by Tran Chinh Vu

It was getting less cold and the image of spring was seen green on some thin branches of bang lang trees in the lane and on the isolated milk tree in the yard. It was so lonely and empty that afternoon amid the noises echoed from vehicles on Nguyen Trai Road. The cup of tea had just been put on the table, but its sweetness still lingered on his lips. And there were clusters of the countryside flowers, the bushes of wild trees grown by the roadside, even the violet colour of bindweed flowers in the pond. He found his childhood and adolescence unforgettable. And it was so difficult to understand why there was such a strange coincidence: his friend from Sai Gon brought him a packet of "Sam Cuc".

He reached for the box of tea and took out a packet. Then he dropped it into the tea cup. A thin cloud of smoke spread over the top of the cup, full of scents and memories. "Sam Cuc" was like a human name. Memory overwhelmed him through the whiteness of the window, making him remember a little girl with two plaits of hair always moving, those bright and playful eyes and a permanent smile on her lips. Yes, it was several decades ago, in that year-end afternoon when he went to buy some medicine for her mother’s cold in the adjacent drug store. He saw a little girl appear behind the door of the inner room, signalling him with her fingers. He asked the shop owner’s permission to talk to her.

"It seems that the girl wants to ask me something."

"Yes, please come in. Maybe she wants you to help her solve some difficult math exercises. She has been mentioning you," the owner said.

He rapped lightly on the girl’s head:

"You sucker! What do you want to ask me?"

"First of all, I’m not a sucker, so try me again!" the little girl irreverently responded, raising her face to assert herself.

"You’re only twelve years of age."

The little girl interrupted him.

"I’m already thirteen. You always want to cheat me."
"O.K. You’re thirteen now. So you can shoot up quick."

"No, it’s not that. I mean I’m only five years younger than you."

"Oh, yes. Is it?"

He crossed the threshold into her room.

"What can I do for you, Huyen Sam?"

The girl’s two plaits of hair swung around her head.

"Do call me Sam Cuc, as my friends do," she requested politely.

"Your name is Sam, not Cuc."

The girl repeated it categorically:

"My name is Sam Cuc. You should address me that way."

"Yes, you’re Sam Cuc."

She laughed, clapping her hands in great interest. Then she took his hand and asked him to sit down. Her hand was so small, occupying only half of his, but it was so white and smooth compared to the brownness of his hand.

Sam Cuc was the youngest daughter – constantly coddled by her parents. He could not understand why the little girl liked only the button-like daisies. On her small desk was always a small vase of these flowers; sometimes they were golden, sometimes they were white. This kind of flower was often used by the Hanoians to flavour tea. Sam Cuc often used them that way for her mother’s tea.

"Is it a difficult problem, Huyen Sam?"

"Don’t you forget my name!" the girl’s eyebrows came together.

"I won’t forget it next time," he pursed his lips.

"No, I don’t ask you to help solve the problem," the girl said. He watched the smile return to her face.

"So what do you want?"

"Please sit there and you’ll find out."

In that small room, the scent of the daisies could not be diluted; it was strong. Sam Cuc went to the cupboard and retrieved one cup. Then she took out a pot, from which she poured tea water. He was still wondering what she was doing when she pulled a drawer and took out a small packet:

"Please, close your eyes until I tell you to open them. And don’t peek!" she said.

"Why?"

"Just do as you’re told!"

He had to obey. Even though she was only his neighbour, he took her as his sister and that was why he had mostly done the things she asked of him. He heard rustling and a package being opened, and Sam Cuc’s voice rang:

"Now you can open your eyes."

The girl pushed the cup of tea before him. He saw a light brown colour of water and some tiny daisy petals still floating on the surface. He found it so strange.

"What kind of tea?"

"Ginseng tea, you know. My father prepared it for my mother, so I got some for you," the girl set her lips against his ears and whispered.

"What about those petals floating on the surface of the cup?"

"Those are dried daisies which I prepared by myself. I put it into the tea to give it a strong smell."

"But if I die when I drink it," he pulled her legs.

The girl’s eyes widened.

"How can you die? I drink it everyday, even the tiny daisy petals. My father said those daisies give a very pleasant coolness which is very good for our lungs."

So he again had to do as instructed.

Looking back, he always remembered things about that moment in time. He still smelled the aroma of tea, and saw the girl’s image in his mind.

"Sam Cuc!" He called her name in a soft voice, and felt the pain growing in his mind.

His family and her family had lived on the same street for quite a long time. He lived on the third floor of a house numbered 73 on Cua Nam Street, and Sam Cuc lived on the second floor of number 71. Sam Cuc’s house had a tile roof and a backyard for her to play in the afternoons. He, at the age of eighteen, was full of joy and dreams. He often made paper birds and boats and then dropped them down to her. He would draw funny pictures of monkeys eating bananas or a cat ambushing a mouse, and they always made her laugh. Once he drew a little girl with braids, and she gave it back to him and asked him to draw another.

"You drew me as if I have two horns on my head!"

"But I did not draw you."

"Isn’t it me?" she asked.

"Your hair would have to be in braids."

"I won’t plait it," she stubbornly replied.

Right after that the little girl loosened the hair to make it fall to her shoulders, but it only reached her shoulders. The next day he drew her with her hair down on the boat. Sam Cuc screamed:

"The hair looks so stiff. I don’t like it," she said, returning it to him. He then drew another girl with smooth hair, which a girl of her age could not have. But Sam Cuc liked it.

