Hour of the Rat

by Lisa Brackmann

  “Do you know where he is?”

  She tilts her head to the side. A hitch. Shakes it no.

  There’s something she’s not saying, I’m pretty sure.

  “Look, like I’ve told everyone else, I’m a friend of his brother. I can show you pictures. We just want to make sure he’s okay.”

  “I really don’t know,” she says, and that part I believe.

  “What about Daisy?”

  “Daisy?”

  “Your friend,” I say, and I’m starting to get a little pissed off at this innocent-pixie routine. “She’s David’s girlfriend, right? They left together?”

  She tilts her head the other way. Actually puts a finger on her chin. “I think so, maybe.”

  “Come on,” I say. “You know if they left together or not.”

  “Okay. They left together.”

  “How long ago?”

  “Maybe … almost two months?”

  “Are they together now?”

  “Maybe not.”

  “Would she know where he is?”

  She gives a fractional shrug. “Don’t know.”

  “Do you know where she is?”

  Alice takes a moment to toy with the Hello Kitty charm dangling from her cell phone.

  “I don’t know why I should tell you,” she finally says.

  Well, shit, how am I supposed to answer that? “Because … it won’t hurt anything? Because David’s brother isn’t healthy, and knowing that David’s okay would make him happy?”

  At that point a couple of Westerners come in and take seats close by—a man and a woman, my age, except all healthy and glowing, wearing yoga pants and groovy eco-spiritual Tshirts.

  I switch to Mandarin. “I won’t cause Daisy a problem.”

  “It’s not so simple,” she mutters.

  “Okay, so the complicated part, what is it?”

  “Who told you about David and Daisy?” she asks abruptly.

  Now it’s my turn to hesitate. “Some people in Yangshuo.”

  “Was it Kobe?” she demands in a rush. “Did he talk to you?”

  And that’s when I put it together.

  “You really like Kobe,” I say.

  She blushes. “We’re friends.”

  “But he thinks Daisy is a better friend.”

  “Daisy is foolish. She’s not the right girl for him.”

  “And you think you are.”

  She looks up at me, her dark eyes flashing. “We want the same things. To build something, here, in China. We could have our own guesthouse, our own bar, but he is so stupid about Daisy. He can’t please her. She wants a car, a house, he can’t give her those things. So she runs off with David. And Kobe still wants her back.”

  I’m thinking, I hate to burst everyone’s bubble here, but there’s no way David … Jason … can give her those things either.

  “And if she stays away, maybe you have a chance with Kobe,” I say.

  All this is making me think, after years of obsessing over a guy who didn’t want me anymore, that it’s a fucking huge relief to be single and not give a shit.

  “You say you’re her friend, but you don’t want her to come back. I think you’re not a very good friend.”

  Now her eyes brim with tears. “Daisy is my friend,” she says quietly. “I want her to be happy.”

  “Wo mingbai,” I say. I get it. “But if she wants to come back, she comes back. I talk to her, I don’t talk to her, it doesn’t matter.”

  She bats around the Hello Kitty charm some more.

  “If you really are her friend, you want the best for her, right?” I ask. Twisting the Hello Kitty, as it were.

  She lets out a sigh, and then she tells me.

  CHAPTER TEN

  THERE’S NO WAY I’M going to be able to sell Mom and Andy on a vacation where I need to go next.

  We’re having dinner at a rooftop Italian restaurant in a prosperous village in the shadow of Yueliangshan—Moon Mountain—about a half hour by taxi from the Ancient Village Artist Retreat. I’m burned out on beer fish, so I figure why not ravioli and red wine for a change?

  This was one of the first villages in the area to start farmers’ restaurants and take advantage of the tourist trade. Now a lot of the farmers have made some money, which they show off by adding upper stories to their skinny cement homes, a third and then a fourth or fifth that no one actually lives in.

  Andy sips the wine. Wrinkles his forehead.

  “Do you like it?” my mom asks him, a little anxiously.

  “I …” He turns to me. “Ni zenme shuo, ‘wo buxiguan’?” How do you say …?

  “You’re not used to it,” I tell him.

  “Yes. I am not used to it.” He takes another sip. “But I think I can learn to like.”

  He and my mom smile at each other. He lifts his wineglass. My mom blushes and raises hers. They clink.

