Anarchy and the Old Dogs

Will She? Won’t She?

There was something static about the Mekhong that evening. Of course it was moving. It had a thousand communities to feed downriver, rice to water, pretty ladies to wash. But to the naked eye it seemed to sit like a long, broad pond. Already it was beginning to swell from the rains in China and overwhelm the vegetable allotments along its banks. As the retreating sunlight cast its shadows, Siri sat alone on his log and imagined that the mighty river had stopped. He’d learned all its secrets and it was prostrated before him, seeking forgiveness for all the lives it had taken.

His feet danced back and forth to stop the mosquitoes settling on his ankles, and his mind danced in time with them. He wondered whether there would be any more lunches here with his best friend, whether Civilai would survive retirement, whether he’d done the right thing. He wondered whether he was right to give his blessing to a pressured marriage, and whether Judge Haeng might allow him to retire now after he’d helped to rescue the republic from anarchy. He wondered whether the Odeon might consider showing the odd Bruce Lee film on special occasions. He would have wondered himself into oblivion if his thoughts hadn’t been drowned out by the sudden screeching of cicadas.

A sliver of lightning and a groan of thunder across in Thailand made him think of Pakse and this brought him full circle to Daeng. The cream-colored champa flowers sat at his feet in a bunch, wrapped in mulberry paper. He’d performed surgery with bullets whistling past his ears and confronted malevolent ghosts, but neither had made his stomach churn as it did now. Would she have him? He wasn’t much to look at, half of one ear was missing, and goodness knows there were a thousand other reasons to turn him down. But Auntie Bpoo had confirmed what he’d already known in his heart. The first part of the fortune-teller’s prophecy had already been in his plans: that by the end of the monsoons he’d be married. And there weren’t that many prospective brides to choose from.

He took a deep breath and began the walk along the river’s edge that would take him to Daeng’s new noodle shop. The trumpet trees that once lined the bank had been cut down by the army for security reasons. The trees had obscured the view of their enemies across the Mekhong. If the Thai military had been observing at that moment, they would have seen a nervous seventy-three-year-old shuffling his sandaled feet along the Lao bank, indifferent to any thought of being shot. He had two things on his mind that were more worrying: the first, what words he could use to convince Daeng his intentions were honorable; the second, Auntie Bpoo’s other prediction, that by the Lao New Year, Dr. Siri and his new bride would have two bouncing baby boys.