by Justin Hill
Old Zhu’s wife nodded and then Madam Fan did clap her hands: Heaven was kind!
All her daughter needed was a little encouragement, and you never got oil without applying a little pressure.
Madam Fan stood on her balcony and tried vainly to suppress a long, slow yawn. Dawn was still half an hour away: the world was pale and colourless. She shivered briefly and cleared her throat, and thought of all the food she had to get for lunch. It was too early for singing, she decided, better to go shopping.
Madam Fan pulled the door behind her as quietly as she could, and fumbled across the dark room. Her purse was on the shelf by the door, she thought, and her hand crawled along the shelves until she found it. She slipped it into her pocket as she unlocked the front door and stepped out into the cold light of dawn.
Madam Fan caught a flicker of movement on the edge of her sight as she walked towards the gate. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the shadow under the trees, then she could see the man dressed in white practising taichi: the scrunch of gravel as he moved his feet, his arms and legs moving with the slowness and elegance of a dream. She didn’t stop, but kept on walking down to the gate. The dawn sky had a green sheen, it seemed to be an auspicious sign for the day ahead. Nothing would go wrong today she decided as she walked under the factory gate. Nothing.
The first peasant Madam Fan came across wore a Russian hat with sticking-out ear flaps that made him look half man half dog. She picked through the pile of cucumbers at his feet while he rubbed his blue hands against the dawn chill, and stared down at her.
‘How much a kilo?’ she demanded, turning cucumbers over and squeezing them.
‘One yuan,’ the man croaked.
‘For this rubbish?!’
He nodded.
‘Wah!’ she said and walked on.
Madam Fan stopped at the next but the price was the same. These days everything was so expensive: it was too difficult to treat friends. Prices were like flood water, she thought, they just kept on rising.
At the end of the row the chicken seller had filled his bamboo crate with clucking fowl. Madam Fan lifted the lid and reached a hand inside. There was a surprised squawk as her fingers closed on a chicken, then the sound of flapping wings. She felt the bird’s breast for meat and then let it go and searched for another, sending off another flurry of startled squawks.
The stall owner squatted behind, warming a pot of water on a coal stove as he watched her. ‘Native chickens,’ he declared as he lit his cigarette, and blinked away the acrid smoke.
Madam Fan was still rummaging inside the crate with her hand. ‘How much a kilo?’ she called out.
‘Twenty yuan.’
‘Too expensive!’
The man took no notice, but crouched by the coal stove and sucked in his first drag of the cigarette: complaints were expected.
Madam Fan’s fingers soon closed on a chicken that felt right. She pulled it out of the crate and held it up. The chicken blinked a reptilian eye at her. She massaged its legs and breast and it let out a long nervous squawk. Another squeeze and she dropped it back in the crate and reached for another. Too thin.
‘Native chickens,’ the man said again, standing up. ‘Good for the blood. Keep you warm.’
Madam Fan took no notice. He irritated her, what with his black-stained teeth and promiscuous familiarity. The fact he annoyed her annoyed her even more, because today was such a special day. No one was going to irritate her today.
Eventually Madam Fan pulled out another chicken. It struggled and flapped its wings for a moment, then gave up. Its legs were fleshy and soft, the breast full of meat. She checked its gullet wasn’t full of grain, ran finger and thumb down the legs just to make sure and then handed it to the man and said, ‘I’ll take this one.’
The chicken let out another curious squawk as the man tied its feet together and hung it on his scales. ‘One and three quarter kilos,’ the man said picking up his knife.
Madam Fan nodded.
‘Do you want the blood?’
‘Yes please.’
The chicken squawked as its throat was pulled back. The note of tentative protest turning to alarm and pain as the knife began to slice, then the squawk was cut short and all that remained was a bloody froth of bubbles. The blood dripped into a plastic bag as the man held the thrashing legs and wings firmly. Finally he dropped the bird to the ground and it flapped and kicked in the mess of blood and dirt.
‘Can you put some vinegar with that,’ Madam Fan said as he tied the top of the bag, ‘I don’t want it all to congeal.’
