Writing a story in English is an interest way to learn English?

[Quang51]

WRITING A STORY IN ENGLISH IS AN INTEREST WAY TO LEARN ENGLISH ?
I think and I do it. But I can not express myself exactly in English. I send you two chapters. Help me to correct it. Thank you. Vinh Quyen, Vietnam

SAND AT THE BOTTOM OF THE WAVES
Novel by Vinh Quyen

One

During March and the begin of April is the most beautiful time of the year in Danang, a sea city in central Vietnam. But it was an abnormal in 1975.

As from 29 March North Vietnam regular army and South Vietnam liberation forces had occupied Danang. They were surrounding Saigon. So, there was nobody in Da Nang, the victor or the loser or innocent civilians, who had the peace of mind to notice the beauty of blue sky, white clouds and yellow sunshine of the end of the spring.

An American Jeep with a white star on the top of its dome was running slowly on the main streets of the city. There were three men on it. One of them was a young North Vietnamese soldier with uniform. By an iron loudspeaker he was announcing the commands of the City military management committee. “Today, at 9 a.m, all teachers who had worked for the Saigon regime must come forward at the City hall."

Kha and Cuong, two young teachers, renting private apartments in the same house, heard the commands while sitting together in the guest-room for breakfast.
"Will you go there?" the mistress came into and asked them with an uneasy voice.

Two teachers looked at each other then nodded their heads at the same time in silence. They were worrying about their future. One week before, all military officers and high-ranking civil servants of Saigon regime were sent to the penitentiary camps.

Then, Kha and Cuong were slack in going into their bedrooms to change formal dress. Kha tried to imagine himself in the first meeting with "the revolutionary intellectuals". But he couldn't think of what was easy. The city was under new management in just two weeks. Suddenly Kha saw himself in wardrobe mirror with a dark blue tie. An everyday habit gave him a start. He took it off hastily and threw it into the corner of the wardrobe. After "liberation day" nobody went out with a tie.

"Farewell !" he thought sadly.

At that time Kha could not believe that he would find it ten years later.

Meanwhile, Cuong was being under stress. There was an expression of great worry on his face. He was losing sleep most every night since 29 March. He was a military officer on secondment to the education. “It was a guilt,” he thought.

"Most young men in the South had been conscripted into the Saigon army. Teachers were not exception. After military training courses they were on secondment to the education. What do you think about them?" pretending not to be involved he asked a North soldier in the main street yesterday.

"Military officers on secondment to the education? To oppose revolution by American reactionary education policy? Oh, they are very very dangegous !" the soldier raised his voice. Maybe that man has heard the word “secondment” first time in his life. But at that time, most North soldiers tried their best to prove their worth. They could answer any questions, for instance.

Kha knocked at the door when Cuong was falling in his recall.

"Don't be late today !" Kha said.

***

The teachers living in Danang crowded early into the City hall. Whispers and comments. They guessed that after the meeting, some of them will be "teacher of people" and the rest will be rejected. Personal and family political biography play the decisive role in the choice. What happen to you if you can not become a member of new regime? It was a vital question at that time. Especially to the elders who had participated in political parties and had served in old regime for long time. It was easier for the younger generation like Kha and Cuong. Everybody stopped talking suddenly.

"They are coming !" someone whispered.

Kha looked curiously at educational managers who were going into City hall. They came from the North or from the war zone in the South. Some of them appeared in soldier uniform and wore pistols. They sat at a long table facing the teachers. The table was covered by a white cloth and topped with a vase of plastic flowers.

Kha and Cuong looked at each other furtively. They were astonished at Vietnamese usage of the North. There were many new words in their speechs. Some words were changed in meaning. When they said "bồi dưỡng" the South teachers understanded "to have adequate food and a good rest in order to improve one's health". But in reality they meant "to cultivate political standpoint".

The "local revolutionaries" made Kha feel uncomfortable. Some of them went over to the new regime on 30 March, just a day after Danang was occupied. They wore hurriedly the hat and rubber sandals of the North soldier. Nobody believed they would doff their "revolutionary fashion" a few years later, like Kha would find the tie.

