Beauty Rising

by Mark W. Sasse

  “I just have to figure out what my new life will be like.”

  I knew what I wanted her new life to be like. I wanted us to be together. But I could never say anything like that. Deep in my heart, I knew this could never be – not someone like her with someone like me – but hope doesn’t stop at plausible possibilities. It plows through unchartered territory. Hope builds a home at the highest peak and then watches to see if it will come to fruition. I couldn’t dare let on what I had in my heart. I sat in a chair and she sat across from me on the couch. We were silent for a few moments.

  “I had a fight with my Mom this morning.”

  “Really? What happened?”

  “You know that flower? The Phuong flower?”

  She nodded.

  “Well, she burnt it, and it made me really mad.”

  “Why did she burn it?”

  “That’s what she does. She destroys things. That was my only souvenir from Vietnam, and now it’s gone.”

  There was a long pause of silence. We both started talking at the same time.

  “You go,” I said.

  “No, what were you going to say?”

  “My taxi driver, Tan, he said that that flower represented the Vietnamese woman that I didn’t meet because I didn’t have any money.”

  I laughed to myself, and she looked over at me with a sweet smile.

  “Because of that mean person who stole your wallet?”

  “That’s right. He said no Vietnamese girl for me because I was broke.”

  “Well,” she said in a flirtatious manner. “There is still one Phuong in your life.”

  She smiled at me again. I must have turned beat red at that remark. I had no idea how to interpret it, or what it really meant. A Phuong in my life. What did that mean? If hope had been sitting at the earth’s highest peak, it had just hitched a ride on a rocket to the upper stratosphere. I had to change the subject. If I was misinterpreting her banter, I didn’t want to know about it. At least not now.

  “So I know that Phuong means flower . . .”

  “Phuong,” she repeated emphasizing the heavy tone.

  “Phuong. Sorry. So what does My mean?”

  “Well, My means aesthetic. It comes from the Chinese character Mei.”

  “Aesthetic?” I looked at her blankly.

  “Yes, like beauty or beautiful,” she clarified.

  “Beautiful,” I repeated.

  She paused for a second.

  “But that is not the only meaning, do you know that My also means American?”

  “No, really? Your name means American?”

  “Yes, it’s true. Beautiful and American are the same word.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Well, I heard the story that Vietnamese always liked the American flag and thought it looked very beautiful. And actually, the stars look like flowers. A field of flowers. Beautiful Americans.”

  She laughed.

  “Americans can be pretty ugly too,” I said with a smile.

  “No, I like Americans.”

  “No, don’t say that. That’s what my taxi driver Tan would say. ‘Americans are fat. Hey, Martin, why don’t you wear short pants? Because you too fat? Right? But don’t worry, I like Americans.’”

  We both laughed out loud. It was the most fun I had in a long time, or at least since last evening – Day One. Perhaps it was the most fun I ever had. I wanted to bottle this moment and keep it forever. I couldn’t even breathe. She just sat there so beautiful, so kind, and so easy to talk to.

  “And Phuong means flower. So your name means beautiful flower.”

  “Or American flower,” she said, with a hint of devil’s play.

  “That’s right. Or how about ‘Beautiful American flower’?”

  She laughed again.

  “Yes, but you know Phuong has another meaning as well.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Phoenix.”

  “Huh?”

  “Phoenix.”

  “Like the city? Phoenix, Arizona?” I asked.

  “Yes, it’s the same as that, but it means the bird. Phoenix the bird.”

  I had a blank stare on my face.

  “Phoenix is a bird in ancient mythology that at the end of its life burns up, but then out of the ashes rises another Phoenix bird.”

  I really didn’t learn much in school. I realized that.

  “So your name means ‘Beauty rising out of the ashes’?”

  Beauty rising. There were no other words to describe her life or my feelings. I marveled at this beautiful creature sitting beside me. It was too good to be true. Now I knew how my dad felt under the banana trees. A war zone all around and a piece of heaven suddenly comes into your life.

