The Time Keepers

Chapter 52

CHAPTER 52

A NH HAD FINALLY MANAGED THE COURAGE TO VENTURE INTO town with B?o by her side. It was now mid-July, and she knew it wasn’t going to get any easier if she didn’t put in the effort necessary to practice using English outside of the motherhouse. B?o would be starting middle school in little over a month and he, too, would need to become more comfortable speaking to the outside world. As Dinh would constantly remind them when the Sisters had left the group to socialize by themselves, “We’re not returning to Vietnam. Like saplings to new soil, we must put down roots and grow.”

Anh often felt Dinh was talking specifically to her, even when she was surrounded by the others. His eyes focused on her when he spoke, and his smile was always full of hope.

When she confided in him that she was overwhelmed by her newfound responsibility to be B?o’s adoptive guardian, he reassured her that she would blossom under the role.

“You will find your way, em, ” he’d promise and touch her gently on the wrist. The warmth of his touch, no matter how fleeting it was, always soothed her.

Aside from Dinh, she had trusted Grace too. Anh had expressed concern at first about B?o’s fascination with American cartoons, particularly the Super Friends episodes that always absorbed his attention. But Grace had assured her that the show was popular with lots of school-age children. Anh was relieved to see that when B?o was with Grace’s daughter, Molly, watching the show gave them something in common.

B?o’s language was now peppered with phrases that weren’t in his practice workbook, like “Holy cow!” and “Sure thing!” which made the Sisters giggle when they worked on conversational English with all of them.

Today, however, was their first day out together by themselves, and Anh wanted to make sure everything went well. She’d been nervous when Sister Mary Alice drove them toward the heart of town, where lots of small shops lined the streets. The incident at Kepler’s had been unsettling and she wanted to replace it with something more positive.

“Meet me back here at three o’clock,” Sister Mary Alice instructed, showing three fingers and pointing to her watch. She then pointed to the large green clock on the side of the brick building that housed the Golden Hours.

Anh nodded and B?o jumped out of the car.

In the crisp July sunlight, the two of them walked side by side. As they crossed the street, the Goldens’ station wagon zoomed by. The window half-open, Anh heard, for a second, laughter in the breeze.

She reached out to hold B?o’s hand and for the first time since they arrived, he slipped his small fingers into her own.

“We’ll get some mangoes today. I’ll find you a sweet one, bé tí,” she promised.

Anh pointed in the direction of Kepler’s, but B?o shook his head.

“I’ll be quick,” she said in Vietnamese. “I’ll find the sweetest one for you and then we’ll go back home.”

But B?o pulled her toward the store with the window full of clocks.

They walked closer, B?o’s steps increasing with speed, until they were standing directly in front of it.

Anh felt the same sense of curiosity as her nephew as she took in the dazzling array of timepieces. Two tall grandfather clocks flanked both sides of the display. One was sharp and rectangular and had a sun and moon in its golden center, the other was shaped like an hourglass. On a pedestal table sat a white clock with painted flowers. But most intriguing was a chestnut-colored clock that had been carved to resemble a birdhouse. Just as the other clocks sounded the half hour, a tiny bird peeked out from a carved hole.

B?o’s finger pressed against the glass. She knew his father had sometimes secretly taken him to the shed and shown him how the inside of a radio worked, now she could see that same curiosity sparked.

“Do you want to go inside?” she asked.

But when they went to the door it was locked.

On the front door there was a handmade sign that said C LOSED FOR THE D AY . She glanced at the green and gold painted letters above: T HE G OLDEN H OURS . They were standing in front of Grace’s family’s store.

She bought the fruit and a few other provisions. “We’ll go back to the clock store the next time,” she promised. She took the mango she felt was the ripest and handed it to him, her heart filling with the memory of Linh.

Later that afternoon, Anh shared with Dinh how she had to sort through at least a dozen mangoes at Kepler’s till she found three worthy of bringing back home. She cut the fruit up into slices in the kitchen area they all shared.

Dinh took the fruit between two fingers and dropped it into his mouth.

“We need to find a way to fill our bodies with sweetness in this new life … too much sadness otherwise.” His face was full of hopefulness that moved something inside her.

“They pick the fruit before it has time to ripen, that’s the problem,” Dinh said as he sucked on his fingers. “We know the longer it stays on the vine the better.” He smiled at her gently. “Like children, right?”

Her own child had not stayed too long on the vine, but she did not share that with him.

“Yes,” she said softly. “Just like children.”

“This Kepler’s Market needs some help with their fruit, I think,” he said with a grin. “And we need to help them.”

Anh smiled. She imagined her village in better times with bamboo woven baskets filled with exotic varieties of fruit piled high.

“There is so much I miss,” she added to the space between them. Her voice was full of longing. Anh closed her eyes and imagined the inside of her childhood home, the smell of cooking rice, her mother’s papery hands cutting cilantro and radishes on a wooden board. The sounds of the laughing thrushes and greenfinches in the trees.

It pained her that she could not bring anything from the ancestral shrine with her. The incense. The tiny vase they used for flowers. The two framed photographs. All of that had been left behind.

“We could only bring so much, right?” she widened her eyes as she looked over to Dinh. “And almost everything I brought was either lost on the boat or in the refugee camp. I naively thought America was just a few hours’ journey, not on the other side of the world.”

“We all thought that, Anh,” he replied. “I left with a friend who constructed our boat from the wood of an abandoned piano and a small motor. Even parts of the keyboard and the strings were used to make the small dinghy. Can you imagine?”

Dinh closed his eyes. “My friend discovered it in one of the abandoned halls of an old colonial hotel. He cut it apart with an axe and constructed it during the night when no one was looking. We thought it would keep us afloat for a couple days … which is how long he thought it would take to get to America.”

“We all believed the same foolishness,” Anh said softly. She reached for the last mango and took her paring knife, deftly peeling away the skin.

“My friend died after our tenth day adrift. Sometimes at night when I can’t sleep, I still see him on his back, hollow eyes looking up at the sky. He’s telling me in only a whisper of breath that he thinks we’re really close … that we’re bound to see the horizon tomorrow. I hear his voice in my head, Anh, and then I see myself rolling his dead body into the sea.”