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The woman at Doi junction
By Nguyen Quang Thieu
 After
20 years, Bang decided to return to Doi junction. All
seemed unchanged. As before, the arid hills and slopes
were scattered with patches of myrtle bush. The junction
was 30 minutes' walk from the nearest hamlet and people
rarely passed by. What surprised Bang most after 20
years was finding a solitary tea stand at this remote
intersection. The surrounding area stretched vastly in
every direction, but in daylight it was possible for
passers-by to see the distant hamlets. Newcomers,
however, would be sure to lose their way, particularly
by night.
Twenty years before, Bang was such a newcomer. The first
day he came to Doi junction, he was returning from three
days' leave before his military unit headed south. The
whole unit had moved to a nearby station and Bang
hurried to catch up with them. From Bo District Town he
walked as far as Doi junction when it began to get dark.
Suddenly, Bang was lost. He sat down to smoke and
waited, but not a soul passed him in the darkness, only
the wind rustling the myrtle bushes and tall grass. He
finally decided to choose a direction at random and set
off. After one hour, Bang realized to his surprise that
he was approaching the same intersection. Again, he
chose a different road at random, and again after an
hour of walking he arrived at Doi junction. Each road
seemed to go around in a circle. Bang sat down to think,
breathing hard, finding the situation both confusing and
funny. He pulled himself together and started down the
last road out of the intersection.
After several minutes of walking, Bang glimpsed a
distant light. Overjoyed, he quickened his pace, eager
to have located his unit and to be with his comrades
again. In the night, the light looked so near, but it
was well over a kilometre before he reached it. It
turned out to be a pile of burning grass.
Near the fire was a small house, which Bang approached.
A young woman was within. Seeing the stranger, the woman
started in alarm, but relaxed as soon as she realized
the man was a soldier. She looked at Bang, laughing
lightly, and asked, "Have you lost your way at Doi
junction?"
"How did you know?" He responded in surprise.
"That junction is haunted. People get lost there all the
time. I am Luu. Please come in and have some tea."
"I am in a great hurry," Bang said nervously, "I only
want to ask the way."
"The more nervous you are, the more lost you will get,"
Luu laughed again.
"Without a guide, you'll go round in circles for
eternity."
Luu smiled held out a bowl of boiled water to Bang. Then
she went into to the kitchen and brought back a basket
of manioc, saying "Please, have some manioc. We grow it
here ourselves."
Now Bang could see Luu's face. What a beautiful girl she
was! What night was it tonight, he asked himself, trying
to remember the date on the lunar calendar. It was the
night he lost his way and found a small house. And
inside that house there was a beautiful girl. It was
really like a fairy tale. All the stories he had read in
books seemed to come true somehow or other in life. Bang
looked into the house and saw a green mosquito net
hanging down like a fishing net.
"Have your parents gone to bed?"
"Only my sister and I live here. Our parents are dead.
You want to go to Choi Hamlet, don't you?" She asked,
changing the subject abruptly.
"How did you know?" Bang was again surprised.
"There is an army unit stationed there tonight."
"It's my unit. Please tell me the way there," Bang
asked.
"It's only five kilometres, but now it is too late. You
will stay here tonight, and then tomorrow I will take
you there," Luu said.
"But I have to go now... "
"You'll lose your way! There are dozens of trails to
choose from. If you don't know the way and go there by
night, there is no way you will know which trail to
follow. Moreover, the poisonous 'tailless snakes' come
out onto the road at night. They bite cow and man alike,
and they are lethal."
After a last moment of hesitation, Bang decided to stay
at Luu's. Of course he was not afraid of the tailless
snakes. It was just that this meeting was so unusual to
him, and he was intrigued. Naturally his judgement was
also affected by Luu's beautiful face and warm, soft
voice. They went to the well together so Bang could wash
his face. The well shaft was as small as a clay pot, but
it was as deep as the eye could see. "What a deep well!"
Bang marvelled. Luu smiled and said, "The deeper the
well, the cleaner and purer the water is." The water was
so cool that it could quench even Bang's fatigue.
After washing up, they sat on the bamboo bench on the
veranda. The moon illuminated the shadowy hills.
v "Why is this junction so mysterious? I kept walking in
circles and coming back to the same point," Bang asked
curiously.
"I told you, it's haunted," she replied.
