Mrs. Soon spoke again to Ba Li. The answer was short. “Why do you want to know this?”
“Ask her again.”
She did, got the same response.
“Ask her again.”
This time Mrs. Soon did not translate. “Why do you want to know?”
The old man was sweating, and his voice seemed higher. If I was looking for a word to describe him right then, I’d say desperate.
“Ask her again. Why were they on the street after curfew?” He almost screamed the words.
Mrs. Soon turned slowly back to Ba Li. Her voice sounded like a whisper after the old man’s yell.
Ba Li said more this time, and Mrs. Soon interpreted without looking at the old man. “They were hungry … looking for food. Their father had been killed two days before, their mother was missing. They were on the street after curfew because they were trying to steal food.”
The old man’s voice was more normal as he said, “Soldiers came. They saw you and your brother. Your brother threw something at the soldiers. They shot him. Tell her that. Then ask her if her brother was VC.”
Mrs. Soon didn’t say anything. She was looking at Ba Li.
“Say it,” the old man told her. “Ask her if her brother was VC.”
Mrs. Soon said something. Ba Li looked down at her hands, then up at the old man. She said something. Mrs. Soon translated. “She wants to know if you killed her brother.”
“Was he Viet Cong?”
Mrs. Soon turned to the old man again. “He was twelve years old.”
“I saw people killed and maimed from grenades thrown by kids ten years old. I saw one of our officers die a bad death when he ate a piece of fruit that a little girl, maybe seven years old, had given him. Poison. I saw soldiers die because they believed what they were told by old people, by women with babies in their arms, by pretty girls on bicycles, by children. They believed and then walked into booby traps and ambushes.”
He took a step closer to the woman. “Please … it’s important. Was your brother VC?”
The woman spoke, then Mrs. Soon. “She wants to know if you killed her brother.”
I looked at the old man. I saw his face go all distorted, and I saw tears on his face. He hadn’t cried when he was telling me what happened on Hill 453, but he was crying now. When some people cry, it seems more than sad.… Looking at him, it was like watching him die.
He wiped a hand across his eyes, and he spoke in a voice I hadn’t heard ever before … not from him. Not from anyone.
“I killed your brother,” he said. “I killed your brother on that street. We … I thought he was VC. He threw something. I thought it was something that would explode. I was afraid … and I shot him. I came here to tell you I’m sorry. I never wanted to kill children. I’m sorry.”
Mrs. Soon translated and no one spoke after that. The only sound was the old man’s breathing. Loud breathing. He wiped his face again with his arm. It felt like a minute passed. Maybe two.
“Please tell me if your brother was VC. Please … I need to know that.”
Ba Li spat. The spittle struck the old man in the face. He didn’t wipe it away.
“I … I would like to do something for you. If there is something I can do for you. Money, get you some food, some clothes … ”
When Ba Li spoke, it was in a voice so full of anger, so full of hate. Then she turned, went back into her house and closed the door.
The old man stepped back. He pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped his face. Mrs. Soon turned away from the house and looked at us. Her eyes were very much like the woman’s had been.
The old man looked at her. “Was he Viet Cong?”
“She didn’t answer that.”
“What did she say?”
“First she said that she would like to kill your son. So you would know.”
The old man’s face didn’t change, but he lowered his head a little. Maybe a couple of centimetres or so. “What else? What else did she say?”
“She said her brother threw an onion at the soldiers. You killed him for throwing an onion.” Mrs. Soon walked away without saying anymore. The old man never got the chance to pay her for her translating. She disappeared out onto the street and into the hundreds of people there.
We didn’t move for a while. The old man stared at the door of the shack where Ba Li lived. I never knew what he was thinking about right then.
I didn’t know if I should do something, take his arm and lead him away or maybe say something. I didn’t do anything. I’m not sure how long we stood there before he turned and walked slowly away. I walked with him, but we didn’t speak any more that night. I’m not sure he knew I was there.
3
The next morning when I woke up, he was dressed and getting ready to go out.
“What’s up?”
“I’m going up to the roof to have some coffee. Maybe some breakfast. Looks like a nice morning. You can come up there when you’re up and dressed if you want to.”
“Yeah, okay.”
“We’ll be leaving tomorrow to go home.” He went out and closed the door behind him.
On my way up to the roof of the Rex, I sent Jen another text.
I miss you. R U back? Going back to Canada tomorrow. Call or text me. N.
I remember reading that signing an email or a text with just an initial was supposed to mean something special. I wasn’t sure what, but I figured, now that I was on the clock with Jen. I’d better pull out all the stops.
I ordered French toast and tried to keep an eye on my phone and the old man at the same time. He was drinking coffee, and there was an order of toast in front of him, but he didn’t seem all that interested. He was sitting sideways to the table and had the paper in his hands. It gave me a chance to study him. I noticed something. He seemed thinner than the day he’d picked me up at the house.
