Lucky Child (5 page)

From the white sheet, Minnie stares up at me with her wet eyes and pleads for friends. As I begin to draw her some friends, Eang’s voice booms above me. I lift my head to see her standing in my closet’s doorway, my tan cotton curtain all bunched up in her hand.

“What are you doing?” she demands, sounding irritated.

“Drawing,” I reply nonchalantly.

“I’ve been calling you for the past fifteen minutes. Didn’t you hear me?”

I want to scream out,
Of course I heard you! No amount of banging pots and pans can mute the shrill sound of your voice!
But instead, I cast my eyes down and say, “I’m sorry.”

“All right,” she sighs. “Come help me clean the house. The McNultys will be here soon to pick us up for a barbeque at their house. We don’t want them to think we live in a messy house.”

“Can I have fifteen minutes? I want to pick up my closet first.”

“Oh, all right.” With another resigned sigh, she exits my space.

I drag the curtain across the copper rod and shut myself in again. I close my sketch pad and lay it on the floor, then fold up the metal chair and lean it against the wall. Picking up a clothes hanger from the ground, I hang it on a wooden rod stretched across the back of the closet. Next to the other skeletal hangers, my one white shirt, now wrinkled and slightly stained, looks lonely and sad. I pull out a drawer where I store my few sets of clothes and gently place my drawing in among them. Above the drawers, on one shelf, I adjust my small rectangular standing mirror, straightening out my comb, brush, and pencil box so that they line up evenly next to one another, careful not to knock over the glass of water nearby. On another shelf, I pick up stray bobby pins, rubber bands, and safety pins and put them in a wooden bowl already filled with colorful ribbons for my hair.

I pick out a red ribbon and smooth it between my thumb and index finger. As the silky satin glides over my skin, my mind travels back to Cambodia where for four years we lived without colors and wore only the official Khmer Rouge black pants and shirts. The soldiers said that sporting colorful clothes separates people and breeds contempt and distrust among its citizens. They warned that children who longed for a red skirt, pink shirt, or blue pants were vain, and therefore had to have their vanity beaten
out of them. I wonder what the soldiers would say if they saw my bowl of colorful ribbons. Whatever they would say, I hope they spew their words from their dead lips and decomposed flesh. I tie a red ribbon in my hair, thinking how happy I am to be in America.

It seems so strange sometimes that I have lived in America for two weeks now. And even though I have learned to live with the ghosts and spirits next door, at dusk each night I still take out my pen and mark Xs on my heels and ankles before the sun hides completely behind the mountains. Under the blanket, with Mickey, Minnie, and the gang on top of me, I escape to a troublesome and restless sleep. In the morning before Meng and Eang see me, I rush to the bathroom and scrub off my Xs so they will not scold me for being crazy. But sometimes we are surprised with an early visit from one of our sponsors and I have to resort to other means to erase the Xs.

One such surprise arrived on our second day in Vermont when we were awakened by a loud knock on the door. While Meng went down to open the door, I groggily rushed into my closet and changed out of my pajamas and into my brown shirt and pants. I cleared my throat and attempted to spit but my mouth was dry; instead of saliva, a glob of mucus landed on my palm. I smeared it over my ankles and rubbed out my Xs. I fumbled for the comb and brushed down my fly-away hair before securing it down with bobby pins. Finished with my primping, I hurriedly left my closet to make my bed.

All the while, the cheerful lady huffed up the stairs, explaining to Meng that she was a member of the parish from the Holy Family Church that sponsored our family to America. Meng smiled and thanked her. She then walked into our kitchen and proceeded to show us how to operate the stove, oven, and refrigerator. Crossing the kitchen to the sink, she opened our cabinets and pulled out a mug. She explained that it is used to drink tea or coffee. She then pointed to cups, bowls, and plates, and with each item, she told us what they are used for. When she got to the new tableware set, she instructed us that for everyday use, we were to use the old set; we were to use the new set when we have guests. By the end of her speech, Meng and Eang’s faces were tight and their smiles forced.

