“I will be back for Mid-Autumn Festival,” Mom said as she quickly grabbed her clothes and stuffed them into her bag before running off.
Mother encountered Sao's pleading gaze as she rushed down the slope in front of the house. Holding her hands tightly, Sao held back a sob in her throat. Much later, in the afternoons sitting on the slope of the gate, looking into the distance, waiting for a figure, Sao always blamed himself. If only Sao had held onto her mother's hand that day, screaming "Mom, don't go", then perhaps everything would have been different. Mother would have hugged Sao and sobbed. Crying until she was exhausted, Dad's drunkenness gradually faded, his yelling was drowned in snoring, then Mother fell silent and leaned against the wall. The sky was as bruised as Mother's body. Strands of hair were still covered with straw, sometimes even dried blood. Sitting until it was almost dark, Mother put her hands on her knees and struggled to stand up, picking up each pot and bowl scattered in the yard, in the banana bushes. Mother washed rice to cook for Sao to eat. When she sat at the kitchen looking at the blazing fire, Mother's eyes were lifeless. Sao put handfuls of leaves of the plant in her mouth, chewed them with a few grains of salt and applied them to the wounds on her mother's body. It must have been very painful but she never complained. Sao only felt her skin tremble with anger.
“Mother will be back during the Mid-Autumn Festival.” Mother ran quickly, one foot tripping over the other, in a hurry because she knew that if she hesitated for even a few seconds, she would never be able to escape this place. Sao never blamed her mother, nor did she blame herself. When she helped her pick up each pot and bowl in the yard, Sao felt at ease thinking that somewhere now, mother was living a more comfortable life. At least mother was not beaten by father. Then, father’s drunkenness gradually lessened. The bottles scattered around the house no longer contained alcohol. One afternoon, sitting by the door, looking out at the broken bowls scattered in the banana bushes in front of the house, father asked Sao:
- What color shirt were you wearing when you left?
- Plum red, dad.
Sao didn't turn to look at her father and answer. How could she tell her father that the red color of her mother's shirt was aching in Sao's memory. The little boy still remembered that it was the shirt his father had bought for his mother when he sold the first batch of pigs. Sao still remembered when he held the stack of money in his hand, his father was thinking about re-roofing the house, buying his mother a gas stove to make cooking easier. His father also planned to buy Sao the most beautiful school bag in the district market. Then his father suddenly thought, money must be used to make money, he must buy a herd of breeding pigs to raise. When he was rich, he could buy anything he wanted. But man's plan was not as good as God's plan. The pigs his father had bought to raise and let roam free suddenly fell ill and died. All his capital was gone, and his father was bored and went to the pub every day. He often returned home drunk after spending the last of his money on drinking, blaming, scolding, and beating his mother. When he woke up, his father sat looking out into the yard and asked why the pots, pans, and dishes were scattered like that. He looked at the wound on his mother's body and asked what happened? Who beat you to this state? Later, whenever he sobered up and looked at his mother's bruised body, he would cry and ask, "Did I hurt you like this?" Many times, my father promised not to touch a drop of alcohol, but every time he went to the market and met his friends, he got drunk. Standing at the top of the hill, he tilted his head up to the sky, drained the bottom of the bottle of wine, then shouted angrily, "Why doesn't God love me? Why does he always want to keep my life down?"
*
The man sat looking at the pale sunlight in the yard, not blinking. On that uneven yard, there was a wine bottle thrown carelessly, a clothesline fluttering with some old, wrinkled clothes that his son had just hung up. The man moved slightly, his skin itching from the soiled clothes he had worn for several days without changing. The man realized that no one cared about his beard, hair, or clothes anymore. On sunny days, no one brought a chair out to the yard to drag him down and sit down, complaining: "If you try sitting still like a statue here for a while, a bird will come and make a nest on your head. You are not like a wild man." He would laugh, thinking to himself that he was once a wild man too. At the age of ten, he lost both his parents and lived at his uncle's house. All year round, he followed his uncle into the forest to pick medicinal plants, mushrooms, and bamboo shoots, climbing trees to collect honey to bring back for his aunt to sell. He preferred to live in the forest than at home, not having to listen to his aunt coming in and out and glaring at him because there was another mouth to feed. Not having to see people gathering while he was alone. Back then, his hair was as thick as the forest. Sometimes the two of them looked at each other and laughed heartily. Sitting under the tree, they cut each other's hair. His hair is still somewhere in the old forest.
Then he had a lover. The two of them took each other back to the land his parents left behind, borrowed money to build a temporary house. This place used to be a warm home filled with laughter. He gradually went into the forest less and less, but together with his wife, they planned to make a living. He went to the district town to work for hire, refusing any job. With his strong shoulders, he was willing to shoulder all the hardships on his shoulders to give his wife a warm home. Sao was born, the kitchen was warmer. Debts, food and clothing did not make him feel less happy. But an accident happened, he fell off the scaffolding, luckily he saved his life but left a disability in his leg. His health gradually weakened, he walked with a limp, and he could not find a job anywhere. The couple decided to raise livestock. He used to spend nights stretching a hammock to watch over the pigs giving birth. He used to lose sleep when a pig in the herd fell ill. He used to earnestly beg God to have mercy on him because all his capital and debts were in the pigs. But...
