What We All Long For by Dionne Brand (most important books to read txt) 📗

in the end for the Dong Khoi and Pulau Bidong if I’m grateful for anything. But gratitude is not one of the outcomes of this story or my life. My brother got my father and mother at the thick point of their guilt. They don’t see him, they see me. They imagine me in the dense mist in the South China Sea, me on Bidong. They pour all their senses into him, paying and paying out till he’s sick with indulgence. I’ve got no pity. You think I would look at his face and not see the years he’s been fattened instead of me? Brotherliness is another feeling I can’t come up with. Self-interest is what moves the world. People bunch together because they’re scared. I’m a loner. Don’t expect me to tell you about the innocence of youth, that would be another story, not mine.

What happened to the master who made the servant swear never to tell his stories to anyone else? Did I tell you that story? The monk who came to Pulau Bidong once told it to me. I’ll tell it to you in case you think I don’t have a sense of humour.

Once there was a servant who had a young boy for a master. Every night the servant would tell this boy fantastic stories, and the stories were so good the boy didn’t want anyone else to have them, so, the son of a bitch that he was already, he told the servant never to tell anyone else these stories just so he could have them to himself. He made the servant swear never to tell the stories outside his room, and the servant, ass-licking servant that he was, vowed never to do so. The boy grew up and was to be married. He dressed up in his finest clothes and went out of the house to his carriage to leave for his wedding. The servant happened to be passing by the boy’s room when he heard voices from inside. Who could be in his master’s room? he thought, and he leaned his head against the door to listen.

One voice said, “We have to do something about this damned boy today!”

Another voice said, “Yeah, that cac is going off to get married and we’ll be locked up in this room forever.”

“Okay,” said a third voice, “here’s the plan. I’m a story about a poisoned well. When he gets into his carriage and they’re halfway to the wedding, he’ll get thirsty and I’ll appear and he’ll drink from the well and that’ll be the end of the selfish lo dit.”

“Great idea,” said the first voice. “But just in case he doesn’t drink from the well, I’m a story about flaming hot coals. When he reaches his bride’s house, they’ll run out with a footstool. I’ll lay under the cushion and burn him to death.”

“Yeah,” said another voice. “Fantastic. I’m a story about a deadly venomous snake. Let’s say he doesn’t drink from the well, let’s say he doesn’t put his foot on the stool. I’ll lay in his honeymoon bed next to his sweetheart’s face like a beautiful embroidery. When he lays down, I’ll kill the du-ma-may! And we’ll all be free from this room.”

“Yeah,” they all agreed.

Just then the frightened servant, who didn’t know a good thing when he heard it, burst into the room, but there was no one there.

When the master went out in his carriage to his wedding, the servant begged to go with him. On the way the young master said, “Oh, I’m so thirsty, servant, get me some water from that well.”

The servant, risking a blow to the head, said, “Oh no, master, you’ll be late for the bride. They’ve prepared better than water there for you.”

The master said, “Okay, you’re right.”

When they got to the bride’s house, the footmen brought out the footstool for the young master’s feet. The old servant grabbed it quickly, burning his own hands, saying, “Oh, master, the coals are too hot, these idiot footmen. Climb on my back and I’ll take you inside.” The master was astonished but went on his back.

After the wedding, when the bride and groom had retired to the bedroom and the bride was all naked in the matrimonial bed, the servant snuck in and stood behind the curtain. Next to the bride’s lovely face was the most exquisite embroidery of a languorous snake. And as the bridegroom was about to lay his head on it, the servant jumped out and grabbed the deadly venomous snake and smashed it to death, apologizing and explaining the conspiracy of the stories he had overheard in the master’s bedroom.

What makes a guy so slavish? This is a fairy tale, the kind you know. Now who would make up a story like that?

TWELVE

AT THE ATM MACHINE in the bank, Tuyen found a photograph. It was lying there as if waiting for her. This always happened to her. She would turn around and find frames filled in with the life of the city. She would find discarded looks, which she tried to trace to their origins, or alternately their flights. On any given day, on any particular corner, on any crossroads, you can find the city’s heterogeneity, like some physical light. And Tuyen found herself always in the middle of observing it.

She’s taking her last twenty dollars out of the ATM machine, and when she looks down, there’s the photograph lying on the floor. There are two people in the small photograph, a man and woman, against a tropical tree, with a church steeple in the background. The man is wearing light pants, a suit, single-buttoned, with a tie; the woman is wearing a white boat-necked dress. Tuyen turns the photograph over and reads: “Recuerdo de nuestra noche, 1968.” She was torn between taking the picture, that was her first instinct, and leaving it for its owner’s return. Such a photograph, someone would return for. The idea of using it in her installation came