I.

He returns from swords and steel, hand holding a bride anew.

His old wife cries, still, singing a lullaby.

“A bastard,” he accuses

—to save face, he keeps the babe,

His wife, though, he throws away

in the dirt behind the mansion wall—of vermin, shackles, and crimson clay.

II.

Six decades of breathing, now silenced in a coffin.

Six undertakers to carry the weight of a man’s sin.

And the son—the one he said “not mine”—stands at the head,

the only mourner left.

Is the savior really my father?

The soil doesn’t care for the young man’s doubts,

only for the old body drowned in stouts.

III.

Sixteen years of fists and smears

left scars unclear,

only a cold map of broken mind,

of ice, of love never appears.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

thrice a nail—

eighteen—

redeem a father’s sin.

Each blow rang through wood and bones,

Now free from the reach of iron knouts.

Behind a wall in the mansion’s stone,

His mother’s screams crack all gouts.

IV.

Six feet under, a father fades from matter.

Key loose in hand, son borrows a sledge hammer.

Whack.

a final whacking, rattling the entire coffin.

deep under,

The last bent nail—crooked by hatred and unloving hand—

No more, nothing stands.

Iron knows a marrow’s taste.

A curse is never a waste.

“May earth hold what heart could not.

May spirit stay tethered to the rot.

Six feet under, your spirit stay forever,

Stay in the dark, forever lost.”

Note:

This is the unedited story where the poem comes from.

Part 1: The bent nail, Weight of Sixes.

He has been gone for 6 years at war, back with a new bride, greeted by a new lullaby. He thought it wasn’t his. To save face, he kept the baby, but his first wife, he threw away.

Now he’s dead at sixty, the baby that wasn’t his stood the only child for his funeral. Six undertakers lift his coffin. The oldest, only son, carrying his picture, is the old man, really his father.

Doesn’t matter when he laid six feet under. In those sixteen years they had been together, beating, smearing, humiliating—all just daily matters. But the son didn’t remember much of it now but a feeling.

Not being appreciated. Not being loved.

Six nails on the coffin. Tap-tap-tap, thrice a nail, eighteen completed a father’s sin. The son cried, being free from the grab of an evil man. Behind a wall in the mansion, a cell still stands.

With the broken lock and a self-made key, he borrows the hammer and seals the coffin with a final whacking, rattling the entire coffin.

May your spirit never free, six feet under, your ghost stay forever.

This is a part of generational trauma from men returning from war and treating their women wrong. I think we heard the story here and there. This is one of them, I try making it into dark fantasy with a touch of dark spell in part 2.

Part 2: Why does there have to be a spell to curse this man, this so-called savior? How does one break the spell (generation trauma)?

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“He who loves money will not be satisfied with money, nor he who loves wealth with his income; this also is vanity.” — Ecclesiastes 5:10

Nam pulled over and lit a cigarette. The first puff reminded him of the win, the second, another win on another day; the third was a loss, until all of his tuition fee was gone as the last smoke dispersed under the darkening sky. He turned on the engine again, then turned it off. Sliding his phone out, he was about to call his dad. Then he remembered how hard working he was—bent back under the sun, half calf buried in the mud, sweat soaked his clothes, and leeches didn’t spare a single drop of blood.

Nam mumbled the sermon’s last section.

“Step away from the table. Take your two hands and build something slow and real. A meal. A letter. A repaired fence. A held hand. That is the only jackpot that does not disappear by morning. Amen.”

He turned on the engine again, already making up his mind. This bike would remind him of what was lost. He would sell it to the man across the canal, whose promised to keep it until he could buy it back.

The iron lattice of the third bridge groaned under Nam’s boots, sending vibration up his shins, his hips, his neck. He checked his watch nervously—11:45 PM. He had walked five miles back and just on time for the last ferry back to the city. There, he could book a ride back to his apartment. His pulse thrummed underneath his fingertips, sucking the cold of the railing up his bloodstream.

At the end of the narrow wooden slip that smelled of shit and wet cedar was a ferry awaiting like an iron beetle. Weeds choked the path, much more intimidating with the absence of the sun. The ferryman—skin like cured leather and a smirk that suggested he knew your secrets—leaned against the tiller. He spun a yarn for a pair of wide-eyed tourists, his voice a theatrical rasp.

“The girl with the blue ribbons,” he’d said, spitting into the silver water. “Fell in forty years ago. She isn’t looking for a way out—she’s just looking for a ride to the other side. But she only boards when the boat is light.”

“What the fuck?” Nam said. He was the only one on the ferry and this old man just decided to scare him with his superstitious nonsense? The mist rolled in, thick and smelling of silt and cold iron. It clung to the back of his throat, making every breath heavy.