At this moment, the man looked at the boy's messy hair and suddenly realized. He had been immersed in his drunkenness for so long that he had forgotten reality. He had forgotten that little Sao was growing up day by day like a pebble or wild grass. He dragged the boy, pressed him down on the familiar wooden chair, and made clumsy cuts with the scissors. The boy reached out to catch the falling hair and asked absentmindedly:
- When will fall come?
The man stopped, looking at the persimmons that had started to burn on the tree. Now it was the little boy's turn to stand in front and hold up a mirror for his father. The father took the scissors and trimmed his own hair. The cool breeze blew through the nape of his neck, cutting off the messy hair, making the little boy shiver slightly. The little boy looked at the new hair of the father and son, smiling and asking:
- Would you like some tea, Dad?
The father stopped and pulled his son back, not knowing how to answer him. He couldn't remember when he got used to the smell of alcohol, and without alcohol, his mouth was bland. How long had it been since he had had tea? While he was still lost in thought, the boy had run to the edge of the forest and brought back a handful of fresh tea leaves. He had lit the firewood, put on the kettle, and was scraping the pot to prepare to wash rice for dinner. Looking at his son's lonely figure, he felt sorry and regretful.
- We are running out of rice, dad.
He stood up, took the bucket to the small stream behind the house. The stream was so cool, he dived into the water to clean away the alcohol that had seeped into his blood. He knew it was time to sober up and take care of the little boy. The last bit of sunlight in the afternoon shone on the sparkling water like a memory of Xoan. Also by this stream, there were times when the couple came back from the forest and sat here to rest at noon. Letting her long black hair flow down the stream, Xoan thought about the meal while her stomach growled with hunger. He would definitely catch some fish, snails or stream crabs. Add a handful of pre-picked wild vegetables and you would have a delicious meal. He had lost that simple, cozy happiness.
The little boy ran out to take the bucket of fish his father had just brought home. He nimbly cut the fish on the broken chopping board, clamped it on a bamboo stick and grilled it over the fire. In no time, the aroma of the cooked fish filled his stomach. Sao took a plate of white salt and ran to the garden to pick chili peppers for his father. Seeing the little boy understand what was going on, he felt even more heartbroken. The meal was spread out on a mat and brought out to the porch. Darkness covered the mountain village, the sound of frogs croaking loudly. In the sky, a crescent moon appeared behind the black clouds. A few bats flapped their wings and flew across the precarious yard. Mosquitoes buzzed as if their dinner had arrived. Dad wasn't drunk. Sao sat quietly by the meal tray, munching on that happiness. The little boy blurted out:
- If only I had a mother…
Halfway through the sentence, he realized he had misspoken and slowly looked up at his father. The man let out a sigh as thin as smoke.
- When you grow up, will you run away from home like your mother?
- I'm just here, waiting for mom to come home. No one wants to leave home, dad.
He tilted his head back, trying to swallow back his tears. The drunkenness had robbed him of a complete family. He didn't want to be immersed in alcohol anymore. The sound of the boy stripping rice from the jar this afternoon made his heart ache. Tomorrow morning, when the sky was bright, he would go into the forest. He believed that the forest would never abandon those who had been close to him. As long as he was diligent, he would not let Sao go hungry. Finding his basket and his boots on the kitchen roof, he thought about the bamboo shoots. The next morning, he woke up early, lit the stove, boiled water, and fried rice for the boy to eat before going to school. He carried his basket and looked straight into the forest as he walked. After the rainy season, bamboo shoots would grow in abundance. Occasionally, he saw traces of those who had gone before. During this season, there were many people who went into the forest to pick the gifts of heaven. There were families of four or five people, carrying packed rice, leaving when it was still pitch black. Occasionally, they met in the old forest. They greeted each other with the flickering light of flashlights, patted each other on the shoulder, and asked if the wound on his leg had healed completely. When tired, they sat down to rest under the canopy of the forest, opened the rice ball they brought along, and ate it with the wind and the chirping of birds. On his backpack, there were not only bamboo shoots but also precious medicinal plants that he picked to sell to the traditional medicine shop in the district. In his fitful sleep in the middle of the vast forest, he dreamed of his wife. When he woke up, he felt like there was still warmth somewhere...
*
The little boy brought home a sparkling lantern from school. He said the charity group also gave him a carp-shaped moon cake. The little boy climbed onto a stool and placed the cake neatly on the altar. He told his father:
- To burn incense for ancestors on Mid-Autumn Festival. When I was at home, my mother often did that.
The little boy sat looking at the moon hanging high in the sky and missed his mother terribly. When he was still at home, every Mid-Autumn Festival, his mother made pomelo dogs, bought moon cakes, and baked cakes for him. The whole family spread mats in the middle of the yard, displayed bright red persimmons, and nibbled on each piece of cake. In recent days, the little boy always felt that his mother was somewhere very close. His mother promised that she would return during the Mid-Autumn Festival. The little boy always believed that his mother was watching over him and his father every day. Who knows, tomorrow morning when he woke up, his mother would be sitting on the porch picking vegetables. His mother smiled and said, "Why are you awake already? Hurry up and wash your face so you can go to the market with me. The Mid-Autumn Festival market is so much fun. I still have to sell all the bamboo shoots that my father just picked."
The little boy smiled and slowly fell asleep…
Short story by VU THI HUYEN TRANG