They put all the stupid kids in one school, where he had to takeremedial English (for the extra dumb, like he was) with Donald, where theywent over flashcards and read books that still had pictures in them.“Farmer Jim has two cows. Say,” Mrs. Trahan, the remedial Englishteacher, would say, “Fa-arm-er J-im. Say, too k-ows.” Tuấn couldn’t help butfeel like a baby in her class.Now Tuấn smacked Donald’s hands away. “Not for fat pig,” he said.“Oink, oink!” he called out. “Oink, oink!”They all laughed and Donald grabbed Tuấn’s shirt, twisting the collar, butthe sound of Ms. Swanson’s heels clicking against the floor made him let go.“He’s not worth it,” one of Donald’s friends said.“Yeah, leave him.”“For now.”As the others left, Donald leaned in and whispered, “Dog eater.” He said itagain, pausing between the words—“Dog. Eater.”—before catching up withhis friends.“Are you sitting alone because they made you?” Ms. Swanson asked whenshe found him. Ms. Swanson was a tall woman, taller than any of the otheradults. A permanent wrinkle marked her forehead, making her look angry orannoyed. She wore suit jackets with skirts, but they always looked small onher bulky, uneven body. The upper part of her body bulged against the fabric;the lower part seemed dainty. Tuấn thought that if she looked like thatgrowing up, perhaps she understood what life was like for him. In his mind,he saw her standing in a line, waiting to be chosen for dodge ball or sittingalone during lunch. She placed her hand on her hip and frowned when hedidn’t answer. “Or do you like sitting by yourself?”“Yes, ma’am,” Tuấn answered.“Well, which is it?”“I like sitting myself,” he said. He stuffed a spoonful of rice into his mouthand she walked away.After the bell rang, everyone headed for class while Tuấn waited. It wasthe easiest way, he learned, to avoid the too-crowded hallways. When all thestudents were gone, Tuấn headed for the door. As he rounded the corner forMrs. Trahan’s class, Donald jumped out, his hands stuck in the air like amonster’s.“What you doing, Ja-uan?” he asked. “Don’t you know the bell’s gonnaring in a minute? You’ll get in trouble if you’re late, Ja-uan. You can’t be late,Ja-uan.”Tuấn looked down the hall behind Donald. Everyone had disappeared. Hetook a step forward, and the bell rang.“There it goes,” Donald said and shoved Tuấn down to the floor. His headhit a locker.“Go back to China, Chinaman,” he heard Donald say.He wanted to say “I came from Vietnam. I am Vietnamese.” But he didn’t.—As Tuấn approached their apartment, he saw his brother standing outside.Bình swung a plastic bat in one hand and palmed a crumpled-up Coke canwith the other. The bat they got from the Dollar General. The Coke can heprobably found near the bayou because people were always throwing awaystuff out there.His brother threw the can up and swung the bat. He missed.“You have to keep your eyes on the can-ball,” Tuấn said.Bình looked up. “I know.”Can-ball, they called this.“But I have to blink, don’t I?” his brother asked.“Yeah, but you have to follow the can-ball still.”“Impossible.”Tuấn chuckled and they ran up the stairs and he let them inside.He was making their afternoon snack—rice with Maggi sauce and lunchbologna—when Bình came to him with his notebook.“They’re giving you homework in second grade nowadays?” Tuấn asked.His brother opened it up and showed him two words. On the left, hisname, Bình. On the right, Ben.“That’s what I want people to call me from now on,” his brother said,pointing to Ben.“Why?” He pointed at Bình. He couldn’t imagine his brother being calledsomething else. Everything had a proper name.His brother shrugged and gave a disappointed look. “I don’t know. Easier,I guess.” Then he added, “For everyone.”“But it’s your name,” Tuấn said.“I can choose my own name. No one says I can’t.”“Mẹ will be mad.” He imagined their mother throwing up her hands likeshe did a lot of the time and saying, You boys give me a headache—why can’tyou be good? “And Dad…” Tuấn added but couldn’t finish the sentence; hedidn’t know where it would go.“I don’t care what Mom thinks.” His brother grabbed the notebook back.