When Heaven Fell (13 page)

“Oh, yes. People call it Italian food, but it’s very popular in America.”

Binh slowly moved the unfamiliar eating tool into the noodles.

When the waiter brought the check, Di glanced at it then pulled bill after bill from her wallet.

Binh stared at the pile of money Di put down. It had paid for just one meal for the two of them, yet it could have bought rice and vegetables forever and ever.

Leaving the restaurant, they walked down the street, past women and girls peddling cups of fruit, sodas, and coconuts. Binh thought of how soon she too would be selling by the side of the road.

They wandered into a shop many times bigger than Third Aunt’s tourist shop. Binh gazed at shells with words painted on them, parasols like huge flowers, dolls wearing tiny
ao dai
s — while Di made her way to a rack of clothing at the rear of the shop.

“Look, Binh. They have dresses. Why don’t we buy you something clean to change into?” Di pushed the dresses along the rod, pausing over some, fingering the fabric.

Binh lifted her eyes to the wall, where an
ao dai
hung. The tunic was of apple green silk, the loose trousers white. The pattern on the green silk was like soft clouds. It wasn’t American. But it was so lovely. . . .

Pointing to the
ao dai,
Di beckoned the shopkeeper.

The shopkeeper began to speak to Di in English. When Binh listened to English in movies, it sounded strange to her. But at least she had subtitles to read. Here there were no subtitles and she was lost in a sea of words.

In America it would be like that: a continuous noise like the rumble of the ocean, sounds that made no sense.

As Di and the woman spoke back and forth, Binh gazed up at the
ao dai.

Finally, the woman used a long-handled hook to lower first the trousers, then the tunic.

“How much is it?” Binh asked Di.

“Three hundred thousand
dong.
”

Binh sucked in her breath. She sold cups of pineapple for one thousand
dong.
Three hundred thousand
dong
would buy a school uniform.

The shopkeeper led Binh behind a curtain, where she changed out of her salty blue dress into the magnificent
ao dai.
The silk was cool against her skin, just as she’d always imagined. She fastened the soft loopy buttons and straightened the high-necked collar.

When she came out, the shopkeeper and Di both smiled.

“Look in the mirror, Binh,” said Di. “You look beautiful now.”

The mirror was as tall as Binh. She stood straighter and smoothed her hair, stringy with salt water, away from her face.

She felt her whole body cool in the silk. It was her special moment. Di was offering to buy her an
ao dai
even prettier than the ones the high-school girls wore. And yet . . . her heart didn’t sing as she’d expected. Instead, it churned like a motor about to break.

How could she wear something that cost so much when Ma and Ba fretted about money?

Binh turned around, looking back over her shoulder once more, studying the elegant stranger she’d become, then returned to the dressing room.

“You can wear it home if you like,” Di called.

But Binh undid the loopy buttons with heavy hands, her fingers clumsy. She hung the pants, then the tunic, back on the hangers, then slipped her salty blue dress over her head.

Stepping out, the dressing room curtain falling into place behind her, Binh handed the
ao dai
to her auntie. “I have no place to wear this.”

Di straightened one trouser leg. “Not to a wedding?”

“It’s not really that.” She looked up at the ceiling. “It costs too much.”

Di lowered her eyebrows and stared hard at Binh. “Before you said I didn’t come here to buy you red plastic basins. . . .”

Binh blushed at the reminder.

“Are you now saying I shouldn’t buy you a nice gift either?”

Binh looked down at her blue dress. A small hole had appeared near the waist. Soon the fabric would rot — the salt water hadn’t helped — and the rips would be uncontrollable.

What
was
she saying? What
did
she want from her auntie? Now that Di wasn’t taking her to America, shouldn’t she get as much as she could from her? No one else would buy her an
ao dai.
So why was she turning it down?

She thought suddenly of the monk’s talk, given the Sunday before Di’s arrival. The monk had talked of possessions as cows that weighed a person down. And now — she’d never thought it could be true — she felt the burden the
ao dai
would become.

“Are you still holding out for a trip to America?” Di asked, smiling.

“Oh, no.” Binh shook her head. She had, really had, given up on that. What
did
she want?

The answer came to her slowly, as though evolving out of the mist. When she spoke, her words also evolved slowly: “I think . . . I’d rather you gave the three hundred thousand
dong
to my family.” Spending the money on a pretty outfit would be cruel.

“Give them money? Wouldn’t that be rude?”

“Not rude. Not at all,” Binh said.

Di sighed. “I just don’t understand Vietnamese culture.” As though exhausted, she sat down on a low shelf, propping her chin in her hands. “Are you saying,” she asked, “that I shouldn’t buy anyone in your family anything? That instead they would rather have the money?”

Binh nodded.

“I’ve been a little blind, Binh. I’m sorry.” Di stood up. “I sensed a big need. I thought I could fill it with things like this.” She touched a bowl inlaid with bits of iridescent shell. “Or this.” She laid an open palm on a stone elephant. “I’ve been very thoughtless.”

