The Mountains Sing(101)
“Perfume of my sleep?” Grandma laughed. “Found it?”
“Bet the mosquitoes found her first.” My mother studied the many red dots on my legs. She fetched another cup of tea, blew it to cool, and rubbed the liquid on my mosquito bites. The itching eased. I leaned against her, becoming a child again in the warmth of her body.
The sun rose from a curtain of cloud, painting the sky with a rosy hue, scattering soft rays onto the yard.
“Everything has changed so much,” said Grandma. “I’m afraid I’ll feel like a stranger out there.”
My mother finished her cup. She took Grandma’s elbow, helping her stand up. Mr. H?i and I hurried to put our sandals on.
My feet felt light on the village road I knew so well from Grandma’s story. We passed the pagoda with its roofs curving like the fingers of an exquisite dancer, the clanging of its bell rippling in the cool air. The ponds stretched out in front of us, their surfaces as calm as silk sheets. Thick canopies of green bamboo swayed, giving shade to the low houses that lined our path.
Several villagers greeted Mr. H?i. An elderly lady froze in her path. “Di?u Lan, is that you?” she asked. The wrinkles on her face deepened when Grandma nodded.
The lady put her baskets down. “I’m . . . I’m sorry about the things that happened.”
“It’s good to see you, Sister,” said Grandma. “Let bygones be bygones. I wish you all the best.”
We watched the lady stagger away, her bamboo pole braced across her bony shoulders.
“She was shouting those ugly slogans and pumping her fists,” said my mother. “I’ll never forget her bitchy face.”
“Try to forgive and forget, Ng?c,” said Grandma. “If you bear grudges, you’re the one who’ll have to bear the burden of sorrow.”
Mr. H?i shook his head. “It was appalling, though. Your parents saved her during the Great Hunger. Then she turned her fists on you.”
We arrived at a dirt road, pocked with holes. “The path to our home,” gasped my mother.
“Our home, our home,” said Grandma tenderly. Following her gaze, I saw a thick fence guarding a large estate.
We arrived in front of a gate. I peered inside, expecting to see an impressive n?m gian house with five wooden sections surrounded by lush gardens. Instead, my heart sank at the sight of neglect and abandonment.
“Seven families live here now.” Mr. H?i led us through the open gate. He raised his voice, “Anyone home?”
Grandma, my mother, and I clung to each other, stepping into the slippery front yard. Once paved with redbrick tiles, it was now punctured by pockets of greenish water and scattered with rubbish. The longan tree was no longer there. Wild grass and green moss had overgrown every possible space and corner.
And the house! Where were the doors bearing exquisite carvings of flowers and birds, the dark lacquered shutters that gleamed in the sun, the ceramic dragons and phoenixes that danced atop the curving ends of the roof?
I thought I’d expected the worst. But not this. Not a rickety-looking building stripped naked of all doors and windows. Not rotting walls with propaganda posters about family planning and drug addiction plastered on them; not makeshift partitions poking out of the house’s floor, like bones of a fish.
The smell of rot drifted to my nose. The garden was now a patch of brown earth harboring large holes, over which clouds of green flies were buzzing.
“Open toilets.” Mr. H?i sighed. “Fertilizers are expensive; human dung is now gold.” He waved away some flies. “When the families moved into this house, they fought and fought about the division of dung. Finally, each dug their own toilet.”
“This used to be heaven on earth.” My mother clenched her fists. “Let us go, Mama. I can’t stand it.”
But Grandma was tearing herself away from us, hurrying toward the house’s door. There, an elderly woman had just appeared. Her hair was white. She felt her way across the large veranda with a walking stick. Arriving at the five steps that led down to the yard, she threw the cane aside, crouching down on her hands and knees, crawling like an animal.
“Let me give you a hand.” Grandma helped the woman to her feet.
Stepping closer, I gazed at the woman’s face. A protruding forehead. Teeth that looked like those of a rabbit. The butcher-woman. She’d viciously attacked Grandma and had been determined to catch her. She was the one who’d driven my family out of our ancestors’ home so she could take it over.
If Grandma loathed the woman, she didn’t show. She held the woman’s hand, guiding her down the steps.
“Who are you?” The butcher-woman gazed up at Grandma with her white eyes. Her withered hand reached up to touch Grandma’s face. She sniffed at her.
“I’m visiting a friend in the village,” said Grandma in her Hà N?i accent.
“No wonder you smell nice, not like the rats that live here.” The woman winced. “Oh, my bones hurt.” She thumped her back with her fist. “Lead me to the toilet closest to the kitchen, won’t you? I must produce my daily quota, else my bastard of a son will punish me with his rod.”
Grandma led the butcher-woman to her toilet. For the pain Grandma had suffered, she could’ve pushed her former enemy into the hole filled with human waste, but she helped the woman secure her footing and left her there.