by Mingmei Yip
I nodded, consumed with gratitude for Qing Zhen and sadness over Baba. Then I poured out how my resolution to revenge my father had sustained me during my life as a maid amid all the tragedies, including Pearl's (another maid, my sworn blood sister) death.
Qing Zhen looked at me meaningfully. "Precious Orchid, I understand your desire for revenge. But please don't let your young life be engulfed by all this bitter qi, which we Taoists consider very harmful to both your mind and body."
"But I have to right the wrong, to carry out righteousness. Haven't you heard the proverb `One may not live beneath the same heaven as the slayer of one's parents'?"
He thought for a while. "I know. But let me ask you a question. What if it will take you five, ten, even twenty years for you to find this warlord? Worse, what if you never find him? Will you pass your entire life tasting only bitterness? How much better to spend your time cultivating the Way."
His questions struck me speechless. I'd never thought that I might spend twenty years in finding, or even failing to find, my father's murderer.
I blurted out, "The qin, Qing Zhen, I play the qin to nurture my spirit."
Now he looked at me curiously. "Precious Orchid, how did you learn to play the qin?"
Damn. I bit my tongue. Once you've lied, you have to lie more to cover up your earlier ones. "My baba taught me before I'd been sent to the rich man's house."
Some silence, then he said, "Precious Orchid, if your mind is filled with revenge when you play the qin, it shows you're still far from nurturing your spirit. I'm afraid it's only the skill that you've mastered, not the essence."
The sharp observation of this hermit monk was unexpected.
"Precious Orchid, suppose you do have the chance to kill the warlord?"
"Then my goal in life will be fulfilled."
"But Lao-tzu said that followers of the Tao do not seek fulfillment."
I said stubbornly, "My soul won't be appeased, not until I find this warlord and put a bullet in his head!"
"Whatever your plan, can you remain still until the time to act?"
I didn't respond; he went on, "If your mind will not be appeased until you avenge your father, then I have a better solution for you."
I studied his smooth face and his thick brows, which resembled two distant hills. "What is it?"
"I can prepare you a fu and some magic water to terrify the warlord and strip him of his power."
I failed to suppress a smile. Some moments passed. All of a sudden my energy was used up. Today's tragedies, and remembering my earlier ones, now left me drained and my eyes would not stay open.
Qing Zhen looked at me with concern. "Precious Orchid, of course, you're exhausted, so you'd better rest now. And we'll look for your friend tomorrow."
He let me sleep on his bed while he went to sleep on the floor in the altar room.
The next morning, I woke from a gentle pat on my shoulder. Qing Zhen's tall body was hovering over me like a mountain.
"Wake up, Precious Orchid. I've prepared breakfast. After we eat, we should go to look for your friend. It's been light for a while but I didn't have the heart to wake you."
Before we left the hut, Qing Zhen grabbed a straw shawl and an umbrella. "Put this on, it may rain anytime."
Again, we were out in the woods. Black clouds gathered ominously at the distant horizon. He looked up, frowning. "A rainstorm is coming. Let's go quickly to look for your friend."
I described as best I could where I'd found the bell. After a long walk, we finally spotted it on the edge of an empty field.
"Teng Xiong?" I knelt down beside the bell and called out her name. My heart beat accelerated, this time less for love than for life's uncertainty But I had no time to think. Qing Zhen had already lifted the bell and toppled it over.
I screamed. It was empty.
While I burst out crying, Qing Zhen sighed with relief. "Your friend has escaped."
"You're sure?"
He nodded. "She must be nearby. I'm sure we can find her."
"But she might have been kidnapped!" I let out a sharp cry. "Oh my heaven, then what should we do?"
"Just keep looking. There should be a temple nearby. She might be there."
Suddenly I felt fat raindrops pelting on my straw shawl. Qing Zhen turned to me. "The rainstorm is starting, and we'd better return now."
"Are you sure we can't keep looking?"
