The Time in Between (David Bergen)

by David Bergen

  Charles waited. After a while Elaine appeared. She stepped out of the door and shut it quietly. She carried the cigarettes and a key. She touched Charles’s arm very near the spot where Jack’s hand had lain and said, “I wanted to smoke. Do you mind?”

  And so they stood under the overhang of the building, side by side, and Charles leaned forward to light Elaine’s cigarette. She steadied his hand, though it was not necessary. The glow of the match accented her eyes and nostrils. She tossed her head and stared out at some point in the darkness.

  Charles considered what he might say and then found himself referring to the last conversation they had had. He said, “And the chaos, how is it?”

  She said, “Right now, I can’t think of a safer place to be.” Then, as if embarrassed by this confession, she said, “The wine was a bit off. Didn’t you think?”

  He said it was fine. Better than whiskey.

  She said she didn’t like whiskey. She asked, “Did you ever think, when you came here, that you would be playing Scrabble with a couple from Kansas?”

  Charles did not answer. Across the street, at the noodle stand, someone had lit candles in buckets. The light flickered and waved.

  She looked at him. “What you said, a few days ago, about being lost? I am lost, too.” She shook her head quickly. “Oh, God. That sounds so melodramatic. I’m not trying to outdo you.”

  Charles said that he didn’t see it that way. He imagined he should say something else but he was not sure how to move beyond the obvious, so he just watched her in the shadows.

  She said, “Everyone loves Jack. He comes to this country and within days, hours even, people are fawning. He’s like a magnet that attracts both good and bad. There’s always someone at our house, for dinner, for drinks, whispered discussions. Sometimes it feels like I’m standing outside of a life that is his making. Not that I want what he has.” She put out her cigarette. “I must smell like smoke now. Jack will notice. Do I?” She put her face close to Charles’s. “Do I?” she said again. He was almost touching her jaw and neck. He breathed in and said it was hard for him to tell. He said that she smelled nice, if that was any consolation.

  She put the key in the lock. Turned it. Opened the door, and without looking at him said, “Good night, Charles,” and then she went inside.

  He walked back to his hotel. It was late on a Saturday night and the traffic was still busy. Young people on motorcycles, taxis, bicycles. He walked past the museum and the wharf. On past a restaurant where the lights were glowing and a party was taking place. On the open balcony upstairs men and women were drinking and dancing. For the first time in a long while, he imagined a woman in bed beside him.

  FOR SEVERAL DAYS HE KEPT TO HIMSELF AND STAYED IN HIS room. He took his meals in the vegetarian restaurant down the street from the hotel, and then he returned to his room. He slept poorly. One afternoon, Charles called Jon in Canada. Jon lived in downtown Vancouver with a man who was older than Charles. Jon had met him at the auction house he worked at. Just last spring Jon had come home for a visit and he had brought the man with him. Introduced him as his friend and said his name, Anthony. The three of them sat in the sunshine on the roughed-out deck that Charles had been building and they drank beer and made small talk. Anthony asked questions about machining and electricity and clearing the roads in winter. They were practical questions, and Charles had to give the man some credit. He wondered if Jon and Anthony would touch each other, show some affection, but they never did and Charles was relieved. He told Ada later that he was working hard at being open-minded, after all Jon was his son, but he still couldn’t get his head around the physical relationship. That was a tough one.

  Ada had said, “Dad, you don’t have to make love to Anthony,” and they’d moved on to other things.

  Now, calling Jon, Charles wondered if Anthony would answer. When he heard Jon say hello, Charles took a quick breath and said, “Hey, it’s your dad.” He heard his own voice arriving as an echo, slightly late, and he imagined their words overlapping.

  “Dad? It’s three in the morning.”

  “Is it?” Charles said, “Jesus, I didn’t realize. You want to hang up I’ll call tomorrow.”

  “No. I’m awake. Is something wrong?”

  “No. Nothing. I’m here, in Vietnam, and I missed you.”

  “Is it good? What you thought it would be?”

  “It’s okay. Nothing’s the same. I mean the light is the same and the sun comes up and sets in the same place and the language is the same but everything else is different. I don’t know what I was thinking. What I was expecting.”

  Jon was quiet. Then he asked, “How long do you think you’ll stay?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe a few more weeks. It’s up in the air.”

