Downtown in the Fields of Rice
an excerpt

The touch of cold on Laura's shoulders reminded her that the ghost had followed her to the temple. She looked up, just making out a flickering in the light, as if there were a heat source making the sky shimmer. The ghost seemed uncertain.

Laura murmured some comments directed above her head. "If I buy a balloon, you could hang on to it and then you won't get lost." And it will give me some time to figure out what to do with you, Laura thought.

She thought the balloon vendor looked at her strangely as she picked out a pink balloon in the shape of a Mickey Mouse head and raised it to the level of the ghost. Strangely enough, the balloon moved, like a person stepping on to a boat, as the ghost wrapped itself around it. Through the string, she could feel the balloon quivering.

She finally found her relatives, watching an action movie under the shadows of the Bodhi trees. The balloon quivered even more and then Laura noticed that there were nebulous white forms hovering in the trees and above the heads of the people watching the films.

Laura couldn't understand what the ghosts found so interesting in the films. They were not that interesting, just black and white movies of the Pathet Lao soldiers fighting for the revolution, running past the the big stone jars on the Plain of Jars, or dancing the lamvong with village girls, dressed in ethnic minority clothing, she seemed to feel that the ghosts were all paying attention. Maybe they had died in the war, in these old battlefields.

Her nieces ran up to her. "Aunty Laura, you bought a balloon. Let me hold it." The girls jumped up and down trying to grab at the string. Laura, afraid to lose the balloon, held it out of their reach.

"Be careful or the balloon will fly away." Both girls looked sad. Laura said, "You can each hold it for a half hour. Ae first." She tied a loop around the child's wrist. She looked up at Uncle Phanh. "How's the movie?" He shrugged

Bor, one of Phanh's friends who usually played petanque near their house, said, "He wanted one of those girly films."

Laura smiled and said, "Better luck next year." What she wanted to do was to scold him for the insensitive comment. She felt a vibration from the direction of the balloon; the ghost was agreeing with her.

Lek started to jump. "It's been a half hour. Can I hold the balloon now?" She reached for Ae's wrist but she pulled away. Lek yanked at the string.

Ae yelled, "You broke the string" and lunged at Lek. Startled, Lek let go of the string.
As Ae started to cry, Laura watched the balloon rise. It floated across the front of the movie screen and then hit some branches. For a moment, it looked like it would stay there and someone could get it down but it loosened itself and continued to rise. Laura thought she could still see the cloud of the ghost attached to it.

Then she noticed that the other ghosts were disturbed, moving this way and that in the shadows. They suddenly rose into the air, following the balloon. They reminded Laura of a flock of birds, the whole cloud changing shape as it dispersed and moved closer together, twining around each other.

Her attention returning to her nieces fighting with each other, she said without thinking, "Don't worry, we'll get new balloons." Laura watched the shimmering lights rising in the night and felt a sense of loss.