And something else. I couldn’t believe I hadn’t noticed this before. There was a scar along the back of his left hand and two of the fingers, the index and middle finger didn’t sit quite right. They were at an angle that you don’t usually see fingers going. Bent, not like totally backwards or anything, but just not right. And it didn’t look like he used them the normal way either. Or maybe at all. He was holding the newspaper with both hands, but it didn’t look like those fingers were helping his left hand all that much. How long had we been together, and I’d just noticed that now. So much for my career as a detective.
I wanted to say something. I wanted to ask him about the fingers even though I already knew. Most of all, I wanted to take away some of what had happened the night before. Mom had told me to take care of him. I wished right then that I could. But I didn’t have the words. I ate French toast, checked out the back of the paper like I had that other time. Different news but the same.
My phone rang, and I almost knocked my breakfast off the table getting at it. Then tried to sound cool when I answered.
“Hello. Oh, hey, Jen, how you doing?” Like she was the last person I expected to hear from.
The old man turned his head and looked at me. Smiling. Okay, so cool didn’t work.
We didn’t talk long. She suggested we meet about four o’clock at the Black Cat. I said that was great, I’d see her then.
The Black Cat. Our place.
The old man asked me if I wanted to do anything for a few hours before “my big date.” I said sure, but I didn’t know what.
“How about a walk?”
So we walked. The Rex is on Nguyen Hue. One block over is Dong Khoi, kind of like Main Street. We walked the one block to Dong Khoi and turned down it. Lots of shops, expensive stuff.
We didn’t go very fast, and it looked to me like the last few days had been hard on him. On his illness. He didn’t say anything and he wasn’t grimacing or anything, but it didn’t look to me like he was a hundred percent. Which I guess made sense.
“So would you think it was a dumb idea for a guy like me to come back here in a few y
ears, maybe teach English to people?”
He stopped and looked at me, I think to see if I was kidding. Then when we started walking again, he said, “You like it here?”
“I don’t mind it,” I said. “I mean there’s stuff I don’t like too much, but there’s other stuff that I guess I like okay.”
“With an answer like that you could have run the Five O’Clock Follies.”
“What’s the Five O’Clock Follies?”
“The lobby of the Rex, during the war, all the war correspondents would come there every morning for the latest briefing on the progress of the war. Fifty percent of the briefing was all about saying nothing and the other fifty percent was bullshit.”
That pissed me off. “You think I’m bullshitting about coming back here.”
“No,” he shook his head. “No, I don’t think that, Nate. I just meant your answer didn’t tell me much about how you feel about this place. I think it would be very cool if you came back here someday.”
“Even if you, you know, hate it?”
“Before we came here, you and me, I thought I hated Vietnam. I wanted to see it again to try to remember some things I thought I should remember, but I hated the place. But since we got here, I figured out that I hate the war, and I hate what the war did to me. And I hate that I saw friends die for reasons I’ll never understand. And I really hated that fake cowboy with the plastic guns.…”
We stopped walking, laughed a little at the joke.
“I don’t hate this country, Nate. And I don’t hate these people. ”
“I walked by this place where they teach English to Vietnamese people. There was a little girl there, and she had an English book. I talked to her, it was cool, and I taught her a couple of new words.”
“I hope they were appropriate ones. I’ve heard some of your words.”
“They were appropriate. And anyway, I’ve heard a couple of things come out of your mouth that they probably don’t teach at that school.”
We both laughed again, a little harder this time.
“I guess you’re right. Sorry.”
I wanted to ask him if he was okay after what had happened the night before. But I figured if he wanted to talk about it, he’d bring it up. We stopped and had a coffee at a place on Dong Khoi.
“You hungry? You want something to eat?”
I shook my head. “I’m saving up. Jen and I are meeting at the Black Cat. They’ve got amazing burgers there.”
“How’s that going, you and Jen?”
He wasn’t asking like he was trying to pry into anything. It was kind of like one of your friends would ask you at school.
“Well, let’s see, her old man doesn’t really like me because he thinks I’m related to a lunatic, and she didn’t text or phone me the whole time she was in Hanoi, and we’re going home tomorrow, and she’s going back to Australia pretty soon, which is about a gazillion miles from my house, but other than that I’d say everything’s perfect.”
“Good. Glad to hear it.”
He stood up. “If it’s okay with you, I wouldn’t mind heading back to the hotel. I might lie down for a while. That way I’ll be able to pace the floor tonight worrying about when you’re going to get home.”
We went back to the hotel, and I jumped in the shower. When I came out, he was lying down reading.
“You … uh … wouldn’t be able to spare a little aftershave, would you? I notice you have some in there.”
“Go ahead, but I’d use it sparingly. My experience is that girls don’t like it if you marinate yourself in the stuff.”
“Right.”
I went back in the bathroom and did all the good smell stuff. Deodorant, toothpaste, aftershave. When I came out, the old man sniffed the air.
I said, “I might suck at this date stuff, but I’m not going to stink at it.” He smiled at that, then closed his eyes.
By the time I got dressed, he was sleeping. I eased my way out the door. Three twenty. Just about right to be at the Black Cat at four.