“And Dad’s dead.” He walked away.He didn’t even look like a Ben.—Tuấn couldn’t sleep that night. The dog—out there—was barking again. Itwas nearly three. Tuấn went to the window and tried to find it. No one inVersailles was allowed to have a pet. He squinted and looked out beyond thefence. It had to be somewhere out there. Something moved, and he took astep back.A gecko. Just a gecko. They were always around. Them and palmettobugs.For a brief moment, he had the idea of leaving the gecko on his brother’sbed and imagined him squirming and screaming. Bình (he would never callhim Ben) didn’t like any of the things Tuấn liked. Tuấn thought geckos werefascinating. He heard that if a bird grabbed a gecko, the tail would just falloff. In an instant, the gecko would escape, and later the tail would grow back.Bình didn’t like any of that. It reminded Tuấn of their father. He didn’t likehim going outside to play and getting dirty. He remembered one time he wasplaying and it rained and he ran home muddy. His father looked up from hisbook and nearly screamed. His face screwed up in disgust. Tuấn couldimagine Bình doing that; his face would be like their father’s.Tuấn reached up and held out his palm. “I’m not gonna hurt you, buddy,”he coaxed. At first, the gecko avoided the hand, but eventually it stepped on.Tuấn cupped it in both hands—“What I tell you?”—and walked out of theroom. In the distance, the dog began to howl, a long, whining howl thatbecame almost like a cry. “What could it be crying about?” Tuấn asked, looking at the gecko. “Let’stake a look-see.”He opened the front door. Not knowing what else to do, Tuấn sat downand listened to the howling mix with the hum of air conditioners and thesound of frogs and crickets somewhere in the thickets of bushes and trees thatsurrounded the Versailles bayou.When he was little, what he loved most was going to the bayou. In hismind, it was the best place to be because no one bothered him there. Beingalone, he could do whatever he wanted.One time he pretended he was a pirate, and Cô Lam, who lived in theapartment across the dirt road from them, called out from her window: “Norespect!”“I’m sorry!” he replied. “I’ll be quieter.”“And I have to work tonight!” She threw a rolled-up newspaper at him, butit hit the water instead and sank.People were always throwing things into the bayou. Heineken cans andcigarette butts littered the water along with whatever else was useless—broken lawn chairs, burned and scratched cookware, cardboard boxes. Thetrash of Versailles convened in the brackish brown waters of theneighborhood’s back bayou. It convened and stayed and floated until it wastoo heavy and sank.Nothing could survive here. But then there were the frogs and the cricketsand that dog. He closed his eyes and listened.—In the morning, Tuấn woke up to his mother’s shrieking.“What are you holding?” his mother cried.He felt something in his hands and remembered the gecko. To hisamazement, it had stayed there all night. He felt its little claws. His mothershrieked again and Tuấn held his hand closer to his body. The lizardsquirmed.“Dirty! Dirty! Dirty! Let it go and come inside! Why are you outside? Doyou know what time it is?”Tuấn looked at the lizard, then at his mom. Hesitantly, he let the gecko goand went inside. At the doorway, his mother swept it down the steps and heswore he heard little pings as its body bounced.After his mother pushed him out the door for school, he walked out ofVersailles. As he passed Donald’s house, he quickened his pace as the frontdoor slammed shut and Donald came out. A brown-and-black dog withpointed ears was tied up to an old oak tree and began to run after him. Itstopped as it reached the end of its rope. Disappointed, it howled the samehowl that kept Tuấn awake at night. He knew then it must have been the samedog.Donald stopped at the end of the driveway and was surprised to find Tuấn.“You always had dog?” he asked.“None of your business,” Donald said.A woman, the same large and bulbous shape as Donald, lumbered out.The fat woman carried a smoking cigarette in one hand and a bottle in theother.Tuấn whistled to the dog and held out his hand.