The ferryman smiled widely with a few teeth gone; his eyes darted to the empty space right behind Nam’s shoulder. Then his face was lost under the shadow of his cap.

Splosh. Splosh, Splish.

Then the engine hummed—a low, grinding thrum that rattled his teeth, pulling him off the weird last sound of water. They pushed off, the boat cutting a silent V into the black glass of the canal.

Midway amidst nowhere of the blackwater, the boat lurched—a violent, downward tug that nearly threw Nam off his heels. The water was dead; there were no waves here. He scrambled to the stern, expecting a log, or a clump of urban trash had hit the ferry. Instead, he saw a hand.

The skin was the translucent white of a fish’s belly, slick and blue-veined. It gripped the gunwale, the wood creaking under a weight it shouldn’t have felt. Then a second hand. A head emerged, long dark hair draping over her face like wet silk. It smelled of stagnant mud and something metallic—old blood or old pipes.

She just hung there, her weight dragging the stern down until the black water lapped over the edge, soaking his shoes. Nam saw it then, a shimmering flash of a blue ribbon tied around a sodden braid.

“The ferryman...” Nam croaked, his throat so dry it felt like swallowing glass. “He said you wanted a ride.”

She didn’t move, but the water around her began to glow with a faint, sickly green light.

Nam scrambled back, his heels skidding on the wet deck. “You can’t touch dry wood! Begone, drowned ghost!” Nam yelled. He’d heard this story before, mouth-travel between moms and aunties to keep the kids from black water. In their story, there’s always a way out. He spun toward the front to yell, but the bench was empty. The tiller moved on its own, steered by an invisible hand toward the dark, hungry underbelly of a bridge.

When he looked back, the girl was on the deck. Puddles of black water spread from her feet, carrying forgotten silt from the canal floor. She reached out a dripping hand. The air grew silent, the engine’s thrum replaced by the sound of his own frantic breathing. His mom was wrong. The ghost didn’t play by their rules, just like how he’d played the game on someone’s rule. The swim to the other side of the bay was a long, long way.

Check out my other work

Mark of a Herald, A dark fantasy novel

The Long Siege, psychological thriller novella

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Backlog:

Andy—dressed in black t-shirt, jeans, red hat, and a huge backpack—waves at the camera with his perfect teeth, yellow stubble, and eyes bluer than the ocean.

Andy: [Hello guys! Just arrived in Vietnam two minutes ago. We are on a mission to find a man who never sleeps.]

Andy: [Honestly, I’ve read about this man from another local Vietnamese myth hunter. He’s local, and great news! He will be our tour guide to find this man. Cool, yah? Win for me, win for him, win for all of you my faithful audience.]

FF »

Taxi, bus, another taxi. The scenery faded behind the vehicles’ glasses, from concrete jungle to moving boxes, and finally, an infinity of greenery and sky blue horizontally cutting each other.

Trung, the local myth hunter, greeted Andy and the camera man with handshakes, a wide practiced smile, and a lot of nods. The man was slim, with strong jaws and eyes hidden behind yellow sunglasses.

Andy: [So do we know where the man resides?]

Trung: [We can’t reach there by public transport, nor cars. He lives near the border. There’s a local motel near the market we can use to store your gears.]

Andy remained calm, but his eyes darted to the camera man. [Right, let’s go.]

FF »

The market emerged when the sun was behind the treeline. Dirt road red, concrete unit yellow, and the rest were houses made from wood with thatched roof, temporary fence with dented B52-wires. Andy booked a room, shoving everything unnecessary in before following Trung to the local dining. It was like a food vendor in the city, but outdoor. Prior to order, the mosquitoes had already circled around Andy’s ears. Buzz. Buzz.

Trung: [You didn’t bring lotion for this? Here, take mine.]

Andy: [I thought you guys are immune to this.]

They all laughed, then started devouring a bowl of vermicelli. Then another bowl, then another.

Trung started to ask the shop owner—a middle aged lady dressed in the local pajamas of red and black polka dots—about the man who never sleeps. She advised them not to go now, for the fields weren’t safe—mines and snakes, leeches and bugs, and ghosts. She shook her head. [Even the locals wouldn’t go, come back tomorrow.] Translated by Trung, of course.

Andy nodded, giving her an appreciative smile.

FF »

The sun had just cast its first warmth on the green grass when Andy quit complaining on the orange ants. Deep in his eyes, wasn’t regret, but pure annoyance. By the time they opened the door, Trung was there, leaning on the wooden pillar, smoking. [Want some?]

Andy: [Fuck it. I understand why people smoke here.]