When the sponsor lady left, I asked Meng why so many people assume
we don’t know about such things as fine china and cups. Yes, it was true that during the Khmer Rouge regime, our plate sets and silverware consisted mostly of coconut shells, banana leaves, our fingers, and our table was the rice fields. But before the war, our family sat for dinner at our big mahogany table and high-backed teak chairs while our house help served us food on fine china. Young as I am, I felt my ego bend like a bamboo tree each time the lady picked up another item, until in the end the reed was too heavy with burden and snapped, causing my face to darken and my eyes to harden.

“These people know nothing! They think we’re backward villagers and peasants!” I blurted out.

Meng bent down to my level. His eyes bulged and his head expanded with hot air so that he resembled a praying mantis. He ordered me to be quiet.

“These people have busy lives. They don’t have to help us at all but they do, so you be grateful.” His voice low, he continued. “They may only know about Cambodia’s war and poverty. They have no way of knowing we once came from a high-class family. Without them we wouldn’t be here, so unless you want to return to Cambodia, you better show them gratitude.” With that, he turned and left me. Ashamed and embarrassed, I vowed to be nicer and more grateful, and not complain anymore.

The next day, Michael Vincenti returned carrying a small, nine-inch TV. I followed on his heels and watched him set the TV down on the coffee table in the living room. As he pushed the plug into the wall, I bounced on the couch and waited for the magic pictures to appear. A few seconds later, the TV buzzed like a thousand bees, and black-and-white lines swam across the screen. Fascinated, I stared at Michael’s fingers as they fumbled with the knobs and dials until finally a clear voice came through and with it a cartoon cat chasing after a little mouse. I clasped my hands together in a praying gesture and glued my eyes to the magic box.

For the next two weeks, the sponsor visitors kept arriving, each time to give us new life lessons on everything from how to take a bus to the grocery store to operating the machines to wash our clothes at the Laundromat. In between these visits Sarah, our English tutor, would come to our home to teach us the English language. In her mid-twenties, Sarah was
all smiles and big eyes that looked buggy behind her thick glasses. Each day, she would sit across from Meng, Eang, and me at our kitchen table and play cards with us. From her old cloth bag, she would retrieve her cards and teach us Go Fish and Memory. Each time we flipped a card, we would repeat the word after her. After we finished with our games, Sarah would take out of her bag many books with bright pictures of the rooms in the house, numbers, and letters. She would point to the various pictures or numbers and ask us to repeat after her.

As nice as Sarah is, I am happy when it’s time for her to leave because it means I can turn on the TV. Although I don’t understand the reason, Meng and Eang have a very strict policy that while there are guests in the house the TV must be turned off. This makes for many awkward and silent visits with our guest peppering Meng with questions as Eang and I sit silently nearby. Sometimes, a visitor looks in my direction and I smile, pretending to pay attention to words I do not understand. While the adults talk, in my mind’s eyes I flatten, pull, stretch, and reshape their human faces into cartoon characters. A man with a big nose becomes a pig, a round face turns into a monkey, and a thin-lipped person transforms into a chicken. At times, I have a whole farm of animal people, all of them pecking, hissing, or spitting noises at me as I nod my head in reply.

When we have no visitors, I stay in my closet; outside, the sun makes the white people brown, the birds chirp their wake-up song, and the clouds roll by as soft as cotton balls across the blue sky. At three, I leave my closet and turn on the TV in time to hear the familiar Looney Tunes theme. Then for an hour I follow Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, and Tweety Bird as they chase, kill, and bash one another without bloodshed or anybody getting hurt. In shows where a cartoon character dies, it usually comes back to life in the next episode or flies up to heaven with its tiny white wings while strumming a harp.

Each time the Road Runner comes on, I hope for the coyote to catch the bird and sink its teeth into the bird’s long neck. After all, I reason, the coyote isn’t being mean; it is hungry and only wants something to eat. If I could create a show, I’d draw the Road Runner plucked of its feathers and hanging on a hook, all naked and skinny. Slowly, I would deep-fry the bird in hot grease until it was golden and crispy. Then the coyote and I would crunch on it, bones and all, like it was a pheasant.