“Quit it,” Donald said. “He doesn’t like you.”The dog whimpered.“He likes,” said Tuấn.It didn’t have a tag, it didn’t have a collar. Just a rope around its neck. Helooked at the dog’s fur. Patches of it were missing like somebody had pulledthem out.Out of nowhere, Donald said, “Race you to the bus stop, Ja-uan,” andpushed him aside.As Donald disappeared, the woman got to the curb.“That boy forgot his drink,” she said and shook her head. She let thecigarette drop and stomped on it with her sandal. Her toenails were paintedlime green. “Do you want a soda?” she asked.—That afternoon before lunch, Donald met Tuấn at his locker.“See here, Ja-uan,” he started. “I wanted to tell you I’m sorry.” Tuấn didn’trespond and Donald repeated himself as he wiped his face with the back of ahand. “Sit with us today.” He reached an arm around and slammed the lockershut. “We’ll start over. You and me and Tommy and Pete. We’ll be friends.”Donald led Tuấn to his table, where Tommy and Pete, two other whiteboys, were already seated. Gripping his shoulder, Donald guided him to thebench.“Doesn’t Mrs. Trahan look like a horse?” Donald said as he sat down.“She has to be part horse, am I right?”The boys laughed, though they weren’t in Mrs. Trahan’s class. One boymade neighing sounds while the other clapped his hands on the table to makea galloping noise. Donald eyed Tuấn.“Maybe?” Tuấn answered.“Maybe!” they echoed and took out their lunches.“Oh, man!” Donald exclaimed. “Margaret forgot my soda. That’s howstupid Margaret is. My dad’s more stupider for marrying her.” He opened hisbag and took a bite of his sandwich. “Hey, Ja-uan. Old friend, old pal,”Donald said, “do me a favor? Here’s two dollars. Get me a Coke, why don’tya? And get something for yourself, too. Maybe milk, ’cause you’re smallstuff.”Tuấn looked at the crowded line. He looked back at Donald, who beamed.“It’s Tu-hung,” Tuấn said. “My name is Tu-hung.” He said it slowly,enunciating the words the same way Mrs. Trahan did in class.“Okay, okay,” Donald said. “I get it. Now, a soda?”When Tuấn came back, Donald was whispering to one of the boys.“Thanks, buddy!” he said when he noticed Tuấn. He grabbed the soda canand rubbed off the water.Tuấn opened his lunch and stirred the leftover noodles with his chopsticks.His mother was angry that he and Bình hadn’t eaten the leftover noodles shemade two nights before for their after-school snack. “I don’t make food to goto waste,” she said. She went on about how money was tight as she threw inslivers of beef and packed it for his lunch. Tuấn lifted his chopsticks to hismouth and Donald screamed: “Bug-eater!”In the Tupperware, a black lump moved. By reflex, Tuấn threw thecontainer in the air. Tommy and Pete screamed but then laughed, anuncontrollable hoo-ing and hollering. The noodles landed on the table and inthem a cockroach moved. More came out of hiding. Everyone in the cafeteriastood up, not knowing whether to run toward the mess or away from theroaches. Ms. Swanson came over.“Who made this mess?” she demanded. “Whoever made this mess has toclean it up. Donald, was it you?”“No! I swear! I hate those things! Yuck!” He screwed up his face andmade it look like he was about to puke. “Ja-uan brought them in his lunch. Iswear.”Tuấn stood up and started to gather the bugs into the container. It was notright to treat animals that way. They were living beings. How would Donaldfeel if he were treated that way?“Look, he’s saving them! He wants to eat them!” Donald yelled.Tuấn put the container’s top on. The bugs crawled around in their enclosedsafety as he walked away. “Mẹ mầy,” he mumbled.“Y’all heard that?” Donald asked the cafeteria. “He said he’s going to eatthem anyway! He said it in his ching-chong!”The kids laughed and their laughter echoed.“Both of you! Detention! After school!”—In Ms. Swanson’s room, Tuấn and Donald sat as far away from each other aspossible until she told them to sit closer together toward the center of theroom.“I want to keep an eye on the both of you,” she said.Tuấn looked at the clock. They had an hour. Donald smirked as he drew inhis notebook. Ms. Swanson came over and ripped it away from his desk.