All Lin Su could do was look into what was her home. She didn’t recognize it. It was torn apart, things she didn’t even recognize strewn everywhere. Her mind raced—she didn’t have anything of real value, just the most necessary articles of daily living—linens, clothing, pots and pans, dishes... She’d always felt safe from burglars—there wasn’t much to steal. But there were pictures! She ran to what served as her bedroom, turning on lights along the way. She pulled out the drawer under the bed and it was still there—her album. She wasn’t just frugal with money, she was also frugal with space. She had kept some pictures from her childhood in Boston and there were the pictures of Charlie as a baby and toddler. And they were safe.
Then she spied the small closet, the door literally ripped off—and it was gone, her box of treasures. It was a wood and ivory box, not very big. It didn’t hold much and the street value would be nothing. Less than nothing. It held the hospital bracelets she and Charlie wore after his birth, his first tooth in a small envelope, two faux-gold coins, a chain and pendant given to her by one of her sisters. And the swatch—the lotus embroidery. The only thing she had of her biological mother.
She fell to her knees and started searching the floor of the closet, the backs of the shelves, under the bed. “No no no no no,” she whimpered. Why take that? It was worthless. Even the box itself couldn’t be worth twenty dollars! She crawled around the room, stretching her hands under shelves, into corners, even under the bedding. She reached into drawers that had been rifled through and, without realizing it, she was speaking Vietnamese. Rapidly. Breathlessly. Mournfully.
She cried. Then she began to hum softly as she searched.
* * *
Charlie stood in the bedroom doorway. “Send someone, please,” he said into the phone.
Then he disconnected and found another number, one recently put into her directory. He clicked on the button. The man answered, “Blake Smiley.”
“Yeah, it’s Charlie. Need a little help here, Blake. Our trailer—it got ripped up, torn apart, and things were taken. Things my mom really loves. I don’t know what to do.”
“Did you call the police?” Blake asked.
“Yeah, but... They’ll send someone when they can. They said we should file a report. It could be a long time since there’s no imminent danger—no robbers here. But I think we have a problem. My mom. She’s broken.”
When Blake pulled up to the trailer it didn’t look as though anything was amiss. When he went to knock on the door he could see the lock was broken and the door was closed but not latched. Still, he knocked.
Charlie opened the door. “Sorry, Blake. I guess I could’ve called Troy and Grace, but my mom, she worries a lot about people feeling sorry for her, especially people she works for. She’s the caregiver, y’know? She always has to be the strong one. The together one. I’m the only weakness in her life.”
“Don’t start that,” Blake said. “You’re her kid and she takes good care of you. That’s not a weakness.”
“All I’m saying is I’m the only thing that keeps her from going to work. Like if I get sick or something. And I know you offered us a place to stay overnight if we needed it so I thought...”
“You did the right thing. I’m glad I was able to take the call. Now what’s happening with your mom? You said she’s broken?”
“Look,” Charlie said, nodding toward the bedroom.
Blake could hear soft humming. He was a little perplexed, but he looked. Lin Su was kneeling on the bed, folding clothes, rocking and humming as she did so. He looked a little more closely—they were mostly Charlie’s clothes and it appeared some of them might have been damaged. He wasn’t sure if these were just clothes hard worn by a fourteen-year-old boy or if the vandals had done it.
“Was anything taken?” he asked Charlie.
“It’s kind of hard to tell, it’s all such a mess. A couple of things for sure, my mom’s winter coat—she hung it in the bathroom. She said it stayed fresh that way as there was no room in the closet and she wouldn’t keep it near the cooking. And her treasure box. It was little.” He demonstrated, using his hands. “It just had a few things in it—no jewelry or anything. There were two gold coins she said came from her grandfather, passed to her mother, passed to her. It was rumored he was an Army officer, but there’s no proof. She said keeping them safe in a refugee camp was a miracle. Our wristbands from when I was born—hers and mine. A crucifix and beads given to her by a Catholic sister at a hospital once when I was a patient. But the most important thing she had was a swatch—her mother embroidered some lotus flowers on a cloth and it was the only thing she had of her mother’s.”
“Have you talked to her? Is she in shock?”
“I think a little bit. She’s been talking in Vietnamese—she only knows a little. She was adopted when she was a real little girl, like two or three, so it’s amazing she remembered any. But she worked in a couple of manicure shops that were owned by Vietnamese and picked some up again. She was born in America. I think this Vietnamese stuff... I think it’s stress.”
“Okay,” Blake said, rubbing a big hand down his face. “What is it you want me to do?”
“I don’t know. We have to get out of here—the door won’t close. I wasn’t sure I could convince her...”
“Right,” he said. “Go try to make some sense of the mess in the living room and kitchen. Do a little straightening, figure out what’s missing if you can.”
“What if they come back?” Charlie said.
“That would make my day,” Blake said, eyes narrow, jaw clenched. “Those three dopers who chased you the other day?”
“Seems like. But you gotta wonder why they didn’t do it sooner. I mean, we’ve been here nine months.”
“Maybe we’ll figure it out later. Right now we have to get this place under control, pack up some things, leave. You work out here. Let me see to your mom.”
Blake went into the bedroom. He scooped up a pile of clothes off the floor, dumped it on the bed, knelt by Lin Su and began folding. There were jeans and board shorts and T-shirts and sweatshirts. Some looked as if they were stained with paint and he instinctively knew they hadn’t been like that before. Some were ripped. Slit. It looked as though a pocket knife could’ve done the damage. He tossed those in a pile. And some were all right, completely salvageable. Those he folded.
She didn’t speak; she just carefully folded clothes from her pile, then began taking clothes from his pile. They proceeded like that for a few minutes before she looked up. “Why are you here?”
“Charlie called me,” he said.
“He shouldn’t have called you. We can manage.”
“Either you’re a very messy housekeeper or you’re not managing that well. We should pack a few things.”
“I can take care of it,” she said.
“I don’t know you very well, Lin Su,” he said. He continued to fold. “But I know you like to do your work, pay your way, take care of your son and responsibilities. But sometimes you have to be humble. Sometimes when you have an opportunity, you have to be gracious and not stubborn. You are so stubborn.”
“Stubborn is strong,” she said.
“Stubborn is also pigheaded and counterproductive. Tomorrow is Charlie’s first day of school and you really shouldn’t stay here tonight—it’s obviously not safe.”
“There’s a motel...”
He put his big hand over her forearm, stopping her from