Suddenly Kha started at the glint of the chairman. It was directed toward him with concentration. In order to dodge it, Kha shammed to look at the speaker who was addressing his speech. Some time later, Kha glanced at the chairman. He still looked fixedly at him. And he seemed unconscious what happened around him. There was a cold shiver ran down Kha’s spine.

“Why it is me and not someone here?” he wondered himself. “There are hundreds of the Democratic Party members and the Saigon military secondments in the City hall. Why does he only look at me with suspicion?”

The chairman inclined his head toward the secretary to ask something. And he pointed his forefinger at Kha. Showing respect, the secretary noded his head, went to the row of table where Kha was sitting.

“Stay here after the meeting to answer some questions of Mr. Chairman,” he said glacially then turning to his work.

The chairman still looked at Kha.

“Did he mistake me for a certain bloody reactionary?” Kha wondered. No answers.

“Kha will be detained by the chairman!” teachers in the City hall announced to each other with low voices.

“What’s the matter with you?” My Thuong, a former university classmate of Kha, asked him concernedly.

“I don’t know,” Kha replied.

Then he heard nothing from the speaker. He was busy waiting for his G-hour. A sudden thirst rose in his throat. But he didn’t dare to go to the pot of water that was putted at the lobby.

The meeting ended with deafening applause. Kha nearly jumped out of his skin and applaused mechanically. He didn’t know what to do next. In succession, teachers came out of City hall. They felt compassion for Kha because of his embarrassing situation. North educational officers also left the hall, with the chairman excepted.

“I wait you outside,” Cuong said and claped discreetly on Kha’s shoulder.

Kha nodded his head in silence.

My Thuong came and sat beside Kha for sharing his troubles. Kha glanced at her with a grateful glint. Last week he just got to know that her father was killed as a member of Communist Party in 1960 in Quang Nam province. With status of a revolutionary martyr’ daughter, she felt no fear at the new power. Because it was the power of her father. And she was preparing to hold office as headmistress.

City hall was nearly empty. The chairman still sat motionless at his position. Tens of electric fans on the ceiling still whirred. In the calm midday, the sound of iron friction seemed to drill to the ears. Suddenly, the chairman came in front of My Thuong.

“Excuse me, this is a personal matter,” he said gently.

It was an order too. Having no other option, My Thuong resigned herself to leave Kha alone. Waiting for her to go out, the chairman sat at a table facing Kha.

“My name is Tan”, he said with a warm voice that Kha felt unexpected. “I would like to know something about you.”

Kha didn’t know how to begin. The chairman repeated his requirement and waited in patience. After a delay, the statement of the teacher finally started. Then his expression gradually improved. Suddenly he stopped saying when he found out that the chairman no longer listened to him. With the chin in the hand, his eyes was absorbed by a branch of flamboyant with some young and tender leaves in the end of spring swaying lightly in the wind outside the window...

Fifteen minutes later, in a coffee house, Kha narrated to My Thuong and Cuong what just happened to him.
“I turn out to be the living image of his son who has stayed in Quang Nam since 1965. It was also the year he escaped from prison and went to the North. Seeing me today, he got his hope, but…” Kha ended his story with a sad voice.

“War is war. I feel sorry for him,” Cuong said.
My Thuong took out handkerchief to wipe her tears.

Two

Before that two weeks, about 80 kilometers distance from Danang, at the foot of Hon Tau mountain, Mau, Phan, Long and Binh sat round the fire lighting in the middle of a military hospital, in the late night. They were former classmates of Kha in Hue University and joined the revolution army since 1972. Mau poured the tea into four cups and divided them among friends.

“In the long run, we can return home now!” he said then tasted the heat of tea with the tip of his tongue.

“We four are still living but six our friends dead in the jungles,” Phan sighed.

“It is over, isn’t it?” Binh looked at the fire. The flickering fire made his burned face, by napalm bomb, more ugly.

“Right. The directions of attack are approaching Danang,” Long replied and complained. “Meanwhile we must be here to protect the empty hospital. Damn it!”

