Butterfly tears

"Mom… Mom…"

The sound of a child calling startled her, and she jumped up, "Mommy's here! Mommy's here!" The night was cold, the mist a silvery, ethereal haze. She groped her way out into the yard. Outside, her small, naked son waved at her. Behind him was a chaotic crowd of children, running and playing boisterously. She held out her arms towards him. He looked at her for a moment, then dashed away with a shrill laugh like glass scraping against glass. She chased after him, running and shouting, "Son! Son, stay with Mommy!" The night was dim. She continued running frantically down the deserted road. He ran so fast. Was he still angry with her? She frantically pedaled, his shadow still flickering before her eyes. She fell into a hole in the road. The hole seemed bottomless, and she hurtled down…

She woke up with a start, realizing it was just a dream. The weather was chilly, yet she was drenched in sweat. The boy and those strange children had been bothering her in her dreams ever since she became pregnant with him. She had hoped for him, but the harsh circumstances forced her to grit her teeth and reject him, to preserve what she called her love for that despicable man. And yet, in the end, she lost her child, and her love was gone. Leaving her with so much bitter resentment…

The dim moonlight outside shone through the window, and the chill of the late autumn night made her shiver. Her mother lay beside her, her voice hoarse: "Go to sleep. You're having too many deliriums." She lay down, trying to curl up and bury her face in her mother's chest: "I was so scared! The boy came back and called me again." Her mother got up, lit an incense stick, mumbled a prayer, then lay down gently: "Thinking too much leads to too many deliriums, too much confusion." Her mother's breath caressed her forehead. She felt peace again. For years, she had maintained the habit of sleeping with her mother like this. Her mother would often gently push her daughter away while playfully scolding: "Move aside. You're a grown woman..." She would then whine: "I won't get married. I'll sleep with you for the rest of my life."

Yet one day she found herself nestled against another man's chest, more muscular and his breathing heavy and rapid. "Will you be my wife...?" But when she announced she was pregnant, her eyes sparkling with joy and hope, he panicked:

- Oh my God! Just give up! Just give up!

Why? I'm already twenty-eight years old this year...

- Because we're still poor! Still poor! Do you understand?! Get rid of the pregnancy, then we can get married. Now, let's focus on building our finances .

He insisted on that. And the very next morning, her man had disappeared while she was still sleeping, clutching her pillow, mistakenly thinking she was embracing her fiancé. She went to the bridge construction site to look for him, but they told her he had gone back to the main project. Bitterly, she dragged her weary body back to her rented room. Then she took leave to search for the father of the baby in her womb.

Her heart was shattered, tormented by a feeling of utter despair as she trudged out of the maternity clinic. The pain cut into her flesh. The agony tossed her to the very depths of suffering, sorrow, humiliation, and hatred. Last week, she found him, weeping, pleading, and kneeling to beg, but the lover who just days before had been half of her heart, her pure love, had now revealed himself as a philandering, unfaithful man. He coldly pushed her away and handed her a wad of money, saying, "It's best you leave him. We're no longer meant to be together. Never look for me again!"

She remembered walking into the maternity clinic unconsciously, and in a moment of intense hatred, she impulsively decided to remove the unfaithful child from her body. Then she found herself lying in a deep, cramped, oxygen-deprived pit. She gasped for air, trying to inhale the precious breath. There were hurried voices and hurried footsteps, then the pounding of a heartbeat... She opened her eyes. The doctor sighed in relief: "You're awake." She stared at her, not understanding what was happening. She was dazed, then suddenly sat up, pushing aside the tangled IV drip, panicked: "Where is it? Where is it?" The doctor reassured her: "Lie down and rest. You can't go home yet. Go home tomorrow when you're feeling better. We need to monitor you first..."

It wasn't until noon the following day that she finally trudged home. Her mother, with a special intuition, grasped her daughter's hand and choked back tears: "How could you... Have you forgotten all my advice... that we, mother and daughter, could support each other...?"

All she could do was bury her face in her mother's arms, sobbing uncontrollably with a feeling of injustice.

With her leave over, she threw herself into work like a madwoman, trying to forget the haunting guilt. Sometimes, in the late afternoon, she would walk past the clinic, hesitating, half wanting to stay, half wanting to hurry away to escape the fear. She would see the timid figures of the young women approaching… She felt heartbroken. Those young women would recover their health. They might start a new love. But what would happen to their blood, those poor fetuses? Just like her own child last month. They would become medical waste! The image of the red bucket containing the remains of her own child and those of others before her kept flashing before her eyes… Oh, she didn't dare think about it.

But at night, I tossed and turned, tormenting myself.

She remembered vividly that night when she dreamt of the baby again. Its laughter was so clear, yet in an instant, it faded into a hazy, ethereal, distant yet close dream, as if echoing from somewhere far away. She frantically ran after it, wanting to hug it, wanting to whisper sweet nothings. She thought that if she didn't quickly confess her sins to her child, it would never forgive her. The baby still stumbled ahead. Running, she tripped over the large, black plastic bags scattered along the path. From those mushy bags, babies spilled out, crawling about… She woke up with a start, frantically reaching to switch on the lights in the house and yard. At that moment, something awakened within her, urging her: Bring those poor fetuses home and give them a home! Save them from their fate as medical waste! Hurry! Only then would her heart find peace.