They followed the local map and arrived at a house on renovation. A huge man was filtering sand, and didn’t look like a construction worker, but the owner. He was shirtless, and his tattoos were quite scary. It wasn’t the usual black ink, but blue, yellow and red. They covered both his arms and back. On his chest, when he turned around to greet the group, was a tiger’s head. No it was something else, a local mythical beast. He and Trung exchanged some greetings.

Trung: [He’s the son of the man who never sleeps. His father… er… resides in their ancestral house, about two miles away. We can only walk there.]

Andy: [Two miles? Yeah, we can do it. It’s good to show the countryside fauna to the world.]

FF »

They found the old man in a house near a brooke. He was old, white hair, sun-kissed skin, and he was puffing a cigarette eagerly. When he smiled at greeting them, half of his teeth were already gone, another half was rotten. His eyes were beady, and his cheekbones were high, very high and round. Trung, as usual, talked to him for a bit.

Trung: [He has a bullet’s fragment in his skull, that’s why he can’t sleep.]

Andy: [Bullets? That’s at least 40 years ago.]

Trung: [37, he’s fighting Pol Pot.]

Andy: [Could you offer him money for us to set cameras around his house… to prove that he doesn’t sleep.]

Trung: [Already did, he invites us to stay. There’s erh… homemade rice wine.]

Andy: [Great.]

They started talking, small talk, weather talk, history talk, whatever talk to break the ice. The old man was called ‘Skinny Fourth’, for he was the fourth son, and he was skinny. He lived alone, but his house had new furniture, probably moved here since his son was renovating a new house. The old man smoked a lot, even when he’s making lunch. Chicken, farm raised, and they also ate the blood. Trung said they ate blood raw in some places.

They drank homemade rice wine fast. They got drunk faster.

Cam 1—Wide Angle: Mounted in the corner of the main room, capturing the bamboo bed and the front door.

Cam 2—Handheld: Carried by the cameraman during the day; left on a table facing the kitchen at night.

Cam 3—Night Vision/Outdoor: Fixed to a tree outside, overlooking the path to the forbidden field.

The Log

1st night

01:44 AM [Cam 1]: Andy and the cameraman are visible in the foreground, fast asleep. In the background, Skinny Fourth is sitting perfectly upright on the bamboo bed. The night vision makes his eyes glow yellow, like a nocturnal beast.

02:00 AM [Cam 3]: Skinny Fourth exits the house. He looks straight ahead, walking with a stiff, unnatural gait—as if his limbs are being pulled by invisible wires.

03:21 AM [Cam 3]: He returns. As he passes the camera, he stops and leans into the lens until his eye fills the entire frame. He doesn’t blink for 30 seconds. Then, he simply walks inside. The camera glitches.

On the next day, Andy and the guys followed Skinny Fourth, making sure he didn’t hide anywhere to sleep. They talk a lot about history, everything, literally everything, men talk, just vulgarly, complaints, then switching back to vulgarly again.

2nd night

22:15 PM [Cam 2]: A low-angle shot from the kitchen table. Skinny Fourth is sitting on a low stool. He has a whetstone and a collection of his son’s butcher knives. The metallic screech of the blade glitched the audio like someone is messing with a plastic bag. Every few minutes, he tests the sharpness on his own prints. He doesn’t bleed. He just nods and starts on the next knife.

01:30 AM [Cam 3]: The son appears in the doorway. He doesn’t speak. He just hands his father a jug of the illegal rice wine. They share a look that suggests they aren’t just father and son—they are accomplices.

03:00 AM [Cam 1]: Skinny Fourth is back on the bed. He begins talking, but the room is empty. He is gesturing as if he’s hosting a dinner party. He pours rice wine into empty space.

On the next day, the same thing happens. Skinny Fourth didn’t sleep. He just occasionally laid on his bamboo bed for rest; his eyes always opened. His day job was just going to the market, trading his rice wine for food and packs of cigarettes. Walking kept this man living. But today, he walked towards the forbidden field. Across the tall grass, rusted edges of old mines poking through the dirt, labeled with faded red paint. He navigated through it like it was his playground, and finally they found several gravestones. He lit a few cigarettes up and left it there.

Trung translated Skinny Fourth words: [It’s not the mines that keep people out. It’s what the mines are guarding. The earth here has a very long memory.]

Last night

03:50 AM [Cam 1]: A sudden, heavy thump is heard. Both the journalist and cameraman wake up. The room is filled with a thick, white mist—the mountain breath.

03:52 AM [Cam 2 - Handheld]: The journalist grabs the camera. The frame is shaky and out of focus.

03:55 AM [Cam 3 - Outdoor]: The night vision shows dozens of thermal heat signatures emerging from the forbidden field. They aren’t walking; they are crawling toward the house. They are low to the ground, moving like people who lost their feet.

