Potato - a short fiction writing by Su

The morning breeze combed my fuzzy hair, playing with any strands it could find. The frigid sensation freezes my brain as I felt as if many insects made of ice are crawling on my head. This eases the scorching earth under my feet and made blurry the image of my messy office – with men wearing nice long sleeved shirts and colorful ties, cannot wait to be their sloppy self again. 

In the distance, the electrical poles stand still and firm as I remember, like guardians protecting the village.  I took a breath and filled my lungs with the ripening aroma of the paddy field, although now and then the sharp smell of fertilizer spices it up a little bit.

Is this a hallucination? The village in my memory is drastically contrasted to what in front of my eyes now. And it seems to be inviting me back into its arms.

I know this place too well to be fooled again.

Every day in my childhood I learned many new things, and this includes realizing how poor my village was. I’ve never tasted the excitement before meals as a kid, since I always knew what we were having: potato.  

Hard boiled potato, fried potato, mashed potato, potato soup, you name it. Sometimes we would have some paper-like slice of meat and some broccoli but potato is what always on the table. For the past years I tried to cook and eat many different dishes but could not get rid of the starchy, bland taste that has been glued onto my taste buds, seasoned with the saltiness of my tears.

“Janet! Eat your food and stop crying. You are such an ungrateful brat! Don’t forget that Charlie’s house has much less than us and he has to go to bed at eight so he does not feel hungry.”

Charlie is my neighbor two doors away. He does not talk much and always sit in the corner while we were playing hide and seek. He always wears the same yellow dirty shirt and rarely take a shower, so it is hard to come near and comfort him. However, my mom had no idea that I am exactly the same as Charlie. After two or three days, I would fed up with potato and throw the food away to regain my appetite, but mostly to prove that mom is wrong.

Besides, what does mom know? She has only one duty: cooking for the family. Well two, if you count gossiping with the other moms as a tedious job. 

The one I was always worried about was dad. He works in a gold mine from 5:00 AM to midnight. I tried to stay awake and wait for him on any day I could, with a glass of water ready. He would come back with ashes covering his face like the soldiers in World War I. 

As soon as I saw his shadow, I would run towards him and he would hug me, leaving some traces of dust and ash that I never clean before sleeping. He always tried to move his mouth into a curl and give me a smile. On some days, however, I would hug a zombie dad.

I wanted to tell him that he should change his job to be happier and have time for me, but soon realized that it was the one and only thing he could do to keep our family running. 

There are no factories in the village, and the farmers have far more bad harvests than good ones. If someone asked me why I did not tell my parents to move to the city, I would say: “Oh we have never thought about this! Now let me tell my mom and dad to get their wings ready,” and they would slip away.

Saying that I dislike the village is a euphemism, I abhorred it. It was like a prison, a bottomless hole in which the unfortunate people who once fell down may never see the light again. My everyday life was a frustration. Realizing how poor we were did not make me feel humiliated much. 

On the contrary, it acts like a big pile of hay covered in oil, fueling my determination to make a big leap out of this hell on earth. I am one of the few people to have become a “white-collar”, and all the ones that called me nerdy, geek or dork ended up like my parents or in addiction treating camps.

But right now, that loath is the weakest emotion. I only picture mom’s stunned face when she saw me home. Of course we would cry, but then mom would forget and let her potatoes get burned (a thing that she never tolerate), compliment on my white dress and sit down and talk with me for hours. We would both wait for dad to come home when the clock strikes twelve. And we would…we would… oh there are tons of things that we can do!

Another breeze come and fondles my face. I take a deep breath and ran to the brown house with the leaf rooftop and no windows, feeling every step I go.

Green Cocaine - a short fiction writing by Su

I still remember that the bike was one “Martin 107”, metallic green and about 3 feet tall, it was my 9^th birthday present. As soon as I left my air-conditioned house, I immediately regret it. Saigon is a beautiful city, but in summer the heat comes. It seems to melt all the nice things down, leaving behind trash and dust.

