LONTAR issue #2 (10 page)

"I thought it moved," she explained innocently.

"You have to be careful, Quyên. Em trai will be very small and delicate when he emerges into the world. You have to help protect him." Má said as she continued sewing the holes in Ba's shirts. Quyên made a face when Má wasn't looking

"How do you know it's a boy?"

"I feel him sometimes, in my dreams," Má said with a smile. Her fingers never stopped knitting the two frayed edges of the fabric together.
 

"I don't want an ugly boy! I don't want Em at all! What's wrong with the way things are now?" Quyên said, staring at the ground.
 

"Oh Quyên, you'll feel differently when he's here. I know you, my little stubborn one, your heart will melt."

"No it won't, it won't, it won't! I won't ever love him!"

Quyên found herself rocking forwards and put her hands out just in time to stop her head from hitting the water elephant's. The mongoose jumped from her shoulder, holding a golden orb filled with opaque liquid that warped and writhed. It held the orb up for her to inspect and Quyên could just about see her infantile face shouting defiantly at her pregnant Má. It must have only been weeks later when Má died.
 

"Take it," she said. The mongoose nodded and gobbled down the memory like it was a snake's egg. Quyên pulled the bangle around her wrist but all she could feel was the grip of a manacle.

A ky lân stepped forward with its horns of green and gold. It had delicate hooves that danced on the air and a tail made of fire that swung round and kept others at a distance. Despite all this, Quyên could only stare at the beautiful dress it held carefully in its mouth, an
áo dài
in sky blue silk with silver lotuses embroidered around the hem, and matching white trousers. She took it carefully from the ky lân's grasp and felt the soft fabric flow like water from her touch. The ky lân's mouth was upturned like the merchant who knew he had a captive customer. Quyên didn't even attempt to haggle, and reached out her hand willingly to make the exchange.

She remembered scuffing stones into a corner. The sole of her sandal had started to split like a panting dog's mouth, but Bà noi said she would have to be patient until next month or go barefooted. Quyên wouldn't have minded going without shoes except the other children already teased her about having no Má, and she didn't want another reason to be mocked at school.
 

"Pass me the string please," her Ba said from behind her. She huffed and stalked across the room to his tin of repair tools and back. Ba didn't look up once, just put his hand out and mumbled thanks when she slapped the reel of string into it with all of her strength. He just kept on searching the fishing net for gaps.

"I'd be more useful on the boats with you anyway," she began as if they had never stopped the argument for dinner and then for bed the night before. "I don't see the point in school. Mr Truong just drills us and then falls asleep."

"Mr Truong cycles an hour a day to teach our children and the only payment he is given is a free lunch."

"Well if I don't go to school, you won't have to feed him and we'd all be better off!"

"Quyên," Ba warned.
 

"If I was a boy you'd let me come!"

"Quyên!" Ba looked up this time and she knew he was angry. Still, she refused to take it back. She just stood there with her shoulders and fists clenched, wanting him to hit or shout at her so she'd have a reason to push back. "One day you'll understand," he said finally. He returned to the net and she knew then what she would do that night when they were asleep. She would cut through those carefully mended gaps, just enough so that it would seem like bad luck rather than malicious work. She would do it even though it would mean a hard week for them all.
 

The ky lân looked at her as it swallowed the memory and for the first time Quyên felt shame. She clutched the dress to her breast and buried her face in it until the creature left. Over her head and round her waist she tied the new clothes that were too big for her twelve year old frame; besides, there was no mirror up here in which to see herself, no one she knew to whom to show off.
 

The floating market continued to gravitate towards her with their wares but she shook her head. Quyên was tired now and urged the water elephant to take her home. Her new jewellery jangled like she was a queen and she longed for a mirror to gaze at herself. The elephant ignored her, hovering as immovably still as a forest giant. A catfish larger than a dog sallied towards them with a red dancing fan dangling from its whiskers.
 

"I'm not sure there's anything sweet to find in here but you can look anyway," she said. With that, the fish brought up an unencumbered whisker and touched her forehead with it.

She remembered that the basket of coconuts was heavy but every time she let them drag on the ground, Bà noi shouted at her and she had to heft the strap further up her shoulder. She glared at her grandmother's back and resented the beads of sweat pouring down her face and neck. So what if the old woman was carrying two baskets to her one, she had decades of experience! If only Quyên could be allowed one of those coconuts and its sweet water to enjoy in the shade, she would be able to walk at double the speed with enthusiasm, of that she was certain. But they were all earmarked for market and Bà noi had looked horrified when she had suggested it earlier.
 

They had cleared most of the jungle and were on one of the dirt paths when they could see a commotion in the village. A crowd of people had gathered and some of them were shouting at each other. Bà noi seemed unfazed, plodding on and taking a route that would detour them around the throng. Quyên strained to hear the crux of the argument but her grandmother had gained a sudden spurt of energy and was practically sprinting to their hut.
 

Quyên was not therefore expecting her to stop suddenly. She bumped up against the old woman's back and was surprised to not be greeted with the usual curt comment. Bà noi stared down at the ground, muttering very softly as she shook her head. Quyên peered around her and saw Thuan the water buffalo lying on his side, breathing shallowly. Flies buzzed around his nose and eyes but the beast didn't care and let them crawl over his face. Those ribs that she remembered from the bruising on her thighs, were nothing more than bare branches and Quyên knew straight away that the water buffalo was dying.

One of their neighbours walked unhurried towards the buffalo with a pan of water. "He collapsed at midday," she explained as she crouched beside the beast and coaxed it to drink. "D
ươ
ng had already told us to rest him because of the sprained leg but ah, on his last legs and only 10 years old? Maybe the sky will bring us the money to replace him because harvest is going to be difficult this year."

