by Julie Wu
The world lay below, an ocean of ponderosa pine punctuated with granite peaks, sloping down to pale green valleys where houses clustered, tiny and brave. In the distance, mountaintops marched to the horizon—pale, misty, infinitely layered. I could see the curvature of the earth. And up above: the sky, its vast cauldron of swirling atoms tinged golden by light shot from our star’s fiery surface, past Mercury and Venus and all their moons, through the black nothingness of space, to reach us.
The earth turned. On the other side of it, the sun’s rays would soon reach the horizon and filter through the red curtain by our rosewood bed. Kai-ming, lying by his sleeping mother’s side, would stretch his tiny arms and, eyelids fluttering, turn his head toward his mother, his shock of hair squished flat against the underside of her arm.
I took Yoshiko’s latest letter from my breast pocket. It flapped loudly in the wind. I hadn’t had a chance to read it before we left. I so longed for Yoshiko’s presence, for her laugh, for her touch, and this piece of thin, fluttering blue paper was a poor substitute.
Dear Saburo,
I have some bad news.
My sister Leh-hwa was hit by a truck. She is still alive, but as my mother says, she might have been better off dying and coming back as an ant or a catfish or some other animal that knows no pain. She has several broken bones and bleeding inside her body. Her husband is so busy drinking and fooling around that he doesn’t even visit her in the hospital. I’m sure it was because of worrying about him that Leh-hwa failed to watch her step in the street.
I went to visit, and my mother said I was dressed like a doctor’s wife.
I was wearing that red dress with white polka dots and that swingy skirt. I bought it with my own money from my old job.
And then my brother Kun-ji, who didn’t even come to the hospital right away, came into the room and pulled out a chair for my mother, and they turned their backs to me. They were jealous, I suppose, and it made me sad. I have had people ask if you’re sending me money, and it’s possible my family assumes you do and they wish they had a bit of it, too.
It’s because of that hundred fifty dollars you sent to your mother. I told you not to send it. Your sister used it to buy six pairs of black shoes from New Rose. No wonder everyone thinks you’re rich.
I folded the letter back up and put it into my pocket, looking glumly at the vista at my feet. The sunlight deepened to orange, setting a lake afire in the valley below, and here, on the highest peak in the United States east of the Rockies, I was not John Wayne, not some genius electrical engineer. I was the stupidly obedient son of parents who knew no end of greed, the buffoon who didn’t know to wear proper shoes for a hike, the lone boy at sundown, stepping between the sunlit rice paddies toward home.
I heard Beck’s voice and stood up, toes throbbing, pain shooting down the side of my leg. He walked toward me from the tower. As he drew near, he looked out at the panorama. “Nice view.”
“The sun is setting,” I said. “Shouldn’t we get home quickly?”
He looked at me for a moment, his hat flapping in the wind. “I thought you knew,” he said. “We’re camping.”
I HAD NEVER known how hard the ground could be. Beck gave me his blanket and a plastic sheet, explaining that he was already the third man in his friend’s two-man tent and had no space to offer me. I hesitated, not knowing whether to put the blanket and sheet over me for warmth or under me to protect me from the hard rock. In the end, I put the plastic between me and the rocks, the blanket between my face and the bugs.
I swatted bugs that buzzed in my ear, and fuzzy moths that landed on my neck, and I sat bolt upright, hearing the rustling and cracking that might mean moose or bears or whatever large creatures roamed the American woods. The moon was out, and it shone on the pointed roofs of all the little tents in the clearing around me. Inside those tents, I knew, everyone was laughing. I was nothing but an amusement for these people, all snug in their tents, laughing at the funny Japanese, Korean, Indian, or whatever they thought I was. One of them could easily have let me into their tent. But that would have meant snuggling right next to me, and how could they do that if they couldn’t even use the same urinal as a black man? How could they ever scrub off my germs?
Who was I fooling? I was never going to belong here.
21
YOU’RE MAKING A MISTAKE,” Beck said.
“Perhaps.”
“No—to the side . . .”
We were knee-deep in the cool, swirling waters of Rapid Creek. Evergreens dotted the grassy banks rising on either side of the water. Beck pulled my arm down from over my shoulder.
“This isn’t tennis, Chia-lin. Now, cast.”
I flung the rod awkwardly to the side. The line whirred out and landed with a little plop in the rippling water. I lost my balance in the current for a moment and stumbled, my waders squeaking as the legs rubbed against each other. I had borrowed the waders from one of the American graduate students after asking, this time, what equipment I needed. Harney Peak had been two weeks ago, and I was still sore from head to toe.
“You’re not a pharmacist,” Beck said.
“I’m not American.” I reeled in my line, still bitter from spending that night under a bush. I still played along, though. Played the part of the funny Chinaman making a fool of himself in the South Dakotan outdoors. “I borrowed the money, I need to pay back. I have a full scholarship to Baylor, and it’s useful to my family.”
“Master’s in pharmacy?”
“Bachelor’s.”
“You already have a bachelor’s.”
I said nothing.
“What’s one year of a bachelor’s going to do for you?”
“Make my family happy.”
