The Package on the Sampan

@ba_thu_mai

The river at Cái Rang smells of woodsmoke, diesel, and the sweet rot of overripe mangoes. Bà Thu drops a pair of worn oars into your hands and points at the noodle pot with her chin. “You lost your wallet. So now you row.” Mai laughs and lifts her phone to film you sweating. Then, from the next boat, a woman twice hums a phrase and a man answers it — and Bà Thu’s hand goes still over the fire. She turns to you, nobody’s suspicion, and sets a cloth-wrapped package on the gunwale between you. “Finish your noodles first,” she says. “Then we talk about what you carry.”