#32. Vietnamese ghost dog - 03

I have just collected a long story about dog ghosts in the Vietnamese countryside, a work that after reading it brings so many emotions... I am very pleased to introduce it to you...

Chapter 1: Coconut shadow under the moon

This story has been around for a long time, because I was not born yet, I only heard it from my grandparents. It was about my dad, who was 19 or 20 and obviously in the military. When I went home to visit relatives, I had to catch the bus. When the bus stopped to let everyone go to the bathroom to rest, my father suddenly saw a little yellow dog running out of nowhere from the grass on the side of the road. It wouldn't be surprising if it didn't track my dad. Dad didn't pay attention at first, and then when I got back in the car to go to the bathroom, I saw him trailing behind, wagging his tail. Looking around to see someone's dog, there are only fields and weeds in that place, and the roof is far away. Dad didn't know what to do. He stood and looked at the dog, and he sat beside him, looking up at his own tail, which kept swinging, but the car was about to roll over. Without even thinking about it, my father took it into the car. Bringing it home, he followed his father all day. After staying at home for a few days, Dad returned to the unit and left it at home. A few days later, something strange happened.

I remember it being like a full moon. The moon was very bright that night, because summer nights were also very hot, so at that time, my grandmother often laid out mats to enjoy the shade in summer, and didn't go back to sleep until eleven or twelve o'clock. She said that it was the same that night. Looking at the bright moonlight, she could lie down and fall asleep after shaking the bamboo fan a few times. I was dozing off when I heard the golden baby (named it by my father). Startled, she opened her eyes, grabbed the golden one standing on the sidewalk, and raised its snout toward the garden, barking. It barked high-pitched and scratched at the brick floor with its front paws. Grandma looked in the direction it called, and saw that the tops of the coconut trees on the edge of the garden intersected with the neighbor's garden. At that time, the neighbors planted a lot of coconuts, and each tree was higher than the roof of the tile-roofed house, covering a corner of the sky. The fruit grows too high, and the two grandparents next door can’t pick it off. 

Sometimes the deaf-mute grandson comes up to play, so I ask him to climb up to pick it, and then give me one or two fruits. It's like coconut water, look closely, it's a little red. Grandma keeps whispering that T's family wants sweet coconuts, which are so delicious. Back to the situation at the time. Hearing the strange barking of the dog, she narrowed her eyes in that direction. The pale yellow moonlight was reflected under the sky, and what was particularly conspicuous was the pitch-black giant coconut-leaf boat at that time, which was still because of the still wind. Above the tall tree trunk and under the coconut tree is an indescribable place that my grandmother said. It's not a black or white shadow as you know it. But thanks to it, the ambiguity is visible. It looks like a pale mirage, clinging to the trunk of a coconut tree. Grandmother stood for a few minutes, blinking and staring at "it". Immediately afterwards, Jin Tong's cry became louder, making her seem to be resurrected from the dead, calling for her brother. When she looked back, of course, it was gone. She went to shake him and told him the whole story, and he shook off her drowsiness and asked her to close her eyes and watch the chicken turn around. My grandmother also quietly went back to bed, because maybe he was right. Only the golden one continued to stand beside Chu Xia, occasionally barking with a few neat steps...