“Why did you even apply to pharmacy programs? Let me guess. Because your parents asked you to.”
I cast my line. In Taiwan I had viewed myself as something of a rebel. Here, I was nothing but a patsy.
“That’s better,” he said. “Hard to believe you never used one of these.” He reeled in his line. “What about Gleason and ionospheric sounding rockets and all that?”
I reeled my own line in, silent, thinking of my excitement in Ann Arbor. Perhaps that would have been my fate in another life. “Filial piety,” I said. “You Americans obviously don’t know anything about it.”
“We do,” he said. “And we reject it. For the most part. You know, it’s too bad I can’t give you a teaching fellowship.”
“Why can’t you?”
He was quiet for a moment. Had I been too bold?
“Well,” he said, “you’ve only been here two and a half months. You’ve done well but you haven’t done anything special, engineering-wise. It would look like favoritism.”
“Special? What would I have to do?”
He paused for a moment, adjusting his fishing hat. “Research.”
“Research? With you?”
“Not with me. We’re going to Sweden this summer, visit my wife’s family.”
“Oh.” I looked down at the water. Beck’s teasing, his flippancy, irritated me. My life was at stake and he played with me like a toy. He knew very well that the other engineering professors I’d had did no research.
A dark form glided below, following my line, but when I pulled up my hook, it was empty, dripping water that sparkled in the sunlight.
Beck pulled a leaf off his reel. “What about Gleason?”
“He told me to come back after I get my master’s,” I said.
“So? I’ll give you a recommendation.”
I thought of Li-wen and the Professor. “I would be embarrassed,” I said.
He looked sideways at me, one eye hidden by the brim of his hat. “Chia-lin, anyone who can hike up Harney Peak in wing tips can take a little embarrassment.”
“He might say no. Then my chances of working with him will be ruined.”
“And if you go to pharmacy school and head home?”
I said nothing and cast my line.
“To the side,” he said. “Don’t cast so wildly. You’ll hook me in the head.”
“Maybe that’s what I’d like to do.”
“Watch it.”
“We’re not catching anything,” I said.
“Don’t give up so easy. Fishing’s all about patience. You can’t just go in and grab ’em by the throat.”
“Actually, you can,” I said. “But it is more dangerous.”
22
WHEN I CALLED GLEASON’S department at the University of Michigan, I was told that his graduate student positions had been filled for the summer many months ago.
“Totally filled?”
“Filled.”
“May I speak with Professor Gleason, please?”
Pause. “I’m sorry. He’s very busy.”
Dear Yoshiko,
I have some bad news of my own. What my parents have been saying has turned out to be true, after all. I can’t get my master’s and I’ll have to go to pharmacy school. I got a full scholarship at Baylor University, so I’ll be able to save up money. I’ll make a lot of money over the summer and I’m sure when I get back they’ll pay me more at Taikong. We’ll make enough capital to open that radio shop in Hsimenting in no time.
“I need to make a lot of money this summer,” I told my roommate. He had been at the School of Mines for several years in its master’s program. I did not normally confide in him, but I did not feel I could broach this topic with Beck.
He paused to wipe the sweat from his hands and the top of his head with his napkin. He had cooked our dinner, a large lump of pork boiled in undiluted soy sauce. I had already rinsed my piece in the sink, but when I put some on my tongue, it still drew all the saliva from my cheeks. I took a long sip of tea.
My roommate cleared his throat. “Then you will have to work at a fine establishment.”
“How do I apply?”
“Apply?” he scoffed. “What you do is, as soon as classes end, you hit the road for Chicago and knock on the door at all the restaurants to get a job washing dishes.”
I looked at him incredulously. It hadn’t just been Sun-kwei after all.
My roommate pointed his chopsticks at me. “It’s what all Chinese students do. My advice is, you go early, because the best jobs go first.”
I took a sip of tea, imagining all of Taiwan and China’s intellectual elite tripping over each other for the opportunity to wash dishes. For this we devoted our lives to study.
“What day is your last exam?” he asked.
“June twenty-eighth.”
“Ah . . .” He shook his head. “Many of the jobs will be taken.”
I put down my cup of tea, watching him shovel pork and rice into his mouth. So accepting of the status quo, so lacking in curiosity. The ultimate product of a patriarchal society intolerant of questions or backtalk.
“Mark my words,” he said. “You’d better take that exam early.”
A few days later he appeared in my doorway, smearing his palms against the doorframe as I punched at the typewriter, squinting at the classifieds in the Chicago Tribune.
“Dear Sir,” I typed. Return, return. The machine dinged with reassuring familiarity. Part of my job at Taikong had involved correspondence with foreign pharmaceutical companies.
“What are you trying to do?” he said.
“Apply for a job,” I said. Ding.
He shook his head. “You’re wasting your time.”
THREE WEEKS LATER, I hitched a ride with a Chinese graduate student who was driving to Chicago’s Chinatown to stock up on food and cooking supplies. We all took turns making the thousand-mile journey for Japanese rice. Uncle Ben’s was not the same.