03:58 AM [Cam 2]: The journalist runs to the door. He swings the camera around. He finds Skinny Fourth standing in the middle of the room, holding a butcher’s knife. The old man is smiling—a wide, terrifyingly genuine smile.

Skinny Fourth: [You sleep for us.]

04:00 AM: [Cam 2] dropped. The last thing recorded is the sound of the door being unbolted from the outside, followed by the sound of a hundred nails crawling onto the wooden floor.

Trung, the son, and Skinny Fourth

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His house was like every house in Southeast Asia. Small, wall-to-wall with the neighbor’s, stacked in many levels. His dad slept on the ground floor because he was bed-bound. His mom was already gone. He slept on the second floor; he couldn’t sleep at all lately.

Whenever he opened or closed the toilet door too hard, the front door would burst open by itself.
Whenever he heard stray cats meowing in mating season, he shot them with paper bullets. Their mating season was infinite.
Whenever he heard the neighbors arguing, he put on his earphones. Morning, noon, and evening.

Then one night all the noise suddenly canceled out.

He took off his earphones.
Silent meant death.

He hurried downstairs. His father was still snoring. The urine box was half-full. He emptied it like a pre-coded routine, head aching. Three a.m. Back to sleep, then.

Then the mating season began anew.

He opened the front door to shoot the cats—his toilet door creaked open behind him.
Then the neighbors started arguing at fucking three a.m. Their cat’s gone.

The tree has eyes.

PI got it wrong

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In silver flat, mirroring life, 
What happens to a dead person's eyes?
They leave life, purest form lay still
Captured clear in silver flat hue
What of the living that blurred in behind?
They breathe, burdened still
Yet dead eyes moving instead
Trapped in the process of leaving
You stare long enough 
Circuit connecting rough
Does it want my life?

Farewell—Barrel on fire.

Black smoke wraps around my white shirt,
a farewell, not a rebirth.
Spiritual bribe for safe travel,
a blessing from a heart unraveled.
In this flame I see no vision,
for my heart has been unbroken.
Just rust and heat and a low, wet hiss,
of a ghost retuning his last kiss.

A poem for A mark of Herald - Episode 1

The Sear hums,
Blue eyes stare back.
A dear future's sold for Solfire,
A nightmare returns from hollow prayers,
Chains and Blood. The brooch lies broken.
A shadow wearing a rhys’s smile whispers a killing spree,
The cage swings, a woodman flying free.
In the furnace heart a gray egg pulses, 
From a confused heart, arise a new resolve.
The Sear hums,
Death's eyes stare back.

Let’s stack some more with Mark of a Herald palms/threnody/prayers

One Light Kindling

“Blessed art thou, devotees of the Onelight,
the lifekeeper, champion of the Just.
Wrought in fire, raised from the ashes, 
the eternals, forever praised in the Chants.”

Safe travel

“Inside the Sear, I pray. 
Shroud me with health, fill me with strength, banish illness that may enter my body. 
May the light guide my path, reveal the dangers, and lead me home. 
Blessed art thou, I bathe in your golden glow. 
Inside the Sear, I pray to thee.”

Threnody of the Hallow Church

“No Sol reaches for your warmth. No crows feast on your mortal form,
No plague curses your domain, bring forth husk of dominion. 
Only us, the ashen warriors. Only us, the devoted shepherds,
Only us and his true flame, sets forth your righteous path.”

History of Sahada

Leaves of ink, roots of might, elders whispered through the night.
But greed awoke the outer call, Makaiel's breath, the endless fall.
As Zul’drak claimed the shade, Myrmidons fell, the Descent was prayed
The Second Sun burned their blackened earth, sealed our fate, gave us rebirth.
But in the embers, thorns may creep,
Guard the light, lest shadows reap.

A hymn after long travel

O Sol above,
Burn away what hides from sight.
Cleanse the false, enshrine the true,
Light the heart of every Suledin too.
By flame, we kneel; by fire, we rise, 
Ashes drift, pyres never die.
Grant us will, and grant us flame,
That all may burn in Sol’s own name.

(This is for Ianc, my protag), tagged by Stefan Pasek.

Into the hollow of my chest,
A fire ignite,
Not fierce, nor bright,
A heat barely warm in the endless night.
I walk beneath hunger and terror,
The gods I serve aren’t mentors,
The path I walk isn’t meant for,
May my fire linger,
Oh light, please reach my yearning finger.

Micro-fiction,

1. A headache hammers on my head when I wake up. I check, rolling my neck, clacking my teeth, massaging my eyes, everything hurts, probably a flu.

Ignoring all, I burst into morning routine. My mom, my aunts, my uncles, all cloudy in their moves. Is it really a flu?