  We chatted in a light-hearted manner until around noon when Reverend Fox came to invite us for a light lunch at his house. I ate very carefully and very little. I wanted to lose weight like I never wanted to before. Perhaps if I was thinner she would be attracted to me. I would do anything for her. I would never eat again if she asked me. Reverend Fox gave her some advice about possibly finding a job in the area. She seemed very open to the possibility, and I told her that I could help her that afternoon look around at some possibilities.

  On Day Three, I called off work again and took My Phuong around Butler applying for various jobs at restaurants and retail stores. On Day Four, I took My Phuong for a second round of applications, and then we ended up having a picnic lunch at Moraine State Park in the afternoon. On Day Five, I told my manager Mr. Hutchins that I had pneumonia and might be out for a while. I spent the day re-canvassing retail shops on Main Street in Butler. I took her out for dinner at Natilli’s where she ordered spaghetti and a bottle of wine of which she drank the whole thing. On the way home, she was quite drunk, and I helped her up the steps and put a blanket on her as she lay down on the couch. She drifted off to sleep in a drunken slumber, and I watched her for several minutes. I could have sat and pondered her beauty all night, but I knew it was not right. I wrote a note for her and placed it on the end table by the couch. ‘You are sleeping peacefully. It looks like the wine did you in for the night. I hope you have sweet dreams. See you in the morning. Martin.’ I debated for a long time whether to add the word ‘love’ or not. Eventually, I decided that I couldn’t do it.

  I slept horribly that night thinking constantly of her sleeping peacefully on her couch. I had the terrible feeling that everything I was doing would only end in more heartbreak, but I had no other options. I would do anything for her, and if I ended up getting hurt, well, at least I still had Day One and Day Two and Day Three and . . .

  On Day Six, I didn’t even call in sick. They expected me to be out for a few more days. I wondered if I would ever go back to work. Mom would yell at me every morning and threaten to call K-Mart and tell them that I played hooky. But she never did. So on Day Six, I arrived at My Phuong’s apartment around 9:30. She was cooking in the kitchen when I knocked on the front door.

  “Martin, come in,” she said enthusiastically. “I’m making you breakfast.”

  “You are making me breakfast?”

  “Yes. I have eggs, and I walked down to 7-11 and got a package of sausage. I hope you like it. Oh, and I have some orange juice and toast.”

  She was an angel from God. I was sure of it.

  She talked non-stop as she made my breakfast. I marveled at every word she said and at ever movement she made.

  “Eat!”

  “It looks delicious.”

  “Eat. And if you don’t eat a lot, I’ll be very offended. Vietnamese people believe that if guests don’t eat much, they don’t like the food. So I hope you like it.”

  “It looks wonderful.”

  “So prove it,” she said with a smirk on her face.

  I did. I ate four eggs, five pieces of toast, twelve sausages, and three glasses of orange juice. I couldn’t help myself. I ate like I never ate before. Sh
e sat across from me and kept encouraging me to eat more and more. I finished my plate and she added more onto it. Finally, she ran out of food and fretted that I didn’t have enough. I told her I was never so full in my life and it was the best breakfast ever. She smiled at me again.

  “All week, you haven’t been eating very much. I’m worried that you are losing weight,” she said. “Have you been afraid to eat around me?”

  I put my head down slightly and nodded.

  “Why?”

  I just shook my head and smiled, but I refused to say anything.

  “Why?” she persisted.

  “I . . .”

  “Why Martin?”

  “I’ve been trying to lose weight.”

  “Why are you trying to lose weight?”

  I didn’t say anything again.

  “Martin, tell me. Why have you been trying to lose weight?”

  This was the moment I had been trying to avoid all week. I didn’t want to come clean with my true feelings because I felt that everything would come to an end.

  “Martin. Why have you been trying to lose weight? And Martin, why haven’t you gone to work at all this week?”

