A crack of thunder split the sky. The boat heaved up, and the deck fell away. My stomach lurched, and then I slammed down on the wet planks. An unsecured ceramic bowl shattered beneath me. Searing heat shot through my right side as a shard pierced my right buttock, and warm and thick blood dripped down my side. The pain was sharp and blinding, but I bit my lip, swallowed my cry, and rolled onto my left hip to press my palm hard against the wound to stem the bleeding.

Another wave crashed over the bow before I could push myself up. The deck tilted, and I slid toward the edge. Dad grabbed my arm.

“Inside, now!”

He pulled me from the water pooling on deck, and I crawled towards the cabin, each agonizing movement sending a jolt of pain from my hip up my spine.

Fortunately, the wound did not become infected. However, it left me with a jagged line etched into my skin, hidden but indelible. Though the skin had healed, what it signified remained tender, much like the memories that lingered in my mind. Every so often for years, touching that scar in the shower would stop me in my tracks. It wasn’t the ache, but how it yanked me back to the sea. The salt stung my lips, and the world tilted as we bounced on waves, teetering between staying alive and drowning.

Decades had passed since my family made our daring escape from Vietnam. The screams of war and whispers of fear had given way to the hum of computer fans and the rattle of automobiles in our Texas home. But the echoes of the past could never be silenced. On hushed nights, when the world grew still and memories flickered, the storm’s fury would return in fleeting shadows, and I could see that my siblings, too, had to wrestle with their own invisible haunting remnants.

Folks used to say kids bounced back, that they wouldn’t remember as much or feel things so deeply. But I knew what I saw as a child and what followed me to sleep for years afterward.

I am now past fifty, gray at the temples. My stories aren’t easier to tell so much as I am stronger, or perhaps only more stubborn, and I can speak about these things, not without difficulty, but without drowning in them.

I have tried to see the world again through the eyes of a child. What follows are memories filtered and sharpened by over forty years of context. I cannot promise the exact words of a conversation held decades ago, but I can promise what it felt like to be inside it. This book lies between a terrified, starving child adrift in the Pacific Ocean and the man now holding the pen.