Loaded Hearts First 60 Pages

PROLOGUE

VIETNAM 1989

Wind ruffled the surface of the Thu Bon river. The wooden boat, steered by an impassive mariner, chugged a steady rhythm through the spray caught on the breeze. The captain ignored his passengers, paying attention only to the currents and winds. He ran his course close to shore, using the camouflage of overhanging trees to avoid the eyes of the local police. The evening air rustled in the bamboo canes. The engine thumped softly. Mai watched the white ducks asleep in their pens at the bend in the river. Her younger brother, Tam, sat as still as a bird caught in a snake’s gaze.

Mai saw her mother check the plastic bag tucked into her trousers, feeling for the sticks of gold. Twenty-four sticks each for their passage out of Vietnam. Enough money to buy a house. From the prow of the boat, painted eyes shaped like black almonds kept watch over the silent fugitives. Mai recognised one of the passengers, a young woman who worked at the tailor’s near the Hoi An market. She had sewn Mai’s ai-doh for her first day at high school. Every year Mai’s mother took her back to the tailor’s shop to be measured; the woman cut and sewed her new white trousers and tunic. Now she sat on the bench opposite Mai, not meeting her eyes.

The smell of salt filled the air as the boat struggled through the shifting currents. On one side of Mai, her mother sat, tense and unmoving; on the other, Mai felt Tam’s skinny thigh alongside hers. Through the dusk they spied the surf, white against the purple sky. Waiting for them, an ocean-going fishing boat bobbed out to sea past the white water.