The girl was wilder outside of work. Hương wanted to say it aloud, but theAmerican went after Kim-Anh and she followed him into the bar, whereKim-Anh was already sitting on a stool. The dance floor lay bare and thelights spun, illuminating graffiti here and there on the walls and the floor. TheAmerican massaged Kim-Anh’s shoulder and pointed to a booth in thecorner. She pulled away and waved at the bartender. He put down his rag andshe talked into his ear as if she already knew him.“Over there,” said the American, leading Hương to the booth. “What doyou want? How about a Coke with rum? My treat.”“I don’t like Coke anymore,” she said. “What they have?”“They have everything. It’s America. We have everything.”“Something sweet,” Hương said. “No beer.”“I know just the thing,” he said. “You stay here.”A glittery silver ball hung over the center of the dance floor, where KimAnh now danced alone with a beer bottle in hand. The song changed tosomething faster, but the lights spun around at the same pace. Kim-Anhflailed her arms and closed her eyes.Was this what she and Công missed during the war years? If so, Hươngwasn’t very much impressed. Within minutes she felt bored and wanted to gohome. She thought about the laundry she would have to do tomorrow and thetrouble of going all the way to the Laundromat and sitting and waiting. Shethought about what she should pick up from the grocery store. Would the bagof rice she had now last another week? She wondered about her boys. Hermind drifted to Bình crying. She’d felt terrible when Bà Giangswept in and hecalmed down. As his mother, she should have comforted him, perhaps evenstayed home. At times like this she wished Công were there. Parenting washard enough; parenting alone and in a different country was something else altogether. The American came back and handed Hương a tall glass of what lookedlike milk.“What it is?” she asked.“Piña colada,” the American said. “Tropical. Thought it’d remind you ofVietnam.” He sat down next to Hương. “It has several entire servings of fruit,believe it or not.” He picked up the glass and pointed at it as he talked. “It haspineapple. It has coconut. It has rum, which is sugar, which comes from aplant, which should count for something.”Hương laughed. “You are funny man, Mister…”“Just call me Frank.”“Mr. Frank, you are so funny!”“No, just Frank.”“Mr. Frank.”“Anyway, you’ll like it. Drink up.” They knocked together their drinks,and Hương sipped from her straw as Frank drank from his bottle.“She’s beautiful, isn’t she?” the American said as he watched Kim-Anhdance.“Very,” Hương replied.Men were beginning to join Kim-Anh. She danced with several, neverstaying with just one. One minute she’s dancing with a man with a goatee,and the next the man is shorter and wearing glasses. It was then that Hươngsaw how the bar was full of white men and how the few women there werelike her, if not Vietnamese then at least Asian. The men were different fromthe type of men Công would have acquainted himself with, the womendifferent from those Hương would have known. It seemed as if they were adifferent species of human altogether, living different kinds of lives shecouldn’t imagine.She wondered what Kim-Anh was like before she left Vietnam. She had aslack Saigonese accent. She was a Buddhist, because she wore a bodhi seedbracelet, which she refused to take off even on the assembly line, hiding herhands in her pockets as they entered and exited the factory floor. Once shethought she had lost it in the machine and somehow (through her charm orwit, for Hương would give her that much—Kim-Anh was charming) got theoperator to stop it. She frantically searched the conveyor belt and stuck herhead in a compartment where the gears were hidden at the bottom of the vastmachine. She eventually found her bracelet—fallen on the floor—but Hươngcould not forget the image of Kim-Anh squatting, her legs splayed apart, herback hunched so she could get her head inside. She looked froglike. It was sodifferent from the confident yet delicate way she always held herself. Howmuch had Kim-Anh changed since she’d left Vietnam and how much effortwas it? Who was Kim-Anh, really?“I saved her, you know,” the American said. He pressed the beer bottle tohis lips. When he put the bottle back down, his hands wandered on the tableand returned to the drink. “She was nothing, you know. Just some poor citygirl. No mother, no father.”He paused as if he had finished, and a silence sat clumsily between them.“She must love you. She love you very much,” Hương said, not knowingwhat else to say, just wanting to say something, anything, so the air betweenthem didn’t feel so heavy anymore.He continued, “In Saigon, she worked at a bar where she had to dancewith older men. She was so little, how could those men? Those men weredisgusting. They touched her, gave her bruises. I’m not like those men.“I saved her,” he repeated. “I told them she was my fiancée. That we weregoing to marry, but then I was forced to leave. I gave her money. She left byherself, you see. It wasn’t a cruise ship. Just a regular fishing boat. When shegot to Hong Kong, she wrote to tell me she was safe. She said I wasn’t likeany other man she’d met. I was different, she said, and she couldn’t wait to seeme again. I asked my church to sponsor her. And that’s how she came over. Iam not a bad man, you see. I go to church. I’m a good man. I saved her.”“Which church?” Hương asked. Everyone in Versailles came throughSaint Expeditus. She didn’t know any other church in the area that did thesame.“What?” He looked confused. He took another drink of his beer.