I cracked open the shutters and peered through the slats at the bright lights that bleached the Nanchang sky. A row of illuminated factory windows meant workers were toiling into the night. It wasn’t like in the countryside, where the stars made the blackness seem bigger and deeper. I’d left home for this.
Ren’s notepad was still hidden under the loose floorboard by the door. I sat by the window where a little light seeped through the shutters, and felt the coolness of its pages. It smelled of the dies used in bonding, but there was also an earthy smell to the paper, like mud. Ren had grown up on the banks of the Yangtze. However far we travelled from home, some things always remained part of us. Her pen was heavy in my hand, burdensome. The page was striped with shadows where I began to write.
At first, I jotted whatever came into my head, random phrases or memories that became a torrent, flowing into paragraphs. Soon a letter formed on the page. A letter to my baby, to my dear child.
Who grows inside me as secret as a flower in the soil; who turns and moves and is stirring me up at night. A small grain of goodness in this bitter agony of life. I love you before you are even born.
I think of you all the time, from the start to the end of the day, and all during the night … I cannot sleep in my bed tonight … Thoughts of you burn like a fire over wild plains. When will I see your face? I see it already … I know your eyes and nose. I feel your tears inside the secret place. How much longer until these arms hold you?
The page was damp. I wiped the tears form my chin and tore it out, anxious it should be kept perfect. More perfect than the person writing it.
I shut my eyes and pictured my baby’s face. It would look like me and not the evil bastard who had forced himself upon me. It would look like Mother, Father, Little Brother. I resolved not to let Manager He persuade me into going back to the abortionist. I kept his name out of the letter, as he would be kept out of the baby’s life, at whatever cost.
You are my shadow … flesh not for cutting … essential as the beating of a heart …
They cannot take you from me. I will guard you with my life. No harm will ever reach you. Whatever they say, we’ll never be parted – not even for a second. Ha! Listen to the way your mother talks before you are born.
I signed it ‘Mama’ and replaced Ren’s pen and notepad beneath the floorboard, exhausted. I clenched and unclenched my fists, my hands numb. “Trust no-one,” Ren once said and she was right. I tucked the page inside my overalls’ pocket. I’d carry the letter to my baby with me wherever I went – safe, as I carried the child.
The next morning there was no breakfast alarm. Circuitry was deserted. The blinds were drawn and the door to his bureau locked. I banged several times and called out his name. No response, not even the sound of his snoring. I was about to call a final time when a hand clutched at my shoulder.
The clean-shaven man raised his sunglasses. Manager He gestured towards my stomach, his impeccable face unmoved. “Did you get rid of it?”
“Why haven’t the food pipes come on? What’s going on?”
A look of smug satisfaction crept over his face.
“Was it you who turned them off?”
“Maybe.”
I pushed him on the shoulder and he faltered, gripping the handrail. He straightened his tie, composed his sunglasses. The old determined Manager was back.
“I suppose you’ll only find out sooner or later … I’m the new Head of Production, 2204. The Chief Executive was a puppy dog in the end, he just rolled over.”
I stepped back in disbelief.
“Most of you will probably walk out once you realise you aren’t being fed. That gives Forwood a clean start. Remember how we talked of change, 2204, the bright future? News of Schnelleck’s visit – even though no business was done – has been in my favour. The factory’s practically mine now to do as I want.” He rattled the bureau door to check it was locked, “Anyway, that’s irrelevant now, especially for you.”
“Sorry?”
“I said you were being transferred, but omitted the details.”
“What details?”
“You’re officially being transferred to the street. Understand? It’s over. You’re out.”
“But – you can’t do that.”
“I’m firing you on the grounds of material damage. It’s all there in the rulebook.”
“Material damage?”
“Damage to the physicality and functionality of this factory.”
“I didn’t do a thing!”
“Trespassing, theft of factory property, deception, contaminating the water, spitting, absenteeism, intimate relations with a worker of the opposite sex … need I go on?”
