But not in this life. Not as long as there was Nu Nu.
Nu Nu was aware of almost nothing during all this time. She had the impression that Death still stood at the door, exuding his stench, on the verge of stepping in. Uncertain yet whom he would take. The mother or the child? Or both?
She was not afraid. She lacked the energy even for fear.
She perceived little more of her son than his lips sucking at her from time to time. His gentle breath on her skin. The short, pitiful cries that grew quieter and weaker rather than louder and stronger. His skin was wrinkled and limp. She could feel it as she dully stroked his tiny body.
The midwife did not give Maung Sein much cause for hope. She had seen too many mothers and newborns die. Danger lurked everywhere after such a difficult birth. Nu Nu had lost far too much blood. She was too weakened, just like the baby, and the world was full of germs, bacteria, viruses, and parasites just waiting for an opportunity to infect them. Their fate would be decided in the coming days, perhaps weeks, and beyond the care she was already giving them there was not much she could do. To be safe she was bringing a small offering twice a week to the spirit who lived in the fig tree near the house. Rice. Bananas. Oranges. She did not know whether it was in his power to heal Nu Nu, but it could hardly be a mistake to incline him favorably.
Later, when Nu Nu and her son had gotten through it, she would call it a miracle. At one point during the birth and then one other time thereafter she had taken the child for dead and had given up on Nu Nu. There was no saving a woman with a lifeless child in her womb. And no saving a woman with so little blood, either. They were on their way to a new existence; she had never before seen a mother and child recover once so far gone.
One morning Nu Nu awoke and knew that Death had changed his mind. For the first time since the birth there was no stench of decay in her nostrils, only the sweet aroma of ripe mangoes. For the first time since the birth she could feel her body without freezing. She breathed deeply in and out and sniffed her son’s hair as he slumbered at her breast.
He smelled different. A hint of almonds and honey. The scent of life.
She looked around the hut. The doorframe was empty; she had a clear view of the papaya tree and the palms in the yard. Two butterflies danced in the sunbeams that fell through the windows. Maung Sein squatted by the smoldering fire, stirring a pot. Beside her were towels, a yellow hibiscus blossom in a vase, strewn in a circle beside it the petals of a red rose.
She tried to sit up but felt too weak. She called to him. He did not react. For a moment she thought it was all a dream. Perhaps this was not a return to life but the moment of final farewell. A terrible fear gripped Nu Nu. She did not want to die. Not yet. Not with her son in her arms. She mustered all her strength and called his name again. Loudly and clearly. He turned to her. Puzzled. As if not believing his ears.
“Nu Nu?”
“Yes,” she whispered.
He stood up, walked over to her with careful steps, and bent over her.
“Nu Nu?”
She smiled faintly.
Chapter 8
THE FIRST TIME she left the house with her sleeping son in her arms, still unsteady on her legs, gripping the railing tightly, she surveyed the yard, astonished. It was at once familiar and strange. Something was different, though she could not immediately put her finger on it. The morning sun beamed through the bushes. The leaves of the banana plants seemed greener, their fruit larger and yellower. The hibiscus and the bougainvillea had never looked so beautiful. A warm breeze caressed her skin. Maung Sein was perched on a log below her, chopping kindling. Stroke by stroke he would split branches as thick as a fist. The uniformity of his movements radiated something infinitely reassuring.
Nu Nu looked at Ko Gyi in her arms. He had her nose. Her mouth. Her cinnamon skin. She cautiously took one of his little hands. It was warm. And would always remain so. Suddenly he opened one blinking eye, and then quickly the other. He had her eyes, too, without a doubt. Ko Gyi regarded his mother earnestly, intently. She smiled. His deep brown eyes did not move. They looked for a long time at each other. Then a quiet smile drifted across his face. No one had ever smiled at her that way. No look had ever moved her so.
She was back.
In the weeks that followed she recovered more and more of her strength, and it was not long before she could assist her husband with simple chores. She would buy food at the market, balancing the big basket of rice and vegetables on her head all the way up to their hut with Ko Gyi wrapped firmly on her chest. In contrast to all the other young mothers in the village, she did not like to carry him on her back. She wanted to see him. She wanted to smell his hair. She wanted their hearts to hear each other.
She managed all of the work in the house with a single hand. She fanned the fire one-handed, cooked, swept the yard, pulled weeds out of the tomato beds, washed longyis and towels, and even developed a technique to wring them out one-handed—all because she did not want to put her son down. Not for one second. They had together been ordained to die, and together they had returned. It would be a long time before she was ready to let him out of her sight even for a few minutes.
The most beautiful part of Nu Nu’s day began when Maung Sein set off for the fields in the morning. If Ko Gyi was awake she would unwrap him and gaze at his small, perfect body. The most beautiful she had ever seen. A full head of hair, a round face with strikingly large eyes and comely lips. She marveled at his soft skin, smelled him. Took his tiny hands and feet in her mouth, rubbing his belly again and again, seeing in his eyes how much he enjoyed every touch. His tiny fingers gripped hers tightly, as if they would never let go. She noticed changes every day, however small they might be. His grip was getting stronger. His eyes were bigger, his gaze more alert, his kicking more boisterous. The first rings of fat appeared on the thighs and little arms that had previously been so thin. His gaze began to stray from her, to wander. Fixating on shadows on the wall. Marveling at his own little hands that appeared suddenly like shooting stars sweeping across his field of vision only to disappear again mysteriously. Until he learned to control them and put them in his mouth. With each passing day his soul came a bit farther into the world, thought Nu Nu. A bud unfolding slowly.