The days I don’t think about deep-frying the bird, I daydream about roasting the pig, barbequing the duck, and steaming the fish. This usually means that I need to fill my stomach with chips and cookies until the next mealtime. With my stomach full, I sit in front of the TV lost in a world where everything is light, silly, and young again. In the evening, when there are no more cartoons to keep me company, I tune in to the Brady family and laugh at their antics. Although I cannot understand their words, the largeness of their family and their crowded house make me feel less alone in mine. For half an hour each night, I live their lives and enjoy their family bonding and sibling rivalries. Watching them, I am taken back to a time and place when I, too, was part of a large family. But now, I am the only child of Meng and Eang.

As much as I like the show, I sometimes fantasize about beating up the Brady girls. In my mind, I lift their stick figures up in the air, their golden hair flowing like silk threads over my shoulders as I send them crashing on my knee, snapping them like dry old twigs. I think of doing this not to hurt them but to save them. In my mind, I worry that if fighting suddenly erupts in America, many of its frail citizens with their weaknesses will not survive. And I want them to live because it is so much harder to see them die. I know that in my new home, there is no war, hunger, or soldiers to be afraid of. Yet in the quiet recesses of my mind, the Khmer Rouge lurks and hovers in dark alleys, waiting for me at the bend of every corner. No matter how far I run, I cannot escape the dread that they have followed me to America.

To escape the soldiers, I sometimes find myself in a field not far from our apartment. With my hair loose and free, I run through elephant grass as tall as my thighs until I come to a brook. The sound of the gurgling water soothes and relaxes my mind, shutting out the thoughts of war. On the edge of the rushing stream stands a tree that reaches up high into the heavens with branches that dip toward the earth. I run and wrap my arms around its trunk, pressing my body against its hard bark. My eyes closed, I imagine Chou on the other side, her cheek smashed against the tree, her fingers reaching out for mine the way she used to when we were together. When I open my eyes, Chou is not there and my mind races to find her, wherever she is.

As I focus my thoughts on Chou, in the kitchen Eang is being noisier than ever.

“Loung! Come help me clean the kitchen!” Eang wakes me from my daydreaming. I ignore her call.

“Loung, come help me now!” she yells.

In the past few months, I’d noticed that Eang had been more impatient and spent a lot of time throwing up in the bathroom. Then last week, while Meng waited quietly outside our apartment, Eang told me that she was pregnant and that the baby will come in December. I burst out laughing then because I now knew the reason for her bloated face and bad moods.

“All right! I’m coming!”

I turn around and survey my closet to make sure all is neat and orderly. In my sanctuary, my world is decorated with a single picture—a drawing I made of Mickey holding Minnie’s hand. Pulling the curtain open, I enter the big world.

A short time later, Joe McNulty arrives to take us to a barbeque at his house. At forty, Joe is a big Irish-Italian man of few words. Lumbering a head taller than Meng, Joe stands as strong as a tree and has a spirit as clean as the earth. Behind his thick glasses, his kind eyes inquire about our well-being and his hands are always ready to help fix anything broken.

At his house, Lisa McNulty swings open the door to greet us. Stationed regally near her feet, two gray fat fur balls with beady eyes regard us with suspicion before deciding we aren’t interesting enough and saunter back inside.

“Welcome! Welcome to our home!” Lisa walks toward us.

Whereas her husband, Joe, is quiet and reserved, Lisa is a fast-talking, animated Italian woman with an easy manner and infectious laugh. Standing almost as tall as Joe, Lisa dispenses motherly energy to everything she touches. And thus her garden blooms, her husband grows, her daughter sprouts, and her cats multiply. Beside her, strutting confidently toward us, is their daughter, Ahn. Now thirteen, Ahn was only eight when she left the orphanage in South Korea and traveled by herself to America to live with her new mom and dad. Five years later, Ahn possesses the bright smile and kind eyes of a well-loved child.

As Lisa beckons us into her home, Ahn runs up to me and grabs my hands. Pulling me into her garden, she talks excitedly and points to the six
cats in her yard. Her hands mime that they’re all hers. Before we can escape, Lisa stops us and whips out her camera. She then takes one picture after another of our family before asking Joe to take one of just the two of us.

With her arms around my shoulders, Lisa tells me how pretty I look. Eang laughs and explains that I chose my own outfit. As Joe aims his camera at us, I run my finger through my hair, tucking a piece behind my ear and beam at the compliment. After four years of living under Khmer Rouge rule, I now wear only brightly colored clothes.