“You can’t sack me for being loyal to you, for doing everything you asked of me, for helping you achieve your dreams. Your bureau was a mess, the workers didn’t respect you. They laughed behind your back! If it wasn’t for me …”
He passed me a brown envelope. “Here, think of this as a leaving present, a bonus for all that rubbish sex. The thing is, 2004, I had someone follow you. That’s how I know you didn’t go through with the abortion. In the end, you were just like your cousin. No doubt she’s learnt how to fend for herself on the streets and so will you.”
He inhaled. “But that’s the past and I refuse to let this whole episode sour me. In fact, I want to thank you. You’ve taught me something very valuable. I am only young – a young manager has many things to learn on the road to success. You’ve taught me never to trust anyone ever again. This time, thanks to you, I’m going it alone.”
He bowed mockingly as I clutched the brown envelope. My first reaction was to throw it after him, shout an insult. Then my baby jumped suddenly and I steadied myself.
On the envelope, he’d written two addresses. The first said Madam Feng, Straight Street, Market District. The second address provided the clinic of ‘Doctor Quo’, a place off Shongshan Road in the heart of the city – an area I knew well from my shopping trips.
The addresses burned my hand like a firecracker. Damn him, the envelope was too thick to throw away, but too thin to bring me security.
I kicked at his door, never wanting to see him again in my life. It was time to leave Forwood. Every important effect and belonging accumulated at the factory was already safe; buried in a secret place, like Grandmother’s jasmine bowls.
So there it was: The Truth. Yifan wasn’t the twins’ father. He wasn’t even May’s fiancé.
“What were you thinking, putting the girls through that? What if he had been their father – were you just going to drop it on them?” shouted Iain. “Haven’t we been through enough?”
Nancy snapped. “Don’t preach about what’s best for our girls. I know what it’s like: growing up with a mother who rubbed herself out of the picture. Every day another part of you disappears. Okay, so you don’t want to be here, but don’t make me feel like I’m the mad woman who can’t let go.”
“That’s ridiculous. Of course I want to be here – they’re my children, I’m trying to help them. But you’re being so …”
“So what?”
“You don’t have the monopoly on pain, Nancy.”
She spat out the last remaining wick of her fingernail. Her mom’s gold locket felt tight around her neck. “I’m going out.”
“Can I come?” he softened, knowing she would say no.
Nancy hurried into the settling dusk. At first, she drifted through the streets unsure of herself, a Western woman alone. She reached a large crossroads and turned right, hoping it would lead down to the river. Her pace quickened. By the time she reached the river banks she was out of breath and perspiring in the humid night air. The bridge stretched out in front of her, as she remembered, its footpath dotted with fishermen. Beneath it, others trawled their nets. She raced up the steps onto the bridge and walked some distance to a solitary place. They had walked the twins out here those first evenings, when they wouldn’t settle.
Nancy gripped the wooden raili
ngs. The water was dark and intoxicatingly deep. In a few seconds, she could leave it all behind. Dare she? What would her mom say if she saw her daughter standing above this river black with silt?
A sudden memory surfaced, of her mom buying Neapolitan ice-cream from the drug store. But six months later she was dead, drowned; how bloody awful the turns a life can take, the pull of water inside a person, tugging in all directions. The old familiar feeling in Nancy’s stomach returned, of waves breaking, rolling, breaking and consuming.
She removed her mom’s necklace, stepped onto the railings and leaned over. Nancy felt light-headed, her sandals unsteady on the damp railings. It was time. Her grip slackened on the wet metal. She closed her eyes, unable to watch in case she bobbed back up to the surface and like a fool it didn’t work. She could do this. She could let go.
Mom …
When she opened them again, the locket was nowhere in that wide, dark river. It was only Nancy, alone, leaning over the railings. A chill lifted from her. The lanterns bobbed and flickered in the water’s gloom. The locket containing her mom’s photo had vanished and in its place: water – water, fluid and weak. Water, overcoming fire. Water, the most transforming of all five elements: turning solitude, privacy, nervousness, insecurity, introspection, mystery to truth, honesty and maybe, just maybe, a dashing peace.