Thermometer, blood pressure, daily medicine hours, checked. Then the sun finally shines. It’s just a new season. Too much pores from wild flowers.

2. I wake up with a slight pain on the the otherside of my left ankle.

Then I walk. Then I goes down stair.

Something hidden behind the stair stab my ankle again.

Oh ho ho, I didn’t fall.

I grab the shadow skinny a** goose neck and tell it to behave.

This is my dungeon. Now you pay rent!

It still cry in the corner when I left the house to work.

Sorry guys, this wasn’t supposed to be sent. Well, it’s going to be an ongoing collection so I’ll update it accordingly then.

May the muse cascade upon you!

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The boys ran. Their flip-flops slapped against their feet in chaotic cadence; their giggles faded under the glowing pink sky of the early autumn season.

… hundred! Thao slapped the street light pillar and pivoted to the empty alley, number 210/12. The boys had scattered into three main smaller alleys that connected to this spot. Her job was simple, finding them before they smack her pillar. Even one would secure a win, and the prize today was cotton candy, her favorite. Just one more game, just one more tag, and she would be happy before her first day of second grade on the morrow.

Most of the alleys from number 210 to 280 were connected behind houses and smaller alleys, with slashes up to five numbers, and Thao remembered all of them. There’s two restricted routes though, one at the elementary school and another where addictive juveniles seize for their clandestine behavior. Thao didn’t know what that meant, she’s only seven but she knew she shouldn’t know. It’s just forbidden. The school though, wasn’t as forbidden as the dark alley, that’s where the boys would hide, or at least one of them would, always one of them would. That one would give her the cotton candy.

Dan’s feet knew every crack in the alley. Every drain cover. Every spot where broken glass hid in shadows. He ran past the tire shop, past the sleeping dog, past Mrs. Hanh’s door where the light was already yellow behind the curtain, then past a Buddhist temple where the monks already turned the light off.

The school wall rose ahead, its moss grew in the cracks like veins. Dan ducked when a flash of lightning turned the pink sky red. He looked through the cracks of the gate, seeing light inside, just the usual night light. The guard had gone home, perfect, he found the dog hole leading into the schoolyard.

Inside, the air went cold and still. It smelled like wet leaves and something else, something old and burned, like the ashes in the alley after someone burned trash. The smell stuck in his throat.

The yard was empty. Grass grew wild through cracks in the concrete, some blades as tall as his knees. A single tree stood in the middle, enormous, its branches reaching toward the darkening sky like arms stretched after sleep.

Thunder rolled again, far away. Dan skidded under the shadow of the trees, finding its trunk comforting. Then he heard something above his head, leaves rustling, but he couldn’t feel the wind.

He looked up. Two red dots flickered behind the leaves. Watching. Thunder rolled again, closer. Then, the sky flashed white.

Aunty Huong, whose duty was to watch the kids today, stood somewhere between number 236 and 234. She had found the cotton candy seller. Buying two for the winner and her son, Dan, whose she’d promised to reward regardless of the result. They had played this game for twenty nights in a row. Dan never won, and the other moms never gave extra, just not happily giving out the minimal reward for the kids.

In the 90s, the streets were full of children playing. Sometimes Huong didn’t even know who was who, so the oldest of the kids group often had to help with names.

When Huong returned to the streetlight pillar, the kids had already counted another game. She quickly scanned them and no, her son wasn’t here. “Stop! Where’s Dan?”

“I don’t know,” the biggest boy dressed in white pajamas said.

“What do you mean you don’t know?” Huong asked.

Thao turned her head around. “Can’t find him. We called him, but he didn’t answer.”

“Must have thought it was a trick,” another boy said.

Huong felt an ember of wrath sparked inside her stomach. But these were kids, they knew nothing, just pure joy. She handed Thao the candy. “Let’s go find him. Did you check the school?” She divided the route for the boys and told them all to gather at the old school after the search.

Huong pressed her hands against her hips, puffing. There’s no sign of Dan, and the school was the last place she hadn’t searched. The dog hole she had told him never to get in emerged as she walked towards the school gate. Then she heard sobbing. “Son? Dan?”

No answer, just sobbing. She peeked through the gate’s cracks, trying to locate the source. Dan wore blue, which had become quite a challenge to spot in the night. But she found him, shaking near the thick root of the banyan tree. “Dan!” she shouted.

He turned to her voice, the act looked like a disturbed radio frequency. Then a series of thunder thrumming beneath the earth. She could feel it inside her chest. “Come to mommy. Come back to the dog hole.”