A small basket of greeting cards lay on the counter. Di fingered through the pile and chose one picturing two birds. The birds were made of pale straw. “Let’s see if I can do better,” she said, paying the disappointed shopkeeper.

A
thatched hut served as a bus station. Sitting down on the bench, Di said, “I want to write a little message in this card. But I can’t write Vietnamese. Would you?” She held out a pen and the card with the straw birds.

As Di dictated, Binh wrote, slowly and carefully, while her auntie watched. Did she notice how poor Binh’s handwriting looked, how much time it took her to write the simple words? Would Di guess her secret?

When the bus came, Di led the way on, choosing two seats in the front. Once they were settled, Binh looked out the window at the pretty town. Even the trunks of the palms were wound with strands of lights.

Di leaned her head back and sighed. “It’s been a good day.”

The bus rolled out of town and into blackness. Binh dozed, resting against Di’s shoulder.

Finally, the engine stopped and Binh looked out to see the restaurant where they’d eaten in the morning. The same street children were already milling around the door of the bus.

“Can we stay inside this time?” Binh asked. She didn’t want to see the children again.

“I’m thirsty, Binh. And we both need to stretch our legs,” said Di, getting up from her seat.

At the door, the children pressed toward Di. “Madame! Madame!”

“Go away.” Binh shooed them.

The children retreated a few steps, then followed Di as she walked to the restaurant.

Di ordered two sodas.

The children hovered nearby, greedy for the sight of an American with money.

“Those boys and girls are here all day and night,” Di said. “Once their vacation is over, at least they’ll be back in school.”

They don’t go to school,
Binh almost said. Instead, she knocked against her drink and spilled it.

Di reached across with a napkin, while Binh just stared at the soda bubbles bursting on the surface of the table. Di assumed the children were on vacation. Did she think that Binh herself was on break and would soon return to school?

The bus driver honked and the passengers stood to leave.

Di handed out money as she passed through the children. “When do
you
go back to school?” she said, relaxing into her seat.

“Never,” Binh blurted out.

“What do you mean
never
?” Di’s thick American eyebrows met over her nose.

Binh clutched the arm of the seat. The word
never
still vibrated in the air. Why hadn’t she thought of a quick lie?

She felt as though she’d fallen into a river current that carried her against her will. “Those children don’t go to school.” She waved toward the faces on the other side of the glass, already growing smaller as the bus backed up. “And neither do I.”

Just then, the driver turned off the lights inside the bus. Di’s voice cut through the sudden darkness. “What do you do instead?”

“I sell fruit and soda. That cart in the backyard . . .”

Di was nodding. “Now I understand. I thought school was out. Yet I saw children in school uniforms. I thought you . . . Why don’t you go?” When she turned, Binh smelled the Italian food on her breath.

She waited until the bus turned onto the highway before saying, “Ba can’t pay the six hundred thousand
dong
a year for my schooling.”

“Six hundred thousand
dong
? I thought school was free in Communist countries.”

“School
is
free. But not uniforms or books. Without those, I can’t go.”

“Six hundred thousand
dong
— that’s — mmm . . .” Di held up her fingers as though counting. “That’s only about forty dollars a year. That’s not much.”

Binh sat up straight. “But Ba doesn’t have six hundred thousand extra
dong
.”

“I’m sorry, Binh. In America, forty dollars isn’t a lot of money. What about Hai? Has he gone to school?”

“Oh, no. Ba Ngoai taught us to read and write a little. I can read all the subtitles in the movies.”

“Oh, my.” Di laughed, then asked, “What about your cousins?”

“They do what I do. They help with the vegetable garden. Or sell things.”

“Well,
you
have to get an education. I’ll see to that.”

Binh put her hand on Di’s forearm and left it there. She recalled the way the ship captain had handed Fourth Uncle the shining red apple. Before biting in, he’d held the apple to the sky. Just so, Binh examined the apple that Di had just handed her, imagining its sweetness.

After a while, Di said sleepily, “I knew I chose the word
Wonder
for a reason.”

Binh giggled. Maybe the blue stone hadn’t been such a silly gift after all.

“Would Hai like to go to school?” Di asked.

“Anh Hai already has a real job. He has to work.”

Binh thought of Cuc unpacking coconut ashtrays in her mother’s shop.

Going to school without Cuc, Binh thought, would be like getting on a bus and driving away, leaving Cuc in the darkness.

Binh let several miles go by before she increased the pressure on Di’s arm. “Di Hai,” she said, willing her voice to rise above the sound of the engine, “could Cuc go to school too?”

“Cuc? What does she do now instead?”

“She helps Third Aunt at the tourist shop.”

“Well, if your brother can’t go . . .”

Binh held her breath while the bus hurtled through the night.

“Cuc should go.”

Binh let her breath out in a long sigh. “Thank you, Di.” The imaginary apple was very sweet indeed.