  I looked down at the ground for a few seconds, and then I turned back into her face.

  “I haven’t gone to work this week so that I could spend time with you.”

  “But you could spend time after work, right?”

  “I’m afraid if I go to work, then you will be gone.”

  She turned away from me for a minute and then persisted in her questioning.

  “And the eating? Why haven’t you been eating this week?”

  I hesitated for a long time and then looked back at her again.

  “I thought that if I could lose some weight, that maybe you could be attracted to me. That maybe you could look at me as . . .” I stopped and looked down at the floor.

  She reached over and touched my cheek and lifted my head so that we were eye-to-eye.

  “Martin, you have been the kindest, sweetest person I have ever met. What would I have done without you? You have helped me so much. And Martin, I’m sorry I got drunk last night. Sometimes getting drunk is just my way of forgetting all the problems that I have in my life. But I woke up in the morning, and I realized that you tucked me in. You tucked me in. I have never had anyone tuck me in since I was a child living with my parents.”

  She turned away from me for a second and then turned back. Tears were streaming down her cheeks.

  “And you didn’t take advantage of me. You had every chance in the world to do whatever you wanted with me last night, but you are the first man to ever treat me with respect. I don’t know how I could ever thank you.”

  I started crying as well.

  “My Phuong. I know I’m fat, and I’m ugly. I’m not attractive, not like you.”

  “Martin, don’t. You don’t know the things I’ve done. You don’t know.”

  “I don’t care what you’ve done.”

  “Martin. I’ve been bad. Really bad. When I left Ban Me Thuot, I was angry at the world and I would do anything to survive. I lied; I stole; I became a Karaoke girl. I am not a clean person Martin. You don’t know how bad I’ve been.”

  “I don’t care about what you’ve done in the past. I really don’t care. I don’t care.”

  “But Martin . . .”

  “My Phuong, I don’t have anything to offer you. I don’t have any money, I don’t have a house, I don’t have a good job, and I’m fat and ugly. That’s all I have to offer you. But My Phuong, I love you. I love you so much it hurts, and I would treat you so well. And . . .”

  “Oh, Martin. You are the sweetest man in the world.”

  She put her hands on each of my cheeks and rubbed my scraggly whiskers just staring at me for a minute. Then she smiled at me. She leaned over and put her hands around my neck and kissed me on the lips. I felt like our lips were connected for an eternity. Then she pulled back from me and smiled again.

  “Martin, it’s okay. You can go back to work tomorrow. I’m not going anywhere. China Buffet called this morning, and I start work there tomorrow afternoon.”

  I leaned back and just realized that the girl under the banana tree truly smiled at me. I didn’t know why she smiled, and I didn’t know how long she would continue smiling, but I just knew that you didn’t second guess instances like this – not in the hell-hole named Lyndora.

  My Girl and My Mom

  My Phuong continued to live in Reverend Fox’s apartment. I continued to work at K-Mart but I had a new place I loved to stop for lunch – China Buffet. My Phuong wore the cutest blue uniform and would come around to fill up my cup and smile at me. Nothing else needed to be said. She was my girl. I had a girl. I had a hard time convincing myself that I had a girl, but there she was filling my tea cup at lunch and hanging out with me every evening.

  Mom constantly harassed me about everything those days, and I kept planning to find a way to get my own place, but it just hadn’t happened yet. Every evening I went over to My Phuong’s place and we played games like little kids. She loved Uno, and we would play cut-throat for hours. Sometimes Reverend Fox would join us as well, and we would’ve woken up the neighbors with our hooting and hollering if it had been much later in the evening. We also watched a lot of TV. My Phuong loved to watch cooking shows and scratched down every recipe telling me over and over that she was going to make it for me. She would sit on my right with a beer in her hand. I would sit drinking my glass of milk constantly edging over to put my arm around her. Other days we just sat out on Reverend Fox’s wooden picnic table and talked. On Wednesday evenings, we could hear the faint voices of the few church members singing hymns before their prayer meeting. I always wondered if those songs took her back to her childhood. I could never imagine how much her life had changed since the time when her father was a pastor and she sat in the church service singing hymns like that.

