Spring Rice

Rated 18+ for language, mild war violence, and racism.

As her smooth, supple face peaked from the behind the ferns of the jungle, he took a moment to notice the small bead of water that had formed at the bottom of her innocent red lips. It was a tear, spawned from one of those dark, almond eyes. To her left lay the boy, most likely her brother. He was dead, his dark eyes open and staring at the cloudless sky in an empty despair.
"What would your family think?"
Her ridiculous Gook words meant nothing to him, yet at the same time he knew what she was saying. His thoughts were on his own child, his Anna Louise. Where was she? At school most likely, learning her alphabet, or perhaps at home playing in the garden. Away from the Vietcong, the Commies, and all the damned Gooks.
He stared at the girl's face once again, his own light eyes boring into her dark animal ones. She was no human, she hardly looked comparable to the humans from back in the States. Anna Louise would not mind him killing a mere animal. He'd gone on many hunting trips back at home. This Gook was more similar to an ape than to a human. Her eyes were dumb and dark, with no usual human intelligence lurking in their depths.
The little girl - her name was Phan Lua Xuan - frantically clutched the limp body of her younger brother, Lanh. She'd found him leaning against the side of their home, blood dripping from the corners of his mouth, and carried him into the refuge of the jungle.
Her mother had always said that the only two things that were certain in life were the Sun and the Rice. No matter what happened, the sun would always shine. And no matter what happened, they would always have rice to eat. Even with the invading Americans, the sun still shined every day, and the rice was still continuously harvested. "That is why you are named Lua Xuan," she had told the little girl. "You are as certain as the Spring Rice. You will always protect little Lanh, and you must promise me of this." Lua Xuan had instantly sworn to be her brother's protector, but the weight of her mother's words did not descend upon her until she came face to face with the dying body of her baby brother.
The American was as cold and dead as the grown ups in the village had always said Americans were. His pale, dull hair peaked from beneath his helmet, and his eyes were as grey as the sky on a lifeless hazy day. They lacked the emotion and depth of the eyes of her mother's, her brother's, and even her own eyes. Where these the eyes of a Killer? She thought of his wife and his children back in America. Did they know that their beloved was a murderer? Or did they even believe this to be murder? She, her family, and all her people were hardly the same kind of humans as these heartless Americans.
The soldier - his name was Private James Glover - shivered in his uniform, even though it was quite warm outside, and he even had sweat dripping down his face. The Gook was staring at him with unnerving directness, as though she were staring directly into his soul. It reminded him of the face of his little Anna Louise. They possessed the same small, pouting lips and the same chubby cheeks. They were perhaps even the same age. But no, they were not the same at all. Anna Louise was not an enemy of the Western World.
The frivolity of his thoughts caught him at an edge. How was this small, innocent child an enemy of the Western World? She would sooner blow her own brains out than cause any damage to any of the people of the West. She was nothing but a small girl, clutching the dead body of her brother with heart-wrenching futility.
Lua Xuan stared James' cold grey eyes, begging them to spare her. She knew he had every intention of killing her from the moment he had stepped foot into the jungle. James struggled to collect his wits, trying to keep his rifle steadily aimed at the forehead of the young girl. She was an enemy. She would put a bullet in his head, were she to get the chance.
In an instant, he pulled the trigger of his rifle, sending a single bullet into the head of the child. As he watched her fall, he could not help but see the face of his own Anna Louise in the wide, startled eyes of the girl. What would Anna Louise say? This child could easily be just another girl in her primary school class. The girl had a family, same as him, and as Anna Louise. What was the girl's favorite color? What was her name?
James felt a hand on his shoulder and he turned around to face the Captain. "What?" James stammered, pulling his eyes away from the corpses.
"Powell an' I've searched the West side o' the Jungle. Nothin' there. How's it been for you?"
Private Glover could not look into the eyes of his Captain; he looked over the man's shoulder instead, into the tangle of jungle trees. "Just found these two. Got 'em, though."
The Captain looked past Glover's shoulder at the dead bodies of the two children, and then up at Glover's face. Sensing his agitation, he said: "Don't worry 'bout it, son. Them Gooks are all the same, you know? There's another thousand brats out there to replace 'em."
Private Glover hoisted his rifle onto his shoulder and nodded. "Fucking Spicks. Don't got no souls."

"What would your family think?"

I know it's the girl saying this, but you really should state this in the text. Just so it is more clear for the readers.

I think this is a very touching piece of work and for some reason seem very guilty. I feel so sorry for them. I couldn't find any mishaps through the text but that first thing I mentioned.

I think this a very good peice of work and commend you on it.

Hello!

I like this. You've captured a very short moment in time, and I think you've done it well. The story is haunting and emotional, without any of the sort of silly over-the-top emotional descriptions that usually hurt this sort of narrative.

