By Nguyen Danh Lam

My father placed a bunch of bananas between the two graves of my grandparents, then planted several burning joss sticks in front of their tombstones and bowed down to them.

"Respected souls of Dad and Mum! You must lie here without our frequent care, for my family's about to move to a new economic zone far away," he prayed softly.

It was a dull winter afternoon, and a cold wind was blowing gently over the surface of the rice fields.

"Offer blessings for your grandparents' souls, my son," he urged me.

I bowed my head to pay homage to them and burst into tears.

When I returned home, Mr Tac, our next-door neighbour, was standing with my father by the persimmon tree my grandfather had planted in our courtyard years ago.

"We'll be provided with five vans for the 13 households of our village leaving in the first wave, then we'll catch a southbound train. Better sell your heavy belongings," he advised my father.

Mr Tac's daughter Mam smiled at me, showing her decayed teeth.

"Coi, come with us!" Mam exclaimed.

"Dad, can we share a van with Mr Tac's family?" I asked.

"I can't think about that right now," my father snapped.

***

I woke up to Mam calling, "Coi! Get up and catch fish with me. My brother Ca's already caught two baskets of fish." I got up, shivering as a cold draft blew in.

"Last night two more water buffaloes died of the cold," Mum told me as I was leaving.

"People say it won't be cold where we’re going," I replied. According to rumour, everything in that faraway dreamland was perfect.

***

The next morning at 3am, five vans reached the entrance to our village. The village came to life, resounding with cries and the sounds of colliding trunks and boxes as they were loaded onto the vehicles. With a newly-carved top in my hand I searched for Mam in the crowd, but she was nowhere to be found.

"Mam! Mam!" I shouted myself hoarse.

"Get into the van at once. You might find her when we get there," Mum reprimanded me, dragging me onto one of the waiting vehicles. I fought the urge to cry. My mother had grabbed my hand so violently that my gift for Mam had fallen into the pond and vanished into its waters.

The five vans started off at sunrise. I sat by a window and watched things go by, one after another. "Goodbye to our myrtle trees, thatch houses and water buffaloes ploughing the rice fields," I said to myself.

"Mum, will we come back here again?" I asked.

"God knows!" she answered, her eyes brimming with tears. I was told to shut the window because of the thick, cold mist. My little sister Quat slept soundly in the lap of my father, who had not slept at all that night.

By the following night, we had reached the outskirts of the city. An ebullient mood came over the passengers on our van. We kids crowded by the windows to examine the strange new world outside.

It was the first time I had ever seen a big city. "Nothing special! Just old trucks going to and fro and people wearing dull-coloured clothes, under a gloomy sky," I said to myself.

One of the adults loudly suggested, "Tonight let's put all our luggage together, so the teenagers can lie around it and the women and kids can sleep on the trunks and bundles of clothes."

In the station, we kids were concentrated in one place and told not to move. Suddenly, I saw Mam getting off of a vehicle in front of me.

"Mam! Mam!" I shouted.

She stared at me. Her eyes looked vacant; her complexion pale. I proceeded towards her, asking, "What's the matter with you?" She remained silent.

That night I did not sleep well due partly to the cold air and the wet platform and partly to my homesickness. I crawled out of the blanket, causing some trunks under me to creak noisily. Mum opened her eyes and pulled me into her lap. I looked for Mam, but she was nowhere to be seen.

Perhaps 20m away, I saw a few boys with black caps nearly covering their faces, their hands in their pockets, going around our piles of pillows, blankets and mosquito netting, but then I fell asleep again. I awoke to find the whole platform thronged with other villagers.

We boarded one of the dozens of cars, like a series of chicken coops clinging to each other, and our train began its long journey, tearing through the veil of mist.

Mam had kept silent since the early morning. I didn't know why, and I didn't know how to start up a conversation with her.

The train came to a stop. A strange stretch of land under an overcast sky spread far and wide in front of us.

"Don't be angry with me any longer," I said to her when she passed by me. She only smiled. "What happened to you last night?"