“Which church?” she asked again.He paused and swirled his bottle around. “Church? St. Mary’s. InMetairie. You wouldn’t know it,” he said. “I’m not like the other men, Hương.You got to believe me. I saved her.” He wiped the sweat from his forehead,which shined even in the dim light, and folded the napkin until it was toothick to continue.The song changed again and now Kim-Anh became more audacious. Sheheld on to a man and swayed as he rested his hands on her hips. He was morehandsome and better dressed than Frank. He wore a metal watch thatreflected the disco lights. Frank wore no watch. When Hương comparedFrank to this man, he looked pitiful and nervous. He was becoming evensweatier despite the air-conditioning.He wiped his hands on his pants and stood up. “And this is how she treatsme,” he said, more to himself than to anyone else.When the man Kim-Anh danced with moved a hand away from her hipsand latched on to her backside, Kim-Anh smiled and nodded. She seemed atease, familiar with it all. Hương was sure Kim-Anh knew what song this was,the exact lyrics, and when it would end. Hương imagined her coming hereevery night after work—she knew the bartender by name, knew the happyhour specials by heart. She had a calculating look in her eyes; Hương saw thatnow.Frank grabbed Kim-Anh’s wrist, and Hương heard him say “No” to theother man as he pushed him on the shoulder.“What you doing?” Kim-Anh shrieked. “Why you like this?” She pulledaway. “Why you don’t go home?”“We’re going home, Kimmie. Let’s go.” He tried to steady his voice butcouldn’t. His fingers fidgeted.Hương stayed in her seat. The next thing she knew, Kim-Anh raised herarm and slapped Frank’s cheek. A crowd formed around the couple. Hươngstood up to see what was happening, though everyone was in the way.Yet even with the loud music, she heard it all. Kim-Anh was shouting, “Gohome, Frank. Go home!” When he didn’t answer, she continued, louder.“Poor man, go home! Go home, poor man!”—Hương left Kim-Anh and Frank at the bar, walked out of the Quarter, andfound a bus stop on Canal. After the bus arrived in New Orleans East, Hươnggot off, walked the four blocks to Versailles, and stopped at Bà Giang’sapartment before heading up to her own. She carried Tuấn while Bà Giangfollowed behind with Bình. They tucked them in and drank tea to end thenight.As Bà Giang began to leave, she asked, “Did you find a người đàn ôngmỹ? Those kids need a father. Any father is better than no father.”Hương laughed, though she didn’t know why. “They have a father,” shesaid.“The fates would have brought him here if they wanted him.” She stoppedtalking until they got to the door. “Do you pray?” Bà Giang asked.“I don’t,” Hương said.“That’s the problem. You don’t pray. You need to pray.”“I don’t believe in that. You know that. We believe in different things.”“It’s worth a try,” Bà Giang said. “Why don’t you try? Have you forgottenabout Công?”Hương opened her mouth to say something but found herself grasping forwords. For a moment, she wanted to confide in Bà Giang, to tell hereverything. That Công had abandoned her. That he was staying in Vietnam.That he was living in their home in Saigon right now. That she was all alonein the world. All alone with two sons.But none of this produced any words. In the silence, Bà Giang realized hermistake and reached out for Hương’s hands.“I’m sorry,” she said. “I shouldn’t have. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it.”They told each other good night and Bà Giang left.Outside, Hương sat on her steps and looked at the moon. How did she getinto this situation—to be right here, right now? She weaved back throughtime and wondered if there were warning signs. Yet another part of herselfwas outside of her body, watching her and calling her a stupid woman. Shehad thought there was love—pure and simple love—and she was duped,tricked. Life was a shell game dealer, and under every cup what she thoughtwas there or could have been there was not. She looked at herself with pityand shook her head. This wasn’t the way it was supposed to be, she toldherself, holding herself.What kind of man would abandon his family? That was the question shetried desperately to answer. Not only abandon them but lead them out to sea.Did she ever really know Công? Did she know he could be so cold, sounkind? What were his thoughts all along?That he could betray her was less upsetting than the fact that he would behurting their children—her children. What if they learned their father hadabandoned them, did not—in the end—love them? How would they take thatpiece of knowledge? How would it be imprinted in their minds? How fastwould it break their hearts?And what if everyone found out? Wasn’t it the fatherless boys you werealways told to be careful around? How did those fatherless boys feel hearingthis? Her body shuddered. She looked around and everything becameunfamiliar and threatening. The world was cold and wild. A country couldcollapse. A father could disappear. She would have to protect her sons, shewas thinking, protect them from all the cruelties of the world.She decided what do then. She ran upstairs and headed for her room. Allthe returned cassette tapes she had left in a shoebox. She grabbed that and hisletters and the last postcard he sent in reply to her confused message. On thefront, a yellowed black-and-white photo of Paris’s Latin Quarter, where he’dlived as a student studying abroad. She remembered they kept it in their deskin Saigon. It was a memento of the past, kept but never used until he had towrite her back: Please don’t contact me again. It is the best for the both of us.Please understand. Love, Công. She threw it into the shoebox and hid it in thecloset. No one would ever see this, she was thinking.If her sons asked about their father, she told herself, she would tell themsome kind of truth, what she knew of it: their father would not be joiningthem in New Orleans; this was all beyond their control and they had to trytheir best, she would say, to move forward. She would keep from them thefather who stayed behind, the family they could have been, the injustice ofwhat they had lost. She could protect them, if only they’d forget. She wouldprotect them, if only she’d forget. Forgetting, she was so sure, was easy, theeasiest thing that could be done; we forget all the time—we forget names andaddresses, the color a childhood dress, the name of a favorite song. We couldforget anything and everything, if only we tried, if only we made the effort.