Across the Mekong River Read Free Page A

Pathet Laos soldiers, one as deadly as the other. During the day we hid in groves of bamboo or oleander. It wasn’t far now, Father said.
    Only twenty- two of our original group reached the Mekong River. Seven had died, and Youa had left with her baby for her brother’s village near Luang Prabang after Choa was killed. We hid among the bushes, waiting for our chance. I knew that when we touched the lights in Thailand, we would be safe.
    Father talked with local fisherme n and learned there were no boats to ferry us across, no matter how much silver he offered. The soldiers kept close guard and shot anyone who ventured onto the water. So Father and the other men crawled on hands and knees through the darkness to the riverbank, cut bamboo poles, and fashioned crude rafts by lashing them together with rags and reeds. Once they were ready, Fong rushed back for the rest of us.
    We ran bent low to the ground, but Bee Yang’s baby girl, tied to her back, woke from t he sudden bouncing and wailed. Within seconds, bright shafts of light swept back and forth across the meadow like giant sunbeams trapping flies. Gunfire erupted over our heads, followed by rockets. A swirl of yellow and blue and red filled the night sky like Chinese fireworks at a New Year’s celebration. Mother dragged me by the arm, my feet tripping over mounds of dirt, my lungs burning as the world exploded around us. I never noticed the spark that set my pant leg on fire.
    If I close my eyes, I can still feel the shock of cold water rushing over my body as we crashed into the river. My memory plays tricks now; those next moments stretch into endless minutes like a film in slow motion. I could not find a footing as my body became weightless. Father held the raft with one hand and grabbed my arm with the other, but the swift current caught me. I felt his grip slip down my arm to my wrist and over my palm, his fingers sliding away one by one until I sank into the depths. I could not lift my arms and legs. Water filled my mouth and lungs. Muffled screams, perhaps Mother’s, drifted down. A hand thrashed through the water and pulled me up. Somehow Father caught my hair and then my shirt, grasping, lifting me to him and onto the raft, pinning me under his left arm. I coughed up water and gulped for air. Father had saved me. I believed he always would.
    Father helped Mother roll onto the fragile hollows of bamboo. She cried out for my brothers to hurry, her arm stretching out to them. Ten feet away they struggled onto a smaller raft, swirling around like a top. Rockets whistled overhead and a huge wave crashed over them. A machine gun echoed in my ears, bullets bouncing off the bamboo and splashing on the water around us. A searchlight passed and in that moment of illumination, Fue jerked up to his knees, his hand flying to his chest. Mother let out a piercing wail as he fell into the river. The light brushed away and the world turned black once more. Our raft was swept into the rushing waters. I tried to keep my eyes pinned on the spot where my brothers had been, but they had disappeared into the dark expanse.
    Father whipped his arms in the water, trying to guide our raft across the rushing current, avoiding floating logs and debris that bounced past. We clutched at the sharp edges of bamboo, spinning and rolling. I squeezed my eyes shut. I had no sense of how long it took--minutes or hours--before we finally washed up on the opposite shore. I remember being passed into a strange set of arms and then sitting on sand and rocks. My body shook. My limbs felt numb, too heavy to move.
    Fourteen others from our group struggled onto the riv erbank in Thailand that night. My aunt, four cousins, and half the Yang family, were all dead. My brothers Fong and Fue floated somewhere in the depths of the murky, blood-stained waters, never to reach the shore across the Mekong River.
     
    The judge shuffles the papers into a neat pile and puts them aside. The muscles in his face go