Picture Bride

by C. Fong Hsiung

  I count the rings in my head. Halfway through the eighth ring, I hear Daniel’s groggy voice. “Hello . . . who’s this?”

  My knees tremble at the sound of his dear voice. “Oh, Daniel . . . I’m so glad I finally connected with you.”

  “Jillian? Wha . . . what’s going on?”

  “I’m in trouble and I need your help.”

  “How could you be in trouble? You’re at home with your parents, aren’t you?”

  “My papa is holding me prisoner here. He took my passport and won’t give it back to me unless I agree to marry someone he’s picked for me.”

  There is silence.

  “Daniel?”

  “Are you in any danger?”

  “No, Papa thinks that as long as he has my passport, I can’t go anywhere.”

  “Don’t panic and do something stupid. I’ll book the next flight to Calcutta. Is there a number I can reach you at?”

  I root in my purse for my small phone book and then call out my friend Deepa’s telephone number.

  When he hangs up, I hold on at my end. His voice lingers in my ear—the static did not diminish the love and concern I heard in his voice. The operator coughs. I ask him to call Deepa. When I finish talking to her, I take out some money and pay him.

  Robert looks up expectantly as I walk out. “Well? Did you get through to Daniel?”

  I nod. “Can you take me to Deepa’s house?”

  Deepa opens the door as soon as I ring the doorbell on her second-floor flat. She married Anil Ghosh recently and lives across from New Market, a few doors away from Globe Cinema.

  Her eyes dance with excitement in her tanned face as she grips my hands and pulls me inside. “How long has it been since we saw each other?” She leads me to a leather couch and offers me snacks and tea, but I shake my head.

  “I need your help,” I tell her.

  She sits down beside me. “What’s going on? I could tell from the way you spoke on the phone that you’re upset.”

  I take a deep breath. “I haven’t been completely honest with you in my letters these last few years. I was so ashamed of what happened to me that I couldn’t bear to tell you everything.”

  As Deepa listens to my full story, she wipes her kaajol-darkened eyes. She leaves a trail of black lines that smear her cheeks. “Oh, my sweet, sweet Jillian. Why didn’t you tell me all these things before? I would have offered you my place to stay if you wanted to come back here.”

  “Thanks, you’ve always been such a good friend to me.”

  “And now your papa wants you to marry this . . . this man who is fifteen years older than you.” Deepa’s eyes well up again.

  “I may need a place to stay if I can’t get out of this engagement that Papa is determined to announce.”

  “Of course, you can come here whenever you want.”

  “Daniel will be calling you in the next day or two. Our phone at home is not working. I’ll try and come back tomorrow to find out if he’s called. If I can’t make it here myself, I’ll send one of my brothers to see you. In fact, I’ll try and come by every day until we hear from him.”

  “Yes, that’s a good idea. Anil should be coming home for lunch soon, you could meet him if you stay longer.”

  “Oh, how selfish I am. I’ve been so absorbed with myself I forgot to ask about you. How is your newlywed life going? Tell me about your husband.” Deepa and Anil were married in October, after an arranged meeting followed by a brief courtship.

  Deepa’s face breaks into an angelic smile. “Anil is everything I dreamed about in a husband. He’s a wonderful man. I don’t know what I did to deserve him.”

  “You’re special . . . that’s why.”

  Mama turns her head towards us as Robert’s scooter glides inside the gate. She leaves the worker, still gesticulating and muttering. “Where have you been?” she asks us.

  I toss my head back. “To the post office.”

  “What for? I was looking all over for you. Why didn’t you tell me where you were going?”

  I dismount from the scooter. “I needed to call Daniel.”

  She looks startled. “Your papa will not be happy to hear that.”

  “He won’t know unless you tell him.” I walk away. “And I have every right to call Daniel. He’s my fiancé.”

  Mama touches my arm. I ignore her and continue towards the stairs.

  “Please don’t be upset. We are doing what we think is best for you.”