  “What do you do all day?”

  “Huh, lots to do. I sightsee. I eat. I sleep. It’s all quite relaxing. I eat clams down by the beach and then sit in a hammock and drink beer. I’m spoiling myself.”

  “That’s good. Ada was asking about you. If you’d called. You should phone her. She worries.”

  “I’ve started a bunch of letters, but I haven’t sent any. I’ll phone. Tell her. Have the postcards arrived?”

  The phone crackled and the connection fell away and then came back.

  “You there?” Charles asked.

  “I’m here.”

  “I’ll let you go back to sleep.”

  “You okay, Dad?”

  “Great. Just great. In the lap of luxury, son.”

  “That’s good.”

  “I love you.”

  “Me too.”

  THE NEXT DAY ELAINE CAME TO VISIT. SHE BROUGHT FLOWERS, A bouquet of orchids. Sammy was with her. They went up to the rooftop. While Sammy played with the rainwater in the barrel, Elaine sat across from Charles and asked him why he was hiding. “We haven’t seen you. I leave messages at the front desk but you don’t return my calls. Even Jack noticed. Jane, on the other hand, asked me, ‘What’s with you and that Mr. Boatman?’ I said that you were a friend. Wasn’t that okay? And she looked at me like teenagers are wont to, with suspicion.” Her hand was resting on her leg.

  He said, “I’m not hiding. You found me.”

  Elaine said that she and Jack were going up to Hue for the weekend. “He’s got people to see there. The children are staying home with Ai Ty. Why don’t you meet us there?”

  Charles said that he didn’t know, though he had always wanted to go to Hue. Elaine said that the train ride was spectacular. She stooped and dried Sammy with a towel, her hands quick and her movements efficient. She stood and faced him again, stepped forward. She was wearing a simple sleeveless print dress, and as she came closer he noted the scent of some kind of powder and bath oil that seemed familiar and made him lean forward slightly. She took his hand and put her mouth close to his right ear. She would be lonely in Hue while Jack was busy, she said. If Charles came they could visit the Citadel together and play at being tourists. “You should try to be a tourist for a few days.” He recognized the scent now, it was something his daughter Del had used long ago, when she was young and still lived with him.

  Elaine was still holding his hand. Sammy was behind her, peeking around her hip, as if this were a game.

  Charles said, “He’s watching.”

  She smiled and turned and scooped Sammy up and moved toward the door of the rooftop stairs, whispering in her boy’s ear. Just before she left she looked back at Charles and her mouth went up on one side, as if she were communicating something, or as if she knew something about the two of them that he didn’t yet understand.

  The following morning Jack came by and asked Charles to join him for breakfast. With Jack was a young Vietnamese man who wore leather shoes, no socks, and tight jeans. He deferred to Jack, who called him his helper. He introduced him as Lan.

  Lan drank coffee while the two men ate. Jack asked Charles if he had found yet what he was looking for here in Vietnam. “Everybody’s looking, of cours
e. The expatriate community is a soup of bewildered souls. Nicky, the handsome Italian with the Vietnamese wife, who would rather be floating down some mosquito-infested river in Africa than running a bar for Americans in Danang; Miss Hereforth, who works for the UN as a dentist but spends her evenings dancing with young Vietnamese men. Haven’t you noticed the sexual energy one gets from this country?” He pointed his chopsticks at Charles’s chest.

  “What do you mean?” Charles asked. He wondered if this were directed at him, some allusion to the time he had been spending with Elaine.

  Jack said, “Perhaps it’s the heat, which leads to torpor, and the torpor leads to indolence, which in turn leads to desire.” He drank his coffee. He turned to Lan and said something in Vietnamese. Lan stared at Charles with his dark eyes. Then he touched the table with his little finger.

  Across the street, in midday’s white light, a mother followed a toddler following a dog. Lan stood and wandered off toward the motorcycles parked near the sidewalk. He leaned against the wall and began talking to a waiter. As he talked he laughed, and once he touched the waiter’s shoulder and then his face.

  Jack asked for the bill and said, “Elaine told me you might be coming up to Hue this weekend.” He studied Charles’s face. “I think that would be good. You haven’t been there, that’s what she said. Though it’s cool this time of year, the trip alone is worth it.”