He nodded again and nudged the chicken with his toe to see if it was dead. Madam Fan looked away and rubbed her hands against the chill. In her head she went through the list of dishes she was going to cook. She didn’t want to wait here while he plucked and gutted it, she still had all the other shopping to do!
‘I’m going to buy some vegetables,’ Madam Fan told the man. He didn’t take any notice. ‘Heh!’ Madam Fan shouted, ‘I’m going to buy some vegetables.’
‘All right, all right,’ the man said through his cigarette stub, ‘I’ll be here.’ He picked the limp chicken up by one leg and dropped it into a clear pot of water, staining it red. ‘I’m not going anywhere.’
The only people who visited Liu Bei’s house were lost and looking for somewhere else, so the sudden knock on her door disturbed her. She dropped the clothes back into the tub and dried her hands as the knocking continued.
‘I’m coming!’ she shouted.
‘It’s me!’
‘Mother?’
‘Yes!’
Liu Bei unlocked the door and turned back to the wash tub as her mother came in and put her bag of shopping down on the table. ‘I’ve bought some pork,’ her mother said. ‘Where’s Little Dragon?’
‘He’s out playing.’
‘Who with?’
‘His friends,’ Liu Bei said, picked up the pork. ‘Why have you brought this?’ she asked.
‘He’s looking too thin. You don’t feed him enough. You should be a better mother.’
Liu Bei didn’t answer, pulled the clothes out of the water and started rubbing them against the board.
‘Look at yourself!’
‘Mother,’ Liu Bei warned.
Her mother began to cry, but stifled the tears as they came out, and bit her lip. ‘Your father and I were so proud, and now look at you,’ she said.
Liu Bei rubbed.
‘What have you done with your life?’
Liu Bei rubbed.
‘Why did you get involved?’
And then rinsed the clothes one by one.
‘Didn’t I tell you?’
‘Yes, you did.’
‘But would you listen?’
‘No, I didn’t.’
‘And now look at you.’
Liu Bei sat up and wiped her hair back from her face with her shoulder, keeping her dripping hands away from her.
‘Mother, why did you come here?’ she asked.
‘I wanted to tell you.’
‘What?’
‘Before anyone else told you. I wasn’t going to–but there you go.’
Liu Bei looked away and said with exasperation, ‘Mother–what are you talking about?’
‘I wanted to tell you,’ Liu Bei’s mother trailed off into silence, unable to bring herself to tell Liu Bei her news. ‘I wanted to tell you,’ she repeated, wriggling closer to the point of her visit, ‘I wanted to tell you–Old Zhu’s son is back in town.’
Liu Bei stopped and looked up. ‘Da Shan?’
‘Yes.’
She dropped the washing and pushed the hair from her face. ‘How do you know?’
‘I saw him,’ she said. ‘He came to the house.’ Liu Bei searched her mother’s face, but it was set firm.
‘And?’
Liu Bei’s mother struggled with the words. ‘He wanted to know where you were,’ she said at last.
‘Did you tell him?’
‘Of course I didn’t.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because he abandoned you!’ Liu Bei’s mother said, mining an old vein of anger.
Liu Bei swore as she dumped the clothes into a basket and took them out to hang them out on the line. This was the last thing she needed. Shit.
Shit!
Liu Bei threw the clothes over the line, where they flapped in the gentle breeze. She pinned them to the line with wooden pegs, but they still waved arms and legs at each other in a childish dance. Liu Bei rested her head against the line for a moment. There was no point. What else could she do?
‘Mother!’ Liu Bei shouted through the door. ‘Can you look after Little Dragon when he comes back?’
Her mother’s voice came back from inside, tinted with suspicion: ‘Why?’
‘I’m going out.’
Her mother’s face appeared at the door, her hands smeared with minced pork and held up so as not to touch anything. ‘You’re not going to see him are you?’
‘Yes,’ Liu Bei said, ‘I am.’
Madam Fan’s flat was seething with activity all morning as meat was chopped and vegetables were sliced. Peach was in charge of gutting the chicken and chopping it into small pieces, while Madam Fan tried to keep herself calm as she talked and scurried around, checking everything was going according to plan.
‘How are you doing?’ she fussed. ‘Where is your father? You did tell him the right time, didn’t you?’
