,” Vinh called.

  Tuấn looked back and saw Vinh standing on the sidewalk. When he turned back straight ahead, he bumped into a tourist and they both fell.

  “Sorry,” Tuấn said. “Sorry, sorry.” He helped the woman up. He was about to start running again, but a hand gripped his shoulder. He tried to shake it off, but it was too strong.

  “Tuấn,” Vinh said. “What you doing here? Don’t you have school?”

  “Let go!” He tried to pull away.

  “What you doing here?” Vinh repeated.

  “I could ask you the same. What you doing here?”

  “I’m a free man,” Vinh said, and laughed.

  “I’m eighteen. That makes me an adult. Let go!” It made him feel like a child again, begging to be let go. He pulled harder. Vinh tightened his grip. “Let go. I’m an adult! You can’t do this to me.”

  “Eighteen, but you’re still a boy. Still a kid.”

  “You can’t tell me what to do. You’re not my father!” Tuấn said. Did he scream it? Was everyone looking now? Where was the tourist he ran into? A sense of embarrassment came over him. His face was red, he knew. He closed his eyes. “You’re no one, Vinh. God, you’re nothing.”

  Vinh let go, and, suddenly released, Tuấn fell down heavily.

  “Kid” was all Vinh said in a shaky voice, as if a nerve had been hit, and walked away.

  * * *

  —

  Two nights later, everything was planned.

  Quang gave Tuấn a steel bat. Wei Huang closed at ten. At 9:55, Tuấn would arrive at the store. Madame Wei would be standing behind her counter. She might be reading her book or she might be closing up, counting her money. Tuấn would push the door, and as it opened there would be the sound of the bell tied to the door. Ting-ding! Madame would look up from whatever she was doing. “Oh, allo!” she would say. “We about to close. Can I help?” And Tuấn would say, “No. I’m just getting back from baseball practice and was hungry. Can I look around?” To this, Madame would answer, “Yes,” because she never says no and she is not one to be rude. And anyway, extra money—like a dollar for a snack—is a dollar she wouldn’t otherwise have, and because the Chinese are greedy, greedy people, she would wait. If she was counting money, maybe she tries to hide it. Meanwhile, Tuấn would walk around. It is a small shop. Just four walls and a long shelf in the middle. After one loop around, he would come back to the counter, empty-handed except the bat, which by now he is swinging threateningly. “Are you looking for something?” she would ask, pushing up her glasses, which would be greasy, too, because the Chinese are not a clean people. “Oh, me?” Tuấn would say. Then he would raise the bat and bring it down on the glass counter. Crash! Next, he would bring it down on her display case, shattering the glass in one swift movement. Slam! Finally, he would smash down that annoying waving cat on the counter. She would be screaming now and asking you what is it you want. Is it money? And it is now that you explain. You explain everything to her: you tell her who you are and where you’re from and what you’re about. And she would understand. She would run out of the store, arms waving in the air. Wei Huang would be closed the next day. It would disappear in the next week. It would be replaced by another souvenir shop with tacky trinkets in a month. Tuấn would be part of this strange, violent family with a strange, violent history. He would create a new New Orleans.

  * * *

  —

  When Tuấn came home, his mother, brother, and Vinh were already there. She walked between the stove and the kitchen table. In recent months, she’d taken on bookkeeping for the nail salon. She’d look at the numbers in the ledger open on the table and return to the frying pan on the stove.

  Tuấn headed for his room but stopped when his mother called him.

  “Are you staying for dinner?” she asked him.

  “I’m not grounded.” He looked over at his brother, who was reading a weathered paperback book.

  “That wasn’t the question,” she said. “Are you staying for dinner? You should stay for dinner. I work all day so you have food on the table. And you don’t even eat at home most days.”

  “I’m busy, mẹ.”

  “Are you still hanging with that girl, Thảo?”

  “He is,” Bình chimed in.

  “No one asked you, retard.”

  “No need for name calling,” said Vinh. “In this house, we respect one another.”

  Bình rolled his eyes.

  “No, mẹ,” Tuấn told his mother.

  “Don’t nói láo.”

>   “I’m not lying, mẹ.”

  “That girl bad trouble,” she said in English. “Those other boys she hangs out with. If your father were here, you know he wouldn’t approve.” She shook her head. Then, as if remembering what she’d asked in the first place, she repeated, “Are you staying for dinner?”

  “No, mẹ.”

  “I’m just trying to take care of you,” she said.

  “I know, mẹ.”

  She held him by the shoulder and looked into his eyes for a long time. He wondered what she was trying to find. “Okay,” she said.

  Bà Giang let herself in and Tuấn’s mom began setting the table.

  He went to his room and packed the bat and the black clothes he needed. By the time he got out, Vinh was sitting on the steps, reading a Bible and drinking a Coke.

  “It’ll be a while until dinner,” Vinh said. “You know how talkative Bà Giang is.”

  Tuấn wasn’t going to answer but decided to, feeling the way they left things on Bourbon Street hanging in the air. They hadn’t talked about it since, and it didn’t seem like Vinh had told his mother. “Yeah,” Tuấn said.

  “Where you going?”

  “Friend’s house.”

  “It is the Southern Kids?”

  “Southern Boyz,” he corrected, trying not to raise his voice.

  “You want to know the real story of Vietnam, kid?”

  “I don’t have time right now. I have to go.”

  “Well, I tell you this. Look at me. Look.”

  Tuấn sighed and looked Vinh in the eyes.

  “Everything was a mess,” Vinh began. “War makes everything a mess. And everyone is guilty of doing something bad. No one came out of it not doing anything bad, even all the good guys. It was a mess. That’s why I became Catholic.” He grabbed on to the small gold cross necklace he always wore. “A nun at the refugee camp, she said our past—we can make up for it. We just have to choose to do it.”