The Unwanted (3 page)

ON APRIL 28
, just before morning broke, my mother heard the report we had all waited for: a panicking voice on the radio reported the coming of the Vietcong. My mother told Loan to go and get me out of bed. Without a word of explanation, Loan took me to the basement, a twelve-by-fifteen-foot hole that the owner had dug under the kitchen floor as a hiding place in the event of war. The rest of the family was already gathered.

In the far corner, my grandmother sat like a statue near a dim light. In her hand she held a string of beads collected from under the Bo De tree, where the Buddha once sat to seek enlightenment. The tips of her fingers moved the beads in a methodical manner. Her eyes were tightly shut, and her lips whispered an inaudible prayer. Next to her my grandfather huddled at the only table in the room, covering his ears, trying to block out the terrifying noises outside. Beside him lay his cane, which he had acquired many years earlier, after serving in the Vietnamese Republican Army as a captain, up until the day a Vietcong bullet exploded in his right hip.

A few steps away Lam lay on a sofa. As usual, his jet-black hair was perfectly combed and blow-dried. He looked alert and relaxed. Deeper in the shadows of the room, my brother stood next to my mother, clutching his favorite teddy bear to his chest. My mother's hair was pulled back in a tight knot, and her face, pale without makeup, appeared stark under the flickering light as she leaned heavily against the door. Her full stomach was visible under her nightgown, and one of her hands lay across her belly as if she were trying to protect the fetus inside. She and my grandfather were in the middle of a conversation as Loan and I entered the room.

“Daddy, we have to leave,” my mother was saying. “Please, sir. There is no time left to waste.”

My grandfather lifted his head from his hands. His eyes were two dark holes filled with pain, but he shook his head decisively.

“I've told you many times before, and I am telling you again. I am not going anywhere. I was born here on this land. I will die here on this land. So will your mother.”

My grandmother continued to pray quietly, her expression unchanged. I wasn't sure if she was paying any attention to the conversation. For her entire adult life, she had never made a move without my grandfather's permission. The fact that my grandfather had decided to stay behind was enough for her.

He continued, “I can't go to America. I don't want to go to any foreign land where I don't speak the language or know the customs. I'd rather die here by the Vietcong's hands, among my ancestors, than live like a ghost among strangers. You go! Take the children and go. Stop wasting time waiting around for your mother and me. We'll be fine, don't worry about us. I am a sixty-four-year-old decrepit man. No one in this world, not even the worst kind of Congs, would be heartless enough to hurt an old man and his feeble wife. Don't stay here because of us.”

My mother was not convinced. “Please, Daddy. Think of the children. You know I can't leave you and Mother here alone, but, if I stay, the children will suffer.”

“I am not going anywhere,” my grandfather insisted. “Nothing you can say will change my mind.”

My mother understood her father's dedication to his country. But she also knew that Vietnam was beset with racism. Through generations of defiance, as they struggled against Chinese, Japanese, and French oppression, this bias had been ingrained in every Vietnamese person. My mother feared what it would do to my brother and me in the future.

Nine years before, when an American civil engineer working in Saigon had hired my mother as a translator, a romance had blossomed between them. I was the result of their brief liaison. My fair skin and curly hair spoke clearly of my father's dominant genes. Perhaps because my appearance made him recognize his own mortality, or because of my mother's irresistible charms, before he left the country permanently, my father emptied his bank account into her hands. The thirty-something-thousand U.S. dollars he left us was a great fortune for anyone in Vietnam. My mother used this money, and her connections, to secure herself a partnership in a bank.

A few years later, she married another American, an officer, and Jimmy, my brother, was born. Jimmy's father left Nhatrang in 1971, with the last of the American troops, to go back home to his own family. He, too, was quite generous. The money he left us helped to pay off the mortgages my mother had on the mansion and provided some needed renovations. My mother also had the tall wall erected around the mansion, which not only shielded the house from outsiders' curiosity but also sealed us up, as if covering something shameful. We were meant never to be discovered.