“You will meet Duyen in Hoian if you can follow the troops,” Mau said and claped on Binh’s shoulder.

“Tell her that I died in battle!” Binh said and spited at the fire.

“It’s nonsense!” Phan scolded.

“I don't have anything additional to say. But you know, none of girls love a burned face like mine. That’s all women!”, Binh said then stood up and went into the dark of night.

Mau attempted to run after him.

“Let him alone now!”, Phan told Mau.

Two cups of tea fallen on the ground. Three remaining men turned to their hammocks.Lying in the silence, Long fallen into the meditation.

“Why are we sorrowful when the victory is coming? Binh is much to be pitied. That’s all women! It appears he is right”, Long wondered and unexpectedly missed Dung...

***

It was a night in rainy season of the year 1974. In flashing light of a series of napalm blasts, Long ran fast to look for a shelter. Behind him was a sea of fire that enveloped the wet jungles. Afterwards, every time to hear “flaming inferno” he has seen again and again the fire of that night, fire of hell.

Suddenly, he tripped over a girl who fainted with shock and lay just out the door of an underground hide-out. He pulled her into it. After that he didn’t know since when the storm of bombs was over.

“How long was the dead silence?” he wondered and he started to hear voices echoed from immediately above his head.

“American raiders!”, he whispered and tried to hold his breath.

In the dark of a tight shelter, he felt the girl recovering consciousness. She moaned softly and tried to move out of his arms. He signed to her to recognize about their dangerous situation. She listened to the sounds on the ground and shrivelled up. Then, the voices from the American raiders moved away. A flare beam passed through a slit of the hide-out door. He saw the beauty of her face. Her sweet-smelling breath mixing bomb smoke spreaded to his nose. The light putting out. All things were sunk again into the darkness.

“ Don’t worry,” he set her mind at ease. “My name is Long, Battalion 707.”

“Call me Dung, Central Ensemble,” she replied with Hanoi accent.

“Singer?” he asked.

“Yes,” she anwsered and tried again to move out of his arms but she could not detach herself from him because the shelter was too narrow. Then the exhaustion didn’t allow her to think of standing on ceremony and sent her to sleep.

Later, in the sleep she felt the arms of the man left her alone. With a start she woke up and saw Long creeping to the door of their hide-out. She drabed his belt in unconsciousness.

“Don’t worry. I don’t let you here,” Long turned his head and said. “The Americans went away. I try to find the way to Thanh River. My Battalion is garrisoned on the other bank of it. We must cross the river as soon as possible.”

“To cross river?” her voice was frightened. “I can not swim!”

“Oh, hell !” Long made a slip of the tongue.

“Don’t worry about me. You must go now. The Americans maybe return again soon,” she entreated.

“I just abuse on… the river!” Long said. “It is not the time to argue. I will find out the best way for you to cross it. We should have a rest now.”

For a while they lay side by side in silence, breathing the cool night air with a dilute smell of bomb smoke.

“I would like to hear something about you,” and then Dung said.

“Nothing at all,” Long gave a curt answer.

“I should have to know who I am living with in this awful hide-out at the last moment of my life. It’s the least I can do before I die,” Dung said.

“Don’t say about the death, please!” Long was bad-tempered.

“I beg you! Tell me anything you think. Because I fear the silence,” Dung asked insistently.

“Who am I? Nothing worth to say. Honestly, growing up in the students’ movement in Hue city, participating in helping street children program, then enlisting as a special task force member of Danang city, and then jumping up the Truong Son mountain, and then lying with you now. End of film !”

She brusted out laughing.

“Hush !” he stopped her with his hand. “Maybe the Americans are still nearby !”

“I don’t care,” she pulled back his hand. “Tell me about your lover, please. Hey, she is very beautiful, isn’t she?”
“Having not a lover, I had to go to the battlefield in jungles.”

“There are also women in jungles!”

“Maybe I have no my own girl until the end of war,” his words like a soliloquy.

Suddenly a storm of rockets poured upon the ground. Their shelter bounced up several times.

