moved about. Strangely, her father was wearing the saffron robes of a monk, but with chains cutting into the flesh of his ankles. “My dear father, what should I do?” she asked him. He touched her cheek but did not answer her question. Instead, he whispered, “Bad times.” “For me?” asked Ryna. “When?” Then she was back in the dark house with Pich.
When her daughter Nita arrived at Praek Khmau on the bus, struggling with her two bags of belongings, her stomach bulging beneath her faded sarong, Ryna could hardly stop weeping with joy. “Mi-oun, mi-oun, mi-oun,” was all she could say. “Mae looks tired,” said Nita, who had not seen her mother for over a year. Nita’s breasts, tiny buds when she first married, had grown plump. Her lips were bright red, her fingernails and toenails the same color. “Tonight, I will make amok for you,” said Ryna. “I will make amok and luk lak and bok choy, and I have some nice bananas. But first, you are resting.” Ryna wrapped her arms around her daughter and helped her get into their oxcart. The bus stop was crowded with people and motos and carts, some of the little motos carrying entire families wedged together. One moto had a pig strapped across sideways. “Is your husband angry that you left him?” asked Ryna. “He doesn’t care about me,” said Nita. “I think that he has a girlfriend in Kampot. More than one.” She hugged her mother.
After Nita moved in, the house was so alive and so crowded that Kamal and Pich slept in hammocks under the house, hung between the corner posts, and the oxen were retied to a stake near the kitchen shed. On the first day of Pchum Ben, they all dressed in white clothes and went to the pagoda at dawn. Several hundred villagers were already there, wearing white tops and black pants and skirts, praying and tossing rice on the ground to feed their dead ancestors. Ryna had brought along all the ancestral photographs, including the one of her father. During the Pchum Ben holidays, Ryna always thought of her parents, wondering if she might hear them as they crept about the village. But on this Pchum Ben, with the return of Touch Pheng and the flood of old memories, she was certain that she could feel her father brush past her.
“May your ancestors be released from their misery and reborn in a happy life,” chanted the three monks, who sat cross-legged on white cushions. Behind them, a long table was laden with bowls of rice and fruit, and on the wall was a large photograph of the Venerable Thy Hut, who had worked in the resettlements after the war. As Ryna sat with her eyes closed, feeling her family around her, her three daughters and her son and her husband, the thought came to her that not all of her fortune in this life had been bad. But it had not been good either. A shudder went through her as she remembered what her father had said in the dream. Was it a summary of bad things that had already happened, or a prophecy of bad things to come? Ghosts sometimes mixed future and past. Ryna half opened her eyes and saw among the throngs of people Makara and her husband, kneeling on mats. At the other side of the pagoda, beneath the photograph of the venerable monk, she saw Lakhena, sitting alone and wearing a white lace blouse with a lavender sash draped over her shoulder. Lakhena was looking intently at Ryna and her family. When she noticed Ryna looking back, she dipped her head in a bow. Ryna hesitated and then gave a slight nod in return. Lakhena surely had her own suffering, she thought, like all women. “May your ancestors bless you for what you are doing to release them from their misery and for offering them food,” droned the monks.
A week after the dry season had begun, after the mud turned to dirt and the dirt turned to red dust that hovered like mist in the air, Ryna saw Touch Pheng limping up to her front gate. When she went down to meet him, he told her that he had come to say goodbye. He was leaving Praek Banan. It had been five months since she first saw him in the village.
“You are leaving before the rice harvest?” asked Ryna.
“I have to go,” said Touch Pheng. “An old man has worn out his welcome. Do not feel sorry for me. I am alive. I’m going this afternoon, to a nephew in Banteay Meanchey. My bags are packed.”
“That is a long trip on the bus.”
“No matter.”
The old man leaned against the gate, thin as a reed even in his traveling shirt. He would not live long, she thought to herself. “I would like my daughters to meet you before you go,” said Ryna.
Touch looked at her as if he didn’t understand what she had said.
“Two of my daughters are here. If you are all packed.”
“I am packed,” said Touch Pheng. “I do not have much.” He began coughing and could not stop for a full minute. “All right,” he said, taking large gulps of air. “I will meet your daughters.”
With some effort, Ryna helped Touch Pheng up the ladder into her house. As always, he smelled of tobacco. He looked around without comment. Nita was napping behind the curtain, and Sreypov, just home from school, sat cross-legged in the corner with a book. Ryna introduced her daughter, who greeted the visitor and went back to her studies. The radio was playing some songs of Pen Ron. Letting his stick drop to the floor, the old man sank into one of the two chairs.
“Do you like her singing?” said Ryna.
Touch Pheng nodded. He seemed a bit out of breath and closed his eyes. Ryna was again struck by how thin he was.
“If you don’t like Pen Ron, I can change the dial,” said Ryna.
“Don’t go to any trouble for me. Whatever you want is fine.” Touch Pheng rubbed at the mole over his eye and shifted in his chair. “To be honest, Pen Ron is a little crazy for me.”
“Rock and roll,” said Ryna. “What about Sinn Sisamouth? There’s a channel that plays Sinn Sisamouth all the time.”
“I know,” said Touch Pheng, opening his eyes. “I like Sinn Sisamouth. ‘Violon Sneha’ is my favorite song.” Ryna turned the dial of the old radio until she found the Sinn Sisamouth channel. “Yes, that’s him,” said Touch Pheng. “It’s a song I don’t know, but no one can mistake his voice.” He closed his eyes again.
“My husband and I listen to him all the time,” said Ryna. She noticed that Touch Pheng sat so that he cocked his left ear toward the radio, as if he might be deaf in his other ear.
“No one sings like Sinn Sisamouth,” said Touch Pheng. “Listen to the words. He knew the pain of romance, didn’t he.”
“He’s my favorite singer,” said Ryna. She closed her eyes, and they both sat with their eyes closed, listening to Sinn Sisamouth on the radio. Some minutes passed, how many Ryna couldn’t tell. It was sweltering in the house, and she could feel the sweat dripping down the small of her back.
“Did you know that he went to medical school?” said Touch Pheng. “At one time, he was going to be a doctor. Think of that.”
They could hear Nita behind the curtain. She drew long breaths as she slept, and she turned over several times.
Ryna looked at Touch Pheng. He appeared to be dozing, his head drooped down to his chest. She stood up. “What?” he said, opening his eyes and looking around as if he did not remember where he was.
“Let me give you something to eat,” said Ryna.
“No need to feed me,” said Touch Pheng.
“You have a long journey,” said Ryna. She went down the ladder and came back with rice and pork. She watched as he ate.
“Neang will not eat?” he asked.
“I ate already.” She served him more rice.