They dropped me off at Zenith, where the recipient of my letter, a man in a white button-down shirt, handed me a radio across the table. “It’s broken. Fix it.”
“YOU’RE FIXING RADIOS in a factory?” Beck’s eyebrows wrinkled together. He sat behind his desk, his feet up on a filing cabinet, his hands clasped together on his stomach. Mrs. Larsson, in an electric-blue dress, bustled in to place a folder on his desk, then hunted around inside a drawer.
“Pay is very good. It’s better than being a dishwasher.” I was a bit stung at his reaction. Gleason would have been more impressed. “Not everyone can fix radios, you know. I had to take a bus down and interview and pass their test.”
Beck cocked his head, looking sideways at me. “What was their test?”
“Fixing broken radios. I did it easily, and the others could not.”
“And you’re going to Baylor at the end of the summer.”
“Yes.”
Beck scratched his head. “I don’t know what to say. I guess you must love your parents.”
“It’s not about love. You Americans are always talking about love.”
“What is it, then?”
“Duty. Honor. Respect.”
“Well, who’s respecting and honoring you?”
I hesitated. “My family will. My son will,” I said. “I think.”
“You think?” Beck folded his arms. He looked at me for a long time, and while he did I thought wistfully of Mount Rushmore and Bashir and how I’d wanted to be like him—unencumbered, confident.
“Well, enjoy pharmacy,” Beck said. “And remember that in America, we can change our minds.”
I walked out of his office, head reeling. Mrs. Larsson was standing by the door and caught my arm. “Where are you staying?” she said.
I turned to her in surprise at her low tone, my eyes glancing over her neckline, which revealed a lot more than Yoshiko’s ever did, both because it was lower than anything Yoshiko would wear and because there was more to reveal. She looked at me, eyes glittering blue, the black discs within them moving back and forth. I could smell her perfume, powdery and sweet. “What?” I realized at that moment that while she often talked about her children, she had never once mentioned her husband. But the hand on my arm had a diamond ring on it.
She pulled her hand away under my glance. “To forward your letters,” she said. “Here. There’s one for you today.”
Dear Saburo,
Leh-hwa made it out of the hospital, and my mother is taking care of her at my parents’ house. Leh-hwa is back to her usual self, complaining constantly.
I had dinner there today. My father got a beautiful red snapper for me. Of course, he can’t afford such luxuries, especially with Leh-hwa at home again, but he was standing in front of the fish cart jangling the coins in his pocket, and the fishmonger snared him because the fish were fresh, on ice. Ice is so big now.
My uncle’s new ice company is so successful he bought a car, while my father has been puttering around in his charming way, smiling and laughing and accumulating more and more expenses.
So I was enjoying this red snapper that my mother steamed with ginger and scallions, some roast duck, and spare-rib soup. It was such a pleasure to have so much delicious food! Then my father announced to me that his brother had finally agreed to let him into the ice company. Finally!
I said, “Do it!”
My brother’s wife, Ying, had been giving me sour looks all evening and she gave me an especially sour one then.
My father told me then that his brother was making him buy into the company, at a very high price, and my father would have to sell the house.
I said, then sell it. His brother’s company is doing so well—everyone has iceboxes now. This is my father’s one big chance.
Ying was arguing with me, saying soon everyone will have refrigerators like you, not iceboxes.
Well, but this isn’t America, right?
It really isn’t fair of my uncle. He kicked my father out of the lumberyard, and now he’s making my father buy into the ice company. But what can you do? He’s the eldest.
My brother started saying that the house is so valuable, in such a great location on Chungcheng Road, and how much it will be worth in ten years.
My mother said, “In ten years we’ll be dead
. You can’t eat the house. If you want to keep it, get a decent job.”
Kun-ji did not look happy at that. To tell the truth, I made many times more than he did when I worked at the bank, and it was a big blow to my parents when I left home. You don’t make much working in a cannery. If only my older brother were still alive, things would be different entirely.
I kept telling my father he should sell the house. He’s been there for so many years and hasn’t gotten anywhere. They never make enough money from rent. They’re just surviving. All the other buildings have more and more stories, and their house is the only one that has just two floors. It looks funny and people laugh at them. And now he has this chance to actually make money.
My father nodded and I think he knew I was right.
Ying was so mad she slammed her chopsticks down on the table.
Countrywoman! If I were her, I would get a job instead of complaining all the time.
But I should tell you, don’t worry about these things here. Don’t worry about what your parents want. No one here cares what you study, and it doesn’t make any sense to leave South Dakota and go to Baylor. Get your summer job and go back to the School of Mines. All they care about is whether you are sending home money, but please don’t do that, either. They have plenty and you don’t. The world is open to you there. Don’t let this Old Country squabbling and greediness tie your hands behind your back.
By the way, your mother has a soft heart. When I was talking about Leh-hwa almost dying, she started talking about your little brother who died, and how she should have taken him to a different doctor, or taken him earlier to the hospital. She said he looked a lot like Jiro and was a very good boy, very sweet and obedient, and not so headstrong like you! She actually got a little teary talking about it. She said she was so exhausted all the time when all of you were little that she couldn’t think straight.