But he remained unresponsive now. He was always afraid of thunder, everytime, he would hug himself like a shrimp; she would wrap two or three blankets around him, and talk to him, or sing a lullaby, whatever worked that reduced his fear. But this time, there was a wall between them. “Come please. You have to. I can’t get in.”

But the thunder and flashes of lightning refuse her effort.

The rustling of leaves began again, and a new wave of rain began to fall. She knew a way to get him out, a folklore horror that would scare him more than his fear of thunder.

There were always two versions of the same story. A tree siphoned the air, the earth, and the darkness of a crescent moon night. Days turned to month, month to years, years to centuries, the tree grew sentimental. Once a year, it woke up. When green turned brown and fell to the ground, leaving lonely branches reaching at autumn grey sky like skeletal hands accusing heaven, borne the Reckoning tree.

His mother told her of the veteran’s story. They hid in the shadow of the tree, and as if blessed by its spirit, no bullets could find the soldier. But what of the price? There’s always a price, a piece of their mind left their body, and they returned wrong. Their temper changed, their mind produced images more real than their eyes see in reality. Eventually, the veteran broke.

The smell of petrichor rose, not yet from this ground but carried from softer wet earth near the buddha temple at the end of the dark alley. Yellow cloth with red letters shimmered against the flickering lanterns.

The other story was to scare children off the dark because nasty things live on the tree, snakes, possums, even ants and spiders, and owls, each of them scare even the growth up. Of what risk? You knew it. You could imagine the creep lining behind your back now. But to make this an obsession of fear, they wrapped another story in, where the trees saw the children with its spiritual eyes, and if they were disobedient, it would punish them. It would eat the kids who didn’t listen.

She chose the second story. She needed her son to fear the tree more than the thunder. She needed him to come to her, to offer her his hands so she could pull him out.

The rustling stopped; the world held still, a signal before real rain hit the district. She could only hear her son’s weak sobbing turned to heavy breathing. “Come quickly, it will eat you.”

He didn’t move, yet. But his arms were shaking differently, from frozen in fear to trying to control.

“Come. Mommy will protect you.”

A flash of lightning erased all of her effort. Before her mind returned to her body, the sound arrived. She covered her ears, but her heart still jumped in her chest. “Dan! Come NOW!” She screamed finally, and tucked her arms inside the dog hole.

“Yes! Mom.”

The break in his voice almost broke her. She had terrorized her son by projecting her own in a raging call. She felt his arms now, small, soft, and covered in dirt, but more importantly, it reached for her. Fingers weaving together first, then she reached for his wrist, then she felt his elbows. “Kick slowly.”

As his skull was under palm, she pulled his arm harder. “Now. Kick hard.”

And then he was out, his meager weight pressed on her chest. He sobbed harder, then cried louder. “I’m here. I’m here. Mommy’s here.” She tapped on his back, even swaying a little like he was still a baby.

When he finally stopped crying, she pulled him up to his feet, hand in hand. Then she heard laughing, giggles first, then laughing. The kids were laughing at her child.

“Dan is crying like a baby, that’s gay.” One of the boys said. The rest followed.

Her rage almost burst out. She saw herself slapping that boy’s face and beat the rest. But in the corner of her fiery eyes, she saw a girl, Thao, not laughing. She just stood there, frozen, head tilting up. She was looking past them, through the cracks of the gate, to the tree inside the schoolyard.

Huong followed Thao’s gaze, slowly. The rest also followed her. Behind the leaves of the old tree, two red dots flicker. Watching. Then the rain fell, heavy and punishing.

Huong turned around, pressing a finger on her lips. “Shh! Walk home. Don’t run. Don’t look back.” The creeps lined on her spine as if the shadow of the tree had reached her skin. She managed to make the first step, the example for the children to follow.

They formed around her. Thao was the closest. She handed the cotton candy to Dan. As Huong was about to scold him about not saying thank you, she froze when her son’s eyes met hers.

Leaves in his hair, dirt on his face, but no residue of tears trace. Soot on his clothes, mold on his collar, then there’s blood on his lips. The candy on his hand was just held aloft before him. He simply stared at her and the creep crawled from her spine to the back of her neck.

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Now he sought cheaters, followed them to the hotel room and called the husband, or the wife. It often ended with a divorce, which he gladly provided the evidence to his lawyer friend. It wasn’t ethical, he knew too well, but an old wisdom said alluvial water shall not leak to someone else’s fields.

Nothing today worth a second glance, and he was out of job for the last two months. He lit a cigarette up and walked towards the window. Puff after puff, he stared at the busy street of district five absentmindedly. He should visit his ten years old daughter this weekend; he should do it with a gift, and the truth appeared before him. He didn’t even know what his daughter wanted anymore. He recalled his memory, forcing it to their rare chance of meeting each other. His phone buzzed. “Alo!”