“Eyes forward, Donald,” Ms. Swanson said. “Straight ahead.”“He’s not looking forward!” said Donald.“Lie!” Tuấn said. “Your fault! Everything, your fault!”“Settle down, both of you,” said Ms. Swanson. “What both of you need isdiscipline. Haven’t your parents ever spanked you?”“I don’t deserve to be here. It’s all his fault!” Donald reached over andpoked Tuấn, but Tuấn grabbed his finger and twisted it around. Donaldwhined in pain.“Enough, you two. Do you want me to call your mothers?”“I have no mother!” Donald yelled.“You mother fat, too!” Tuấn added.“Enough!” Ms. Swanson yelled, slamming her fists on the desk.At three thirty, Ms. Swanson allowed the two to call their parents to pickthem up.The last time he got into a fight (in the first week of school when Donaldcalled him a slant-eye and Tuấn slapped him on the cheek), his mother wasbrought in for a parent-teacher conference. He remembered her looking smallin front of the teacher. “Yes, sir,” she kept on saying. The teacher made hersign something and they left. On the bus ride home, she fumed. She wasembarrassed, she said, with how he’d behaved. Tuấn said Donald started it;Donald called him a name and made fun of him.“Then you look the other way,” his mother replied. “You make yourselfbetter than him by being a better student. You don’t hit. You don’t hitanybody. Not ever.”“That’s stupid,” Tuấn said. “He won’t stop unless I hit him. He’ll just keepon doing it.”“Unless you hit him?” his mom repeated, incredulous. “What would yourfather say? Unless you hit him? Ridiculous!”She went on: Did he know it made her look like a bad parent? What wouldeveryone say about their household? That she raised a savage? An ingrate? Itdidn’t help that she was in this all alone—all alone. Those last words hurt himthe most—“You don’t have a father and your mother is in this all alone.” Ifshe was alone, what did that make him? It stung him. And he didn’t knowwhat to do with it; he didn’t want to feel that way ever again. Tuấn pretended to dial a phone number and spoke Vietnamese into the
receiver. Afterwards, he went outside. He remembered an RTA bus stop near
a grocery store. It must have been five or six blocks away. Not too far.
As he began to walk toward the main road, Donald’s stepmother pulled up.
“Versailles, right?” she said, then looked over at Donald.
“Why don’t we drive your friend home, too?” she said to Donald. Donald
knitted his eyebrows, and his stepmother reached back to unlock the door.
“Jump in,” she said.
“Yes, ma’am,” said Tuấn.
To Tuấn’s surprise, the inside of the car was clean. Donald’s stepmother
turned on the radio. The music sounded like plastic bottles hitting each other,
the notes rising with a woman’s voice, singing who knew what. With each
passing second, the song seemed to go faster. It reminded Tuấn of the car
chase scenes on TV.
Donald’s stepmother looked into her rearview mirror. “It’s Donna
Summer!” she said. “I wish I could get this goofball up here to listen to good
music, but all he listens to is noise. All of it is noise.”
Donald let out an angry sigh and rolled down his window. His mother took
a right and then a left into Versailles.
“Donald, why don’t you invite your friend over sometime?” she asked,
slowing the car. “I can make tacos or something! He never invites his friends
over. He’s always playing with his toys. Two weeks ago, we got him a dog so
he’d at least go outside. It’s his only friend.”
“His name’s Walter!”
“His father says the problem is he’s too much like his mother—too
unfriendly. But look at you two! Golly!”
“Margaret!” Donald kicked the dashboard. “Will you just shut up? God!
So embarrassing.”
The car eased to a stop. Tuấn jumped out and watched as it pulled away.
The apartment door opened and his mom called his name. “Why are you
home so late? And who was that?” She stood on the landing, her hands on her
hips.
“Nothing, mẹ,” Tuấn said.
She grabbed him by the shoulder and bent down to his eye level. “Look
your mother in the eyes and tell her that,” she said.
“Nothing,” he said and ran in to his room. He slammed his door.
“You don’t make things easy for your mother,” he heard her say.
