Listen, Slowly: Chapters 8–15

Earlier, when we walked by a four-story house, I heard Út say if she were home alone in such a huge house she would be scared of ghosts. Strange coming from Út, who seems impervious to everything.

The only thing worse than Mom guessing my most private, private thought is her using every cliché to advise me about it.

“Before I forget, SAT word for today, conundrum, c-o-n-u—”

I’m on an SAT revolt, erasing all five-dollar words from my cobwebby mind. Expunged, good-bye. Wait, is expunge an SAT word? Probably. Rewind. How about zapped?

It’ll kill Mom when I come back espousing the vocabulary of a middle schooler, which I am. Wait, is espouse SAT?

I’m going to have to be vigilant.

I keep the phone off, ostensibly to save the battery. But I can’t handle Mom just yet.

“Even if lost, I sensed they never would have relinquished finding a way home.”

Forget standing still and jiggling, I’ve got to pace to buffer against mosquitoes and dread.

I must look confused because Anh Minh repeats, “Ông Ba,” pointing at the detective and “Ông Bà,” pointing at Bà inside the house. I DO NOT HEAR ANY DIFFERENCE!
Anh Minh just won’t stop. “Ba, Bà, as distinctive as saying choose chose.”

“Miss, I apologize but I cannot fully translate his true words. They are beyond my humble English. Not to worry, I will persevere.”

“When you can complain out loud, I know you're still strong. When your pain has advanced beyond lament, when it's unbearable to hear your own story, that's when I know to truly worry. Though hidden in silence, your pain would still surface on your breaths, your eyes, your pores. I will know. Take long inhales, my child, you are more bendable than you realize.”

Yet if my asking equals suffering, we have the option of contacting your father to begin arrangements to release you of your obligation.

In the year when the navy trained him in San Di-e-go while I managed our house and brood.

Anh Minh laughs. Even without sleep he’s upstanding, a shadow of shiny teeth and bright eyes, behind glasses no less. Is that much good mood good for you?

“What you are suggestin’ is, how do you say it, a tall inquisition? I have been up all night doin’ a much more humble task.”
He means a tall order, but I can’t correct him.

“I would never lie, miss.”
He’s so earnest, all I can say is “I know.”

Ordinarily, the sorrow of her grandmother's magnitude, rankin’ deeper than most familial displacement that war induces, touchin’ upon the tenderness of unrequited longin’, would, and should, sprout utmost empathy from even those whose hearts have deadened.

Ordinarily, the sorrow of her grandmother's magnitude, rankin’ deeper than most familial displacement that war induces, touchin’ upon the tenderness of unrequited longin’, would, and should, sprout utmost empathy from even those whose hearts have deadened.

He was an effusive man, capable of much laughter and friends.

This is pertinent information about your grandmother.

One day, while stoppin’ for a sugarcane beverage to offset the notorious heat and dust of the area, as few vegetation had regrown after the brutal wartime strategy of droppin’ chemicals that killed anythin’ green and growin’, I chanced upon the proprietor, the very man who had held her grandfather as a prisoner.

"It is a matter of personal integrity. He is adamant that your Bà comes to him, that no one misconstrues his goodwill for greed.”

“It is a matter of personal integrity. He is adamant that your Bà comes to him, that no one misconstrues his goodwill for greed.”
“Greed how?”
“He does not want anyone to think he is hopin’ for a monetary exchange.”

Neither side is going to appease the other because of something only they understand.

Dogs fighting, crickets blasting, frogs screaming, chickens clucking, birds screeching, mice scurrying...all this before the humans, the many many humans, add to the cacophony.

All the while writing super-slowly in that decrepit notebook.

There weren’t hand motions in my lullaby, which was actually an ancient Buddhist sutra in Sanskrit (how worldly was I?), but whispering those words always sank me toward sleep.

“Today we will practice the caterpillar crawl, a forward stitch that must be done precisely to show absolutely no discrepancy between the front and back sides. Spacing must be tiny as a third of a rice grain to camouflage each puncture. Make certain your puncture points follow in step, much like matching someone's footsteps, to create the illusion of an uninterrupted line.”

Mom will be thrilled to know she’s passed on a skill still in vogue. How useful though, I can’t say.

If a male frog is croakin’ a special pattern to attract a female, the act itself is mundane because every male frog has a song but its pattern is particular to that frog.

Yet it is rather impossible to ascertain that no other frog anywhere else has tried the exact pattern.

Many are asking, “What did she say?” I understand but have to look blank. This clandestine double-language trick is exhausting.

I point to her mismatched, frumpy, froggy-obsessed daughter.

If things turn out well here, then the good karma might carry all the way back to Laguna. I know that sounds desperate, but you try being banished to a swampy sauna and not succumb to a little superstition.

If Anh Minh and Chị Lan do get together, I’ll initiate a real conversation with HIM when I get home.

Cô Hạnh comes back with handfuls of leaves and asks Út to wash them and bring the pestle and mortar set.

We’ve been texting and she’s cranky with worries about her court case yet she still has time to write. Answer: “don’t worry, please, i’m actually doing really great. you’re right; village life is so fascinating. i’m learning so much. the internet here is mercurial and could shut down any minute. love you 100,000 times to the moon and back, mai mai.”

I need drama, intrigue, something to cheer for while I’m on the longest wait ever for the most stubborn guard ever.

From the way her eyes sparkle, I'm guessing it's devious.