Whenever he started to cry she would carry him all around the house and yard; the motion was soothing to him. All the while she would be telling him in detail about everything they saw. The gleaming yellow hibiscus and the ripe tomatoes. The plump insects. The singing birds.
In a matter of seconds Ko Gyi would settle down and listen attentively to his mother’s voice.
After she had seen and described everything for the second time she would think up stories of her own. It was a steady stream of talk that she hoped would envelop and transport her son, a melody to accompany him through life and to protect him in need.
While nursing she would often sit on the porch with a cup of tea, letting Ko Gyi drink until he fell asleep, holding him in her arms or on her lap and watching him while he drowsed. Taking delight in every smile that dreams might charm from his lips. Every sigh. Every breath.
As soon as Maung Sein got home he would join her, but he would grow impatient after only a few minutes. He did not understand how his wife could stare at someone just lying there motionless with his eyes closed.
“Don’t you ever get bored?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
She shrugged.
“What do you see when you look at him?”
Nu Nu thought about it. “Everything.”
“What everything?”
“The Riddle of Life. And its solution.”
A disturbed expression was his only reaction.
She wondered what her son had done to her. Even her skin had settled down since his birth.
She examined her forearms again and again in disbelief. Her legs. Her neck. Her midriff. Nowhere did she find even the slightest hint of a red splotch.
Nu Nu felt so strong an
d confident that she no longer paid bad omens much heed. She attributed no special significance to the dead cat she found lying in the road with foam on its snout on her way to the market. When Maung Sein injured himself carving a wooden fish for his son, she wrote it off as a mishap.
Nor was she distressed when the neighbor’s sow bore six piglets on her birthday, one of them with two heads. For a short time she felt herself immune to the threats and vagaries of life.
Until that evening.
Sometimes it is a matter of seconds.
Chapter 9
SHE KNEW FROM the very first moment.
Just as she had known the first time around. Beyond any shadow of a doubt. A part of him would remain inside her. Implant itself. Grow. Something about this night had been different. Her initial passion had given way to uneasiness. She was loathe to surrender herself to him. She did not wish to be touched. In any way.
Maung Sein did not seem to notice, or perhaps he believed that his own desire would ultimately excite her. He kissed her neck tenderly. He caressed her and touched her with his fingers, but everything that usually aroused her felt to her now increasingly unpleasant.
As if she sensed already that anything they did that night would come to a bad end.
She thought of asking him to stop but did not want to disappoint him. What did it matter if for once they did not share equally in the pleasure? If she went along with it just to please him?
Later, when he entered her, she felt a stabbing pain in her abdomen, a pain that grew more intense with the ardor of his movement. Again she thought of asking him to stop, hesitated, and then let it happen.
To her.
When it was over, he lay panting beside her, and Nu Nu barely managed to suppress her tears. A part of him. But this time she did not want it. The thought of something growing inside her repulsed her from the very start.
She wanted more than anything to go outside and shove a finger down her throat, to vomit until she had expelled all foreign elements from her body.
She did not want a second child. Not now. Later. Perhaps.
Ko Gyi was enough for her. Ko Gyi and her husband. The distance they had felt during the last months of the pregnancy had gradually given way to their former intimacy. She was happy when he came home from the field, sweaty as he was. She needed his proximity. His calm. Nu Nu could not imagine loving a new child as much as those two. There was not room in her life for another person. Later. Perhaps. For now it would bring only sorrow.
During the early days she hoped she had been mistaken. Ko Gyi was still nursing, and she felt no great change in her body for some time.
Then came the morning sickness, the twinges in her abdomen.
Nu Nu pleaded with her body to cast away that little nothing. Seal up. Just stop nourishing it and then at some point wash it away in a gush of blood.
When that did not work she tried willpower. She would squat down several times a day, close her eyes, breathe deeply, and concentrate only on that foreign matter inside her. Go away. Away. Away. Out. Out. Out.
She sought support every morning from the spirit who lived in the fig tree, bringing him papayas and bananas as offerings. Perhaps he had the power to end the life growing within her.
Nu Nu recalled the words of the women in the field. During her first pregnancy they had advised against carrying anything too heavy lest she endanger her child. Now she threw caution to the wind. With her son on her back she would take on the heaviest work in the field and at home, so that Maung Sein exhorted his wife to be mindful of her condition. Ko Gyi needed a healthy mother.
She gave him no answer, but hoped that the physical exertions would eventually have the desired effect. Possessed by rage and doubt, she would drum her abdomen with both fists until her arms wearied. To no avail. Her belly swelled, and she took to ignoring her condition as best she could. As if through her indifference the child might cease to grow and vanish from her life.