‘Yes!’ Peach said for the tenth time as she tipped the chopped-up chicken fragments into a bowl and sprinkled them with salt and soya sauce. ‘I told him.’
‘Good,’ Madam Fan thought. She didn’t want him letting her down today. He only had so many duties as a husband, and he wasn’t very good at any of them.
Peach wiped the blood off the chopping board into the sink and used her arm to brush her hair back from her face. ‘What needs doing next?’
‘The fish.’
Peach sighed and rinsed her hands. ‘Where is it?’
‘In the fridge,’ Madam Fan said.
The blue carp was wrapped in a plastic bag on the top shelf of the fridge, flicking its tail in a languid dream of rustling plastic. She took it out of its bag and rinsed it under the cold water tap and the fish revived a little. Its tail was beginning to flap in appreciation as she held it down on the chopping board and sliced off its head, then slashed open the stomach from gills to tail. She thought of Sun An’s thing, squirting on her hands and clothes as she pulled all the twisted entrails out and threw them into the bin. A dead fish and a slippery and stinking mess.
Madam Fan came back in a swirl of air. ‘How are you doing?’ she asked over Peach’s shoulder as she scaled the fish. ‘Have you finished?’
‘I think so,’ Peach said, putting the fish down and wiping the side of the sink.
‘Good. Leave that now. I’ll do that. Go and get yourself washed and dressed. I want you to look pretty today.’
Peach wasn’t listening. She washed her hands, sniffed them to check they no longer smelt. Not only of fish, but also of Sun An.
Old Zhu’s wife spent the morning fussing to hide her nervousness. Da Shan had gone out after breakfast and hadn’t come back. He knows the time, Old Zhu’s wife told herself, he won’t be late. While she worried Old Zhu gave his vegetable plot a quick tour of inspection, checked on the tomatoes and picked off some snow peas, then carried them upstairs.
‘Look!’ he announced to his wife, who looked. ‘The tomatoes are doing well, too,’ he said. She smiled.
As his wife swept the floor and dusted the table-top Old Zhu smoked on the balcony, admiring his chrysanthemum. There were two heavy white flowers, bobbing contentedly on the air. He tried to remember the line from Du Fu’s poetry: when the flowers open they open my tears–or something like that; it sounded better when Du Fu said it. Something about the flower’s precarious glory and the grieving wind. Or was that from a different poem? Old Zhu was still trying to remember when his wife came and stood on the balcony and stared down towards the factory gate. She looked for her son but saw only strangers coming and going and getting in each other’s way. So many faces she didn’t know: and no sign of Da Shan.
‘Wah!’ she said at last and Old Zhu looked up.
‘Hmm?’ he asked.
‘What time is it?’
‘Eleven thirty.’
‘We’d better be going. Come on.’
It wasn’t Madam Fan who opened the door, but her husband. He didn’t like it when his wife’s friends came over and outnumbered him in his own house; but at least it gave him a chance to drink.
‘Come in come in,’ he said to the old couple, pulling them through the door. He dragged them across the room to the sofa, and he pushed them into it: ‘Don’t be so shy!’ he said. ‘Sit down!’
Old Zhu and his wife were relieved to see Madam Fan coming out of the kitchen wiping her hands. She stopped and looked at them and frowned. ‘What’s happened to Da Shan?’
‘He’s coming,’ Old Zhu’s wife said.
‘Oh,’ Madam Fan said, and let out a long tense breath. ‘So,’ she started. ‘What can I get you?’
‘Nothing.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Really.’
‘Tea?’
Old Zhu was about to agree to tea when his wife cut him short.
‘Nothing,’ she said. ‘Nothing at all.’
‘You must have something,’ Madam Fan’s husband insisted, and told Peach to go and get some tea for the guests. They sat stiffly as Peach pulled the stopped from the top of the thermos and then filled both their cups. The green tea leaves floated up and swirled in a miniature eddy, then slowly began to sink.
‘Are you hot?’ Madam Fan’s husband demanded.
‘No,’ Old Zhu and his wife insisted, but he was already on his feet, moving the fan and aiming it at his guests. He put it on setting number three and pressed the start button. The fan whirred to life and Old Zhu’s wife shivered. ‘Is there anything else I can get you?’ Madam Fan’s husband asked.
