When Francis came home one evening when it was close to midnight, tired and hung over, he didn't expect the kitchen lights to still be on and his beloved Viet sitting on the ground looking as if she was trying to hunt down dust. Yawning, he noticed that there was a cold dinner, wrapped up and left on the table, uneaten. He bend down and laid a hand on her shoulder.
"Mon cher, why are you up so late and how come you haven't eaten dinner yet?"
She looked up at him, grinning naively. "Because you weren't home yet. It's not proper for me to eat before you so I waited." Getting up, she got up and set the can of ant spray on the kitchen counter and began washing the small ants that were stuck to her hands off in the sink. "Also, there were just so many insects all over, I started to get rid of them and I lost track of time."
Francis sighed, looking at the counter and the floor of their once clean kitchen. It was like a battle field littered with bodies.
"Remember, my love, you are no longer in your home country. It will bring no shame or dishonor to the family if you ate supper before the head of the family comes home."
Her little grin disappeared and she nodded. "I know, I'm just so used to it. It was what I was taught growing up." Viet said, turning off the water and drying off her hands.
"If you're tired, just go to bed first and I'll go up after I've eaten a little something. I can clean up this mess tomorrow morning."
Francis couldn't have agreed more and went straight to bed. While Viet bit into a small piece of eggplant, she looked back at the kitchen floor.
'It's just like the war. The same was we beat the Americans into retreating. They're not going to admit defeat and just keep coming back.' she thought, remembering the time she watched soldiers of both sides run through her home town, armed with guns and shouting for everyone to go inside and get down.
-
Francis woke up from feeling the bed shift the next morning. When he finally was awake enough to get out of bed, he got ready for work and went down.
Viet was looking high and low like a humming bird flying around, from flower to flower. Francis, absent-mindedly adjusting his tie, didn't notice until after a while that there was no longer a single black speck on the battle field that was their kitchen.
"Those ants… They're exactly like those American soldiers. I killed hundreds of them yesterday and the dead was all carried back to wherever they came from. I can't even find a single little body left." she commented with a hint of amazement in her voice.
As he walked in, Francis scanned the kitchen over with his eyes once more and saw a little black ant that was carrying another dead one on the edge of the sink.
"Oui, and like those Americans, they won't stop coming back until they're all gone." he added, bending over near the sink, taking a big breath and blowing the ant into the sink. He lifted up the lever on the sink's faucet and washed it down the drain.