"Nothing," she replied. "I got carsick, that's all." I sighed, relieved.

"Why are you wearing that thin blouse in such cold weather?" I asked.

"My clothes are in the mess of trunks and bundles at the back of the carriage."

"I'll fetch some for you, OK?"

Mam and I moved aside several heavy trunks and managed to find her box.

"This place is warmer and more comfortable than where we were. Let's stay here until the end of our trip," I suggested.

She nodded. Sitting side by side under a thick blanket we talked for a long time until we fell asleep. When I woke up I found her leaning against me, snoring slightly. I was a bit embarrassed at first, but also very happy.

While the adults were engrossed in their worries, we kids were free to play our games. Mam and I stayed at the back of our carriage amid the mass of blankets and mosquito nets. I told her to keep our place secret, and she agreed.

I was 13; she was 12. Each of us had our own secret as well. Sometimes I would be bold enough to embrace her, and she would not object.

***

The next day, we arrived at a large green stretch of woodlands lying between expanses of yellow grass spreading as far as the eye could see. I had never seen anything like it.

From the train, once again we were transferred to vans. After half a day's travelling on a bumpy road, we came to a lush forest. I asked Dad when we would reach our destination, but he just looked out the window.

"This kind of soil's very fertile," he whispered.

Perhaps he was dreaming of the bumper crops he would have when he was free to farm in the new land. The road was getting narrower and climbing higher and higher.

"The farther we go, the freer we become and the easier it will be to work our fields," a man remarked loudly. It had been half a day since we had passed a town, but on the roadside plots of land we could see scattered huts.

Early the next morning, we could see no trace of civilisation. Surrounding us were vast plots of grasses that grew higher than humans. Here the breeze was cool but not cold like the draft in our native town. The headlights of our vehicles penetrated the dark, making the wild animals' eyes glow as bright as torch lights. Everything seemed like a dream.

The head of our group ordered all the vehicles to stop. He began to introduce us to the new environment, speaking as though he'd been there before.

"There's a big river nearby, in addition to numerous streams and brooks, so we'll always have enough water for our crops. 

It was then the thick of the dry season, but plants and trees were still very green and lush. If we would unintentionally toss a burning match into the dry grass it would burst into flames that would last for days on end, giving us lots of land ready for cultivation.

Every household was temporarily allotted a piece of land for sowing seeds. Later, land for homes and fields would be distributed appropriately. A new village was thus formed with temporarily rigged-up huts. For us children, those were happy days because we didn't have to go to school. Except for our minor household chores in the daytime, we could play to our hearts' content.

Mam was in charge of washing clothes for her whole family. Every day, she took a large basket full of dirty clothes to a stream nearby, and I usually went along with her, without my parents knowing. After a while, her drenched garments would become nearly transparent. I tried to avoid her discovering my practice, but one day I was caught red-handed eyeing her newly-developed breasts and rosy nipples. Immediately, she plunged into the water.

"You'd go home if I were having a bath; it's shameful to watch girls bathing," she scolded me. I awkwardly stumbled ashore. When I reached the top of the bank, I heard her call, "Dear Coi, I was only kidding. Now get down here and take a bath with me."

I rushed down. She was standing in the middle of the stream, arms folded in front of her breasts, hair flowing down to her shoulders, pink lips alluring. That night I had an experience both enjoyable and horrible, which I did not dare disclose to anyone.

***

Hunger came over us gradually, like a black cloud, and ruined our fleeting moments of happiness. Water was scarce; the seeds would not grow. We resorted to eating plants from the forest, destroying the forest brush in the process.

Though scavenging in the forest kept us from starving, it came with its own hazards. The death of Ca, Mam's 16-year-old brother, was the first tragedy. He had taken his knife and gone into the forest alone to look for food. Ordinarily he would have gone with his father, but that day his father had been running a high fever and was unable to go with his son to help him. When Ca did not come back home by late in the evening, villagers with torches in hand set out in search of him. At last, his body, swollen and black and blue, was discovered lying curled up, with the marks of the bite of a venomous snake on his face.