“Our rockets!” Long judged.

Dung embraced him with sweat and dust. The storm of rockets was over. Silence. Some time later, Long took down her hands gently and crept to the hide-out door.

“It was covered by stones!” he cried.

Excepting a sigh, Dung said no word.

“Have a sleep now. I will open it,” Long sat graspings the knees and tried to calm her nerves.

“Lie down with me. It’s not too narrow. You should save your strength. Everything will be all right,” she said with sweet voice.

He complied with her request. They seemed to caress each other in their arms. In fact, they two didn’t believe they could escape from here. There was not concept of time in the dark of the shelter. How much longer do they live? They tried to parry a deathly question. And they could hear the abnormal rhythm of two hearts. Hopeless and lust life. Changing position, she groped for his hand and pressed it against her throbbing breasts.

“It’s your girl… Love me now…” she whispered interruptedly.

Three nights later, a North army unit discovered accidentally the hide-out and recovered them from their coma.

After a week of treatment, the doctor allowed Long to turn his Battalion. And he was very happy to know that Dung was undergoing medical treatment at the hopital of special zone. Defying his health still weak, he walked through the jungles under the light of crescent moon and in lasting rain. Nothing could hinder his thirst for meeting “his girl”.

The next morning, a young nurse of the hospital helped him to find her. He came and stood beside her bed with a branch of wild orchids in his hand. She was sleeping.

“Dung,” he said gently.

At this point she opened her eyes and looked puzzled.

“You call me?” she asked him.

“Yes, it’s me, Long…” he confirmed.

“Sorry, maybe other Dung?” she seemed unrecognizable to him.

“He get the wrong person,” she told the nurse then closed her eyes.

“Oh, I don’t know what happened,” he cried.

“I am sorry,” the nurse said in confused.

He putted the flowers on the table and went out rapidly. The nurse surprised Dung following the man with her eyes in tears. She ran after Long and wanted to tell him what she catched. But she stopped her intention. She saw him meeting a tall man quite by accident at the gate of hospital. And their conversation reached her ears.

“Van ! Who do you visit here?” Long asked.

Van, the tall man, Long’s old chief, who was entrusted to receive the student group for recruitment several years ago on the bank of the Thu Bon River.

“My wife. We have just married last month. Sorry, because I have no information about your group for long time so I could not send wedding invitation to you,” Van said joyfully. “And you?”

“My friend, but she just came out,” Long lied. “I send my best wishes for a speedy recovery to your wife. I have to go now.”

“Thank you. See you again!” Van walked imposingly to the ward for women patients.

“What’s your wife name?” Long call after Van.

“Dung!” Van said in a loud voice then continued his walking.

The nurse nearly jumpped out of her skin. A strong feeling rose inside her heart. She has just discovered a secret of a love triangle.

***

“Move to Danang ! Move to Danang !” Thang, a war reporter, came like a whirlwind and announced ebulliently the orders from commanders.

Long was pulled off from his said recollections. The personal matter became humble before the national event. Mau ran to the middle of the yard and fired into the air with his K-54.

“What are you doing?” an officer shouted at him.

“War is over. I substitute gun for firecracker to cellebrate our victory !” Mau cried and shot to the last bullet of his cartridge-clip.

The officer continued his storm of anger. But it became insignificant when everybody came out the yard and took photos for souvernir. That was really a date worth remembering to all of them. Mau left the officer alone and rushed forward a crowd of girls who were exciting to push each other with laughing loudly. Thang took photos for everybody, then handed his camera to Mau.

“Take me now,” he said Mau and turned to play a joke on girls, “Who want to couple with me?”

He was surrounded in the girls immediately.

“Keep order, please!” Mau cried and prepared to shoot, “One…Two…” and he happened to remember the officer who was standing solitary in the yard, “Come here with us !”

That man forced a laugh and also took part in the crowd.
Mau shot camera. Nobody heard a “click”.

“A rustic man! You don’t know how to take a photograph !” Thang got back his camera then later cried, “Oh, well! It’s out of film!”