Only the Heart (13 page)

Kieu stood on the stem, looking back. She was waving and smiling, and the rain had plastered her hair to her head, so that the scar on her cheek stood out, vividly red against her pale skin. Diem and Quyen stood beside her, but they didn't wave. They looked back with what I guess was a mixture of relief and trepidation. They were old enough to know that no dream is ever what it seems: that what lay ahead of them was a challenge that, if not as dangerous, was at least as demanding as what had gone before.

But I wasn't. Old enough, that is.

All I knew was that my best mend — at least the best mend I wasn't
related
to — was leaving, and that I was never going to see her again.

Which is why, almost ten years later, I was so surprised that I finally did …

*

25 March 1986
Cabramatta, Australia

KIEU

11.15 pm.
The air is cold as they step from the cinema entrance and out into the street. Hoang and Son walk on ahead, arguing as usual, and Toan watches their backs as Son makes a point, emphasising it by jabbing a finger in the air in front of his twin brother's face. They are already half a block away.

Toan shivers again and zips up his jacket. At least it has stopped raining since they went inside.

Beside him, Linh and Miro walk casually, holding hands, discussing Hong Kong film-making and looking without interest into the shop-windows. It is late and the shops are closed, their doors shuttered and their interiors dark except for the security lighting, but across the street a late-night fast-food joint spills yellow light out across the footpath.

“Coffee?” Miro asks the question of no one in particular.

Toan nods towards his brothers. “What about them? They have to work in the morning, and they won't want to hang around waiting for me.”

“Don't worry about them. Tell them I'll drop you and Linh home afterwards. If they trust you to chaperone …”

Toan smiles. Suddenly the whole suggestion makes a lot more sense. He nods.

“Okay. You go order and I'll let them know. Back in a sec.”

And he breaks into a jog, closing the gap between himself and the two debaters, who have reached the corner, still deep in conversation, unaware that they have lost touch with the rest of their party.

A couple of minutes later, as he enters the fragrant warmth of the shop, he smiles as Linh sees him, cuts short a kiss, and slides a little way along the booth, to position herself a respectable distance from Miro. He stands over them, making no move to sit down.

“I can go for a walk if you like …”

Winking at Miro, he slides into the booth, facing them.

It is then that he sees her.

She is sitting alone at a table near the back of the shop reading a magazine. Her long hair hangs down, obscuring her face as she reads, but suddenly she raises her head, and he realises she has caught him staring. There is no nervousness. She holds his gaze, daring him to look away. He resists the temptation, partly through stubbornness, but mostly because she is so beautiful.

For a moment their eyes lock in a test of wills, but then she , flicks her head, an instinctive action that sends her dark hair whipping back over her shoulder, away from her face.

And something freezes in his chest.

Suddenly he is on his feet, but her name sticks in his throat, refusing to speak itself. A frown crosses her face, but she continues to hold his gaze. Then, in a practised reflex, her hand goes up to cover the livid scar that curves across her cheek, and she looks away, embarrassed finally.

“Toan?” Linh's voice. “What is it?”

The question finally unlocks his throat. Without looking at her, and not really in answer to her puzzled enquiry, he whispers one word. A name, and a question.

“Kieu …?”

Across the shop, the girl is staring unseeing at the coloured picture in the magazine on the table in front of her. At the sound of his voice she looks up again.

“Kieu? Is that you? It's me. Toan …”

Now he is stepping out of the booth, unsure of whether to take the steps which will close the gap between them. What if he is wrong? What if she isn't …

But then the reaction on her face dispels any question. The frown gives way to an uncertain smile.

“Toan …?”

11.45 pm.
On the surface between them, the empty coffee cups sit forgotten. Linh and Miro have long since moved back to the privacy of the booth, and they are alone at the table.

“We looked for you. When we arrived. But no one had heard of you. All this time …”

He looks at her across the small space, trying to see in this young woman the girl he remembers, but too much time has passed. This is a stranger, separated from that memory by the unknown events of ten long years. And yet … something about the way she chews on the ends of her hair, the angle of her head …

“We were sent to Melbourne when we arrived. We only came to Sydney a couple of years ago, when Diem …”The words trail off, and she stares out of the door into the street. It has begun to rain again.