I tried to cycle as fast as I can on the road, hoping that the wind could somehow ease the heat from the 95 degrees sun deep frying my brain. There was this video game that I have always wanted and that day was the day when I decided to spend my 2 month worth of saving money buying the game. 

When I was 10 minutes away from the store, I started to slow down to catch my breath while enjoying the scenery. Many people have started to fortify in their house, drinking iced beer and lemonade in cups reused from last night’s dinner. The ones that don’t have beers chew ice cubes instead. Hadn’t it been for the bulges of electrical wire – some of which are broken in half – dangling in the middle of the road, I could have ride my bike with my eyes closed. Oh, and there were also cracks on the road filled with dust made by the trucks from the night before. They hurt my butt every ten seconds or so.

A chattering pierced the heat waves. The honking from lines of motorbikes, the sound of people yelling and noise of dogs barking… all are jumbled together. Even now I wondered how I notice that distant chattering and I turned my head around. Just some noisy older kids riding on two bicycles. “Those poor ones, ignored by their parents, always fail school, make stupid jokes and laugh about stupid stuff” I thought and continued going. Only one more left turn and …“Hey, brat, what school do you go to?” A smoky, low voice sounded to my left.

Not again! Somehow the teenage group caught up with me. I didn’t look at them, I hate to see twig-like arms and legs; they are creepy. From the corner of my eyes, I saw four guys on two brown, rusty bicycles, so rusty that they creak every time they peddle. By the creaking sound, I realized that they are still parallel with me and figured that they are persistent with this stupid joke.

“High school for the Talented!” I said, keeping my eyes on the road. My dad told me that the more you converse with them, the more you go down to their level.

“Ha! Knew it! My younger brother said he was beaten by a guy from that school, now he’s lying immobile at home with a swollen face and purple eye. We have to check. If you are that guy, we are going to change your face so much that your mom’s not gonna recognize you.” It’s that same voice again but with much more anger, then 3 other voices agreeing with the first and swearing at me.

A moment of confusion. I could feel my brain sizzling. Then I tried to peddle as fast as I could. My shaky legs missed the pedal once, twice, and that was more than they needed. One of the two bicycles went ahead of me and blocked my way, the other gets closer to me but still parallel, forcing me to choose between falling or going into a small alley.

Next things I know I was crying. Tears blurred my vision. My eyes feel so hot that I thought they burned. I didn’t how they looked like, except that they were much taller than me, and that their clothes have holes on it and smell of rotten banana.  I continued to hear words yelling at me, words that will break down the soft-hearted and outrage the aggressive. I was one of those soft-hearted ones, but I kept clinching on my bike. They wanted me to go with them to their house and identify myself with their “brother.” I refused. I knew better.

Even now I can still recall and avoid that place, what I call “The alley of no hope.” You might think that alleys are scary only at night. If so, then imagine yourself standing in one in midday. You can see perfectly everyone on the road, but they were all minding their business and the last thing they want is trouble with some street teens. You can run or yell for help, but good luck finding anyone. These guys wouldn’t let go of the prey so easily, not when they are this close to the prize. They are the type that would strangle you if you call for help, and stab you in the back if you run.

At that moment, I was recalling having read articles about similar cases like this. I was feeling regret for having thought that the victims are not smart enough to escape. The thought of becoming one of them had never occurred in my mind.

“You want to mug me of my bike, don’t you?” I said while still crying. It took me a while to complete the sentence since I was hiccupping, filling my lungs choking humid air with every gasps.  My body drenched in sweat and my T-shirt full of snot. The effect was clear. I saw the slight mix of surprise and fear on their face.

They expected me to believe in that story of the immobile brother. “This is great,” I thought, “maybe there is a way out of this without losing my bike after all.” Their change in expression was enough to give me hope.

Then the oldest of them pulled out a knife from his leather bag. It was over. They left, with my bike and hysterical laughter, and I wished a car would run over them all.