  This all makes what I need to say next so much easier.

  “I’ve got some bad news. I have to leave Yangshuo. For business.”

  “Oh, no!” my mom exclaims. “Really? Can’t it wait?”

  “I wish … but … it’s kind of time-sensitive. So …”

  “Where must you go?” Andy asks.

  “Um … near Shantou.”

  “Shantou.” Andy frowns. “But that is … factory area. Not very much art.”

  “True,” I say. “But there’s this … emerging artist working there who’s doing some really cool stuff. With … recycled electronics. And stuff. And …”

  I really should have thought of a cover story before I started drinking wine.

  “If I go there now, I have a chance to represent him. If I wait, someone else might sign him. And I hear that he’s really good.”

  My mom sighs. “I know that you need to take care of your business. But …”

  “I can try to catch up with you later,” I say. “I don’t know how much time you have, Andy. Before you have to go back to Beijing.”

  Andy takes in a deep breath as he appears to consider. “Maybe three days.”

  “Oh, that’s too bad,” my mom says.

  Truth is, I can’t tell whether she’s upset or relieved. She sounds upset, but maybe she’d just as soon have Andy to herself for a few days, without me in the way.

  Well, fine, Mom, I think. Here’s your chance. Have a blast with Anal Andy. Go ahead, do what you’re gonna do.

  She always does.

  I push that out of my mind. I have a mission, you know? I’ve got something to do. I’m going to find Jason because I told Dog I’d try, and any problems I have when compared to Dog’s seem pretty fucking trivial.

  Even if he does have a wife who loves him. And kids he adores. I mean, so what if I don’t have any of that?

  I can walk. I’ve got two arms and two legs. I can talk without having to fight my own brain to come up with the words. I can work, and I have a good job. I get to represent Lao Zhang’s art, which, even though I still don’t know that much about art, I know it’s good art, and important, and means something.

  Except of course that I can’t sell it and the DSD is on my ass waiting for me to fuck something up. To lead them to Lao Zhang. To arrest me if they want to prove their point. That they have the power and I’m nothing.

  Okay, so let’s not think about that right now. Let’s think about the mission. Operation Find Jason.

  “Honey, you okay?” my mom asks.

  “Sure. Fine.” I raise my arm to call the waitress. “Fuwuyuan! Zai lai yi ping hong putaojiu.” I’ll have some more wine.

  Forget about all this shit until tomorrow. What else can I do?

  I WAKE UP THE next morning, and I’m kind of hungover, but I try to pretend like I’m not. Especially when Mom comes in after her early-morning tai chi session with Andy, all rosy-cheeked and serene, and I’m still lying in bed clutching my pillow and wondering if I have the energy to get up and make a cup of Starbucks instant coffee.

  “Do you want to get some breakfast?�
�� she asks.

  “Yeah. Sure. Maybe.”

  Mom sits down in the chair by my bed. “I’m just wondering … Do you want me to go with you?”

  “No!” I blurt, and then realize that probably sounded harsh. “It’s not a nice place, seriously. You should hang out here and have some fun.”

  “I just don’t want you to go running off because Andy came along,” she blurts back. “I guess I shouldn’t have told him about the trip. I should have said no when he wanted to come. It’s not … it’s not really fair to you. The whole idea was for you and me to spend some time together and have some fun, and it hasn’t worked out that way at all, and I feel really bad about that.”

  Hah. If she only knew. I don’t have a fucking clue what I was thinking when I asked her to come along in the first place. I mean, that was a stupid idea, right?

  It’s totally better if I do this on my own.

  “That’s not it at all,” I say. “I just have to take care of business, and I won’t have time to hang out, and this is a way nicer place for you to be. I mean … I wish I didn’t have to leave.”

  This is, actually, mostly true. I haven’t even gone down a river on a real bamboo raft yet.

  My mom sits there, eyes downcast.

  “I was just wondering …” she says. “Does it bother you that … well, I like having sex?”

  So totally not what I need to hear when I’m hungover and undercaffeinated.

  Or maybe ever.

  “I, uh … no.”

  “Because that’s what’s led me to make some pretty bad choices,” she continues earnestly. “I just … you know, I really enjoy it. Always have. It’s not about needing a man to pay the bills, because God knows the men I chose mostly sucked at that. That always fell on me, and you know I always tried my best, don’t you, honey?”

