Butterfly Yellow

Seeing the destroyed church, Hằng is shaken, having imagined a reunion with her brother at this address for so many years. She has studied, practiced, and memorized this address, looking up the meanings of each of the words and trying to picture the location they indicate. She has fumbled through their pronunciation, difficult for her because Vietnamese words are almost all monosyllabic.

Exhausted, hungry, and desperate, difficult memories come flooding back to Hằng; she is unable to stop them, so she erases herself from them even as she remembers: Two monks, one older and one younger, lie among 46 bodies on a boat. A Thai fishing boat approaches, and the pirates on it bring out machetes. They are enraged at not having found enough loot, and trample over the men and drag the women to their boat. The older monk holds up a stone carving of Buddha, which enrages one of the pirates, who lifts his machete.

Hằng faints outside the church, and an old woman with a cane, who introduces herself as Mrs. Brown, wanders over to investigate. LeeRoy, irritated, explains that he was coerced into being Hằng’s taxi, but has to leave now.