Banyan Moon

Minh’s ghost observes that her daughter and granddaughter seem different. She thinks that “Hương is suspicious of Ann’s flowering love” (309) with Wes, while Ann has become very private and withdrawn. Minh watches Ann talk with Crystal about Wes. Crystal knew Wes’s ex-wife, Fiona, before either of them had children. After Wes’s wife gave birth to their son, she changed. Crystal implies that Wes was hurting Fiona. Ann dismisses this implication, telling Crystal that Wes is a good person who would not hurt anyone. Crystal is skeptical. Hương also overhears this conversation, which deepens the rift between her and Ann. 

Later, Hương and Ann argue about love. Hương tells Ann that she seems to be moving fast with Wes. She says that she and Ann had a plan to raise Kumquat together so that she could protect them both. Ann asks when Hương has ever protected her, and tells her that the only person who ever protected her was Minh. Upset, Hương says that Minh stole Ann from her because she saw Ann as her second chance at motherhood. Minh’s ghost is heartbroken to hear this. Ann lashes out at Hương, saying it’s a pity that Minh was the one who died. She leaves. Minh watches Hương cry in pain at her daughter’s words and wishes she could “hold her tighter. Love her longer” (315). 

Ann goes on a cleaning tear, looking for more of Minh’s secrets. She feels like she is going crazy. She retrieves the photograph of Bình from the trunk in the attic. She wants to tell Hương the truth, but she also wants to protect her from the pain it could cause her. She goes into Hương’s room and flips through an old photo album. She’s surprised to find printed-out clippings of all the art from her art blog. She never realized that her mother cared about her work. She makes a choice to keep the secret rather than upending Hương’s entire world and burns the photo of Bình, telling Minh to “take [her] secrets back” (319). That night, Ann dreams about the banyan tree rising from the earth. The tree is struck by lightning and crashes to the ground, trapping her and baby Kumquat on one side. From the other side, Minh and Hương call out for Ann, telling her to jump across to them. Ann wakes at the bottom of the stairs in terrible pain.

In the hospital, Ann recovers from her fall down the stairs in the same hospital that Minh was in after her own fall. When Ann wakes, Hương assures her that she is going to be okay; the baby was not harmed when she fell. 

Ann tells Hương that she sometimes feels trapped in the Banyan House. Phước and Diane visit Ann and bring her phở. Phước tries to bring up the matter of the house, but Hương brushes him off. When he leaves, he tells her that the issue is not over. Ann sleeps and her phone rings. Hương answers and talks to Noah. He wants to see Ann, but says that she has been avoiding him for months. Hương tells Noah the address of the Banyan House.

Since her fall, Ann’s feelings about the Banyan House have changed. She now feels like it is a dangerous place, like it is “waiting for something terrible to happen” (330). Neither Ann nor Hương talk about Minh, but they wear her old clothes, hair clips, and slippers. Though Ann has not forgiven Minh for interfering in her friendship with Crystal and forcing Hương to keep her illness a secret, she has “found [her] way back to love” (331). Ann and Hương reconcile some of their feelings about Minh and each other. Ann tells Hương about the retelling of the folktale of Chú Cuội that she is working on for Kumquat. She wants to change the ending because she worries that it is too depressing for a children’s book. 

Noah arrives feeling nervous, and Ann takes him to the parlor to talk. Ann realizes that she never told Noah anything about the Banyan House. Noah apologizes again for his affair with Alexis and admits that his parents never approved of Ann. He apologizes for pretending otherwise. Ann admits that she has been seeing someone, and while she can tell this hurts Noah, he tells her that he understands. He insists that they have to get back together, even if his parents disapprove. Ann wonders at his forceful optimism. They both know that their lives do not fit together, but Ann assures Noah that he will always be a part of their baby’s life. Hương invites Noah to stay for dinner. That night, he and Ann talk about how much both of them have changed. As she sleeps, Ann hears a voice telling her to run. When she wakes, the Banyan House is on fire. 

Minh recalls the destructive tendencies Phước developed as a child. Lightning strikes the Banyan House, and there are already flames at the base of the banyan tree. Minh sees a shadow dart away from the tree. The fire spreads to the Banyan House, and Minh calls out to Ann, telling her to run. She watches as Ann wakes and runs with Noah out of their bedroom. Ann, Noah, and Hương fight their way through the house as it burns. They make it outside, and Hương cries that Minh “is in the Banyan House” (343). Ann tells Hương that Minh is not there, that they have released her. She tells her mother that they will start again. They watch as the house burns to the ground. 

Minh is “untethered from the world,” dying her second death (344). She thinks about Ann, baby Kumquat, Hương, and Phước. At last, she sees the shadow figure again. It is Xuân. He tells her to come home and reaches his hand out to her. Minh is overwhelmed at how “love, for all its treachery, finds [her] in the last, unexpected moments of light” (345).

Ann, Hương, and Noah return to the wreckage of the Banyan House days later. They find the burned remains of a watch by the charred banyan tree. Noah says it looks like a Rolex, but Hương insists that it must be a knockoff. Ann and Hương sell the Banyan House and the land it is on. In an interview with the insurance company, Hương insists that they have no enemies and it could not have been arson that destroyed the house. Noah leaves, but he and Ann assure one another that they will remain friends for Kumquat.

Ann and Hương use the money from selling the Banyan House to buy a cottage close to the beach, where they live together. Over time, Ann and Hương navigate a new mother-daughter relationship that makes Ann hopeful for the future. Ann reads her version of the folktale about Chú Cuội, adding an ending where Chú Cuội watches over his family from the heavens. 

Kumquat is born two weeks early and has to spend some time in the NICU. Ann decides to name him Bình. She jokes that “Noah’s parents will probably call him Ben” (353). Noah flies down from Michigan and is overjoyed to meet his son. Wes goes to California to make a start at being a father to his own son. After a week in the NICU, Ann is allowed to bring baby Bình home. On the way home, Ann asks Hương to stop by the beach. They stand on the sand together and look at the moon, feeling optimistic about the future of their family.