Ru Read online

  Absolutely no one will know the true story of the pink bracelet once the acrylic has decomposed into dust, once the years have accumulated in the thousands, in hundreds of strata, because after only thirty years I already recognize our old selves only through fragments, through scars, through glimmers of light.

  In thirty years, Sao Mai resurfaced like a phoenix reborn from its ashes, like Vietnam from its iron curtain and my parents from the toilet bowls they had to scrub. Alone as much as together, all those individuals from my past have shaken the grime off their backs in order to spread their wings with plumage of red and gold, before thrusting themselves sharply towards the great blue space, decorating my children’s sky, showing them that one horizon always hides another and it goes on like that to infinity, to the unspeakable beauty of renewal, to intangible rapture. As for me, it is true all the way to the possibility of this book, to the moment when my words glide across the curve of your lips, to the sheets of white paper that put up with my trail, or rather the trail of those who have walked before me, for me. I moved forward in the trace of their footsteps as in a waking dream where the scent of a newly blown poppy is no longer a perfume but a blossoming: where the deep red of a maple leaf in autumn is no longer a colour but a grace; where a country is no longer a place but a lullaby.

  And also, where an outstretched hand is no longer a gesture but a moment of love, lasting until sleep, until waking, until everyday life.

  KIM THÚY has worked as a seamstress, interpreter, lawyer and restaurant owner. Ru is her first book, has been published in 15 countries and received several awards, including the Governor General’s Literary Award. Kim Thúy currently lives in Montreal, where she devotes herself to writing.

  SHEILA FISCHMAN is the award-winning translator of some 150 contemporary novels from Quebec. In 2008 she was awarded the Molson Prize in the Arts. She is a Member of the Order of Canada and a chevalier de l’Ordre national du Québec. She lives in Montreal.

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Contents

  First Page

  About the Author