Pine box

Back then, my father taught at a school located at the end of the district, the district was at the end of the province at the foot of the pass. The pass was deserted and rarely traveled, occasionally a dusty truck was seen slowly climbing the hill.

My house is near the road but it is also lonely. At night, my father often keeps the lamp on for about an hour to grade his students' papers. Every day, after school, he goes to the forest to collect firewood, scoop shrimp from the stream, plant potatoes and corn on the hill, and practice a flute song called "Drifting Water Fern and Drifting Clouds".

Illustration: China.

At night, around the circle of light from the kerosene lamp with its pungent smell, my father graded papers, my mother sat knitting. The balls of wool gleaned from old shirts were broken and connected continuously. Ha slept on my mother’s lap, and I took out my pencil to draw right next to my father. A steady rhythm of life around the rare but cozy light. The days just passed by…

My father graded papers in a flashy manner, his students usually couldn't write long papers, only occasionally did he stop to read someone's papers carefully. I noticed that when talking to my mother, he often called his students "this brother" and "that brother" and explained about each of their family backgrounds.

One day, I had a fever so I stayed home from school alone. Mom carried Ha to the store, Dad went to work. Because I was afraid of the dark corners of the house, I just hung around in the yard. Suddenly a stranger appeared. Seeing me, he reached his hand through the wooden bars of the gate and called inside:

- Hey, is this Mr. Binh's house?

I was scared because this person looked like he was dressed in a dusty outfit, with many scars on his arms and legs like someone who had come from the gold mines or lumberjacks. Seeing me still hesitating, that person said: “You are the son of Mr. Man from Nam Pu forest…”

I once heard my father say that there was a very good hunter in Nam Pu forest named Man. One day while hunting, he lost an eye. From then on, Man was very afraid to go down the mountain. One time, when he was recruiting students, my father met him and promised to send his son named Chien to town to study and become a good person. But then my father himself drifted to this remote area. I don't know why, but Chien still found my house.

My father asked cautiously:

- Then why did you go panning for gold after finishing 5th grade?

- I can't do anything when I'm hungry. I went with someone to buy enough food for my father to eat for three years, and now I'm asking you for letters.

My father took out the American lamp that was carefully hidden under the cupboard and lit it up. He usually lit it only when there was something important to do. Then he conveniently grabbed a pair of scissors and cut off Chiến’s messy hair. My mother boiled some herbal water and urged him to take a bath.

The next morning, seeing him wearing my father's old clothes, white plastic sandals, carrying an old leather bag following my father to school, he no longer looked like a worldly man.

Since he appeared, my house has changed a lot. The porch was covered with planks and extended into a classroom. Every afternoon, he went up the hill to dig holes to plant more cassava, sow seeds to plant corn, soybeans, and sweet potatoes. But before the plants had grown corn and tubers, my rice bin was empty. Chien ate as much as a farmer but he often daydreamed. I heard that in Math class, he forgot all the formulas from primary school, but he sat down and wrote a letter to a girl very well. My father said he didn't know what he would do in the future...

Then suddenly, gunshots rang out on the border battlefield that spring. That afternoon, my father ran back, out of breath: “Where is Chien? Is he home?” My mother shook her head and looked to the other side of the mountain where there was a winding path leading to the district. Chien had volunteered to go to war. He just left like that, leaving behind his books and many questions.

The news of Chien's death came before the letter he sent to my family. In his room, which was covered with wooden boards, the furniture was quite neat, the only thing he left behind was the pine box he had brought with him since coming to my house, which was always locked.

***

Many years after the war ended, life returned to peace. I passed the university entrance exam and stayed in Hanoi. The market economy began to create material pressures like a fog that covered my vision, making my vision only revolve around house, children, and life was full of petty worries like that.

My parents grew older day by day. Each finger slowed down, my mother wore glasses and knitted each thread of wool as if she wanted to hold on to each moment of life. There were no more connections, each thread of wool was smooth and endless. One day, my father stopped tutoring the children. They rode their bicycles on the concrete road to the young teacher's house to practice the exam questions "hit the mark". The old teacher took out his bamboo flute and played the song "Drifting duckweed and drifting clouds" so that the baby birds that fell from the nest in the backyard after the storm could practice chirping.

My parents told the story of eating cassava and yam mixed with other ingredients in the past, making the children laugh with delight. The children, who had eaten delicious and strange foods enough, now liked the dishes of poor families.

In the afternoon with the children, I carried a hoe up the hill to dig for sweet potato sprouts. After a long time of not working, sweat was pouring out, and I was panting through my ears. Suddenly, I hit something and the hoe blade popped out. It was a sealed plastic bag, it seemed that the rain and sun had not penetrated inside. I carefully opened it, inside was a rusted copper key. I brought it home, quietly soaked it in oil, cleaned off the oxidation, the saw teeth appeared like a puzzle challenging my brain.

Is this key someone's forgetfulness, concealment or mischief? I began to curiously try every lock in the house but to no avail. I gave up my curiosity and recalled old stories to restore my brain, which had gradually lost the traces of my father. Now before me was a senile old man, with gray hair, missing teeth and petty irritability. I saw in that mess scattered fragments of memory.

Suddenly, my father said:

- Why doesn't anyone open Chien's box?

He often had that way of speaking. He always asked vague questions about “who” but actually wanted to express his intention. I tried to take out the key to open the lock, but it was still there. My father pondered for a moment and then reminded:

- Don't dig too deep, leave a piece, rotate and see.

The sound of the lock clicking made both my father and I feel cold. Inside the box were yellowed notebooks, a Truong Son fountain pen with dried ink, and a few souvenirs. I gently opened the letter folded like a bird's wing in the envelope made of gilt paper. Inside was a letter from Chien with these words:

“I don’t know what war is like yet, but I am determined not to be afraid of the most dangerous and difficult places. I want to join the army, I have to go to the most fiercely contested places so that even if I die, it will be worthy of the land I was born in. My hometown behind Nam Pu forest has a stream that flows all year round without running out of water. I believe that after three years if I don’t return, you will open this box because you are a child. Come back with me to my hometown once to see how my father is doing, where my house is…”

I was speechless. My father asked but I did not say anything. It was twenty years now, twenty years after the war, not a short time. What use would it be to say anything? In each unsent letter, Chiến wrote to his mother who had gone far away, to his paralyzed friend who he brought stream fish and lessons to every day. A blind old woman listened to him talk about flowers. A vendor at the market who had lost her child kept mistaking him for a lost son who had returned…

I followed my relatives in the small hamlet at the foot of Nam Pu up the hill. Chien's father's grave was right on the hillside. Next to it was his own grave.

“Actually, the establishment was to ease the pain, not to have any bones. Where Chien is now, his comrades have not found him yet,” a relative told me. I also believe that no matter which village he lies in, to him that place is his homeland.

 

Short story by Bui Viet Phuong

Source: https://baobacgiang.vn/chiec-hom-go-thong-postid415397.bbg