  “No, Mama, this is all about Papa’s good name. I have found someone who truly loves me as much as I love him, and I am happy. Yet you want to take me away from him.”

  “I want you to be happy.”

  “Then leave me alone and let me marry Daniel.”

  Uncertainty flickers in her eyes. Ah-Poh has joined us, and she pushes in.

  “Jie-Lan is right. She should be allowed to make her choices. We have done her wrong once already. I regret coaxing her to marry that no-good Peter.”

  Conflicting emotions seem to chase each other across Mama’s face. She sighs. “All right, but what will Chin-Shen say when he finds out?”

  I glimpse Ah-Poh’s feisty gaze behind her glasses. “You and I will talk to him together. We will make him understand.”

  Kuku hovers over the smoke-blackened wok in her main floor kitchen near the entrance to her tannery. Amy’s back is towards the door as she sets chopsticks and soup spoons on the round aluminum table a few yards away. Cooking aroma vies with the stench of chemicals and rawhide from the tannery.

  Mama rolls up the sleeves of her bright cotton jacket as she approaches Kuku’s kitchen. “Do you need some help?”

  Kuku glances at us sideways while she flips the vegetables in the wok with a metal spatula. “We’re almost done, but you can thicken the mushroom soup for me if you want.”

  Mama finds a bowl and reaches for the cornstarch in a jar on a shelf near Kuku’s head. I leave the two women, friends since they attended the local Chinese school together as children and teenagers. Many women don’t get along with their sisters-in-law, but I have never heard Mama speak ill of Kuku.

  Amy has seen me. She beckons with her hand. “Jie-Lan, come with me. Let’s go inside. I have news for you.”

  I follow her, skirting around the dining table to enter a large bedroom. Amy and her younger sister, Yanmei, share a king-sized upper bed under which a big boxy trundle bed resides, rolled out only at night for Kuku and her husband, whom I call Kuchong. I sit on one of the two chairs in the room, placed beside a sturdy wooden desk.

  Amy has bagged a prize. “I received a marriage proposal from someone who lives in England. Do you remember the Lin family who owns that tannery near Lee Ah-Poh’s place? They have a son who immigrated ten years ago.”

  Her excited face has the same wide-eyed expression I used to see in myself. Already quite the belle in Tangra, she has her pick of marriage proposals. “You’re only eighteen. Wait a little longer.”

  “Almost nineteen,” she says. She opens a drawer and retrieves an envelope. Carefully, she pulls out a small picture. “Here, take a look. Don’t you think he’s good-looking? And I’ll leave this God-forsaken place.” Her eyes gaze into the distance, as though already visualizing herself in England.

  “Don’t you want to go to college before you get married?”

  An exasperated sigh escapes as she sits down on the other chair. “College is not for me. You only finished high school, and you’re doing fine in Canada.”

  “I’m taking accounting courses in Toronto. My high school diploma didn’t get me very far. If I remember correctly, he’s at least thirty. Don’t you care that he’s so much older than you and that you don’t know him at all?”

  “From what I heard, this Sunny Yang is probably forty, and you’re consider
ing marrying him.”

  I glance at Amy in shock. “Who told you about this marriage proposal? In any case, I haven’t agreed to marry him.”

  “But you will, you know you will.”

  Amy’s confidence unnerves me. “You’re forgetting something. I’m already engaged to Daniel.”

  “Oh, he’s just a fankwei. Your papa will die before he lets you marry him.”

  Emotions roil inside me, but I suppress them from boiling over. “So, have you decided what you’re going to do about this Lin guy?”

  She ponders for a while. “A part of me wants to say yes, but there’s another part of me that says to wait. Oh, Jie-Lan, do you think I should turn him down?”

  “Don’t be too hasty with your decision. I too was fed up with the narrow-mindedness of the people here and the way they watch your every move, but getting married just to leave this place is not the answer.”

  “Hmm.”

  I tilt her face towards me. “Your parents are not forcing you to accept, are they?”