"Haunted?" Bang smiled. "I haven't been afraid of ghosts
since childhood. I'd like to see a ghost."
"There really are ghosts there," Luu said, raising her
eyebrows at him. "Some buffalo traders passing by the
place were murdered by thieves. Now their ghosts haunt
the junction to scare strangers."
"Have they ever bothered you?"
"Only once, when we first moved here after land
redistribution." "How did you get away?"
"I didn't. I sat there, crying all night. When the sun
rose, the ghosts disappeared. And I found the way home
then."
v Bang and Luu sat in silence after that. The moon
seemed brighter. Crickets chirped. A light breeze blew.
"How long are you stationed in Choi Hamlet?" Luu asked
Bang.
"Confidential," Bang teased her. "Only one month. I was
just on my way back from R&R."
"How many children have you got?"
"Do I look like a father?"
"Not at all," Luu chuckled, "but it is quite common for
soldiers to marry before going of to the battle field."
"Not me."
"What about a sweetheart?"
"No."
Bang then looked straight into Luu's eyes, keen, black
eyes beneath full eyebrows. They gazed at each other.
And then they both turned away, sitting in silence for a
long time. They spent the rest of the night talking
dreamily, as if they were talking to a third person. At
first light, Bang got up to go. Luu accompanied him as
far as the limits of Choi hamlet, and then turn back
towards home.
Three days later, Bang went to see Luu. They went up to
the hill of cassava trees. Bang gave Luu paper and a
pen.
"I don't need these things," Luu said.
"To write letters," Bang replied.
"To whom? I have only written to one person in my life.
But I did not have the address, so I stopped writing."
"Please keep them and write to me."
"You'll leave for the battle field in a few days' time
and after that I won't know where you are."
"I'll write to you."
"Really?" Luu raised her eyebrows.
Bang said nothing, only nodded his head. From that day,
whenever he had time, he rushed to see her. Luu took
Bang to the Doi road junction and showed him the way to
go without losing his way among the criss-crossing
roads.
"Why don't you and your sister live in the hamlet? So
far away, you must be lonely," Bang asked.
"We're used to it now. Anyway, our loved ones are here,"
Luu said, looking toward the far-away hills. Her sad
eyes brimmed with tears. Bang moved closer to Luu,
asking quietly, "Are your parents buried at the foot of
that mountain?"
"Yes. And also my friend. He was bitten by a poisonous
snake. That is why I don't want to write any letters."
Bang saw the tears running down her cheeks. He took her
hands. They were soft and warm.
"I'll write to you," he said.
"I'll be expecting your letters very much," she
answered.
Bang's unit left a week earlier than planned. Luu took
Bang to Doi junction one last time. They stood there
side by side, looking towards the hills scattered with
graves. She held his hands tightly. It was so windy that
afternoon.
At last, Bang said, "I've got to go." Luu turned to look
at him and couldn't hold back her tears. Bang embraced
her. When she had quieted, he said, "I'll come back here
to look for you. Do wait for me. Don't move to anywhere
else. Can you wait for me, Luu?"
"I can," she said. "I'll wait for you all my life."
v Bang never forgot those days at Doi junction, but it
took him 20 years to return there. He had been wounded
in the war and had no children, but had done well enough
for himself and even had a car. Many times in the past
he longed to return to the intersection but stopped
himself. "What's the use of finding her? It would only
put her in an embarrassing situation," he told himself.
He had written to her, as promised, from the field, and
she had not written back. Although it tortured him, he
thought it better not to return. But finally, he decided
to go to her, and tell her he had stayed single, a man
of his word.
By car Bang went back to the junction, his adopted
daughter Minh in tow.
"Dad, is this the Doi road junction?" Minh asked as she
climber out of the car.
"Yes, sweetie."
"Where is Miss Luu's house?"
"Quite near here. Let's go to that tea shop and ask if
she still lives here."
Bang and Minh walked towards the tea stand. A woman of
indeterminable age invited them to sit and eat boiled
manioc. When she looked up, Bang started in amazement.
It was Luu. The beauty and freshness he remembered were
gone, replaced by ill health and failed expectations.
