The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane(50)

Tradition says those who’ve died a terrible death must be buried right where they fell, but I have no digging tools. After searching the area, I find a small depression that might serve as a burial place. I manage to drag San-pa to the hollow. But once he’s there I can’t just pile stones over him, because one special rule applies to the interment of those who’ve died a terrible death. A sacrificed dog must be placed over the corpse to serve as a barrier so that the disturbed spirit won’t feel a need to roam and cause trouble for humans. There are no dogs in the jungle. I’m a woman, so I’m not a hunter either. I sit on my haunches, think, and wait. Finally, it comes to me. The tiger. I could never move it, but its power, even in death, might be strong enough to work. I try to cut off one of the tiger’s paws, but the sinew between the bones is too gristly. The thinnest part of the tiger is his tail. I wedge my knife between two of the bones, pry and pry. The length comes loose at last. As quickly as I can, I toss the tail on San-pa, then hurriedly cover his body with rocks, branches, and thatch. Anyone who passes the mound will know that someone is buried in this spot. They will recite incantations, seek ritual cleansing when they return home, and, I hope, remain safe.

I say a few last words to my husband. The first are phrases I’ve heard the ruma speak at proper funerals. “When you were alive, your a-ma and a-ba loved you, and you loved them. Now you are dead. When you were alive, you liked to hunt. Now you are dead. When you were alive, you liked to sing and dance. Now you are dead. It is time for the living and the dead to separate. May you travel to your ancestors. May you never disturb living people.”

Next I add a few words of my own. “You must forget all about me. You are dead completely. Do not try to follow me. I say goodbye to the tears you caused. I thank you for saving my life, but do not come back to earth again—as a spirit or in your next incarnation—until I am dead.”

I want to leave this place, but I’m covered with dirt and dried blood. At the stream, I bathe fully clothed so I can retain some decency in case someone should come upon me. My husband’s blood tints the water. My wedding clothes will never be completely cleansed, but my headdress is fine. Dripping wet, I gather wood for a fire, collect some tubers, find a patch of sun, and make a simple meal. Afterward, I lie down—hoping the sun’s rays will dry my clothes—and fall into a sleep as deep as death.

In the morning, I pick up San-pa’s crossbow and arrows, pass by the tiger’s corpse one last time, and find my way back to the path. I search the shards of sky peeking through the branches above me so I can track the arc of the sun as I continue my journey.



* * *



I never find the village where I saw Deh-ja. I get lost. When fog descends or a storm washes through, I end up walking in circles. I ask people for directions, but rarely do I find someone who speaks Akha or Mandarin. Surrounded by the thickness of the forest, I spend hours trying to make sense of all that happened as things I should have paid more attention to crowd my eyes. Two years ago, I overheard A-ba saying to San-pa, “You’ve been trading in things you shouldn’t and trying things you shouldn’t.” I didn’t ask either of them about it, but could it mean San-pa was already involved with the drug? When San-pa hid me from the drug traffickers, did he recognize them because he’d worked for them? Was that how he’d earned money to come for me? Even if we’d gotten Yan-yeh, what did it say about San-pa as a father that he’d been willing to take her to that awful village? Would he have eventually become the kind of man who would sell his wife or daughter? These are questions for which I’ll never know the answers, and that knowledge is a torment. But the memory that cuts the worst is in many ways the simplest. I married a man who lied to change the day of his birth as a way to fool the universe. That act was a pure violation of a most basic tenet of Akha Law. And for what? To marry what he called a number one girl? I find myself speaking aloud to A-ma Mata, the great mother of the Akha people. “What does it say about me that I went along with his lie?”

After days of walking, I reach the trails I know so well. It’s all I can do to keep from running home, but I do what I know I must and go straight to San-pa’s village. The story I tell my in-laws is short and simple, revealing only that their son died a terrible death. And while I avoid details that will haunt their sleeping hours, they can see from my stained clothes that their son must have suffered greatly.

“We knew he’d get in trouble in Thailand,” my father-in-law comments, resigned but accepting, “but we didn’t think it would be this.”

I hold my mother-in-law’s hand while she weeps. Since San-pa died a terrible death, he will not be worshipped and no offerings will ever be made to him. Rather, incantations will be recited to keep him away, and his name will never be mentioned again. If he’d had a younger brother, then I would have been asked to marry him, but he had no brother.

Once my mother-in-law and I have retreated to the women’s side of the house, she gives me a change of clothes. Later, we stand together as I feed my marriage leggings, tunic, and skirt to the fire. All I have left is my headdress. San-pa’s mother hands me a pair of embroidery scissors, which I use to clip off the silver balls and coins. This is my final act of dismantling my husband from my life. I tuck the silver pieces in my pocket and drop the now worthless headdress into the flames. My dreams—and that’s all they were—of happiness are soon ashes.