"I’ll have a hair like this."

From that day, the girl always had a comb by her side. This caught her mother’s attention.

"What happened to you? Have you got an itchy head?" her mother wondered.

"I’ve done it to have longer hair," she replied.

"If you want that, you’d better wash your hair with soap berries."

From that day, Sam Cuc had her hair washed regularly.

For several decades now he had gone through the war and time had buried everything, but the image and memory of Sam Cuc was unforgettable to him. It seemed as fresh as yesterday. A friend of his once said that it was the vacuum memory, which was probably right, as he seemed to see nothing, but actually he could see everything; it seemed as if the memory was far from somewhere, but it was always in one’s heart. As far as human memory was concerned, the joy and sadness of one’s life was something hard forgotten.

He poured some more tea into the cup. A thin curtain of heat was rising from the cup as he pictured Sam Cuc walking out of it. A round, white face with hair so short, and a sweet smile.

"Sam Cuc!" he again called her name aloud. His heart sank.

"Don’t get so down, please!" he thought he heard her say. "Please drink your tea and remember me more. I’m always in each Sam Cuc cup of tea you drink."

His eyelids were slightly wet. He raised the cup in his hand and sipped the tea — all those dried daisy petals made him miss her. The year-end afternoon saw the sunlight fading gradually outside the window and the foliage of the milk flower tree was becoming darker. He again remembered the day he had taken Sam Cuc along a street with many milk trees in bloom.

"Its scent is so strong," she noticed.

"It will remain deep inside when we live far from the city."

He then looked into her eyes, knowing the separation was inevitable.

In 1967, the Americans escalated their war by launching massive bombing raids on the capital. Air raid sirens sounded off several times a day. But to him, there was no turmoil in life. Every Hanoian wore conical hats. Sam Cuc turned fifteen and also had a straw hat. One Sunday afternoon, he took Sam Cuc out. He had received an army conscription paper, but he couldn’t tell her yet. He took her to the Bon Mua (Four Seasons) Ice Cream Shop while the air raid alarm blared. The busy streets emptied as people rushed to shelters by the lake. Far off explosions provided continual background noise. Sam Cuc couldn’t move from fear; he had to carry her in his arms to the shelter. Her arms were around his neck, her eyes closed tightly. She whispered into his ear:

"I’ve liked being carried this way all my life."

In the shelter, she looked around at everyone else eating ice cream.

"Where... where is my ice cream?"

Braving the bomb explosions outside, he rushed out onto the street to get her ice cream.

"Oh, I love you so much!"

Three days later, he set out to join the army. Sam Cuc sadly tagged after him to boot camp. She said to him time and again:

"After each march, you should write me once, and you should not call me ‘little Sam Cuc’ any more."

"Yes, I remember it."

"You should tell me everything there."

"Yes, I’ve noted it down in the notebook."

"I’ll miss you everyday and expect you home." Her face suddenly turned sad.

"I’ll be back home with you. The victory is approaching."

"And if you won’t come back home?"

He was so stunned by her question, and for the first time he could see that Sam Cuc’s sadness was no longer a little girl’s sadness. His heart was touched with sympathy and compassion. He looked deep into her eyes.

"I’ll surely be back home, because little Sam Cuc expects me at home and will prepare the Sam Cuc tea for me."

The girl embraced him and sobbed into his chest. He held her tight. It was the last image of her he had in his mind, together with her tearful kiss on his cheek.

He did not return to his old street until ten years later, sure that Sam Cuc had finished her university education and grown into a beautiful woman. ‘Sam Cuc should be twenty-five years old now,’ he thought. ‘But she’s probably married.’ The war had cut off all communication, so he could not get any information about her. He wondered if she would still remember him and the day they parted ways.

He went straight to Sam Cuc’s house, which looked shabby and abandoned. Her father died the year before, so the house belonged to her mother. The sight of her mother’s white hair wrung his heart. When he asked her if Sam Cuc was at home or at her husband’s, the old woman burst out crying. She took him inside, where he saw Sam Cuc’s room intact. That bed, that desk where he had often helped her with her school lessons, were identical. Her mother pointed to a small altar. His heart sank. He found it impossible to cry. Her image was confined to a frame, with a heading: "Do Huyen Sam died on December 27, 1972".

She died on the day American B52s rained down on Kham Thien Street. He wanted to scream but he could not. That young, fresh smile in the picture made him so sad.

Sam Cuc’s mother started the story: "That morning, she came home from the evacuation area, she wrote a short note for us and quickly went to see her friend on Kham Thien Street..."

The old woman burst out crying again, and he also could not contain his tears.

"When her body was found buried deep in the rubble, she was taken immediately to the hospital. We got to the hospital in time to hear her last words: ‘Everything I have stored in the iron box in the wardrobe. When he returns, please give that box to him, tell him that Sam Cuc misses him so much and will wait for him to the end of life.’ I haven’t opened the box yet. I want to leave it to you to open. Let me get it for you."

She sat still beside him while he opened the box. Everything was intact: those paper boats and birds that he gave her (the pictures he had drawn on them still looked new). Inside the box were also several letters he had written to her on his initial days of being a soldier.

He opened the last package and dried daisy petals fell all over the floor.

"It is ginseng tea mixed with dried daisy petals. She made it for when I return home."

"Oh God!"

The old woman cried. Sam Cuc had kept her word.