4
I walked in at about five minutes to. Jen was already there, drinking a Coke. She stood up and stepped around the table, gave me a hug. There are hugs, and there are hugs. This wasn’t the hug of a girl who had been missing the hell out of a guy and was overjoyed to see him. This was more of a so-did-you-hear-that-the-groundhog-saw-his-shadow-and-there’s-six-more-weeks-of-winter hug. But maybe I was reading too much into it.
She went back around the table and sat down. I sat down opposite her. She looked good. Smelled good too. But so do I, right?
“How was Hanoi?”
“Boring. Mom and I shopped while Dad went to all these meetings with people he wanted to talk to for his book. There’s this prison, I can’t remember the name, but a lot of pilots who got shot down ended up there. They called it the Hanoi Hilton. And some of the actual pilots who had been prisoners there went through the place with him. So he was all excited.
“Then we went to everything to do with Ho Chi Minh — his house, where he’s buried, plus I think we saw every portrait and photo of the guy. If I never see Uncle Ho again, that will be just fine.”
She took a drink of her Coke. “How about you. Been having fun?”
“Not really. Went horseback riding and stuff. It was okay. I spent most of my time missing you.”
She didn’t get a chance to answer because a girl came to our table to take our order.
I shook my head when the girl offered a menu. “I’m thinking of having another one of those burgers. How about you?”
Jen took the menu but didn’t give it much of a look. “Sure, a burger’s okay, I guess. And another Coke.” Coke, not beer … another bad sign?
When the girl had gone from our table, I leaned forward. “So how come you didn’t text or call me?” I tried to keep my voice light, like it wasn’t a big deal, like I was just teasing her.
“Listen, Nate, I’m really sorry about the other night.”
So that’s it — she’s feeling guilty that we went that far that fast.
“Hey, listen, it was me too. I wanted you just as much as you wanted me. And anyway, we didn’t do anything I’d call bad.”
“That’s not it.”
“What then?”
The serving person came back to our table. “I forgot to ask you if you wanted a drink.”
“Yeah, sure, a Coke’s fine.” And if you come back to this table one more time, I’ll kill you right here.
She left again. I wanted to reach across the table and take Jen’s hand, let her know that everything was fine. But I didn’t think that was quite the right thing to do. Turns out I was right.
She put her arms on the table and leaned forward. Closer to me. Good.
“I have a boyfriend.”
If she’d leaned across the table and gouged out one of my eyes, it wouldn’t have surprised me any more than those four words, five syllables.
But in times of trouble I’ve always been able to come up with the right words. “You have a boyfriend?” See what I mean?
I was suddenly filled with the urge to study every picture on every wall of the Black Cat. I spun one way on my chair, then the other, then back again. I must have looked like a pinball on steroids.
I leaned forward on the table. She pulled back again like you do when a crazy person gets too close.
“You have a boyfriend?” I think I was very loud.
She nodded. “I’m so sorry. I should never have —”
She stopped. The burgers had arrived. Why is it when you want the service to be slow, they set a Guinness record for getting the food to your table?
“Did you want ketchup or anything?”
I looked up at the server. “She has a boyfriend.”
“I know,” she answered. “Everyone in the restaurant knows.”
I spun around again, this time looking at the people. A lot of them were looking at us. Others were pretending not to. Okay, so apparently my reaction to Jen’s announcement had
been a little over the top.
“No, thank you. No ketchup,” I whispered.
I knew I wasn’t handling this well, but I hadn’t had much practice.
“So … so what was the other night all about?”
A sip of Coke. “Nate, I like you. I really do. And the other night we were having fun and I … kind of got carried away. We … my boyfriend and I had this huge fight just before I left to come here. And I guess I thought we were done … or at least I thought I could see other guys, or … I don’t know what I thought.”
I didn’t know what to do with my face. Pissed off? Devastated? Shocked? Some combination of all of those?
“Anyway, the day after you and I went out, he called me and we sort of got back together. Well, not right away, but he called and texted when I was in Hanoi, and I guess the bottom line is Roger and I, we’re back togeth —”
“Roger? Your boyfriend’s name is Roger?”
“And I told him —”
“Nobody has a boyfriend named Roger.”
“You are being a total jerk about this. I told him that there was this guy who tried to make it with me and —”
“I tried to make it with you?” Okay, for a while I’d been trying to keep it together, but I have to admit I kind of lost it right there.
The server came hustling over. “Sir, you must keep your voice down, please.”
I held my hands out in front of me. “Sorry.” I looked around the room at the other diners. “I’m sorry. Really.”
“Thank you, sir,” the server said.
“Excuse me…” I looked at her nametag. It read Lo. “Lo, do you have a boyfriend?”
She stepped back. I knew I was being rude asking a stranger a personal question like that. But I kind of didn’t care about manners right at that moment. “Seriously, Lo, do you have a boyfriend?”
The girl looked down at the floor, then back up at me and smiled. “Yes,” she said.
“And what is his name?”
She hesitated but finally said, “Van Loc. Loc.”
“Loc,” I repeated. “Not Roger.” I turned to Jen. “See, not Roger.”
Old Man Page 16