"Precious Orchid," he cast me a chiding glance, "I'm a mountain monk. I know how to live here. Sometimes there are mud slides; we might be buried under one." He held the umbrella over me. "Besides, at least we know that your friend has escaped. She should be safe somewhere."
We quickened our pace. In a moment, the sky darkened; the wind roared like a tiger and rain poured like bats. Mud spattered relentlessly on our pants and legs. Qing Zhen took my hand and pulled me along.
When we finally reached the hut and went inside, the monk immediately went to prepare hot soup and boil water for baths. Once I had eaten and bathed, my exhaustion returned and I went to collapse in his bed.
When I woke up, it was already quite dark outside. The wind and rain were still howling, but not as hard. I stared at the rustling trees and felt anxious but hopeful.
"Precious Orchid," I heard Qing Zhen's voice calling gently from outside my room, "are you awake?"
"Yes," I said. I sat for a while in the bed, while my mind swirled with images of the hermit monk and his magical rescue of me from the bandits. Then the feeling of his muscular arms holding me against his warm chest as he carried me to the hut. I picked up his robe and rubbed my cheeks against its rough texture, inhaling the faint smell of the mountain. I hastily put it on, got off the bed, and walked into the altar room.
Qing Zhen was squatting down, stirring some kind of pleasantsmelling soup on his small stove. His back was solid like a boulder and his hair wound peacefully around on his scalp like a pagoda. I fought an urge to embrace him from behind and bury my face in his neck.
He turned around and smiled. "I'm preparing this soup with different kinds of herbs and tree fungus to revive your qi."
"Thank you, Qing Zhen." My eyes made their nest on his. "But I don't want it now ... "
Qing Zhen stood up and we held each other's glance for what seemed like several incarnations. Finally he came over to me, then, as if I were his priceless Sung dynasty qin, picked me up, and carried me back to the bed I had just left.
With my heart beating like a lost deer bumping through a forest, I watched Qing Zhen's earnest face as he started to take off my robe, very gently, as if he were handling a newborn baby. Now I lay naked under the stare of a man, this time not a chou nanren, a stinking male, but one who actually made my heart beat fast and my body melt.
He blew out the lantern. In the moonlight streaming through the window, he began to disrobe, revealing a smooth, muscular body. With a vigorous swing of his hand, he pulled the ribbon off his bun and let his hair cascade to freedom.
It was a strangely touching sight-a man with long, thick, pitchblack, free-flowing hair. It seemed to say that he, unlike the Confucian scholars, was not afraid to show off his virility. Unlike Buddhist monks and nuns who shave their heads to overcome attachment, Taoists do not cut their hair to show care for their bodies.
As Qing Zhen crawled into bed next to me, I no longer thought about attachment nor nonattachment but only about his care for my body. His intent face was half hidden by his three-thousandthreads-of-trouble; his jade stalk ascended toward the Milky Way.
"Precious Orchid ..." Qing Zhen's voice rose next to my ear. His hands and lips began to explore the nooks and crannies of my body. How could a monk so excel in the erotic art of pleasing?
He pulled me to him, burying his face in my chest. Then he cradled my breasts in his hands and began to stroke them, while from time to time brushing my nipples gently with his lips. Eyes closed, his long lashes cast flickering shadows on his face. When he spoke, his voice trembled. "Precious Orchid, your bre
asts have heart beats of their own."
I played with his long hair and sighed with deep pleasure.
His tongue licked the inside of my ear and his teeth gently bit its outside. After that, he brushed his face over my neck, murmuring, "I can smell fresh flowers and honey in you." Then he slipped his hand underneath my bottom and lifted it a little. His other hand, like a waterfall, cascaded all over my body.
"Qing Zhen ..." I wriggled, starting to lose my soul ...
I stirred against him until finally his yang stalk entered my yin gate. The fervent thrustings emptied my mind and turned my pains into joy. We were like two animals, suddenly released after long imprisonment. Now we were beyond all attachments except to each other.