"Dear Ca! Why did you have to die like this?" Mam cried. Her parents fainted when they heard the news. The next day, Ca was buried on the peak of a hill. I took over Ca's role of taking care of Mam.

The ground dried up under the scorching sun and wind. The villagers tried to maintain their existence by eating forest plants and the meat of wild creatures like reptiles or weasels.

Mam looked like a withered plant, but she continued to grow and soon became a bit taller than I was.

***

The rains came, and the green world came to life again.

I held Mam's hand during a visit to Ca's grave, now engulfed in newly-grown grass.

"Perhaps, my brother's soul has returned to our native village to live with his forefathers," she pondered.

"Surely it has, don't be sad anymore." In response, she hugged me.

"Let's go home. Sitting here is only scaring you," I said. She was gazing out, her hair giving off the fragrance of wildflowers. She started leaning against me.

"Lie down here, will you?" she said softly, pulling violently on my arms. I fell down. She looked into my eyes.

"You'll be my husband, won't you?"

"No!"

She closed her eyes, giggling. I wrestled her onto the grass. Our hair became tangled with grass and leaves. She was in my arms; I held her more tightly. Then I was on top of her, my body moving up and down rhythmically.

***

Mam was no longer an adolescent girl; her body was developing with every passing week. Each time we saw each other, I found her a bit different from the previous time. Strangely enough, whenever she saw me, she would only mutter a few words and hurry away.

Land had been divided into small parcels and allotted to every household, and my house stood only a few scores of metres away from Mam's. I visited Mam, but she turned and went to the back of her house. Seeing her father's silhouette, I hesitated for a few seconds, then returned home.

"What's happened to you, Mam? Perhaps I was in the wrong because I couldn't control myself," I said to myself. Several weeks had elapsed, while I was tormented by worry.

One evening while I was chopping firewood in the courtyard, I heard yelling coming from the direction of Mam's house. With a hammer in hand I tiptoed to the fence. Mam was running around the courtyard as her father beat her repeatedly with a stick.

"How could you have the heart to treat your daughter that way? My poor little child!" Mr Tac's wife cried.

"I'll beat her until death. Then I'll kill the man who's assaulted her and burn his house," he threatened.

I nearly collapsed, and Mam fainted in the middle of the courtyard. Her father, knife in hand, was approaching our house.

***

I returned to my native village only to find the remains of my house leaning against a few broken rafters. I stood silently on its foundation. The well nearby was full of yellowish water. Our persimmon tree was nowhere to be found.

"Is it you, Coi? Why have you come back?" my old friend Thuan called to me.

"I've come back here to pay homage to the graves of my ancestors," I replied.

"How are our former villagers doing in their new land?"

"They're all fine. As for me, I had to return to my hometown."

The evening sunset turned yellow, and the river looked deserted. Thuan released the rope to set his water buffalo free and followed me to the village burial ground.

That day, Dad had blocked Mr Tac's way, and I quickly left our new home in the South to avoid the imminent risk.

I had fled from my new home like an exile and had no more news about my Mam! My mother had gathered her last remaining banknotes for me to return to my native village, but my father had to stay behind.

The graves of my grandparents were nearly submerged in water. I bowed my head before their tombstones. Although my village was small and poor, it was generous enough to sustain us.

"My grandmother passed away last winter during a long cold spell. Now my father is ready to follow everyone to that new land," Thuan told me.

"If you go away, who could I turn to for help?" I asked myself in a choked whisper.

"When do you plan to go?" I asked my friend.

"Maybe in a couple of months, after this harvest at least. Stay here with my parents to help us with our farming work," he insisted.

In another month, Mr Tac's anger might have cooled.

"Mam, my darling! I'll come back to you," I shouted from the riverbank. I knew that in that faraway place, there remained in her belly a drop of my blood, provided that she managed to keep it intact.

    Translated by Van Minh