  “I … yeah … you worked hard,” I manage.

  “I wanted to make a good life for us.” Now she’s getting teary. “I really did. And I didn’t do a very good job. And I’m really sorry.”

  I clutch my pillow, because this is seriously freaking me out.

  “Andy seems like a nice guy,” I finally say. “If you like him … you know, that’s cool.”

  She gives me an odd look. Shakes her head. “Well, I’m glad you think he’s nice anyway.”

  Getting on the train to Guangzhou is a major relief.

  I PROBABLY SHOULD’VE FLOWN. There’s no direct train to where I need to go. The train leaves in the early evening, from Guilin, and I’m facing an eleven-hour ride to Guangzhou and then a transfer after that.

  But I’m actually looking forward to the train. I just can put everything on hold. Get my head together. And I’m not in a hurry, right?

  I spring for a soft sleeper, so I can climb up and sack on the upper bunk, drink a beer, watch a movie. I don’t have to talk to anybody if I don’t want to.

  But it’s kind of tough, because on the one hand I want to relax. On the other, I don’t know if I want to spend too much time thinking about all the weird-ass shit my mom’s laid on me.

  This is why I climb up to my upper bunk with a big bottle of Liquan premium beer and a Percocet.

  Just let me sleep for a few hours.

  Operation Find Jason. Oh, yeah. It’s on.

  SO I FALL ASLEEP in my bunk, and I have this dream that’s part dream, part memory.

  I’m wandering around in this church place, and in my dream it’s Sunrise, even though it doesn’t look anything like the actual Sunrise. Instead of bland, dentist-office decor inside of fake adobe, it’s this bombed-out collection of tents and weird little condos, almost, with shag rugs like in some of the apartments where I lived when I was a kid. There’s a service that I’m trying to find, except I keep getting lost in the tents and the condos, and there’s all these people just sort of lying around on the floor. I don’t know what they’re doing, and they just ignore me.

  Then Trey, my ex, is there, and we’re holding hands, and that part almost seems real—I can feel his hand in mine, the way it used to feel—and I can’t believe we’ve gotten back together, and I’m happy about it. All the stuff that happened, the bad stuff, it didn’t happen or it doesn’t matter, and as soon as the service is over, we can be together, the way we used to be, and I want to get naked with him so bad that I can already feel his body against mine.

  But first we have to go to the service.

  Then we’re in the auditorium where the services are held, which instead of being an auditorium is a big tent, like the Morale, Welfare and Recreation tent in the Sandbox where I met Trey. Except instead of soldiers, there’s all these Chinese people, including some of the artists I know, and Reverend Jim, the head preacher at Sunrise. Reverend Jim looks exactly like he did the last time I saw him, Hawaiian shirt and all. “Are you reporting for duty?” he asks me. “Are you reporting for duty?”

  I run away. The only good thing about this dream is that I can run like I used to, before I got blown up. But I run into this dark room, with orange shag carpet, and it’s someone’s living room, but not anyone I know, and the room gets smaller and smaller, and then there’s no place left to run.

  JUST TO BE CLEAR: There is no fucking way I want to get back together with Trey. Signing the divorce papers was one of the few smart things I’ve done in the last … I don’t know, decade or so. I’m not even sure if what we had was ever love. But there was a time I felt something, you know? I wanted him. Then I hated him.

  Now? I don’t feel much one way or the other. I guess that’s an improvement, right?

  GUANGZHOU AT 6:00 A.M. The third-largest city in China and the biggest city in the south. The train station is your typical China nightmare, magnified. It’s huge, run-down, and there are so many people shuffling and pushing, carrying their ridiculous huge rolling suitcases, boxes tied with string, overstuffed cheap duffels, striped plastic bags. I elbow my way up the platform, up the stairs, trying to find the subway entrance so I can get to the Guangzhou East train station, a babble of Cantonese washing over me in an unintelligible roar.

  I’ve never been to Guangzhou, but the subway part is easy enough. Line 2 to Line 1. Not as crowded as it’s going to be in a couple of hours. I exit at the Guangzhou East stop, thinking I have it wired, except I’ve somehow gotten off at this gigantic underground mall that’s at the same subway stop. Popark, it’s called. Most of the stores are still closed. It’s the usual luxury shit. Gucci. Coach. A fancy Japanese supermarket. A Starbucks.