I did not go out of my house for a week. I got nightmares several days after the incident and claustrophobia for a while. The alley, the rotten smell, the ignorant look of people passed by haunted me. My parents smiled to me and hugged me tight when I came back home that day. Although I kept explaining to them that I was not hurt, sorrow was apparent on their face as they shed tears. I was confused and thought that they were just too scared of losing their only son. They said that they didn’t care about the bike and I believed them.

They said it only cost a fifth of their salary.

But that was before I experienced how it feels to lose a fifth of my salary. 

Emily - a short fiction writing by Su

“I’m really sorry,” the man says.

Sitting opposite to him is a couple, Tim and Jane, with morbid facial expressions. Jane is using a purple handkerchief to clean her eyes, while her husband looks like he will murder whoever dares to speak to him.

The man trembles as he looks at the couple. His mind drifts back two days.

…

He recalls someone splashing water frantically. He was on the shore and recognized the pink bracelet. Without thinking, he jumped into the water. It fought back with icy slaps on his mouth, nostrils and ears. As the waves punched him, the saltiness poked his eyes and blurred his mind. He could sense his muscles protesting with every stroke of his arms, reminding him that he had come back from the hospital just four days ago. 

After what seemed like eternity, he saw the golden locks of hair that reflected the midday’s sun. Half of her face was under water. He reached to the child, pulled her by her tiny fingers into his chest. It felt like he was pulling an inanimate piece of log. A closer look showed that the girl’s face was reddened and covered with snot(tears).

“Emily! Where is Chloe?! Emily, are you ok? Where did Chloe go? Was she with you?”

The girl was choking water incessantly, only stopping briefly to gasp for air or crying her parents’ name.

“Emily, Answer me!” He roared. The saltiness came back on his tongue again, this time it was not sea water.

Her red eyes met his and there was a mix of fear and guilt. Her lips parted as she uttered sounds while shivering: “Uncle! Help! Please!”

A wave, white with foam, tried to devour them. He made a quick dive. Nothing was there but the still, endless sand blanket and a couple of seashells. His head hurt and something blocked his throat, forcing him to go up again. He started scanning the surface. Every sight of empty water killed him a little bit inside.

Seeing his daughter Chloe made his heart started pumping blood again. She was about 15 feet away from Emily, being drifted further away. Her pink headband and flower-patterned swimsuit bobbed up and down in distress.

“Dad!” Chloe shouted. Her arms were pushing down water and her legs kicking, but in a little more controlled motion than Emily’s, thanks to the mediocre swimming lessons she had taken. She tried to lie flat on the water, facing the sky and then float the rest of her body, but every time a wave would come and hammer her down.

The man carried Emily – who was still crying – on his back, her hands wrapping around his neck, and prepared to swim to his daughter. He even forgot to be mad at Chloe, although he knew it was her who disobeyed him and dared Emily to go to this dangerous part of the sea. 

As he kicked the water, a sharp pain stunned his legs. It felt like his skin was ripping apart and was not part of his body anymore. The after-effect of the surgery started kicking in. He could not take both of them back to the shore.

“Dad, help me!” The shrill voice was drowned by the rumble of angry sea.

He cursed god for giving him the car accident. It made his family, especially Chloe, sacrifice their weekend to take care of him. Now he wanted to pay the debt by taking Chloe and her niece Emily for a trip to the seaside.

Another wave hit them, this time whiter, higher and stronger.

The sun was beautiful that day.

…

The scene of Chloe starting to drown keeps replaying in his mind.

“Please… Tell…us what…happened.” Jane’s shaky voice, disrupted by hiccups and tears, brings him back to reality.

“I’m so sorry. I saw Chloe first, but could not find her anywhere. When people found her it was too late. Emily had swallowed too much water.” The man said while looking at his feet and the floor. 

His lips and eyes were drooping, the wrinkles on his face stiffened. Next to him, Chloe looked down too, sobbing. Jane burst into tears, and Tim was not in the mood to comfort her.