She waited until the fishermen had gathered in the last of their nets; then turned and walked purposefully back to The Bluewater Hotel, wanting only to hold her girls.
Queen
The shadows shortened and the glazy Nanchang sun drew out ever longer. For the last time, I glanced across the square where I’d once queued for a job. I had been so excited, rushing off to the factory bus with my fake high school certificate and big aspirations. Now there was nothing worth staying for.
I trudged the highway to the university. Fast-food restaurants and market stalls sold books, fruit and posters of Western singers with crazy ice-cream hair whipped into headbands. The students in white coats were my age, but lacked the stooped shoulders of a dagongmei. They sauntered along in twos and threes, talking a foreign language, sphenopalatine ganglioneuralgia blah-di-blah … There was no mention of the herbal remedies I’d grown up with: ginseng, dragon bone, bitter cardamom.
I sought out a bench opposite the medical library and watched as students filed by, laden with books. Eventually Yifan surfaced from the grey building.
“Mai Ling, I’m so glad to see you.” He reached over to hug me, but I shrank back, mistrustful after Manager He.
“How did your exam go?” I asked as brightly as I could.
“The physiology questions were the ones I had practised; I guessed some answers on the endocrine system, types of intracellular vacuoles … No doubt engineering exams are equally hard to predict?”
“You’re much cleverer than me.”
Yifan blushed. “I still have a lot to learn.”
I suggested we go for a burger. The baby was always hungry and I was forever daydreaming about my next meal. I ordered the biggest cheeseburger on the menu and ate so fast the ketchup smeared around my lips. I gulped my Coke and slurped on the crushed ice at the bottom of the cup. Several students had congregated inside the burger bar while debating facts from a textbook. They were the real stars of the future. They had the potential to be whoever they wanted to be, go wherever they wanted to go. They were in high spirits and eager to learn compared to the weary, resigned women of the factory. I feared the shoe assistant had been right all along; maybe I was just an uneducated peasant.
Yifan passed me his napkin. “You can have my fries, if you’re still hungry. I’m not sure I can eat them all, so soon after the exam.”
I stared at him, saddened by fate. Our paths had crossed, but could never be joined.
“Mai Ling? Are you alright?”
I wiped the ketchup from my lips. “I’m trying to imagine the future. I have a picture of you in my mind: a doctor, sitting by the bed of an old wài pó, caring for her the way you do.”
Yifan found this amusing. “My family say I must use my education wisely; by that they mean a respectable, well-paid job in a state hospital. I’m not so sure.”
I bit my tongue. A good wage wasn’t to be sniffed at.
Yifan said he had an idea to work for a missionary hospital, “Where I can work independently to help those in need. But there are so few remaining.”
“Anyone who’s sick needs a doctor.”
“Not everyone has the chance. The other day, when I bumped into you on Fortune Alley, you probably didn’t realise, why should you? But that area is where young women, loose women, go.”
I thumped my Coke cup onto the table and huffed, “Oh, really!”
“It’s shocking,” Yifan continued, “That’s why I want to live a life helping others, not just myself. I don’t like the way people our age have become so selfish. Many people in the city have no-one to turn to – people are nicknaming them the ‘triple withouts’. You know the sort, Mai Ling, the villagers our age who come here looking for work and end up destitute because they have no home, no job and no income. I don’t know how the future will fit together or how I’ll find the right job. It’s not easy going against your parents’ wishes, is it? I can’t imagine there are many girls like you who win an engineering scholarship and leave their family.”
I bowed me head, ashamed.
“I didn’t mean to offend you. Please, I’ve been too direct.”
“Don’t keep apologising, Yifan. You are a good man.”