—
Walter barked into the night. Tuấn knew where the dog was. He went to the
window. Stars dotted the sky. It reminded him of nights in Mỹ Tho. When he
couldn’t sleep, his dad told him to count the stars. Một, hai, ba…you could
never get to one hundred without falling asleep. He remembered that. He held
the memory in his mind like a breath.
In school, they made him count different numbers. He couldn’t get his lips
to say the words. “Won” was fine, “too” was easy, but it got harder. “Tree.”
“Far.” “Fire.” Donald would make fun of him and then Tuấn would count as
fast as he could in Vietnamese—Một-hai-ba-bốn-năm-sáu-bảy-tám-chínmười! You can’t count, he’d tell Donald. You know nothing. Donald would call
for Mrs. Trahan to tell her Tuấn was cussing at him, and she would believe
him. She would make him sit in the corner for the rest of the period like he
was in time-out in kindergarten.
Tuấn looked under the bed. The lunch container from that afternoon was
still there. The bugs dotted the plastic, not moving except one on the lid near
the hole he had made for them to breathe. Tuấn shook it gently, and the dots
began crawling again. He counted all six.
He left the apartment barefoot and started down the road carrying the
Tupperware of roaches. Dirt caked his feet and the rocks bit into his skin. For
a second, he wanted to go back and get his shoes, but he was so far already. It
was cooler than nights before. A cold front had come through, and the
weatherman said it was perfect “sweater weather.”
Under the stars, the apartment buildings became silhouettes. Walking, he
heard birds singing. He didn’t know birds sang at this hour. He felt delighted
and surprised.
Tuấn passed the gates of Versailles and walked toward the bus stop. When
he got to Donald’s house, he stopped.
The lights were off. The dog stopped barking when it saw him. It began
whimpering and pacing from one corner of the lawn to the other, stopping
when its rope couldn’t go any farther.
“Walter?” Tuấn whispered. He felt as if someone was spying on him, as if
Donald was outside knowing he’d come this night, though he had only come
up with this idea while brushing his teeth. He walked closer to the dog. A
light came on and Tuấn froze.
When no one came out, he set the container down and went to the dog. It
barked, then whimpered again. Its voice was weakening, vanishing from
endless barking. Tuấn petted its head. It seemed more a phantom of a dog
than a real dog, what a real dog should be—its size, its shape. It needed a
bath. It needed food. The dog licked Tuấn’s hand.
Tuấn moved to the tree to look at the rope knotted around it. When the
dog began barking again, Tuấn whispered, “Shhh…” until it quieted down.
With all his strength, Tuấn pushed his fingers into the knot and tried to
unravel it. The burning of the rope made him sweat and his palms became
slick. It was tighter than he could have imagined.
After a couple of minutes, the knot was loosened and the dog began
moving again, wagging its tail and panting with its tongue sticking out. Tuấn
dropped the rope to the ground.
“Go,” he said, too excited to whisper anymore. “Go!”
And, as if understanding, the dog ran out of the yard and into the street.
Tuấn watched until it disappeared. He stood and waited to see if it would
come back.
“Anh,” a voice called out. Brother. Bình stood barefooted on the sidewalk
under a streetlamp. “It’s cold,” Bình said, tiptoeing closer. “You got up. I
followed you.” He wiped his nose with his hand.
“It is cold,” Tuấn agreed.
The two stood under Donald’s tree in silence.
Then Bình spoke up. “Is the dog coming back?” he asked.
“No,” Tuấn answered.
“Where do you think he’s going?”
“Somewhere” was all he could answer. “But he’s not tied up anymore. He’s
free.” He liked the sound of those words—He’s free—in English. They felt
light and floated off his tongue: He’s free.
Tuấn placed the Tupperware of cockroaches under the tree, next to the
rope. “You won’t tell anyone,” he said.
“No one,” said Bình.
“And nothing happened tonight.”
“Nothing.”
“Let’s get back, then.”
And they ran back to the apartment. For the first time in a long time, Tuấn
felt happy, as if he were where he was supposed to be, out in the starlit night
under such a full moon. He swore he felt a breeze run through his hair,
though the air was still.