  “Yes,” Charles said. “We talked about that.” Outside, against the wall, he saw the boy, the movement of his eyes and mouth, a slight knowing smirk. He paid for the meal, even though Jack protested. “Please,” Charles said, and he pulled out his wallet and laid the money on the table. As he did so, he said, “If your offer is genuine, I’ll come to Hue. I’d like that. Elaine said that I needed to be a tourist for a bit. So, why not with you two?”

  “Excellent. I’ll tell Elaine. I’ll be busy, so she’ll be happy to have someone to spend time with.” He took a napkin and wrote down the name of the hotel where they were staying, and the restaurant where they could meet on Saturday night. Outside, Charles saw the young man, Lan, push away from the wall and leave without saying good-bye. Jack didn’t seem to notice.

  IN THE EVENING CHARLES TOOK A CYCLO UP TO THANH THUY Street and stopped at a painted green gate and looked in on a garden where a dog slept. He called hello. The lights in the house were on and the door was open and inside the first room Charles saw a couch and a coffee table and a cup of tea that was still steaming. He waited and eventually a woman appeared. He called out again and she looked into the darkness, holding her hand up as a visor. She was dressed in jeans and a button-down white shirt. She wore cloth slippers. She walked toward Charles and said, “I do not speak English.” She opened the gate and said, “Come in, please.” Charles stepped inside and said, “I’m looking for Hoang Vu, the artist.”

  The woman bowed slightly and left him standing in the courtyard. The dog lifted its head and blinked.

  A young girl entered the room, stopped, and stared. She was wearing shorts and a big T-shirt and her hair was in braids.

  “Hello,” Charles said.

  The girl said hello. Her pronunciation was exact. She asked, “Are you rich?” and then laughed and backed out of the room as Hoang Vu appeared. He was wearing a white shirt and black polyester pants and socks with broad stripes of white and baby blue. The elastic was gone on the socks and they had drooped at his heels.

  “You have come,” Vu said. “Good, good.” He motioned at the couch and told Charles to sit. He sat across from him, lit a cigarette, and said that he had many friends in many places, in London, in Montevideo, in Paris, but it was always nice to meet someone new, and that was why, that afternoon with Thanh, he had asked Charles to visit. He stood and excused himself and left the room, and in a moment he returned with two glasses and a bottle of whiskey, which was a third full. He poured generously, handed Charles a glass, and said, “To new friends.” They touched glasses and drank. Vu finished his and poured himself another. “I know a little about you,” he said. “Tell me more.”

  Charles talked about his life back on the mountain and about his three children, and then he said that almost thirty years ago he had fought in Vietnam and now he was coming back for a visit. He said the country surprised him. He didn’t really know what he had expected.

  “This is the case, isn’t it?” Vu said. “We set sail in a particular direction, certain of the route, and then find ourselves loose.” He paused and tilted his head. “Or adrift. That is more correct. Yes.”

  Charles said that it was, and he complimented Vu on his English.

  Vu dismissed this. “As I said, I have foreign friends, and with these friends I must speak English. How many people from Uruguay know Vietnamese? You see.” He drank and then leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and said that it was to his benefit to meet people who came from another place, because that could only add to his artistic vision. “Imagine sitting in a room by yourself with nothing to look at, no one to talk to. I need other people. I need images. I need the solid world. I am asked sometimes why I don’t move to another country where there is more freedom, and my answer is that I cannot be an artist elsewhere. How would I remain faithful? From which place would I tell my story? Finally, of course, the artist is alone, like Dang Tho, the writer we talked of the other day. I feel great envy and great pity for him. He has succeeded in angering the authorities, but he is also separate. This is what happens, isn’t it? A man has a vision which is not political, but others make it so, and so the vision is made smaller because some person of little consequence decides that the man with the vision is too big, too proud.”

  Vu stopped. “I am talking too much,” he said. He drank quickly and then said, “Dang Tho’s answer to all the attention around the novel was to turn away. He did not write another book. And of course, though the war did not kill him, the time after the war probably will. He is a man bathed in a sad blue light.”