  She shakes her head. I expel a long breath. I hope she will consider my advice although I fear that the glamour of going to England to a handsome suitor may be too tempting.

  It’s 6 AM on Wednesday morning, and jetlag and a virus catch up with me—my damp clothes probably contributing to the fever. Although I aired my clothes after the downpour that pelted my suitcases at the airport, the cold and the moisture continue to cling to the fibers. Without a dryer to infuse warmth back into my sweaters, the winter sun’s tepid heat doesn’t do its job. For three nights my restless brain has churned over my situation. I wonder if Mama and Ah-Poh spoke to Papa today about Sunny Yang. I know that I will never marry him even if my life were to depend on it.

  I fling the covers away. The cold air wraps me like a wet cloak. Barefoot, I open the door to peek outside. Nothing stirs. Mama won’t be back from the market yet. Quietly I make my way to the living room. I put the telephone receiver to my ear. It’s still dead.Dead air.

  I meander to the window. My eyes sweep across the wooden plank field in front of the tannery, come to rest on a lone figure at the far end near the water. The man walks a few paces along the waterfront, and then stops to view the farmland beyond the pond. He bends on his knees and leans over the wooden boards to look into the water. After a while, he stands, retraces his steps, and repeats the same motions at another spot. He intrigues me and I do not recognize him in the darkness.

  I hear a cough behind me. When I turn, my eyes meet Papa’s—soft like I haven’t seen in a long time.

  “Lee-Lan used to put her arms behind her head like you did just now,” Papa’s voice catches.

  His reference to Lee-Lan startles me. “I miss Lee-Lan too,” I want to say as I choke back a lump in my throat.

  He sits down on the couch and pats it near him inviting me to come over. When I am seated, he says, “Your mama told me that you are determined to marry your fankwei.”

  My heart lurches. Has he changed his mind? “I love Daniel very much.”

  “Bah . . . young people and their talk of love. Love can only take you so far. If you have nothing in common in your cultures, your marriage will not survive.”

  “Daniel loves me. His family accepts me. Of course, we have challenges because we are from two different worlds, but whose marriage doesn’t have problems? We compromise and accommodate each other.”

  Papa looks sadly at me. “Do you not understand that I’m only looking out for your interests? You’re still young and you don’t always know what’s best for you.”

  Keeping my eyes down, I say, “I understand, Papa.”

  “So trust me when I tell you that Sunny will be a good husband for you. He is not like Peter. He had a happy marriage, but sad for him . . . his wife died when she gave birth to their second son.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that.” With a heavy heart, I understand that Papa will never change his mind. I might as well try to move a mountain.

  “On Friday, we will have a double celebration—Ah-Poh’s birthday and your engagement. You will make me proud. You will thank your papa one day.”

  My body aches and my eyes burn. The fever that began this morning has not abated. I need to find out if Daniel has been in touch—I must see Deepa. My conversation with Papa this morning adds to my sense of urgency.

  A knock on my door is followed by Robert’s head peeping inside. “How are you feeling?”

  I blow my nose into a tissue. “Not good. Can you do me a favour?”

  Robert steps in and closes the door behind him. “Sure, anything.”

  “Can you go see Deepa and find out if she has a message for me?” My throat hurts when I speak.

  “Mama needs me to help her in the factory this afternoon. If I can’t get out of the chore, then I’ll ask Shane to go as soon as he gets home.”

  I am confident that between the two, one of them will see Deepa. “Shane wanted the three of us to go out together. Too bad I’m sick today. Do you know what he was planning?”

  Robert glances furtively at the door before he sits down on the bed and lowers his voice. “He wants to introduce his girlfriend to you . . . you know, get your opinion about her. Since he can’t date her openly, he thought we could meet her and her sister together at a movie theatre.”

  “Oh, I wish I weren’t sick. We’ll have to go out another time.” I give him a weak smile.

  “You just focus on getting well soon.”