Now though, my mother realized that no wall on Earth would protect us from being ostracized. The secrets that my mother had tried to protect so desperately were impossible to hide. Hopeless, she knew that we would grow up in an unforgiving society, as neglected as wild rice. Our only hope was to get out of Vietnam and move to a more accepting place. She looked at my grandparents sorrowfully, as she held my brother and me in her arms.

“Daddy, forgive me,” she said. “For the sake of my children, I am leaving.”

She turned to glare at Loan, and her voice deepened.

“Loan, get the suitcases.”

Then she told us, “Go and give your grandparents a kiss goodbye. Make it good. This will be the last time you see Grandpa and Grandma.”

We did as we were told. My grandmother dropped her beads on the floor to reach for us. Her tears gushed down her wrinkled face as she kissed us with all of her love. My grandfather's embrace was so tight that it cut off my air supply for what seemed like an eternity. In our ears, he whispered how much he loved my brother and me. Then at last, the embrace broke as Loan reappeared at the door with the suitcases. With her help, we changed into our clothes, packed a few belongings, and headed for the van.

“Take Loan with you. Maybe she can be of help,” my grandfather said, pushing the girl toward us.

“What?” My mother stopped in the middle of the room. “She can't come with us. She doesn't have a ticket.”

Lam spoke for the first time. “So what? We all know that you are a very powerful woman and that you could move a mountain if you had to. Nobody is asking that you move any mountain; we just want you to take care of this girl instead of abandoning her here. Come on! Give it a try, won't you? For once in your life, do something nice for someone else. Who knows? It might even make you a real human.” My mother glared at him as he continued. “Please, I think it could work. Right now, everything is very confusing out there. The police can't possibly check each and every person for passports. Even if they do ask for yours, the way you know people in this town, I am sure we could still sneak her out with us. But seriously, let's be honest. The problem isn't about whether you can or can't. It is whether you want to or not, isn't it?”

“You shut up,” my mother said.

“Sure, anything you say, madam.” He shrugged and walked away.

“Take her with you,” my grandfather repeated. It was no longer a suggestion to my mother, it was a command. “I owe her father that much for the bullet we shared. I promised him I would take care of her, which I have done thus far. I want you to take this responsibility now. Do anything you can to help Loan—for me, please? Besides, she can watch over the kids. And hurry up. Go! Get out of here and save yourselves, all of you, and don't fight anymore, for heaven's sake. If for some reason you can't take care of Loan at the airport, she will come back to me. At least this way, she can fetch some news about all of you for me. Understood?”

“Yes, sir,” my mother reluctantly agreed. Before she could change her mind, Loan ran to the van and climbed inside to huddle in a corner. My mother got in last. She looked straight ahead, refusing to acknowledge the girl's presence.

As Lam drove us away, I could see my grandparents' mournful faces pressed against the oval basement window, which was only a few inches above the ground. My mother sat stiffly, her face frozen in an icy mask. On the radio, the same female voice we had heard earlier that morning shakily announced the coming of the Communists. Their arrival was like an attack of locusts in a rice field, fast and uncontrollable.

SAIGON WAS IN
its last free hours. The smell of chaos filled the air, and confusion was written all over the faces of the people on the street. Groups of armed convicts were breaking into houses, screaming up and down the streets, and shooting into the sky. Furniture flew onto the street, blocking the traffic. Discarded items were set on fire, either by accident or purposely; the smoke and flames added to the terror. Soldiers ran in all directions, tossing their rifles into trash bins, and stripping off their uniforms as if they were on fire. Some children who had lost their parents huddled on a street corner, crying. Above their heads, fire was consuming a coconut tree, and sparks of flame rained down on them. From the car window, they looked as if they were being burned alive in some sacrificial ritual.

We did not get far. The streets were blocked by hordes of desperate people, all with the same futile intention of getting to the airport. Just as we reached the freeway, a painful truth dawned on us: we weren't going anywhere. As far as we could see, the highway was clogged with civilian vehicles and military tanks. The hellish shriek of panic was dreadful in the hot air. People were abandoning their cars, running over each other, jumping on top of one another, climbing onto anything within their reach in order to move forward. Dead bodies lay in contorted positions, grinning horribly at the living. A few steps away from our van, a pregnant woman lay dead near the sidewalk. Her stomach had been ripped open by many hasty footsteps, and next to her lay her dying fetus, moving weakly under a dark mob of curious flies. A pool of dark blood beneath her dried slowly under the harsh sun. My mother quivered and recoiled in her seat, pulling us closer to her.

