“Your daughter was ashamed. She didn’t want to take off her shirt and have all the other girls see.”

“What my daughter say?” After the timid peeps and squeaks and little smiles, her voice roared. Irene Pacheco’s eyes widened. Huong glanced at Irene’s manicured peach nails and saw before her a bully unaccustomed to anyone fighting back.

“Now calm down. Your daughter didn’t implicate you. She said it was a…” Irene Pacheco flipped the pages of her legal pad and checked her notes. She located what she was searching for and ran her finger across the page. “She said it was ‘a medical treatment.’”

“So why you come here? You say my daughter a lying? You say I’m a lying?”

Huong was so angry she no longer cared about consequences. She raised herself from the couch, marched into her bedroom, and retrieved the silk bundle from her dresser drawer. Let them lock me up, she thought and dropped the items in Irene Pacheco’s lap. Irene slowly opened up the silk folds. Her mouth maintained the shape of an O as she examined the little green bottle and the small, shiny, donut-like coin.

Huong scooped up the items as soon as Irene Pacheco set them back down. “This what I use for my daughter when she very sick.” She shook the bottle and waved the coin in the air. She explained how she treated Elle. She told Irene Pacheco that her father had been the private doctor to diplomats, and politicians, the country’s Prime Minister Nguyen Van Thieu! Irene Pacheco raised her brows. Her stiff hairdo lifted along with her expression. Huong grew so bold she put oil on herself and began scraping at her own neck to demonstrate. She swiveled her neck in small circles, sighing once, slightly audible, to illustrate the relief it gave. Irene Pacheco looked puzzled but she continued taking furious notes. Before she left, Irene Pacheco thanked Huong for her time. At the doorway, she even put her hand out as they said their good-byes.

Once she shut the door, Huong felt a rush of triumph. She told herself she’d beat down the devil today. Her hands were still shaking when she closed the windows and yanked the blinds over her beloved herbs. She retreated into her bedroom and used the last of her strength to throw the xu and the menthol oil away. She threw it with such force, the glass bottle shattered into pieces.

Huong locked the bedroom door, slammed the shutters shut, and crawled back into bed. She wrapped herself inside the covers and stayed sweating beneath them. She found solace in the wet heat. The room reeked of menthol. It burned her nostrils and made her eyes water and mixed with the tears streaming down her face.

She reflected back to the first time she was ever insulted. She was so fresh off the boat, she probably still smelled of the sea. Huong had gone to the Woolsworth with her daughters. When they reached the register, the cashier snapped gum in her face. It was intended to be a greeting. The cashier then said, “What’s up?” She was just a girl, a teen, barely older than Elle’s age now. And yet, when Huong didn’t respond, the girl hissed to the other cashier, “They’re so rude. I swear these Orientals don’t know how to smile.” Her daughters looked down at their feet. Their ears reddened.