“Kieu …?”Something in her face worries him. “What about Diem? He's alright, isn't he?”

“Alright? Yes, I guess you'd say he was alright.” For a moment a trace of bitterness creeps into her voice, but then she shakes her head and tries a weak smile. “It wasn't really his fault. It's just … he had no skills. He was still a kid when he joined the army, and after the war … well, after the war he had me to look after, and he made ends meet any way he could. That was why we had to get out of Saigon in such a hurry. This was to be the new start. No black market, nothing … But when we got here, it was just so hard. Long hours, pathetic wages. Quyen was working from home, sewing shirts, and they were both so tired all the time …”

She picks up the sugar spoon and watches the tiny grains pouring slowly back into the bowl.

“I guess he figured all he needed was one big score, so he started gambling and ran up debts with people whose idea of interest is …” For a moment she pauses, shaking her head slightly, but she does not look up. “He broke into a house, trying to get some money. A big two-storey mansion in Toorak. They had a silent alarm …”

She is staring intently at the sugar bowl. He reaches out almost touching her hand. But not quite. She looks at him, and a small smile struggles onto her lips.

“Quyen stood by him and we moved to Sydney when he came out of prison. Another fresh start.”

“And …?”

“So far … not too bad. He drinks a bit too much, but … He's my brother, Toan. I owe him so much.” Suddenly she is silent. Awkward.

But before he can speak to break the mood, she looks toward the door, and a brief look of panic touches her face.

“I have to go.”

She stands, and he turns to see what has scared her.

Three Vietnamese teenagers stand in the doorway. They are perhaps a year or two older than he is, and dressed in the street version of fashion. And they are staring at him.

Kieu walks across to them and whispers something. The stares soften, but only slightly. Across the room Miro leaves the booth and moves to stand behind Toan. Linh follows.

One of the youths walks into the shop. He wears a black jacket with the sleeves pushed up almost to his elbows and his hands hang loosely at his sides, but in spite of his relaxed stance, there is an indefinable threat in his movements, and in the smile that sits unconvincingly on his lips. Than stands to face him.

“Kieu says you an old friend.” The newcomer's accent is strong, and there is a sneering quality to his voice. He turns to face Miro. “What about you?”

No answer. Miro returns the stare, refusing to blink.

“He's a friend of mine.” Toan speaks to draw the youth's attention away, but the ploy fails. The youth answers without altering his gaze.

“Looks to me like he friend of hers. You lost, white boy?” The stress on the adjective is unmistakable.

Still Miro doesn't speak, but his fists begin to close.

“Miro …” Linh begins, and she places a hand on his arm, but the youth smiles again. A cold smile, without a trace of humour.

“Seems like everyone got friends.” Thrning back to Toan, he measures him with a glance. “Seeing you're ‘old friends', I tell you once. Kieu she got enough friends. Don't need ‘old friends'. Time for you to go.”

Finally, Miro seems about to speak, but Linh grabs his arm.

“We were just going, anyway. Come on Toan.”

They move towards the door. Miro reluctantly. Outside Kieu stands a little away from the youth's two companions, and as they walk past Toan manages to whisper, “We're in the book. Under Vo Minh … Call me.”

But Kieu shakes her head.

“Goodbye, Toan,” she says. “Have a good life.”

Sitting in the car, Miro is fuming. “What did you mean, ‘We were just going …'? I wasn't about to …”

“Oh, shut up with the macho bullshit, Miro!” Her rare show of anger cuts him off. “Didn't you ever hear of the Triple K …?”

Leaning across, Toan touches him gently on the shoulder.

“What she's trying to say, Miro, is that if you see one of these guys, and he's acting tough, you smile and suddenly find somewhere else to be. Even if he's on his own. Look at him the wrong way, if you' re real lucky, you might wake up in hospital with all your internal organs still roughly in the right places and functioning. But don't count on it.”

