extra finger

(Baonghean) - No matter how much you love or hate something or someone from the past, sooner or later those things will turn to dust, and the broom of time will sweep them all away with a single sweep. When I was in school, I sometimes forgot the names of my classmates after just one summer. Or I'd mix them up, shouting "Kien, come jump rope!" just because it was Uyen... something like that. But there are also some friends I'll never forget. Forever.

Originally, she was just an unremarkable little girl. A bit skinny, or maybe it was because she was sickly from drinking too much milk, so no one standing next to her was anything but skinny. She was quiet, though even managing to open her mouth in a class full of loudmouths (like me) was a miracle. It's also possible that from the beginning, this frail, sickly girl with a perpetually pale complexion from sun exposure was different, and no one noticed. It wasn't until she started learning to write that she truly stood out.

Nguyen struggled to write. It wasn't because he was stupid, but because he couldn't remember that the letter O was round like a chicken egg, that when it was sunny, the O would wear a hat and become Ô, and that the letter Ơ would be an O with a beard that hadn't been shaved for days. On the contrary, he was quiet and attentive; whatever he was taught, he listened attentively and remembered immediately. We couldn't understand his predicament simply because none of us had encountered a similar problem: Nguyen had six fingers on each hand, so he couldn't hold a pen like the teacher instructed. He unintentionally and reluctantly wore hats on his O letters even when it wasn't sunny, and occasionally let them grow beards, while the writing exercise for the letter Ơ was still a long way off.

I widened my eyes and asked, "Why are your fingers so twisted, Nguyen?" when I saw the crooked "O"s in her notebook. At times like that, I'd breathe a sigh of relief, because my handwriting score never went above a 7, and I'd have a chance to explain to my mother, "Nguyen, sitting next to me, only got a 7!" But gradually, as I became less careless, surpassing her wasn't difficult at all. Poor girl, no matter how hard she tried, even callousing her thumbs, her handwriting remained terrible! Nguyen's spelling was awful, but thanks to that, her "school life" was less boring, as she and I naturally became desk mates, progressing together. Despite her frantic headshakes, I still managed to drag her into our jump rope game. Only when we got to the rock-paper-scissors game did we all stare blankly at Nguyen's extra thumb. I was stunned for a moment, then declared, "Let me play rock-paper-scissors for her," while Nguyen just looked at me, both embarrassed and grateful. For five years, I played rock-paper-scissors for her, winning more and losing less, and I still wonder if she ever felt jealous or curious enough to try it once?

When I entered seventh grade, I almost didn't recognize Nguyen on assembly day. He was waving his five-fingered hands frantically at me. I stared blankly: "What's wrong with your hand?" - "Mom took me to Hanoi to get it cut. If she had taken me earlier, you wouldn't have had to play rock-paper-scissors for me for so long, right?" I looked at him, bewildered and dazed. Well, we were in seventh grade now, weren't we? We didn't play rock-paper-scissors anymore. Was I bothered by having to play for him all the time? Was I relieved not to have to look at Nguyen's extra finger every time he nervously raised his hand to speak? Suddenly, I felt so sad I wanted to cry.

Nguyen and I, in a way, became close thanks to that extra thumb. Will the memories associated with it fade away? Is it possible to not recognize a person simply because they are missing a thumb? It sounds silly, but I'm very afraid that after this summer I will forget Nguyen, just as I forgot my classmates. I'm afraid that when there's nothing special left to evoke memories of an event or a person, sooner or later those things will turn to dust, swept away by the broom of time...

Later in life, I understood that Nguyen's extra fingers were like the raised scars of a wound deeply etched into the history of our nation and an entire generation. These orange fingers, raised to wipe away tears reeking of bombs and bullets, and hastily cleaning away blood mixed with countless chemicals. These fingers made me never forget Nguyen, just as his grandfather never forgot the years of life and death amidst bombs and bullets. These fingers constantly remind us that this intact country was once distorted, that what is whole today was born from the imperfections of yesterday. These are things we will never forget. Forever!

Hai Trieu