All along the freeway, people flowed like water down a stream. The crying of lost children looking for their parents, the screams of people being robbed, the songs blaring from the radio, the gunshots, the wailing of the wounded victims all blended into an incoherent symphony of grief. And like the humidity evaporating in the air, this collective keening lifted higher and higher, mixing with the noxious tear gas in a dark cloud of suffering.

Inside the car, my brother and I were too afraid to make a sound. Lam no longer looked relaxed. His long hair fell over his forehead, which was slick with sweat. His fingers, which held to the wheel tightly, were white at the knuckles. His head shook uncontrollably with each breath he took, and his eyes were opened wide, exaggerating the whiteness of his eyeballs.

Lam let out a loud, frustrated scream, as he pounded the horn in a fury. He turned to face my mother. “We have to get the fuck out of the car,” he spat. “This is not going to work just sitting here. You take the children and move.”

My mother's lips tightened into a straight line. She grasped my arm, and I felt her fingernails dig deeply into my flesh.

“Are you insane?” she replied. “Look at these people! I am not leaving this car.”

Lam leaned within an inch of my mother's face. I could see his jugular veins, engorged with blood like two swollen earthworms, as they stared at each other. At last Lam broke the silence.

“Then give me my damned ticket and my passport. I am sick of listening to you, wretched woman. I am leaving with or without you.”

My mother did not respond.

“Now!”
he cried.

The scream startled my mother. She shook her head as if to clear it, then reached for her purse.

Lam's eyes followed her hands. “Give me your ticket and passport as well,” he blurted. “I am taking Loan with me.”

“Why her?” my mother asked.

Lam focused on something invisible on the floor. “She is having my baby.”

Loan let out a small cry. My mother ignored her. After exhaling a deep breath, she gazed at Lam calmly.

“So am I. How do you explain this to me? Can't you see that I am also pregnant with your child?” she asked.

“So what? You don't need me. You never did,” he said bitterly. “Trust me, you will do just fine.”

He yanked the purse out of my mother's hand, searching intensely until he found what he was looking for. In addition to the papers, he grabbed a thick bundle of cash. Waving them teasingly in front of my mother, Lam said, “You just consider this payment for my devoted services.”

Behind my mother, Loan finally spoke up. “I am not leaving with you, Lam. I am staying here with the mistress.”

He turned to look at her as if she were deranged. Then, his lips pulled back in a distorted smile. “Fine, you stupid servant. Stay. Be my guest.”

He picked out my mother's passport and ticket and threw them together with her purse back in her lap. Keeping the money and his own passport, Lam rammed them into the front pocket of his pants. Then, the smile returned to his face. He sank back in his seat, adjusting his clothing, before opening the door to let himself out. Oddly, he turned back one last time to look at us.

“Have a nice life, all of you,” was all he said before he disappeared into the crowd.

CHAPTER FOUR

April 28, 1975

A
fter Lam left, my mother sat still for several hours. Her facial expression did not change. Loan held us in her arms as we clustered together on the floor of the van. I watched night fall over the city, while the fire, the explosions, and the screaming went on. As I sat on the steel floor with my hands firmly pressed against my ears, everything seemed to fade away. My surroundings were no longer real to me; it was as if I were inside a silent movie, with a black-and-white background. The soundless, colorless, odorless calmness stayed with me until my mother announced that it was time for us to head back home.

The evening seemed to sedate the nervous city. As we ventured along the dark street, the throbbing frenzy subsided. Most of the streetlights had been broken earlier; and many of them were off due to the lack of electricity. All around us dark shadows were moving through the night. We could not tell if they were looking through the corpses to identify and gather up their departed relatives or if, like hungry wolves, they were simply hunting for treasure. Once in a while, a ray of light splashed across the sky, followed by the rumbling thunder of a bomb, or a grenade, or a rifle, sending a wave of vibration out to the surrounding area.