“Is this the number of Vuong Tran, private detective?” The man’s voice was raspy and out of breath.

“Yes.”

“We need you. A construction worker fell to death at …”

Vuong frowned. “You need the police, not me.”

“It’s done. They declared it’s an accident.”

“I don’t see why you need me,” Vuong said. “But I charge by the minute.”

“Come.”

“Ok.”

Vuong took the last drag of his cigarette and flicked it from the second floor. It didn’t hit anyone, of course, because it always landed on the opposite house. The rain would wash them down and no one would know it was him. He was a terrible person and he could live with that, thank you very much.

Vuong recognized the building the moment he arrived at the corner of the street. For thirty years the narrow concrete had stood abandoned at the end of a most expensive street in Saigon. Six different brokers had tried to redevelop the land. Each attempt failed. Workers quit. Equipment broke. Investors backed out.

Now a man had died there. Officially, the worker had fallen down an old elevator shaft during demolition work. But he could already hear the neighborhood already had another explanation. The ghost boy pushed him. He didn’t believe in ghosts; but he did believe in people using them.

By midmorning he had already got what he needed. By night, the current broker demanded what he wanted from Vuong.

So there he was, standing beneath the haunted building again. The house rose six stories above him, tall and skeletal, its windows black with dust. An old construction elevator shaft ran along the side of the building like a spine. Yellow police tape fluttered in the humid air. Vuong studied the structure carefully again, under dim light, for his own protection

The walls were stable. The foundation looked intact. Nothing suggested a catastrophic failure.

Yet for three decades no one had managed to tear it down. Because of a mere superstitious tale. Thirty years earlier, during construction, a child had somehow wandered into the building. No one agreed on how. Some said he was playing. Others claimed he was locked inside by accident.

But everyone agreed on the ending. He had fallen down the elevator shaft. But as a former police man, he knew ghost stories lost their charm when someone asked about safety regulations.

The story grew larger each time someone told it. Which made Vuong more certain it had been cultivated. Ghost stories were useful tools in the real estate business. They delayed projects, frightened investors, and depressed land prices. If someone wanted the property cheap enough, a haunted reputation could be very convenient. One dead worker might even help maintain the myth. Of course, the broker wanted Vuong for his connection.

Vuong slipped a pistol into his jacket before entering the building. If the haunting turned out to be human, he intended to be ready. He wandered the building, checking for set ups and surveillance cameras first, then he waited at the rendezvous, right next to the elevator.

No sign of the broker, just the chill seeping through unfinished windows. He played with his flashlight beam, seeing dust fill the air. The rust and damp smell started to tick on his nose. Then a breeze changed it all. The old lift cage groaned, then the old chains rattled. He skipped to the side, staring at its motionless form. Then he heard footsteps approaching from behind, but no light.

He spun around. The corridor was empty. “Fucking rat,” he cursed. Then he lit a cigarette.

When he closed his eyes to feel the sting of smoke, a small voice spoke. “Hello?” A child’s voice.

At the far end of the corridor stood a boy. Eight years old, maybe nine. He was thin and his clothes were oddly out of style. He appeared in colors of black and old paper, like he stepped out from a newspaper of the 50s. Most homeless kids looked like this. “Boy,” he said carefully. “Where are your parents?”

The boy looked up at him with calm, steady eyes. “Can you help me?”

“What are you doing here?”

“I can’t leave,”

“Why not?”

The boy pointed toward the elevator shaft. “I fell.”

A chill crept up Vuong’s spine.

“I’ve been here a long time,” the boy continued softly.

He studied him more carefully now. The pale skin. The strange stillness. What’s your name?”

The boy tilted his head. “Do you know the story?” he asked.

“What story?”

“The one about me.”

Vuong felt his grip tighten on the flashlight because suddenly the boy’s words sounded familiar. Exactly familiar to the same version his mother had told about the trapped child, the elevator, the running footsteps. Vuong nodded.

The boy smiled. Then he turned and ran, his bare feet slapped against the concrete floor.

“Wait!” Vuong ran after the boy down the corridor. “Stop! I can help you!”

The boy stopped and turned back. His eyes were sparkling under the moonlight.

“Tell me how to free you,” Vuong said, breathless.

The boy’s smile widened. “Thank you,” he said softly.

Vuong’s foot struck loose gravel. He slipped. He knew he didn’t slip, but was being pushed. The floor swallowed his feet. The flashlight flew from his hand. The boy turned to run through the empty halls again, giggling. He understood now.

Then he screamed his daughter’s name.

My main series Mark of a Herald, a grimdark novel.

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You know you need to keep everything in the air, but the moment you focus too hard on one, the others start to wobble because either words economy or genre pressure.