  As he walks out, Ah-Poh bustles in, a bowl in hand. “I made chicken soup for you.” She brings me the bowl of steaming broth and sits on the edge of the bed. “You must get better for the banquet. You’ve come so far for this.”

  Although I do not have an appetite, I spoon some soup into my mouth. The hot liquid soothes my throat. Ah-Poh watches me like a hawk until I drain the last drop.

  Feeling better, I tell her, “You should come to Canada and meet my Daniel.”

  “Heh, heh. Ah-Poh is too old to travel.” Her eyes twinkle behind the stained glasses.

  “No, you’re not. We just have to convince Papa to give up his idea of making me marry Sunny. Then when I return to Toronto, you can visit me, maybe come attend my wedding there.”

  Ah-Poh wrinkles her forehead. “Aiya, your papa is determined that you and Sunny get engaged on Friday. I’ve tried to talk him out of it, but he won’t listen to me or your mama.”

  Just like that, any last hope I’ve entertained that Ah-Poh and Mama can stop Papa’s insanity evaporates like the steam from the chicken broth.

  My eyelids droop, and I am lost in fevered dreams that play like a disjointed movie trailer. I hear Lee-Lan call Jie-Jie over and over. I open my eyes. “Lee . . . oh, it’s you, Robert.”

  “Jie-Jie, I’m sorry to wake you.” Robert is bending over me, his hand on my forehead.

  “It’s okay, I’m glad you woke me. I was having a bad dream.”

  His lips curve into a half-smile. “I was able to meet with Deepa. I have some news for you: Daniel said that he will be flying out Wednesday evening Toronto time. He will be here on Friday afternoon.”

  I grasp his hand. “Oh, finally, some good news . . . but that means he’ll be arriving right in the middle of Ah-Poh’s banquet.”

  “Deepa said not to worry. She will meet Daniel at the airport and bring him to her flat.”

  My spirit soars at the prospect of seeing Daniel soon. Then I frown. “Papa insists on announcing my engagement to Sunny in the Chinese newspaper on Friday—not that it will be a real engagement because I have no intention of marrying that man.”

  “We will get you to Deepa’s place somehow on Friday without Papa finding out. It’ll be easy with so many people in the tannery during the banquet. You may have to leave most of your things behind.”

  “I can always buy new cloth
es when I get back to Toronto.”

  Leaving without my luggage is the least of my concerns right now. I need to get my passport back from Papa somehow.

  ·22·

  Another sleepless night, and I fret that I will not be able to get my passport back from Papa. Although I think my fever has broken, my head still pounds, as it has done all day. The clock’s tick-tocking only adds to my angst.

  Someone whistles on the veranda, which runs all the way on the front side of the tannery. It must be our night watchman doing his rounds. We call him Darwan. Robert told me a funny incident about Darwan. When he was first hired a few months ago, he would prance about noisily outside Ah-Poh’s window every night. When she berated him for making a racket and disturbing her sleep, Robert stepped in to inquire. He discovered that Darwan danced about every night on the hour to let her know that he was guarding the tannery instead of hiding and dozing somewhere—but she only wanted him to whistle.

  And so, the watchman whistles a familiar Bollywood tune. It now fades toward the far end of the veranda. In the foggy haze, where sleep tugs at the consciousness and the mind randomly churns useless information, images of Darwan and Mohan drift through my head. An unlikely pair—the night watchman who should be sleeping during the day, and the driver whose workday ends at dinner time.

  The clock chiming jolts me awake. No, a soft clink, metal on metal. There are more sounds. Whispers, loud whispers. Where are these noises coming from? I throw my covers aside, walk towards the window, and part the curtains. No movement or sound outside except for a dog whimpering. The crescent moon owns the velvet black sky now that the rain has moved on, the stars’ feeble twinkling too far to shine a light where I stand.

  Perhaps I did fall asleep and dreamed I heard whispers. My eyes strain through the iron lattice bolted across my window, searching for anything that moves. Is that someone running towards our tannery? Another black figure darts across the dirt path towards our front entrance.