‘Nothing,’ she stated. ‘Thank you.’
‘Are you sure?’ he called over the electric whirr of air.
‘Yes.’
Madam Fan’s husband pushed through the bead curtains into the bedroom. The beads rattled against each other as they swung back in place, rippled gently. There was a couple of seconds when the beads hung still before he pushed back through them, a couple of ten-yuan notes in his hand.
‘I’m just going to get some wine,’ he told his guests, ‘you sit there.’
‘Not for me,’ Old Zhu’s wife told him, but the metal door swung shut and Old Zhu let out a sigh of relief.
They all sat in silence, the fan contentedly whirling away to itself. At last Peach spoke. ‘Well,’ she began, then stopped. ‘Well,’ she tried again, ‘I’m glad you’ve both come.’
‘Thank you,’ Old Zhu’s wife said and then the silence returned. Peach played with her fingers and concentrated on the sounds of her mother cooking in the kitchen; the hiss of spitting fat and the scrape of metal as her mother stirred the wok. She could still feel her cheeks warming. She didn’t know what to saytothe oldpair.
Her father came back and held up the bottle: Open Your Mouth and Smile Wine. ‘Shaoyang’s best!’ he declared. It was good strong stuff, to get the guests drunk. As he unscrewed the top there was a knock on the door. Madam Fan came sweeping out of the kitchen, wiping her hands on a tea towel and saw her daughter looking at her hands, acting dowdy. ‘Come on Peach!’ she said, ‘don’t just sit there–go answer the door!’
It was Da Shan. He came inside and stood in the middle of the room, everyone smiling at him, waiting for him to do something. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘it smells delicious–almost as good as my mother’s cooking!’
Ha! Ha! Ha! they all laughed, even Madam Fan’s husband, whose grinning teeth bit his cigarette as he took Da Shan’s hand and pulled him across to a seat. �
�Come in, sit down,’ he said, ‘don’t be shy.’ Da Shan resisted at first, but he didn’t want to look too polite so he let Madam Fan’s husband drag him across the room and push him back into his seat.
‘Ah, Da Shan!’ Madam Fan said, clapping her hands in excitement. ‘Welcome! Welcome!’
Da Shan saw the half-drunk cups of tea, could smell the cooked food. ‘I’m not late am I?’
‘The honoured guest is never late,’ Madam Fan expounded. ‘Treat this as if it were your own home!’ She pressed her hands together. ‘It’s such an honour to have you come to our house today,’ she started, the beginnings of an impromptu speech. ‘I’ve never had the honour of such –’ she stopped to think of such a what, and then laughed with embarrassment–‘of such a rich young man!’
Old Zhu’s wife cleared her throat. Madam Fan continued unabashed. ‘Peach!’ she called, catching a glimpse of herself in a mirror and putting her hand to her face, ‘why don’t you sing us a song!’ Peach’s white cheeks went red. ‘My daughter has a very fine voice,’ Madam Fan told Da Shan, ‘like a songbird!’ Peach bit her lip. ‘Come on Peach,’ Madam Fan said, ‘why not sing us some opera?’
‘I don’t like opera.’
‘Oh,’ Madam Fan chuckled, ‘come on.’
‘You know, I’m not really in the mood for opera,’ Da Shan said, and Madam Fan’s expression changed.
‘Oh but you must hear my daughter sing!’
‘How about after lunch?’
‘Yes,’ Madam Fan clapped her hands together. ‘What a good idea!’ She stood for a moment, assessing the situation, then began to usher everyone back to their respective roles. ‘Please, please!’ she shooed Old Zhu and his wife, ‘sit down! Drink tea!’ She picked out a large green apple from the fruit bowl and began to peel it. ‘Husband,’ she said, pointing towards Da Shan, ‘our honoured guest needs tea.’ The green apple skin come off in one long curl and she handed it with two hands to Old Zhu, then she gave the knife to Peach. ‘Here,’ she said, ‘I’d better go back and cook.’ She put an apple in her daughter’s other hand. ‘Peel an apple for Da Shan.’
Peach blushed and Old Zhu’s wife shuffled uncomfortably on the sofa.