He imagined she must have married, had children. And his
anxiety suddenly vanished. Luu also recognized that the
man sitting in front of her was Bang. She was
dumbfounded hearing Minh calling him dad. Through the
years she waited for Bang, Luu had refused to marry
despite the advice of others. She strongly believed that
Bang would return one day, or if he died that someone
would notify her. But now her confidence was crushed. He
had a wife and a daughter. He was a happy man. He looked
so smart and even had a car. He surely was an important
man now.
"I could recognise him, but he could pretend not to
recognize me. Or he has long forgotten me, she thought.
And I wasted so many years at this junction, crying and
calling his name." After pulling herself together, Luu
asked, "What brings you and your daughter to this remote
junction?"
"I am on business. We were thirsty, so we dropped in for
tea," Bang lied.
His answer was like a knife in her heart. So, he was
only passing through.
Meanwhile Bang felt empty and sad.
"My darling, you don't recognize me," he thought.
"Where are your children, that you must sell tea here?"
He went on with his facade.
"My children are at school," she lied back.
Bang wanted to stand up and exclaim, "Luu, have you
forgotten me? I'm Bang, I've come back to you." But he
contained his emotion. Things were different. Twenty
years had gone by. Their lives had taken different
directions. He rose sadly.
"Good-bye," he murmured. "I've got to go now."
"Please have one more cup of tea," Luu said, standing up
in panic. She looked penetratingly into his eyes. They
both stood motionless.
"Thank you," Bang said as if in a dream, "but I've got
to go."
He left the stand quickly, memories flooding his mind.
He turned back to look at her briefly. She sat rooted to
the bench. "She must not have recognized me," he
thought, "or she did not want to recognise me." In any
case it was better for him to go now.
"He did not recognize me," Luu thought with pain. "I
have aged so much. I have become a ghost at Doi
junction. I wanted to call your name," she thought. "I
wanted to tell you I have waited for you every day for
20 years. I wish I had known you would act so poorly
when we finally met again. Do go away, adieu and
farewell!"
As the car disappeared into a cloud of red dust, Luu
bent down to cry. Darkness shrouded the hilly area. Luu
sat like a rock in the hissing wind. At last she stood
up. She looked at the tea stand she had set up ten years
ago, and then took a match to it. When she had set up
the stand, people had called her crazy. Each day, only a
few persons passed by. She would never reveal that she
had built the stand to wait for Bang to return. She had
always thought that if he returned, he would get lost at
the cross-roads again.
So for 20 years, Luu lived in her tea stand by a hill of
manioc. It was enough for her. Over time, ailment and
loneliness had turned her into a woman whose age was
impossible to guess. She couldn't bear to look at her
own face in a mirror.
When they arrived in the district town, Minh asked Bang,
"Why didn't you find Miss Luu?"
"The tea seller was Miss Luu herself," Bang said softly.
"So you both did not recognise each other?"
"We both did recognise each other, but neither of us
wanted to say anything."
"Why, dad?" Minh was surprised. "Why? Was it because she
was married? Or was it that she is so old and ugly?"
"I don't know."
After that Bang decided to go back to Doi junction. He
sent Minh back to the provincial capital and hired a
motorcycle taxi to return to the junction, and then sent
the driver back to town. The driver eyed him as if he
were insane.
Darkness covered the hilly area. Bang approached the tea
stand, but stopped in his tracks when he saw there was
nothing left but ashes. He suddenly understood
everything. He shouted out, "Oh, dear Luu!" And rushed
to find her house. It was like twenty years before. He
went round and round and returned to the same spot. Now
he did not believe that there was a ghost, but he
understood this magical circle of life. He tried all
night but could not find the house. He searched for a
fire's glow, like that night so long ago. Finally, as
dawn brought a glow over the landscape, Bang recognized
the path leading to Luu's house.
He walked into the yard. The house was the same, except
for the explosion of yellow chrysanthemums blooming in
the front yard. The house was locked. He looked at the
house for quite a long time and then went to the well.
He dropped the pail into the water. It seemed to fall
endlessly, as if the well went clear through to the
other side of the world. Just as he felt a surge of
irrational panic, that the well was bottomless, the pail
hit the water. The water echoed vaguely. Bang slowly
drew up the pail. Pulling it up again seemed endless,
but eventually he brought the bucket up onto the rim of
the well. The strange light of early morning reflected
brightly in the bucket of water. Bang splashed water
onto his face. Right at that time he heard the door
opening. He quickly turned and saw the house's wooden
doors slowly opening wide.
Translated by Manh Chuong
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