After our trip to the Wu Mountain, Qing Zhen held me gently in his arms. We both remained silent, absorbed in our own thoughts and feelings. I was savoring the after-flavor of having balanced the yin and yang. Ironically, though an expert in the art of the bedchamber, the first time I relished the gusto of a man's rain showering on my clouds was with a monk in a temple chamber.
I realized why Pearl could be so obsessed with the oil portraitist Jiang Mou-he must be adept at lovemaking.
I reached to touch Qing Zhen; he caught my hand and lifted it to his lips. Just then the wind outside seemed to call gently, "Xiang Xiang, Xiang Xiang."
"Precious Orchid," he bent to kiss me, "I love you."
I searched his face. "Qing Zhen, I love you, too."
Qing Zhen silently held me tighter in his arms, as if silence was a better response and the best comfort. I nestled closer into the warmth of his chest.
"Now I have you here, I won't feel lonely anymore," he said. Moments after, he slid off the bed and lit the lantern.
"Where're you going?" I asked.
"You'll see." He walked to the table. As I watched his naked body outlined by the moonlight, my heart was overcome by a pleasurable pain. Soon he returned with a brush and an ink stand.
"What're you going to do?"
This time he didn't answer me. He was busy grinding ink. When he finished, to my surprise, he pulled off the bed cover, gently pulled out my leg and started to write-on my thigh. The ink felt cool on my skin and its fragrance soothed my nerves.
When he finished, his face glowed and his eyes sparkled, as if he'd just emerged from a hot spring. I looked down and saw my thigh adorned with a poem in bold and vigorous strokes-like an old tree twisting its root.
"Oh, Qing Zhen," I touched his face while feeling touched, "the poem is beautiful. But how can I have the heart to bathe?"
"You can't keep it on your body, so let it stay in your mind," he said, taking my hand. Then he looked out of the window. "Tonight the yuelau-the matchmaker under the moon-ties the red thread between us. Our love will last as long as the moon."
We lay still for a while, dozing. When I awoke, through the window the full moon shone on me. Its detached silver glow gradually wrought a change in my mood. Qing Zhen's words were our wellintended wish, but the moon, like a bright mirror, simply witnesses the endless desires of mortals and reflects them back to the world. As it watches, things arise and cease, come and go, bloom and wither. Ten years, even a year, from now, where would our love be? Would I be seeing Qing Zhen's handsome face? Would I still be beautiful in his eyes? Were we only fleeting reflections in each other's mirrors, brief instants of memory, or merely flickering shadows on the red dust?
Depressed by these uninvited reflections, I tried not to think of love, but of the pleasures of the moment. I tossed my hair, circled my tongue over my parted lips, and threw Qing Zhen a long, penetrating glance. When his smooth body pressed against mine, I forgot the endlessness of desires, the blooming and withering. Change seemed to cease, as I felt his jade stalk harden, find its way inside me, and thrust away all my miseries ...
25
This Woman Is Not My
Husband
the next morning when I woke up, sunlight was splashing on my feet. I stretched and wriggled my toes, enjoying the warmth of the sun and the after-flavor of love. Then I saw Qing Zhen's face next to the qin table, watching me with a grave expression.
"Something wrong?" I sat straight up, pulling up the blanket to
cover my nudity. Then I wondered: As a prostitute, why would I feel modest in front of a man? But I did, because he was not any man, but the first man I had fallen in love with.
"No." He smiled wryly. "I've been watching you sleep."
I smiled back and rubbed my eyes.
"Precious Orchid, we better hurry."
"Why?
"Because we've already lost a lot of time-we need to look for your friend."
I bit my lips till I felt the tangy taste of blood. I'd been so captivated by this monk that I had forgotten about Teng Xiong! How could I be so selfish and heartless?
