The Reeducation of Cherry Truong (28 page)

“Where have you been? I've been looking for you.”

After peering down both sides of the hall, Cam pulled her mother into the room. “I've only been up here a little while.”

“A little while? It's four o'clock.”

Cam rubbed at the corner of her eye with a knuckle, careful not to disturb her eye makeup. Michel's elf cap was gone from the table. He must have put it back on before he left. “No, it's not.”

Her mother offered her wristwatch. Cam turned and looked out the window. Still an indigo night. No different from when she first came upstairs.

“We're leaving,” Cam's mother said. “Grandpère wants to sleep in his own bed.”

“No,” Cam said, shaking her head, shaking off the drowsiness she still felt. “I have to stay.”

“Why?” Her mother was searching her face. “Do you think he's going to come back up here? Cam, he's been downstairs drinking with his parents for the last hour.”

She stared at her mother. “Wait…”

“I'm not stupid, Cam.” Leaning forward, she hissed, “You aren't stupid, either. Do you really think he's going to marry you?”

She took a few steps back until her legs bumped against the bed. Cam sat. “No. You don't understand. You don't know the whole story.”

“I do. And you are not going to embarrass this family. We are going home.”

Just as her mother had managed to pull her off the bed, Cam saw Michel and his parents in the doorway. Her face relaxed into a smile. With the men in their holiday hats and Madame Bourdain's jingle bell necklace, they looked like a Christmas miracle.

“Are you all right, darling?” Madame Bourdain asked, trying to hide her surprise of finding the women in her son's bedroom. “Too much champagne?”

“She's fine,” Cam's mother said.

“Cammie?” Michel asked, looking concerned.

“Who is Cammie?” Cam's mother asked.

“Mother,” Cam said, pushing her hand away, but her mother refastened her grip.

“What is going on?” Monsieur Bourdain loudly asked, his face looking pinched and ruddy, but all Cam could focus on was his furry hat. “Michel, why did you bring us up here?”

Although the bedroom was large, it suddenly felt very small for five people standing around the bed, which still looked rumpled from Cam's nap. Realizing everyone's eyes lay on him, Michel's own could not settle—flitting between his parents and Cam. He straightened his back, his telltale technique to appear confident, but this time, Cam did not find it charming. Standing next to his much taller father, he looked like a weaker, fainter version of Monsieur Bourdain.

“We have something we want to tell you,” Michel finally said.

Monsieur Bourdain shook his head. “No, son,” he said, the joy of Père Noel trailing out of his voice. “Let's talk about this first.”

“That's what we're trying to do,” Michel said.

“I mean privately,” he said, looking scornfully at Cam and her mother. He turned and left the room.

“Where is your father going?” Madame Bourdain asked.

“Michel,” Cam said, but he was already following his father out of the room.

Madame Bourdain offered a weak smile, reverting to her role as hostess. “Excuse me,” she said.

They'd been in the room for less than a minute, Cam realized. She looked up at her mother, who no longer appeared angry but pitying, perhaps even satisfied. It was so hard to tell with her.

“I think we should leave,” Cam's mother said.

Wanting to speak, Cam could only nod in response. Her mother led her by the hand out of the room. The walls were bending. She wanted to throw up.

Downstairs in the parlor, Cam saw her
bûche de Noël
still sitting on its silver platter, untouched, ignored. A few guests still nibbled on cheese and drank champagne, while the Bourdains stood in the corner, whispering, shoulders touching.

She felt her mother's hand on her shoulder, pushing her forward. “I'm right here,” she said softly, and together, in synchronized step, they walked across the room.

“You are not getting married,” Monsieur Bourdain declared as Cam and her mother approached the family.

“We have to,” Michel said. “And you will accept it.”

The Bourdains reluctantly stepped back to regard Cam and her mother. While Madame Bourdain gazed nervously at Cam, Michel's father wouldn't even look at her.

“Is she pregnant?” he asked. “Were you stupid enough to impregnate her?”