Before long, the whole performance freezes. You stare at the same paragraph for hours, tweaking an emdash here, a metaphor there, convinced the sentence is still not quite right. The process stalls, the story gathers dust, and self-doubt whispers that maybe you’re simply not good enough to make it all balance.

This paralysis is incredibly common, especially among writers who care deeply about craft. Fiction demands attention to a dizzying array of elements: plot momentum, character progression, thematic depth, conflict escalation, exposition control, spatial awareness in descriptions, symbolic layering, contrast for emotional impact, pacing rhythm, voice consistency, and more.

Each one matters, yet trying to optimize them simultaneously creates cognitive overload. The brain, overwhelmed by competing priorities, defaults to micro-edits state, fiddling with word choice or punctuation because those feel concrete and controllable. Meanwhile, bigger issues like a sagging middle, an underdeveloped arc, a theme that never quite lands remain untouched.

The most insidious trap of all is when the prose itself begins to steal the spotlight. A beautifully wrought sentence, a clever emdash interruption, or a poetic flourish can feel like a triumph in isolation. But if it draws too much attention to the writing rather than the story, it breaks immersion.

Readers notice the hand of the author instead of losing themselves in the world or the character’s experience. Purple prose, overly ornate descriptions, excessive adverbs, or showy stylistic tricks—these are symptoms of the same problem. The language has become louder than the narrative it serves. The fix isn’t to strip everything bare (unless your genre demands stark minimalism), but to ask a ruthless question: Does this sentence serve the moment, or is it performing for its own applause?

Deciding what to emphasize, and what to subdue, requires a guiding principle. That principle is genre. Every genre carries unspoken (and sometimes very spoken) contracts with readers about what deserves foreground and what should recede into service.

In epic fantasy, lush world-building descriptions and layered symbolism often take center stage because immersion in the secondary world is part of the promise.

In thriller or horror, tight pacing, visceral sensory detail, and relentless conflict drive the engine; ornate prose can feel like hitting the brakes.

Literary fiction frequently foregrounds theme, interiority, and stylistic experimentation, while commercial romance prioritizes emotional progression and character chemistry over intricate symbolism or dense exposition.

Without a clear sense of genre conventions, editing becomes guesswork, or worse, endless second-guessing. You might spend weeks polishing spatial descriptions that readers in your target audience barely notice, while skimping on the emotional beats that actually hook them. Or you might over-correct and flatten your voice into something generic, losing what makes your story distinctly yours.

This is why reading—widely, deeply, and deliberately—remains essential for any serious fiction writer, especially during the editing phase. When you read like a writer, you absorb not just story but technique. How established authors in your genre (and adjacent ones) choose what to narrate and what to imply, when they linger on a detail and when they cut away, how they balance the visible machinery of plot against the quieter work of theme.

You notice patterns like the way a gritty dark fantasy might use terse, sensory-heavy prose to convey dread without pausing for long philosophical asides; or how a cozy mystery keeps descriptions functional and conflict light so the puzzle stays front and center. These observations become your internal compass. They help you answer the question “Does this belong here?” not with abstract theory, but with lived experience of what works for readers who love the same kind of stories you want to tell.

Of course, reading alone won’t cure editing paralysis. You still have to make choices and accept that perfection is impossible. A practical way forward is to layer your revisions rather than trying to fix everything at once:

• First pass: Big-picture only. Plot holes, character arcs, pacing, structure, theme coherence. Ignore pretty sentences.

• Second pass: Conflict and progression. Ensure stakes rise, scenes earn their place, and the story drives forward.

• Third pass: Exposition, spatial clarity, contrast. Make sure information flows naturally and contrasts (light/dark, hope/despair) sharpen emotional impact.

• Fourth pass: Prose polish. Now you can refine sentences, metaphors, rhythm — but with the rule: if the language calls attention to itself in a way that doesn’t serve the genre’s contract or the scene’s purpose, tone it down.

Even then, set limits. One or two focused revision rounds per section, then move on. Read the work aloud to catch showy moments that sound impressive but slow the momentum (I can’t do that but we have audio convert). Get fresh eyes (beta readers, critique partners) to tell you where the story pulled them in versus where they noticed the writing too much (This is why I’m on stubstack, hoping to get more eyes on the story).

In the end, editing isn’t about achieving flawless balance across every element, It’s about making deliberate trade-offs that serve your genre, your story, and your readers. The torches will wobble; some may even drop. But if you keep the core promise of the genre alight, the audience will stay to watch the rest of the show. And sometimes, the most powerful moments come not from juggling everything perfectly, but from knowing exactly which flame to let burn brightest.

Your writer friend,

—Hai Dang

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