One evening they were sitting in silence by the fire, Ko Gyi was asleep, and Maung Sein gazed for a long time at his wife. The arch of her belly was now impossible to miss.
“Aren’t you happy?” he asked, almost casually, scraping rice from a bowl with a tin spoon.
Nu Nu stared into the flames. She felt paralyzed. She was short of breath. She drew shallow drafts of air and exhaled them rapidly. Her heart raced. Fear had returned. The effortlessness of past months was nothing but a faint memory now. Why was her body ignoring her? Why had it not eliminated that something inside her weeks ago?
She summoned all her courage. “No, I am not happy.”
He nodded, as if he had expected this answer.
“Why not?”
She briefly considered asking him whether he did not feel the same way. Whether in his heart, too, there was no room to spare. Whether they might together find some solution. There were a number of young women in the village who could not conceive and who would be delighted to have a child.
“I don’t want a second child.”
“Why not?” he repeated without looking at her.
“It’s too soon.” Later. Maybe.
“Are you afraid of the delivery?”
She shook her head. “No.”
“Of what then?”
If only she had an answer.
“How can I help you?”
“To be happy?”
He nodded, and she saw the sincerity in his eyes. If only it were that simple.
“And you?” she inquired hesitantly.
His laughter in the firelight.
“I am happy. Very, in fact. Nothing could be more wonderful.” After a short pause he added: “Not for me.”
“Aren’t you frightened?”
“No. Of what?” He looked at her intently. “Should I be?”
She pursed her lips and shook her head again, quickly. “I wonder if we should think about …” Nu Nu did not finish the sentence.
“Think about what?”
“There are women in the village …” She saw the happiness in his eyes. He would have no understanding for that train of thought.
“What’s troubling you?” he asked anxiously.
She shrugged. Helplessly. How could she explain something she did not herself understand?
Maung Sein edged over to his wife and put an arm around her shoulders.
“I love you,” he whispered tenderly in her ear.
Three words that otherwise never missed their mark.
“I love you,” she echoed softly.
A chill ran down her spine.
“Don’t worry. The second child is always easier. I asked the midwife.”
Nu Nu nodded. A moment later she felt a sharp kick that made her flinch.
This was no tentative wriggling as she had known it with Ko Gyi; this was a ferocious punching and lashing out.
Maung Sein lit a candle, set it with a bit of wax on a tin can, and lay down beside his nursing wife. He listened to the gurgling sounds of his son’s eager suckling. When Ko Gyi had fallen asleep exhausted, Nu Nu swaddled him in two cloths and laid him on the far side of her husband. For a while they rested wordlessly side by side.
“Do you think that a person can shed?” she asked suddenly.
He looked at Nu Nu in the flickering candlelight. Perplexed. She could tell by his eyes and lightly furrowed brow that he had not understood. “What do you mean, ‘shed’?”
“Shed. Like snakes. Or amphibians.”
Thinking his wife was joking, Maung Sein smiled. He pinched her arm and tugged softly at her skin. “Not you, anyway. Yours is on there pretty tight.”
Nu Nu eyed him gravely. “I don’t mean our bodies. I mean our souls.”
“Our souls?” he replied in surprise.
“I want to know if we can strip away a part of ourselves once something else has grown in to replace it. Like an old snakeskin. Can a troubled spirit transform into a serene one? A sorrowful spirit into a joyful one? A solitary spirit into a sociable one? Not ju
st for an evening or a week. For eternity.”
Maung Sein crossed his arms under his head and looked at the ceiling. It was not a question he had ever considered. He pondered how the monks would have answered it. They might have said that the true essence of every individual resides in the soul; that this essence is not static but dynamic. That each person is free and that no one but ourselves can harm, rescue, or change us. Of that much he was convinced. And if we possessed the power to change ourselves, if the essence in our souls was not set in stone, then a troubled spirit could also transform itself into a serene spirit.
“Or,” he heard her asking, “are we stuck with who we are?”
“No,” he answered confidently, “we are not.”
She laid her head on his chest and gazed pensively at her son as he lay sleeping beside his father. She hoped fervently that he was right.
Chapter 10
THAR THAR WANTED to live. He defied his mother’s every attempt to be rid of him. Obstinately he had implanted himself within her and started to grow. In spite of her exertions and punches.
After toughing it out for thirty-nine weeks and five days he could wait no longer: Thar Thar was anxious to come into the world.
The delivery lasted less than an hour and proceeded without complication. The amniotic sac broke near dawn; the sun had not yet risen over the mountains when the water flushed him out onto a few wet cloths in a little shack. Nu Nu never even really had to push.
She discovered quickly that Thar Thar was not one to depend on the help of others. He was heavier and taller than his brother. His first cries were so penetrating that even the farmers living on the other side of the valley would swear years later they had heard them clearly.
A strong and healthy boy, she heard the midwife say. And a handsome one, like his mother. Someone laid him on her belly. Nu Nu lifted her head. The resemblance escaped her. She saw nothing but a blood-smeared, pointy-headed creature howling in fury. With all his might. Shrill and piercing. Ko Gyi had never wailed like that. Not once.