Quan Barry - She Weeps Each Time You're Born

He had learned about the baby from another man living in the jungle. He didn’t know the man. There had been no joy in the telling. The man had simply said the women in the markets east of the Song Ma say you will be a father. When Tu had looked around in the darkness at the other faces climbing up into the trees for the night, all he had seen was fatigue. All night he lay in his hammock worrying he’d be shot — his face beaming, his happiness radiating outward like a beacon.

An hour after his small dinner of tapioca he could hear someone coming through the elephant grass toward the tamarind tree. A head popped up out of the brush. The sun’s fading light reddened the landscape. It was a young girl, her hair in uneven braids. The girl pointed up at him. Uncle, she said, and smiled. Her front tooth was missing, the head of the new tooth just starting to break the skin. The time for daydreaming was long over, the birthmark on his face as if on fire. Tu shimmied down out of the tree and began to run.

From Cong Heo it was twenty miles to the river and then another two to the hamlet. It was the night of the full moon; he would be easy to spot regardless. He figured she was probably too big to move easily, though Vietnamese women had a way of working in the paddies right up until the moment arrived. The last time he’d seen her was by the Song Ma, her face still as a statue’s and impossible to read. He wondered if she were angry. He had promised he’d be home well before this, and here it was almost three full seasons, more than eight months.

After only a few miles on the road, he saw an American convoy speeding his way. His first impulse when he saw the dust billowing up in the distance was to get off the road without being seen, but by then it was too late. He knew he’d been spotted. Running would only make him look suspicious. The first two trucks whooshed by. He had to close his eyes and cover his nose, the dust was so thick, so fortuitous.

It wasn’t until a series of jeeps began to pass that one of them stopped. There was an American driver with an important-looking man sitting in the passenger seat, the man’s silvery hair cropped close around his head, the cut so sharp Tu imagined it would draw blood if he touched it. The man didn’t have on any of the colorful bars the American officers wore around their own bases, which made Tu realize how important he was — only those of high rank needed to hide who they were. In the backseat, a Vietnamese soldier sat next to a haggard-looking Vietnamese man in the loose black clothing of a peasant, the man’s hands tied together.

Ask him where he’s going, said the driver. The Vietnamese soldier cleared his throat. In the fading light Tu could see there was something unbalanced about the soldier’s eyes. The right one was brown, the left a pale blue. It was unsettling. Tu tried not to stare.

Grandfather. The soldier cleared his throat again. Where is the road taking you today? Tu wondered who the soldier was talking to. It wasn’t until much later when he saw himself in the Song Ma that he realized he looked like an old man. His entire head of hair had been dusted white by the passing trucks.

Em , Tu said, as if he were the soldier’s elder. The words came effortlessly to him. I am going to see the medicine man who lives by the Song Ma. I must have medicine for my heart. The soldier tried to hide his incredulousness. Grandfather, that’s almost twenty miles. I must have it, repeated Tu. The soldier let out a long sigh and lowered his voice. Please ask him to say a prayer for all of us, he said, his blue eye gleaming like a marble. Tu looked at the prisoner. There was a thin red line of blood running from the corner of his mouth.

Tell him to be inside by nightfall, said the important-looking man in the passenger seat. The soldier coughed again. Ong , please be safely beside the fire before sundown. Tu nodded. Make sure he got that, the American added, but they were already driving away.

The sun had set, the air still humid. Tu was more than a mile down the road by the time the jeep came back, headlights off. This time it was the Vietnamese soldier driving by himself, in the darkness his blue eye reflective like a cat’s. I will take you to the river, the soldier said, and nodded to the back. Tu climbed in. They didn’t talk the entire way.

The full moon was just starting to rise. Tu could see the rabbit stamped on its face. In the backseat he put his hand down in a pool of something. He sniffed his fingers, then wiped the blood on his shirt.

The soldier pulled over at the edge of the river. Though he gripped the steering wheel attentively in his hands, he seemed tired, as if he’d had enough. Everywhere insects chirred in the tall grass. The soldier kept the jeep idling. Brother, he said as Tu climbed out. Please remember me in your prayers. Tu swung the door closed. Even in his weariness the soldier’s blue eye burned bright. Then he turned the jeep around and headed back in the dark.

They were squatting by the river in the shadows of ash when he stumbled on them. They used to be houses, growled the old woman. Tu hadn’t noticed her sitting there. In the moonlight he could see that her teeth were a deep red from chewing betel. Beside her was a young girl who looked to be barely in her teens. The girl was obviously demented but with a savage beauty Tu found startling. She raised a dirty arm and pointed, her long hair rippling over her shoulder. On the other side of the river he could see a boat bobbing in the current. Despite the girl’s looks, he didn’t feel any shame. Qui, hissed the old woman, but the girl didn’t look away, her eyes shining as Tu took off his clothes.

When he was done undressing, he walked down the bank and into the water. Instantly his feet disappeared. For a moment he wondered why they called it the Song Ma, the River of Dreams. The water was a deep nut-red and warm on his skin, the river still swollen from the recent monsoons. Then something startled him, and he drew back. He looked again. Staring up at him from the surface of the Song Ma was an old man, hair dusted white as death. Then Tu saw the birthmark on the edge of the old man’s hairline, the thing shining bright like a bloodstain. Feverishly he ran both hands through his hair before dipping his head in the muddied water as if his life depended on it.

He was across in less than ten minutes. He wasn’t a strong swimmer, but the current seemed listless despite the water’s swollen level. On the other side he crawled up onshore. Everywhere there was the smell of burning, the water like voices whispering. Quickly he got in the boat and began pulling himself back across to where the two women stood waiting. He didn’t know where they were headed, but he couldn’t leave them stranded. As he neared the other shore and gazed on the burned huts dotting the riverbank, he thought of the little girl and her grandfather, the fisherman who’d been killed in the fire. He wondered what happened to the silvery bird the man was always seen with, the bird as if carved from ice.

When he arrived back where he’d started, the women were still huddled in the shadows. There is nothing over there, he said to the old woman, nothing but death. At the word death the feral girl clamored into the boat. Tu was panting but not from exertion, the image of himself as an old man still in his mind. The old woman handed him his clothes and crawled in next to the girl. Even with the added weight the boat rode high in the water.

Crossing the river with the two women, Tu thought of hell and the childhood stories of the places that befell the body after life. He pulled the rope as hard as he could. If they capsized — he wouldn’t let himself think of it. The underworld was said to be a festering blister, the darkness so cold it turned the skin blue. When he looked back across the river, he thought he could see someone standing on the shore they had just come from, the figure small like a child, its hair in braids.