I did notice a couple of minor things, though:


1) You go a bit adjective happy, especially in the opening paragraph:

As her smooth, supple face peaked from the behind the ferns of the jungle, he took a moment to notice the small bead of water that had formed at the bottom of her innocent red lips. It was a tear, spawned from one of those dark, almond eyes. To her left lay the boy, most likely her brother. He was dead, his dark eyes open and staring at the cloudless sky in an empty despair.

The thing about adjectives is that they're actually a bit rubbish. Used in moderation that can help strengthen an image - but they can only strengthen it, they need a strong foundation to work off of in the first place. And too many adjectives can hide that strong foundation, making it seem weaker than it actually is.

It's the nouns and the verbs that create strong images - and you've got some good ones here, but they're being overwhelmed by the adjectives, and your descriptions suffer for it.

Cut out a lot of these adjectives, I think. To show what I mean, here is an edited version:

As her smooth face peaked from the behind the ferns of the jungle, he took a moment to notice the small bead of water that had formed at the bottom of her lips. It was a tear, spawned from one of those almond eyes. To her left lay the boy, most likely her brother. He was dead, his eyes open and staring at the cloudless sky.

I've cut out over half your adjectives, but this version paints a much stronger image in my mind, because the adjectives are no longer overwhelming your otherwise strong writing. You don't have to make the exact changes I've done here - it's up to you which adjectives to cut and which to keep - but I hope you can see the difference it makes.

Apply this to all your writing. The rest of this story doesn't seem to suffer as badly from adjective overdose as the opening paragraph, but try to always keep this rule in mind. And remember: you should only use a double adjective in very rare cases.


2) I noticed that on at least one occasion you switched between the points of views of Phan Lua Xuan and James within one paragraph.

Lua Xuan stared James' cold grey eyes, begging them to spare her. She knew he had every intention of killing her from the moment he had stepped foot into the jungle. James struggled to collect his wits, trying to keep his rifle steadily aimed at the forehead of the young girl. She was an enemy. She would put a bullet in his head, were she to get the chance.

Underlined is Phan's POV, and bolded is Jame's POV.

Don't mix POVs in a single paragraph. It'll confuse the reader. Every time you switch the omniscient narrator's point of view, start a new paragraph. The underlined part and the bolded part should be their own paragraphs.

I'm not too sure if you did this in any other parts of the story, and I don't have time right now to check, I'm afraid. Be sure to double check yourself.

Always remember: new POV = new paragraph.


3) And two very minor nit-picks:

shivered in his uniform, even though it was quite warm outside

Get rid of 'quite'. All it does it weaken the description. Just 'warm' will do. 'Warm' isn't an overpowering word anyway - you've no need for 'quite'.

as though she were staring directly into his soul

The whole 'staring into his soul' thing is rather cliché. It really jumped out at me as I read this story through, and is the only thing here that made me cringe. Consider replacing it with something else.


But, yeah, apart from those three issues - and none of them are major issues - this is a really good, really strong story. I loved it.

Good work!


-- Sureal


P.S. Don’t worry about making it more obvious that it’s Phan talking in the beginning there. It’s plenty clear as it is now, in my opinion.

First off, I want to commend you on how good this is. This is a really fantastic piece of work, and in my opinion, your best yet. Good job! :}

But there are some things I need to point out.

Like Sureal said, you often put the POVs too close. In fact, many times I was confused by your transitions. While I can understand why you have both POVs, I honestly recommend sticking to one. In my opinion, I would stick to the POV about James. He could imagine what she's thinking, but everything about her childhood and her name and what-not is very irrelevant to the story. While it painted a bigger picture in my mind, I was also left thinking, Why is this information here?

Next: I know the name of the girl is the also the name of the story, so that is it's importance, but other than that, I find absolutely no reason to know the name of the girl or the boy. The way you put the names seemed almost random and striking to me. It made me want to reread the entire sentence to see if I had been right. Uncovering names should be uncovered like most anything else. When you uncover something, you do it slowly. Every piece of information should be slowly uncovered. However, this is only my opinon, and leaving the names the way you like is totally fine.

Just one more thing left.

Private Glover hoisted his rifle onto his shoulder and nodded. "Fucking Spicks. Don't got no souls."

This sentence only confused me. What is a Spick? Why are we so randomly mentioning this sentence? It doesn't seem like a very good ending, to me.

Thank you very much for letting me read this. I loved it! :}


Love & Blessings,
Aushy

Thank you everyone


The term "spick" means basically the same thing as Gook, just to clear that up.

I needed to give her a name because over the course of the entire story I was trying to show that the Vietnamese children really were just like American children - they had names and life stories. The whole point is to show that they possibly are even more human than the Americans. That's the only reason for the backstory. Why was the soldiers story not also unnecessary? That shows prejudice in itself, haha. It was to put a parallel between the soldier and the girl, cause they really aren't very different. The murdered girl cannot be a mere face.