Bà noi made a sympathetic noise and shook her head. "Well someone must have decided he could work just a little bit more, eh? It's always the way that selfishness destroys our community. Quyên?"
 

The girl blinked at her name, fearing that she had been given away. But no, Bà noi was just querying why her granddaughter's feet had started subconsciously shuffling away.
 

Quyên blinked and saw the memory in front of her in a bubble of golden viscous dew at the end of the catfish's whisker. The fish teased it out as simply as brushing her hair and curled it close to its mouth. Another whisker curled out and dropped the fan on her lap.

"Yes," Quyên said. "Have it!"

The catfish inhaled her memory through its gills. Quyên waved the fan before her face but the breeze it mustered did little to cool the red of her cheeks. "Water elephant, take me home now, please." But the elephant was distracted by a baby water elephant that wove clumsily in between its feet and reached a trunk up to be petted. Quyên realized at once in her heart that it was the same baby water elephant she had met before. She just knew this fact with certain dread,
 
even though she could not explain what she feared.
 

The baby elephant butted the older elephant playfully until the adult gave a gentle kick. It uncurled its trunk and offered Quyên a carved lacquer box. Curiosity overcame the girl and she took it, opening the lid to find a treasure trove that made her salivate: spiced pork bao, tapioca and coconut pudding, sticky sweet rice, sesame balls, rice flour dumplings, and candied nuts. All of the sweet things she loved that her grandmother had neither the time nor money to prepare. It was a glorious feast. And she knew without being told that the box was magical; it would give her desserts and sweets freshly made whenever she desired. Quyên held out her arm for the trade.

She remembered Bà noi tripping over the pot of water. The clatter of plates and pans that fell as she tried to keep her balance. The way her sandal did a little flip backwards as it fell from her foot. Quyên ran to her grandmother's side and put her hand on the woman's arm.

"Stupid girl... Leave...floor?" Bà noi muttered under her breath as she sat up, hand pressed against her right hip. The right side of her face looked like it had melted and then frozen into place.

"Are you okay?" Quyên asked, biting back the retort about how neither she nor Ba had managed to fall over the pot.
 

"Yes, yes...you...fall I never." She did not, however, brush off Quyên's arm a second time as she gingerly came to her feet. Bà noi was crooked and she trailed her right leg like a lame bird who'd managed to escape from the jaws of a dog. She had to go lie down for a moment, then an hour, then the rest of the night, until Quyên had done all the chores and made them dinner as well. When Ba came home, Bà noi tried to get up but she wobbled halfway across the room in a drunken stagger before Ba forced her back to bed. He made Bà noi show him the spot on her right hip that had swollen up. Ba talked about going to the herbalist but the old woman shook her head, took his hand and smiled the way old people did when they thought youngsters were being silly.

Quyên remembered tiptoeing around the house, carrying water from the river, burning meals and putting up with the incessant low moaning that came from the back of the room. At first, she checked on her grandmother every hour with some water and a query until the old woman snapped at her to leave her in peace. So it became twice a day to wipe her brow with a cold towel and coax her to eat a little rice soup. The back corner of their hut seemed to darken even on the sunniest days. A shadow lingered there along with a growing smell of mould and sourness.

Ba held Quyên's hands for the first time in years and explained that there was a strong chance it would just be the two of them soon. She asked if that meant she would have to do the foraging, harvesting, cooking and cleaning all by herself. She asked him if she could quit school now. She asked him if he would miss Bà noi as much as Má. She asked him if it was her or grandmother that had stopped him getting remarried. At that, Ba slapped her.

And she remembered looking over Bà noi as she slept that morning. In her cocoon of sheets, she was not intimidating, strong or fierce as Quyên normally saw her. Her face was still crooked and a silvery saliva trail had escaped down the side of her mouth. She was grotesque, Quyên realised. Like a baby who needed to be cared for, except she would never grow up now.
 

What would it be like just to end it peacefully for them all? She was certain that Bà noi would want her to do it. Who wanted to get old and infirm and have to raise a child a second time when you were already done with your own? Who wanted to carry heavy bags on stooped shoulders every day until they slowly ground you into the dirt? She looked at her hands and wondered if they were strong enough to grip around her grandmother's neck until the air stopped filling her body. Or take one of the kitchen knives and make a clean slit like Ba gutting fish. She stared at the lines in her palms and the calluses forming on her fingertips until they started to shake.

Then Quyên grabbed her hat and the baskets of basil and left the hut. She turned her back on the rasping breath in the back corner of the hut and thought in a tiny voice, deep inside her where no one would ever hear it: perhaps, if she stopped keeping watch, the old woman would just go on her own.
 

The baby elephant held the memory at the end of its trunk. This one was larger than any of the previous orbs. And whilst the rest had glittered golden and dewy, this one was cloudy and lacklustre. The baby elephant brought it closer to inspect and Quyên grabbed onto its trunk suddenly, slipping from her elephant's back to wrest it from the baby.

"No, no, you can't have it, I want it back! Please, let me take it back!" The box of sweets spilled off her lap and fell down into the endless blue of the sky below her, vanishing as though it had never existed. The baby water elephant had opened its mouth and was curling the trunk in to consume the orb. "Em!" Quyên yelled. The water elephant stopped and gave her its full attention. "I'm sorry, em, I've not been the best sister, daughter or granddaughter. But I want to try. Please, let me try!"

The adult water elephant's trunk came down softly and patted Quyên on the head. Then it knocked the baby gently until the memory orb dropped down from its trunk. Without thinking, Quyên jumped down after it.