  Which is open. I go inside.

  “Hello. What can I get for you?”

  I look at the barista, a slight guy with spiky hair, bright eyes, and a big smile.

  “A cup of coffee, please. Medium.” I don’t bother to order in Mandarin. Who knows if this kid even speaks it?

  He brings me my coffee. I sip it.

  Different city. Different day. Same Starbucks.

  It all starts to look the same after a while. The Guangzhou East Railway Station? Blocky granite. Blue mirrored glass. I could be in any big city in China.

  I FIND MY TRAIN. I’m going to a city called Shantou, in Guangdong, on the southeast coast. One of the original special economic zones, but it never caught on like Shenzhen or Xiamen. This, however, is where Daisy has somehow ended up, and with her, I’m hoping, Jason. Alice gave me her cell number and the address of the place she’s working. A toy factory. I guess Shantou is known for its toy factories.

  I tried texting Daisy in Yangshuo. Said I was a friend of “David.” No response. Alice said she was sure Daisy was still in Shantou. Maybe she was busy. Maybe she just doesn’t want to have anything to do with a supposed friend of David’s.

  It’s a six-and-a-half-hour ride from Guangzhou to Shantou. I have a soft seat by the window. No point in getting a sleeper, I figure. I shoulder my backpack up onto the luggage rack and sit. Stare out the window at the passing city, the endless glassy towers, high-rise housing complexes, clusters of shorter apartment blocks, cream and redbrick.

/>   Sometimes the black moods come over me like someone dropped a giant load of sand on my head. It hits me hard, drops me to the ground, but it’s soft at the same time, molds to my body almost, and I don’t know how to shake it off. I’m weighed down, like I’m drowning in it.

  Just because you feel this way now, that doesn’t mean you’re always going to feel this way. The army shrink told me that. “Feelings are transient,” he said. I think he was some sort of weird military Buddhist.

  “You let yourself feel them, observe what they are, let them go. And you think of a time when you used to feel different.”

  I try. I don’t have to go back too far, just to when I was riding the bike in Yangshuo. That felt good—that is, until I went riding after crazy Russell and he pulled a knife on me.

  I go back further. Think about being with Lao Zhang. Lying there curled up against him on his old couch in his studio. Or sitting there watching him paint. That used to feel like home, almost.

  But it’s not home anymore, and there’s no point in thinking about it. His studio is gone, smashed into rubble like all the artists’ spaces at Mati Village. He’s gone, and I don’t know if he’s ever coming back. And if he did?

  Sometimes I want to pretend like it was some great love, you know? But it wasn’t. I don’t think I even know how to feel that kind of big emotion. If I ever did, it got blown up, along with everything else.

  We were friends, that’s all.

  I just want to hole up somewhere and get loaded.

  Not an option, I tell myself.

  I need to call Daisy again. Set up a meeting if I can.

  After that I’m going to go to my hotel, watch some stupid TV, and drink beer. Try not to tip over the edge.

  My Shantou hotel, the Brilliant Star Inn, is close to the factory where Daisy works, and it also advertises “convenient traffic.” Far from the city center of anonymous skyscrapers and broad avenues, out in a suburb of beat-down concrete slabs stained with dark mold. The hotel is a five-story box painted yellow, topped with tinted glass. It has free Internet, and that’s the main thing I care about.

  I get there a little before 4:00 P.M. No answer from Daisy when I call.

  So I do some more research on Daisy’s employer, Furong Wanju Zhizaochang, which means something like “rich prosperity toy factory.” Of course they’re on the Web. Engaged in the manufacture of “model cars, airplanes, model action figures, lucky chicken, the fashion doll, small farmer series toys, main bubble gun toys, and the UFO maze.” Their clients supposedly include Mattel and Disney. “We have always persisted in the business philosophy of first-class quality, sincere services, persistent innovation, leading ideas, nonstop progress, effective integration, humanistic harmony, sustainable development. We sincerely hope to become friendly with all walks of life partner, welcome customers at home and abroad to visit, guidance, and seek common development! Let’s join hands to create mutual glory!”