It seemed simple enough, but putting it into practice was a real challenge. After going through many procedures, she finally got permission from the abortion clinics to collect the unfortunate fetuses. In the early days of collecting them, when she opened the bags to put the babies into jars, she was terrified; the contents piled up to her throat. These poor souls were cruelly rejected by their mothers. But the visual trauma only spurred her on. So, every evening, her old motorbike would take her around to all the clinics. She meticulously recorded everything in her logbook.

On [date], 12 babies (five urns). One baby was five months old (buried separately, named Thien An).

Day... 8 babies (three bottles)...

Her diary grew thicker and thicker. Several more "fathers" and "mothers" joined in, taking turns helping each day. A plastic recycling facility provided her with all the large and small plastic containers she had at her facilities to hold the aborted fetuses... She found it strange. Since starting "that work," she had only dreamed of her son once, and never again. That time, he let her hold him tightly and smiled a lovely smile, not hissing and screeching like before! Waking up, she felt a mixture of joy and sadness, and deep down, she believed her son had forgiven her, even though he had dissolved into the mud somewhere. Perhaps he had transcended into a vibrant flower by the roadside, a small white cloud in the sky, or a moonbeam guiding her home from the maternity wards late each night...

***

The biting wind still blew, bringing the chill of the winter night. She shivered, tightening her scarf around her neck. Her house was nestled deep in the distance at the edge of a tree-lined, sparsely populated city street. The streetlights cast a weak, pale yellow glow. Just as she swerved to avoid a mound of earth, she slammed on the brakes. Startled, she nearly hit a child sitting in the middle of the road. She stopped and walked over. The child looked up at her. Oh my! Was it the same little girl she had found in a garbage dump the week before? That evening, around nine o'clock, on her way home across the Bo Bridge, she had faintly heard crying and moaning: "Mommy, please take me home." She turned her motorbike around. The wind from the stream was bitterly cold. Right next to the garbage dump, a bundle lay there. Suspiciously, she opened it and recoiled in shock. It was the stiffened body of a baby girl, about six months old, with a large, finger-sized black birthmark on her shoulder. She choked back tears, which streamed down her face all the way home.

Sitting beside the child, she affectionately asked, "Were you at the Bo Bridge that night? What do you want me to do for you?" The child burst into sobs, "I long... I long to see the sun... I long to see my parents... I long to breastfeed. I hate my mother..." Tears welled up in her eyes, "My child, let go of your hatred and quickly find peace. Soon your wish will come true..." And in the blink of an eye, she found herself sitting by the roadside, surrounded by silence under the yellowish streetlights. Overwhelmed with sorrow, she continued walking, unable to discern whether the scene she had just witnessed was real or an illusion...

***

Early in the morning, she and two other "mothers" went shopping to prepare for the burial of their children. The freezer was already full. She had buried dozens of babies before, but each time she felt a pang of emotion. Since morning, the three "mothers" had visited several flower shops but hadn't found the flowers they liked. One "mother" impatiently said, "Usually, we use white chrysanthemums because the children's souls are pure." But she shook her head. She wanted to find daisies. They were in season, but why were they so rare? It wasn't until the last flower shop that she finally found them. She chose the most beautiful bouquets to take home. The children would live together in a house specifically for them on her family's tea plantation. All the expenses for digging, building, and tiling the graves were covered by her maternal aunt from Dong Nai . She had invited a monk to perform the rituals at the cemetery. The "parents" had also transported the styrofoam boxes containing the jars of fetuses up the hill. A construction worker prepared the tools. As the sun began to shine, amidst the fragrant smoke of incense, she choked back tears:

Children, the sun is shining brightly. You can enjoy watching the sun to your heart's content!

One by one, everyone opened the jars, poured in a little fresh milk, and placed a daisy inside. Over four hundred tiny creatures were warmed by the first rays of sunlight and the purest air of the earth. Everyone stood still, silently watching. She smiled at the children happily running barefoot on the ground and playing in the bright morning sun. Then, in just a moment, the children returned to nestle under the daisies. When everyone closed the jars, they were all surprised to see the flowers inside glistening with clear, sparkling water droplets...

The next day, upon visiting the grave, the group was stunned by a sight they had never seen before. From the head of the grave, countless white and yellow butterflies, like daisies, fluttered around the tombstones. One butterfly landed on her shoulder. On its pure white wings was a dark gray mark. Its jet-black eyes, like two mustard seeds, seemed to gaze intently into hers. And in those eyes, two tiny drops of water lingered...

Source: https://thanhnien.vn/nuoc-mat-cua-buom-buom-truyen-ngan-du-thi-cua-tran-thi-minh-185241013205024903.htm