Mirrors of Canal Ben (Story Twelve, to: "Voices out of Saigon")

Mirrors of Canal Ben
((Story Twelve) (Yoon> Story, December 1981))



Advance: Yoon Tran, who worked at the Sanitary plant in Saigon, friend to Zuxin’s first husband, lives near the Chinese Pagoda, on Dai 40 street, off the main street known as Hong Bang. He has lived his whole life in Saigon, with his mother Kaojia Tran, aging mother, now seventy-two years old, and remains unmarried.
He is in his 40s, it is near the middle of December, 1981. He has heard the report Si Manh has made, last year concerning her husband’s death; he is dead, by the hands of three brutes, several stab marks were found on him by the police, right through the heart, Si has inherited all his prosperities and monies in the interim. The rape has not been mentioned, or told to the local police, and Yoon wonders if Si knows about his involvement. Of course, Yoon knows nothing about Si’s rape, but Si feels, Yoon has escaped the revenge of Zuxin and Ming, and taken it out on her and her husband. She even feels because of her husband, perhaps he had it coming, and her also for sticking around, she did know he was whoring about, but that was it. Her alibi could not have been a plea of innocence, but rather neglect, for allowing it to go on for so long, and who knows how many other woman had to face his mirrors of destruction.
Yoon, he now is the superintendent at the plant, and takes his daily walks along the Saigon Canal Ben, as he always has.
Yoon and Kaojia plan on visiting Phnom Penh. As Morgan Carter the II, would have told Yoon, had he asked, ‘What goes around, comes around—don-t expect anything different.’

The Canal
His voice had huskiness to it, more so now then in the past, dried up with alcohol, he had been drinking since the death of Mr. Manh, and mentally at work he was crippled. I mean, his boss was castrated and stabbed which was enough to scare an ape back into the jungle.
He had little agility left, and demanded it seemed at work, demanded his fellow works do his work for him, as well as theirs. His mind was grey, too soft for deep thinking, and reading those blueprints. He wanted to take a vacation to Cambodia, Phnom Penh, but as usual it was delayed, he was stuck in Saigon, until a project was finished, so he remained on Dai 40 streets, off of Hong Bang.
His eyes wild and his neck muscles tight, from the stress of the unknown: it was raining like cats and dogs, and he took his hot cup of tea, to keep the damp out of his bones,
“I was a good man in my day,” he tells himself out loud, walking to the Canal “I have pride in myself, in my appearance, I am no bum,” he adds, and because of the death of Mr. Manh, and the way he died, perhaps, who knows, he feels his time is coming. But when and where and how is the unknown question.
Fifteen minutes later he is walking along the Cannel Ben, as he usually does, sees Si. She seemed to have a truly untrammeled spirit. It would seem she found life good, now that her husband was gone, but it could be a mistake to say so.
Therefore, when she approached, he simply said his hello, and she her’s, and as they stood by the canal, she talked briefly about her husband.
“Did you know Yoon, my husband died for his sins, and you, you just walk around as if you conquered the whole world, the earth, and have none.”
It seemed the waters crawled up from the Canal; the sky was a flat grey, from the early morning rain, the sporadic rains of this early afternoon.
“Funny seeing you here, Mrs. Manh,” said Yoon.
“It’s all symbolical; I’ve been solidified like you and my husband. Hardened for life’s unexpectancies, such as this moment: have you been drinking again Yoon?”
“I got a drink on me yes, here in my pocket.” He said.
“Yeh, I see but why?” asked Si; he didn’t answer her.
Miraculously, he stood on one leg looking over into the Canal, she looked around for a policeman, none to be seen, and cunningly, she said with a push “Here is law and justice,” she had pushed him over the railing, quickly, fast, and looked in the strange light of the sun, as the dark clouds passed it, as if telling Zeus, that you for this murderous moment: with a shadow through the hopeless light. She knew Yoon could not swim, her husband told him so, and when he fell, you could hear his body tumble abruptly into the water hitting the side pavement of the canal, a dull clanging thump,
“So long, superintendent, this was for me, Ming and Zuxin, justice now is served.”

She could see him, his reflection out of the water; he floated for a spell, under its surface, and she could see his face bobbing up close to the surface, and then under the water, it was as if looking at a mirror looking back at her, but not her reflection in it, his.