Nothing more is said. After a few seconds Miro starts the engine, checks his mirrors and pulls out from the kerb. The raindrops drift like a silk curtain across the road, shining in halos around the street lights. He flicks the wiper control, and the blades smear the road grime across the windscreen, before the strengthening rain clears it.

Beside him, Linh stares silently at the passing shop-fronts, regretting a suddenly remembered childhood jealousy.

And Toan looks down at his hands, and wonders what it might have been like to touch her damaged beauty, just once, the way he did so often on the floor of her brother's hut when they were children and the noises of the busy camp lulled them gently to sleep.

Have a good life …
The words echo, mocking the memory.

“You too, Kieu … “He whispers the words to a ghost, and looks out at the rain-soaked road.

13

BEFORE THE DEATH OF INNOCENCE …

21 August 1977
Pulau Bisa

PHUONG

The screams awaken her. Screams and the loud crackling sound, close by. She sits up in sudden terror, smelling the smoke. Around her the others are stirring, half-aware of the danger which the sounds and the acrid aroma represent.

“Get up!” She hears the words before she realises that it is her own voice screaming them. “Fire. Wake up!”

Suddenly the sleepers are standing all around her. Son and Hoang, her aunt and uncle, the two young ones. Together, they make for the door. And the nightmare beyond.

Flames leap into the night sky and the gusting wind drives them from hut to hut, licking at the dry wood, until it too begins to smoulder and flame. On both sides of the narrow laneway between the dwellings walls and roofs are well alight, and the smoke swirls in both directions, choking them and obscuring their view.

“Which way?” Her aunt's voice: desperate, pleading.

Her uncle doesn't try to answer. He looks both ways along the alley, then points, picking up his youngest son, and making off in that direction. Linh is already in her aunt's arms. For once she has forgotten her independence. The twins follow, and Phuong is about to join them when a sudden thought freezes her where she stands.

“Má …” She whispers the word, then turns back to the hut, as the others, unaware, disappear into the billowing smoke.

Inside the tin prison the heat is murderous, and the yellow flames show through the cracks. Already the smoke is seeping in, catching at her throat, as she drops to her knees beside the bed, feeling beneath the mat for the one thing which has the power to draw her back into the danger of that room.

She looks down at her mother's face, slides the last remaining photograph into the pocket of her shirt, and turns for the door. Just as the weakened wall of the adjoining hut begins to collapse …

CANG

Just like ants …

He watches the futile efforts of the would-be fire-fighters and shakes his head. They work frantically, a hundred smoke blackened figures passing buckets backwards and forwards, drawing water from the sea to throw onto the flames.

Set fire to the nest, and watch them rush around …

“Phuong!“
The woman's desperate voice rises above the roar of the fire. “Where is Phuong?”

At the sound of the familiar name, Cang turns his head from the scene of devastation, and focuses on her panic.

“She was right behind me,” one of the boys answers her. The flames reflect from the fear in his eyes, as he turns towards them. “I'm going back.”

“No!” The father's voice. “You'll never make it. Look at those flames. I'll …” The man steels himself to run back into the danger zone, but Cang is quicker. He grabs the man's shoulder and flings him aside.

“Stay here with your family,” he shouts. He grabs one of the buckets, and pours it over himself, soaking his hair and clothing. Then he covers his mouth with his jacket, and plunges through the smoke, between the walls of flame that rise at least three times his height on both sides of the alley.

Cang knows the hut. He has followed her home protectively a number of times, always envious of the family that she seems so determined to discard, always careful not to be seen with her.

It is perhaps forty or fifty metres along the alley, but in the dark, through the smoke, with the grotesque flame-shadows dancing like demons all around him, nothing looks familiar.

Perhaps he has come too Jar. Would he hear her cries over the roar of the fire? Is she still capable of crying out?

He feels the tears streaming from his stinging eyes, and the surface of his skin is starting to burn. He smells his hair singeing, but he forces his feet forward, stumbling over unseen obstacles, willing himself on.

Then he hears it. Agroan, almost too quiet to distinguish itself from the sounds of destruction all around them, but so close that he stops dead.