Cam felt her knees lock. Her mother turned to her, her nails digging into Cam's wrist. She wouldn't meet her mother's eyes, wouldn't speak.

The younger Bourdain didn't say anything, his arms crossed in front of him, staring at the shiny marble floor, like a child awaiting punishment.

Madame Bourdain pulled on her husband's shirtsleeve, the jingle-bell necklace tinkling with her urgency. “Please, Michel, this is not the time.”

It was too late. Guests meandered around them, oblivious about their discussion, cheerily munching on the endless array of treats. Cam didn't mind the strangers, whose opinions mattered little to her, but then she saw her grandparents, Xuan, and the rest of her family. They had their coats and scarves on, bundled up like carolers.

Monsieur Bourdain finally turned to Cam, his eyes cold and thin. “Are you telling the truth? Are you really pregnant?”

Though Cam could feel her mother's nails digging even deeper into her arm, close to breaking skin, Cam could only look at her Michel. Why wasn't he meeting her eyes? Why wouldn't he answer his father? When her voice refused to release, Monsieur Bourdain spun around, looking for someone, anyone who could answer him.

“Monsieur Truong,” Monsieur Bourdain said, walking up to Grandpère, whose arm was linked with Aunt Trinh's. “Did you know anything about this?”

“Excuse me?” Grandpère asked, smiling, not understanding.

“Michel,” Uncle Yen said, trying to touch the man's shoulder, “what is the problem?” But Monsieur Bourdain angrily shrugged his hand off.

“Your granddaughter,” Monsieur Bourdain said, nearly standing over Grandpère, shaking with fury. “She has trapped my son by claiming she is pregnant. Did you know about this? Is this what you teach your grandchildren?”

“She's my daughter,” Cam's father said, stepping forward between Monsieur Bourdain and Grandpère.

“Will you take responsibility then for ruining my son's life? Because Petit Michel would never do this intentionally.”

“Did he say that?” Phung calmly asked.

“It is obvious to anyone.”

“Are you saying my daughter forced herself on your son?”

“We have taught him better than this,” Monsieur Bourdain retorted, his face as red as his ridiculous hat. “He wouldn't have touched your daughter unless she provoked him.”

“Shut up!” Aunt Trinh barked. “Leave her alone! Why can't you leave her alone?”

Her words echoed throughout the parlor, clear and sharp. Monsieur Bourdain staggered backward, looking at their entire family as if they were diseased.

While Uncle Yen tried to calm Monsieur Bourdain and Xuan tended to his mother, Grandpère shook his head, his eyes shiny with tears. “What has happened to Cam?” he asked Grandmère in Vietnamese. “She is only a child. How can he be so angry with a child?”

Cam didn't know if she should walk ahead of her family or behind, which was more discreet, and which would humiliate them less. Her father made the decision for her, putting her coat over her shoulders, and walking alongside her. She eagerly leaned into his support, wanting to fold herself into this comfort, this acceptance, forever. As they walked past Petit Michel, she felt the grief bloom in her chest, and turned her head away from him.

“I am very sorry,” Madame Bourdain said as the Truongs walked out the front door. “I don't know what to say.”

They passed the enormous crèche, still brightly lit, the fake animals and people crouching over the manger. The twinkle lights cast an orange glow over the statues, the animals and shepherds, the wise men, Joseph and Mary.

In the car, Cam allowed her mother to hold her until she asked, “What have you done? What have you done to us?”

*   *   *

It took Michel eight days to try to contact her. The morning after the New Year holiday, he called and a few hours later, came by the apartment. It was the first time a Bourdain had ever visited a Truong. Cam pretended she was asleep. Each time he returned, Xuan or her father would send him away with an excuse: she was tired, sick, shopping, napping. He left letters in carefully sealed wheat-colored envelopes. Cam's father stacked them in a neat pile on the dining room table next to the napkin basket, where they stayed until Cam finally asked her mother to throw them away.

In late January, Michel finally found her between classes. She was turning a corner after leaving a test kitchen, adjusting a flour measurement in her head, when she felt a hand enclose her elbow.

