When Hoa Binh arrived back at her family’s house that day, she found her father in the yard talking with a town official. She watched as her father opened an old suitcase, removed a stack of papers, and handed them to the official.
“These days they review Agent Orange cases very carefully,” the official said, as he smoothed out the papers. “As you know, there are travel costs associated with each case, as well as a waiting period. Plus, no result is ever guaranteed.”
“We joined the military and risked our lives for this country, and for people like you to live in peace,” Trong said angrily. “Look at my daughter! Is she not eligible?”
The town official seemed embarrassed. He lowered his voice. “No, I just meant you might want to offer money to those who help you. And I can always help with the networking.…”
Trong seemed surprised. “You mean I should pay money under the table?”
Hoa Binh’s mother, who was listening from inside the house, came outside and said to the town official, “Just please find a way to help us. We’ll take care of those other things.” To her husband she said, “Give him some money for the ‘transportation fee.’ ”
But Trong was now furious.
“This is ridiculous! I won’t pay a bribe to get the benefits we deserve. This should have been taken care of a long time ago, but every time I submit the paperwork it somehow gets lost!” He moved toward the official. “Get out of here! I don’t have time for state officials like you.”
Once the official’s motorbike had completely disappeared in the distance, Hoa Binh watched her father polish and clean his old dagger, one of his most cherished mementos from the war. The whole family was scared. Whenever Trong was angry, he would polish the dagger and then place it in a drawer at the foot of the bed. Then he’d stay up late listening to the radio, taking notes, and making strange phone calls. He seemed so serious.
Sometimes Tu Do and Hanh Phuc would play “war,” using sticks as guns that they pointed at each other—“Bang, bang!” Then one of them would pretend to lie dead on the ground.
“Children,” Trong said once, after silently watching them pointing the sticks at each other, “stop playing that game, or it will ruin you before you even know it.”
Hoa Binh could see the horrifying memory of the war on her father’s face as he sat motionless on the bed. Sometimes, when he was asleep, she would sneak up to his bed and watch his cheeks twitching in panic as he slept. One night he woke up suddenly and asked, “Hoa Binh, is that you? Why aren’t you in bed? I just had a dream. A big, tall, bloody American fell on me.” Her father had sat up in bed and told her about the time his scout team wandered into an ambush and they’d ended up fighting hand-to-hand with the enemy, and Trong had used his knife to stab an American GI through the heart and kill him. Amid the bombardment and gunfire of war, of course, death was common. But Trong hadn’t known that after the war ended, death would still haunt him every night.
Nobody in the family could stop Trong from taking the trip back to Quang Tri. Mr. Thanh from the neighboring village would go with him. They both carried rucksacks filled with supplies. Mr. Trong also carried his old dagger, freshly cleaned and polished. Hoa Binh didn’t understand why they were taking so many things with them, including yellowed old letters with blurred handwriting.
Hoa Binh felt worried while her father was away. One day he called, and over the phone he told her, “I’m not dead, so don’t worry.” The sky outside the house was dark and gloomy again; it seemed like a storm was coming. Hoa Binh slept all day, skipping lunch. When she woke up finally her mother said, “Your dad came back. He and his friends went to meet someone in the village, I don’t know who.”
She went to look for her father and walked along the grassy riverbank. When she came to Mr. Toan’s house, she heard voices and stopped to take a closer look. There were six men in Mr. Toan’s yard, including her father, Mr. Thanh, Mr. Toan, and the village chairman. Mr. Toan seemed to be acting differently than normal. He trembled as he spoke: “I … I … beg you! Please forgive me!”
Calmly, Thanh said, “Do you feel ashamed of stealing credit from your comrades? Tell us, when were you injured in the war?”
Trong was staring at Toan with fiery eyes.
Toan lowered his head and said, “The truth is I shot myself in the leg. I beg you—please forgive me!”
Later that day, a crowd of men gathered at Hoa Binh’s house. They were all veterans who had come to visit after hearing that Trong’s old army friends were in town.
“I am by no means a hero,” said Vinh, one of Trong’s old friends. “It’s Trong who gave up the official designation of hero and passed it on to me. He’s the one who deserves the recognition.” Vinh clapped Trong on the back.
“It was a cruel war,” one of the elderly veterans added. “But we survived. In a sense, we’re all heroes.”
Trong remained silent. It seemed like he didn’t want to say anything in this particular moment.
Vinh stayed with Hoa Binh’s family for a few days after this. She often saw them marking a map with blue and red dots and cleaning old war mementos. They were preparing to take another trip to look for the graves of fallen soldiers from their unit. Hoa Binh had never seen her father so