“You have every right to a successful job. I believe more kinswomen should be granted opportunities in life. It’s not fair us men have been so long in charge. Forgive me. I would love for you to talk more about your work – the 4x4 sounds a superb vehicle, so practical! Do you know how many road traffic accidents there are in Nanchang? How many legs are amputated, how many head injuries? A safe vehicle is a worthy …” Yifan talked on but I couldn’t bear to listen.
I had eaten too fast and was feeling queasy. I made up a story about a work meeting, saying I was already late. My hand went automatically to Manager He’s brown envelope stuffed in my trouser pocket. It was still there.
“At least say we’ll meet again. I really like you, Mai Ling. In fact, I don’t think I could bear it if this was my last chance to …”
“We will, but I have to go now.”
He beamed. “May I call by after work?”
“No! I mean, the Managers don’t like unapproved visitors, you know how it is?”
He gave a resigned nod. “Meet me in the People’s Park. I have a day off a month from today. I’ll be waiting in the shade, beneath the willow trees.”
I hoped a month was long enough for me to find my courage and tell him the truth.
“Yes, the shade is best, too much UV is bad for the skin, all manner of melanoma can …”
“Goodbye, Yifan,” I kissed him on the check and stepped out into the midday heat, unsure of the direction to Straight Street.
Madam Feng opened the door cautiously, took one look at me and said, “Who the hell are you? And who sent you?”
She did not look like any Madam I had ever come across before. She wore men’s trousers, her shirt sleeves rolled to the elbow. Her hair was slicked back from her square jaw and when she yawned, a side tooth glimmered like stolen treasure.
“I was with Manager He. He gave me your address.”
“Speak up, kid. The hell, you’re going to have to speak louder than that if you want to come in.”
“I was with Manager He. He gave me your address.”
“He-Chuan? I thought I’d heard the last of him, hell.”
She extinguished her cigarette against the doorframe and disappeared inside. I followed her trail of smoke.
The apartment was dark and humid, becoming lighter towards the end of a narrow hallway. I could hear Madam Feng’s laughter and followed the sound to where she sat at a dressing table strewn with make-up. Some machinery was hoo
ked up to a pincer tool and she focused on jabbing the back of her left hand, the telephone receiver balanced under her square jaw.
“Hell, Solino, you think I can get away with that? Don’t you remember the last time, at my place? I’m not joking, the guy’s a maniac,” she said.
I wandered over to the open balcony and perched on a blow-up chair.
“Don’t sit there!” she yelled. “She’s on my inflatable, Solino. Hell kid, get off that piece of art.”
The neon sign of a bar flashed across the empty street, and I wished I was on the doorstep of our farm.
Madam Feng’s voice was raspy from smoking. Her pincer tool buzzed continually as she talked. I craned to see what she was doing, there were no wires or circuit boards. The tool was being used to mark her skin. She winced as it jabbed the tiny bones in her hand. After each new incision, she wiped it with a cloth and dragged on her cigarette. Slowly the words ‘Take a Chance’ appeared in her raw pink flesh. A chance on her? On life? On love? I wondered how Manager He came to know a woman like this – there was so much I hadn’t understood when I staked all my hopes on him.
She held up her hand for me to see. “What do you think, kid? You like my tattoo?”
“I’ve never seen one before.”
She bandaged it with a pad then undressed, still holding the telephone. Her body was firm and contoured, with a blue serpent tattoo writhing down her back.
“Sorry, what did you say Sol? I’m getting ready for work here.”
I came to understand they were work friends in the same night club. Their boss, Mr. J, owed Madam Feng money and she was hatching a plan to make sure he coughed up.
“Hang on, Solino … Listen, kid, go find the spare room, get some sleep you look like garbage … I know, I know, but she’s new and I’m a sucker – you want to see the way she’s staring at my ink. It’s okay, kid, the needle won’t bite, unless you want it to. Go dump your bag. Go on! I’ve got work tonight.” She shooed me out of the lounge.
The Secret Mother Page 23