Half an hour later, we were again searching in the woods. Despite the tugging of my conscience and my urgent calling "Teng Xiong! Teng Xiong!" it was my poet-monk lover, not my lesbian lover, who occupied my thoughts. Although my reason told me that I should concentrate on looking for Teng Xiong, everywhere my eyes saw the image of Qing Zhen. All the passing trees were his muscular arms stretching out to embrace me, every sigh of the wind was his powerful voice calling my name, and every rustling under my feet was his moaning during the balancing of our yin and yang.
We walked for another half an hour when suddenly Qing Zhen exclaimed, "Look, there's a Buddhist temple behind those cypress trees." He grabbed my hand and pulled me along. "Let's go!"
A novice monk answered the door. I explained to him about Teng Xiong and the bell.
His face lit up. "Come in!" he said, then turned around and yelled at the top of his boyish voice, "Miss Precious Orchid is here for Mr. Teng Xiong ! "
Soon a plump, fiftyish monk hurried toward us, followed behind by an older, stooped one. Then, behind the two monks, to my great relief, the tired yet smiling Teng Xiong.
"Precious Orchid," Qing Zhen lowered his voice, "I thought you told me your companion was a woman."
Before I had a chance to answer, several monks had gathered around us, excitedly explaining how, during their dawn walking meditation, they'd heard sounds from within their temple's old bell (left there after a new one had been donated by a rich patron) and rescued the semiconscious, delirious, and parched Teng Xiong. The loud explanations exploded in the air, breaking the tranquility of the isolated temple.
Now the still weary Teng Xiong was demanding to know what had happened to me and so I explained to her and the eager monks how I'd been captured by the bandits, then finally rescued by Qing Zhen with his magical feat. Everyone's story told, silence fell during which I noticed Teng Xiong looking at Qing Zhen with suspicion and beginning hostility.
As we followed the small group of monks to the reception hall, I was well aware of Qing Zhen's silent upset and Teng Xiong's swelling jealousy. But I had no idea of what to do. Oblivious to the tension now being generated, the monks ahead were still relishing the excitement of the rescues by telling the tales over and over. With the interruption of their monotonous routine by these exciting events, the monks' cultivation of nonattachment had instantly been thrown out of their mind's window.
After we were served tea and snacks, the plump abbot, Pure Wisdom, invited me to stay. "Mrs. Teng, we've already prepared a room specially for you and your husband."
"But." I stopped short. I'd been about to say: This man is a woman and I'm not her wife! But Teng Xiong cast me a glance so sharp that my words instantly retreated back into my mouth.
She turned to smile at the monk. "Thank you, Master Pure Wisdom. I'm sure my wife is now extremely tired after all her worries and tribulations. She needs to rest soon."
I didn't even have the courage to direct my eyes to Qing Zhen to see his reaction. Moreover, I was glad that my sentence had been killed on the spot; otherwise, who would have believed such mumbo jumbo as "this man is a woman and I'm not her wife"? The monks would only think
that I'd become delirious after being kidnapped by the bandits.
Qing Zhen was silent. When I mustered up the courage to peek, he didn't even look angry as I'd expected-just dazed. He must have thought that I'd shamelessly lied and cruelly betrayed him. Inside, my heart slowly cracked into pieces. I could almost see the shards crash onto the floor, skittering along until they halted right under the statue of Buddha.
Now Qing Zhen was politely taking leave of the monks. Fearing he would be gone without a word to me, I walked to him and lowered my voice. "If you must leave, at least let me accompany you as far as the courtyard."
Once in the open space, I demanded before he had a chance to speak, "Qing Zhen, why didn't you ask me to go back with you?"
He looked both shocked and angry. "Precious Orchid, you're married and your husband is right here. And you want me to bring you back to the temple?"
I screamed. "But I'm not married and Teng Xiong is not my husband. She's a woman!"
"A woman?"
"Yes! Like me! With breasts and no jade stalk! "
He didn't respond, but kept staring at me with his penetrating eyes. Finally he said, "Precious Orchid, are you making fun of me?"