His clean, freshly shaven face startled her. His eyes did not appear swollen from tears or lack of sleep. His complexion looked as tan as if he'd returned from a holiday. He explained his parents had gone to their apartment in Marseille after the
réveillon,
a family tradition. His mother had begged him to go with them.

“I'm sure that must have been hard for you,” Cam said, busying her hands with the button loops of her coat.

Michel ignored this. “I still want to marry you. I still want our baby.” He spoke very proudly, like he'd been practicing and wanted his words to bear significance. “My father has calmed down. He regrets how we all behaved, but he's willing to listen to our plans.”

“What plans?”

“I just said them. Getting married. Raising the baby together.”

Cam shook her head.

“You don't want to get married?”

She shook her head again. Her toes felt cold. They were standing outside, but Cam didn't want to suggest they go sit somewhere together.

“You don't want the baby?”

She watched the shock spread across his face. A brief moment of calm surrounded her, like a flower petal settling onto the ground.

“It's an innocent child, you know,” he said, raising his chin. “What you'll be doing is a mortal sin. Can you live with that?”

He was deliberately trying to provoke her, just like her mother had. But she wouldn't react to his manipulations. She simply shrugged her shoulders, surprised how easy this felt for her, now that she knew she didn't love him.

“This is serious, Cam. If you do this, then we can't be together. My parents can't forgive you for killing their grandchild.”

“It's not theirs,” she said.

“Are you doing this out of revenge?” Michel asked. His lips briefly puffed out, and Cam recognized that face from when they were children, an expression she and Xuan secretly called the Petit Prince pout. “I thought you were smarter than this.”

“I can be very dumb sometimes.”

When she'd learned she was pregnant, she wasn't happy about it until she told Michel. He was the one who said they should keep it, he was the one who thought they should get married. He planned to move her into his apartment, where they would have room for a baby, where she could still be close to school, and their parents could help take care of the child. It all sounded so possible and lovely. It wasn't until the
réveillon
that she realized what a fantasy it was. They simply had been wasting each other's time.

Her mother tried to convince her otherwise. After returning home from the Bourdains, her mother encouraged Cam to wait until she heard from Petit Michel before deciding anything. Now that he was her potential grandchild's father, perhaps he deserved a chance to explain himself.

“I don't know,” Cam admitted.

“He will call you tomorrow,” her mother said determinedly. “He will, because he loves you.”

Her mother's fantasy, as desperate as it sounded, seemed so possible that night. Its sheer, unexpected optimism helped calm her to sleep. The sun was beginning to rise. They'd all sleep in until the afternoon, and then wake up for a late lunch and to open Christmas presents. And if her mother was correct, Michel would call. Apologize. Fix everything. Fulfill his promise. She'd give him his present. After all, Christmas miracles did not come from God, but from people; decent, sweet people who loved you.

Cam's appointment was scheduled for the following Thursday. Xuan had already agreed to accompany her.

But this was taking too long. “If you want,” she said, “you could tell them I miscarried, that God took the baby away.” She took a breath, surprised at how bitter she sounded. This wasn't how she intended it at all. “Or you can tell them the truth. I don't care.”

“I could stop you, you know,” he said, stepping forward, squaring his shoulders. If anyone had seen them, they'd think they were about to kiss. “I can be cruel, too.”

“But you won't,” she said, turning her face up to look at him. The blood was rushing to her head, and her limbs felt like they were floating away. “We're going to leave each other alone.”

 

1982

Kim-Ly Vo
Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

… Mother, do you remember, when we were younger, how the neighbors would criticize us for walking around in our bathing suits or inviting our male friends to the house? How instead of sequestering us in the house all day, like those Catholic zealots, you permitted us girls to enjoy ourselves like the boys did? They do that here in America, and no one objects. At the elementary school near our apartment, boys and girls play sports and games and are treated equally. Children are not given predetermined destinies. Instead, the teachers encourage the parents to allow the children to pursue their own interests and strengths, whatever they may be. At first, I found this freedom refreshing, but now, I can see its drawbacks.