  I left her about nine each evening, but before I did, she would kiss me – a cute peck on the lips. We hadn’t quite figured out how to be physical with each other at that point, or at least I hadn’t figured it out. I just didn’t want to move too quickly and make a wrong move.

  By the time summer officially commenced, we had been in this routine for about three weeks. Mom would typically be sitting on the porch when I came home. We didn’t say much to each other those days other than about the trivial matters concerning living in the same house. I never told Mom where My Phuong lived. I don’t know how she would have reacted to having My Phuong and me in that same apartment where the young Reverend and my Mom kindled their youthful passion.

  One night after I pulled into the driveway and came up the front steps, Mom was waiting on the porch swing ready to ask me an unexpected question.

  “Well, Martin? Are you ever going to let me meet this girl of yours?”

  I hesitated. I never wanted my Mom near My Phuong, but I didn’t want to tell her that.

  “I didn’t think you wanted to meet her.”

  “I do. I would like to meet her,” she said, taking a drag on her cigarette.

  “Mom, honestly, I don’t know if that is a good idea,” I said going back on my reservations about being frank.

  “And why is that?”

  “What are you going to say to her?”

  “I just want to meet her.”

  “Don’t do any of your silly business. Okay?” I warned her. “I don’t want you to make her feel uncomfortable or unwanted. Will you treat her as a guest?”

  “Martin, you have my word. I’ll be a lady. Bring her for dinner tomorrow. We haven’t eaten together for a while. I’ll make a casserole.”

  “Okay. I’ll bring her.”

  I dreaded the thought of bringing My Phuong home to meet my Mom, but it was about time. At lunch I informed My Phuong, and she seemed pleased that my Mom wanted to have her come. I wasn’t so sure. I warned her that she would probably be offended, but My
Phuong assured me that she could take it all. I had no reason to doubt her in the slightest. I believed she was the strongest woman in the world, and she would need ever last fiber of that strength to withstand the hurricane that had the capability to attack at any moment.

  My Phuong arrived at the house on foot around 7 PM. She wore black dress pants and a pretty pink sleeveless blouse. I loved looking at her walking towards me.

  “Hi, My Phuong. Dinner is ready.”

  “Hi, Martin.”

  “Are you ready?”

  “Yes. I’m ready,” she said conveying a positive attitude.

  I smiled at her and opened the screen door leading her into the house. Mom was putting the finishing touches on the meal. A loaf of freshly baked bread sat on the table alongside a chicken and rice casserole. My Phuong’s ethnicity no doubt had something to do with the rice.

  “Mom,” I said as we entered the kitchen. Mom stopped setting the table, quickly took off her apron and slightly grinned out of the side of her mouth. “This is My Phuong. My Phuong, this is my Mom. Mrs. Kinney.”

  “Martin, don’t be so formal. She can call me Jane. Nice to meet you My Phuong – I’m sure I didn’t say your name right.”

  They reached out to shake each other’s hands.

  “I am honored to meet you Jane.”

  “Here, My Phuong you sit here by me, and Martin sit on the end. Now what would you like to drink?”

  “Oh, I’m not thirsty.”

  “Nonsense. Do you drink alcohol? Beer. How about beer? Do you like beer?”

  “Yes, I do,” My Phuong replied in the dainty polite way she had about her.

  “Martin, get her a beer from the fridge.”

  “We don’t have any beer in the fridge.”

  “Yes we do. Look in the back left. There’s some in there.”

  “I don’t need to have a beer,” My Phuong said.

  “Sure you do. Martin, get her one.”

  I reached into the fridge and found a cold one in the back, and set it down beside My Phuong.

  “Martin, don’t be so barbaric. Get her a glass and open it for her.

  I went to the utensil drawer to find a bottle opener.