  He stood and left the room once again, coming back a few minutes later with a plate of satay pork garnished with mint and wrapped in rice paper. Vu began talking about his time after the war, about returning to Hanoi and the difficulty of life. He said that his niece—he lived with his sister and her daughter—had been born a long time after the war, good for her, and with fortune she would never have to suffer. He had run out of cigarettes and he called for the girl. She left and returned some time later, handed him a pack of Rave, and moved sideways out of the room, her bare feet brushing the tile. Vu poured more whiskey for them both, lit a Rave, and closed his eyes. He said, “I love everything. Art. Books. Women. There is an Indian writer, Tagore, a poet. I love him. I love languages. French. André Gide. Sinhalese, German, Arabic.” He paused.

  “You speak Arabic?” Charles asked.

  “Maybe. A good poet is Nguyen Du. ‘In another three hundred years, / Will anyone weep, remembering my Fate?’ Or Tan Da, he wrote about getting drunk. Do you like poetry?” He was looking at Charles. Then, before Charles could answer, Vu was off on several more lines, from Hamlet this time, and then back to a Vietnamese poet, Nguyen Khuyen, and he recited in a soft voice, and though Charles did not understand the words or their deeper meaning, he felt that he had arrived at some unlikely place.

  Vu got slowly drunk. His conversation began to meander. He quoted both Kahlil Gibran and Ernest Hemingway. He said, “I read The Prophet years ago when I was in school. How do you say his name, Kawleel Zibrun? Like that. And Hemingway, you know that one about the fish where the old man comes back with nothing? That’s it. You fly over things, you must, and you arrive on the other side with nothing. You ask me, do I believe? I love the tiniest flower, that rock, that tree, the indigo moon. I am not a Communist. I can believe. But that’s a big question. Everyone’s question.”

  They drank and when the whiskey was gone Vu wandered into another room and came back with a bottle of brandy and poured a little into their glasses. He raised his glass, studied it, and then he ducked his long face and d
rank quickly.

  At two in the morning Charles shook Vu’s hand by the green gate. The moon was full and the streets were bright. Vu offered Charles his bicycle, even began to set off to find it, but Charles stopped him, saying he would walk up to one of the busier streets until he found a taxi.

  He did not know when he lost his way but he supposed it might have been just after he turned off Thanh Thuy Street. He had come down a small lane that he did not recognize and he had arrived at a beach. He did not know this particular beach. It was different from the one at My Khe; debris floated on the water. He walked and he was aware of his own breathing and the roiling of his stomach. He passed shuttered shops and he wandered through small streets and crossed large thoroughfares. Always, he looked for the bright neon sign of the Binh Duong Hotel, but he never saw it.

  He walked by an old man sitting in a metal chair by a child’s swing. Charles tried to talk to the man, but he was sleeping. On a dead-end street, near a cluster of buildings that turned out to be a carpet factory, he was set on by a man brandishing a long knife. The man talked to him quickly and moved the knife in short thrusts through the air. Charles backed up until he was at the gate. He took out his cigarettes and offered the man the pack. The man put the knife in the waistband of his shorts, took the pack, and lit a cigarette, all the time watching Charles. The man made a motion with his free hand, a curling of his fingers. The knife was still tucked away. Charles was drunk. If he had not been drunk he would have swung at the man, who was small and thin. His shorts were dirty and his T-shirt was torn. Charles stepped forward and in a single motion the man pulled out the knife once more and swung at Charles’s waist. The knife slit his shirt. Charles looked down. Put his hand to his waist and felt something wet. “Fuck,” he said and he looked at the man, who clicked his teeth and circled Charles and passed the knife by his face. In the darkness the man was a black ghost, and it came to Charles, in the haze of his drunkenness, that he was going to die. The man crouched and muttered some words that were foreign and fluttered about in the air. There was the knife in one hand and the cigarette in the other and as the man shuffled clockwise he drew on the cigarette and then exhaled at Charles. Charles thought of the money in his wallet. He reached for it and the man cried out and lunged forward. Charles swiveled and watched the knife slide past his rib cage. The man stumbled and fell. Charles knew then that he should kick the man in the chest and in the head, but instead he stood there, offering his wallet. The man rose and was going to reach for the wallet when from the courtyard of the carpet factory there came a whistling sound, a shout, and the rattling of a gate, and the man fled.