Phuong lies barely an arms-reach away, the length of an outstretched hand. Yet he was so close to passing her by …

She is face-down in the dirt of the alley, trapped by the fallen metal of the hut-front, but spared momentarily by some twist of fate, and by that same, thin metallic shield from the flames which consume everything around her.

He grasps the frame of the wall. It is hot and he can feel his fingers blister, but he uses the pain, screaming aloud, as he strains to lift the heavy weight. Then, twisting his body underneath it, he straightens, shoving it away from him towards the flaming remains of the hut, and as it falls he sweeps her from the earth, presses her face close to his chest and begins his stumbling run back towards the water, and safety.

As Hell explodes all around him.

Each breath rasps in his throat and sears his lungs, and he can sense the blisters rising on his cheeks and forehead, the tears evaporating from his eyes. He is running blind now, using the intense heat of the flames on both sides to guide him along the centre of the alley. He feels the pain as the shirt on his back begins to smoulder, but there is no stopping.

Twice infive metres he stumbles, but each time he regains his feet and struggles on. His arms have forgotten the weight they bear, his mind is beyond thinking. All that remains is instinct: the movement, the drive to escape the pain. He would scream but the air is gone, burned away by the flames which lick towards him on both sides …

Darkness plays around the corners of his consciousness, and as his hair takes fire and the shirt on his back ignites, he trips and falls for the last time.

Through the wall of flame, and into the cooling agony of thrown water.

Gentle hands prise the burden from his arms, and he feels himself being lifted. The pain is exquisite. And short-lived. It explodes inside his mind with a sound like thunder, and sears every nerve-ending with an electric heat. Then it is gone …

Leaning over his patient the old doctor shakes his head to free it of the memories. Napalm and bombed-out villages. The ghosts he crossed an ocean to escape.

The gang-leader's breathing is shallow, and the burns on his face and body are horrific.

“He's not going to make it.”

He speaks the thought aloud, to no one in particular, but a voice behind him answers.

“Why'd he do it, do you think? I mean, someone with his reputation …”

The doctors look up.

“Why does anyone do anything?” He glances across to where his colleague is leaning over the girl, and asks the question with his eyes.

The other doctor smiles as she straightens up.

“She'll be okay as long as we can control the infection. A few serious burn scars on her back and arms, and I think her leg's fractured. Nothing that won't heal. But you know, there's not a single mark on her face. He must have had her pressed to his chest all the way …”

His relief for the girl is tinged with a sense of his own helplessness. He looks down at his patient, but the gang-leader's breathing has already ceased.

Later, he will describe the blistering on that face, and the savage burns on the back and the legs, even the way the hair was seared away down to the scalp. He will express wonder at how anyone in that kind of pain could have managed to make it through such an ordeal carrying another human being, when the fire must have exhausted the oxygen in the very air he was breathing.

These things he will discuss. But because he does not understand it, because, in all his years of outfacing pain and death, he has never before experienced it, he will make no mention of the way, moments after all breathing had stopped, and the life had Jaded from those unseeing eyes, that ravaged face had settled suddenly into a smile of such … peace.

Weightless, he floats. There is no pain. And no regret. The world slides away like a memory and is gone. And into the silence and the darkness it leaves behind, he dreams a touch, and a woman's face above him singing softly the words of a forgotten song. And he dreams himself a child again: before the war, before the streets, before the death of innocence …

*

TOAN'S STORY

Twenty-five people died that night, including the infamous gang-leader, Cang Duong.

I don't know how many people gave a silent cheer when they heard the news of his death. Probably a large number. And they probably didn't believe the story of how he died. Why should they? It didn't fit the public image, after all. He was a vicious animal, merciless. Leader of a pack of alley-trash. With him gone, the gang had lost its teeth and everyone could breathe easier.

All true …

But Phuong was alive because of him, and whatever else he had done in his life nothing could take that away.

I guess it's nice to see life in terms of villains and heroes. It's comfortable and convenient. And very Hollywood. But life is rarely that simple.

Ask Phuong …