Kim and Duc had written letters throughout the years. She thought it odd now that she hadn’t asked more questions, harder questions. But truth was she welcomed the love letters. When the transparent sheets arrived from Vietnam, she got to trade in the exhaustion of life as a single mother in a foreign country for the easy past. Duc wrote about how he had once pursued her. He wrote about their mating games and rituals: Friday night movies, Saturday night durian shakes, Sunday morning coffee.

After an hour in the bathroom, Duc returned to the kitchen. He stood stiff, composed, a soldier’s soldier, the officer that he’d once been. Both his upper and lower eyelids were swollen. He held his chin up though his eyes stayed downcast. He tried to shake off her gaze in a spastic jerk the way a dog might try to shake off water or dislodge a flea. He squeezed lemon into his now cold tea and then asked for honey.

She offered to brew him a new cup. But he said, “Do you have any or not?” He drummed the spoon on the lip of the cup.

“It’s really no problem,” she said. The silver spoon clinked against the counter. The lemon wedge dropped in the trash with a thump. The lid clapped shut.

From prison he would write, “You are my heart.” “I’m staying alive for you and the kids alone.” “When we are together again we will…” and they were always glorious dreams.

Kim leaned back against the sink’s edge and watched his long stubborn back leaving the kitchen. She wanted to let him sulk, be a baby, what did she care? But she couldn’t. She stopped him and said, “Here.” She opened the cupboard door. “Help yourself. This is where I keep all the spices and condiments. This is now your home too.” She placed the little plastic bear with the red tipped hat on the counter.

Duc picked up the bottle and rubbed the tips of his fingers together. She could hear its squish. He squeezed the rounded belly and when the bear’s hat plopped off, honey oozed out on the counter. He cursed. Kim reached to wipe it with a sponge. But Duc swiped up the honey with his finger, placed his finger in his mouth, and sucked it. She stood paralyzed, watching. The wet sponge dripped on her toes. He freed his mouth and bared his teeth to her. He said, “You don’t keep house the way you used to.” He looked at her feet. “The floor is wet.” She returned to the dishes. “Your back is wet too. Maybe you shouldn’t fill the sink so high.” Under his breath he said, “You’ve turned Ameri can.”

She asked, “How?” But when she turned around he was already gone. He used to call her his honeybee, give her bouquets and have her suck the stems, every single flower chosen for the sweetness of its nectar.

In the living room, Duc changed the channels incessantly. Images flickered by of human bodies loving or abusing each other. He stared ahead with the television set on mute. All the while his thumb beat on the buttons, click, click, clicking.