Song of the Silk Road

by Mingmei Yip

  I exclaimed, “That’s terrible!”

  “You must have heard of the saying, ‘A prolonged disease will keep even the most filial son away’?” He shrugged. “Human nature.”

  I nodded. What more could I say? “Then who are those two people over there, her best friends?” Or her lovers, I thought as I pointed to the two men talking to each other in a far corner.

  “Oh, no, they’re just staff here.”

  Because, except for Lo and me, there were no guests to shake hands, to bow or prostrate to the deceased’s picture, or to utter comforting yet empty words, the whole service was over in a mere half hour. I carried out my duties of burning paper offerings, kneeling in front of my mother’s portrait and kowtowing three times while hitting my head hard enough on the floor to be heard by her departing soul. Finally I pressed the button to start the combustion of her physical remains. I tried hard to hold back my tears as my mother, or my aunt, or Mindy Madison, or Cai Mindi, was transformed from flesh to ashes.

  Two days later, a car was arranged by Mr. Lo to drive us to Tianjin, a city southeast of Beijing; after that, a small boat took us out on the Bohai Sea. Steadying myself on the undulating boat, I tightly clutched the cindered remains of my two newly discovered parents.

  Everything floated around me as if in a dream. I was holding my parents as my mother had me when I was a baby. Poor Wang Jin, he didn’t even know, as he drew his last breath, that he had left a child on earth.

  The soothing breeze and the brilliant cerulean of the ocean contrasted with my somber mood. On the jars were pictures of my parents in their prime. My mother’s hair was braided into two thick pigtails, her face tilted, her eyes looking up at something outside the picture, as if aspiring to a future filled with hope and adventure. The smile blooming on her smooth face made it seem as if spring was peeking around the corner.

  My father had a crew cut, and his intense eyes appeared larger through the lenses of his round, metal-rimmed glasses. His tight jaw and penetrating gaze gave him the air of a poet or a revolutionary. He seemed filled with ideals and passions to rebuild his country, or, if necessary, to sacrifice his young life for it. Two young people, partners and soul mates, filled with energy, life, and hope for the future. Had they imagined a home full of children, followed by a comfortable old age surrounded by grandchildren clinging to their stiff knees or climbing on their laps to mess with their snow white hair?

  I felt despondent. Who could imagine having to bury her parents a second time?

  I lost track of the time until I realized that the boat had slowed and was now bobbing in the waves.

  The captain, a fiftyish, rod-thin man, yelled to Lo, “Is this far enough?”

  “Yes, please wait here for a few minutes.”

  “Are we far from the shore?” I asked.

  Lo said, “Now you can carry out your last duty as a filial daughter.”

  Feeling numbed, I didn’t respond.

  “You can say a private prayer first if you want. I brought the Heart Sutra, so you can also read it to send your parents to the Western paradise.”

  This stern-faced man in front of me was definitely a man of many details.

  “I’ll first read the Heart Sutra for my parents, then I’ll also pray to God.”

  “Go ahead.” He held out the sutra.

  I looked up at the blue sky to meditate for a few seconds, remembering the Chinese philosopher Laozi’s saying that heaven is indifferent, treating all beings like straw dogs. True, we were insignificant as a speck of grain in heaven, or in God’s eye. Just like my parents, who had turned from flesh into ashes and were now to be dispersed in the infinite nothingness.

  I lowered my head to read the printed Buddhist wisdom:

  The Bodhisattva of Observing Ease is walking deeply in the profound wisdom, reflecting that all five skandhas are emptiness while transcending all sufferings…

  The ancient sutra was too abstruse for my Westernized mind to comprehend. However, I did like the phrase “transcending all sufferings.” Who wouldn’t want that? After I finished reading, I also muttered a short prayer to God: “Dear Lord, I am here to scatter my parents’ ashes into the sea. I thank Mr. Lo and the captain for taking me here so I can give my parents a proper sea burial. I hope both my parents, whatever their sins, will soon be in Your arms hearing the angels sing. I also look forward to the day when I could reunite with them in Your loving embrace. Thank You, Lord, Amen.”

  Too exhausted to think after the prayer, I turned to Lo for further instruction.

  He said, “Now you must say your final good-bye and scatter their ashes into the sea.”

  I lifted my mother’s jar first and kissed her two cheeks on the picture. “Ma, have a good journey home.” I thought that was the most appropriate thing to say, since she’d been such a fearless adventurer. Then the desert, now the sea, then heaven, or the Western Paradise, depending on which would be the most challenging route for her.

  Since I didn’t really know Wang Jin, I only kissed his forehead. Staring at me with his longing eyes, my stranger father seemed to say, “Daughter, sorry that I never had the chance to hold you in my arms when you were little, or to lean on you for comfort in my old age. Fate had it that we missed each other’s presence. The Chinese call this cajian erguo, swiftly rubbing against each other’s shoulders in a huge crowd.

  “Since we are not able to look after you, you must take care of yourself, my dearest daughter. Get married and have many little ones and think of me seeing my grandchildren’s sweet smiles and hearing their joyous laughter from above. I wish you a very happy, long, and healthy life. Now good luck and good-bye.”

  I was jolted by Lo’s touch on my shoulder. He handed me his handkerchief. It was then that I realized my face was raining tears.

  Lo pointed at my mother’s jar. “It is time to put Miss Madison to rest in the sea.”

  I noticed that his eyes were red and his voice trembling. Was it possible that he was crying, as he did when he had broken the news of my mother’s death in the hotel? Could it be that a lawyer would cry for his client? Or was it a man crying for a woman?

  “Mr. Lo, are you OK?”

  His voice was barely audible. “I’m fine. It’s just the salt spray gets into my eyes.”

  I stared at him for a moment before I turned to face the sea, open the jar, and spill its resident into the water. The sea appeared so calm and so bright, and so oblivious of our sufferings on earth. My mother’s ashes pirouetted in the air like dancing stardust before dipping to kiss the waves.

  Next I opened Wang Jin’s jar and did the same. Strangely, his ashes fell straight into the sea without lingering in midair. Maybe because he couldn’t wait to join his most beloved woman so she wouldn’t feel alone on her journey of no return.

  After I emptied both jars, Lo handed me two garlands and I dropped them onto the sea one by one. As if the flowers had thoughts and emotions, they impatiently rode the waves as if to catch up with my parents, to show the way for them with their rainbow-colored aura.

  “Now throw this one, too.” Lo’s emotion-filled voice rose next to my ear as he put a third garland into my hands.

  “Another one?”

  “This one’s for the fish so they’ll stay away.”

  Although I didn’t see the logic behind this, I fully complied, grateful for his consideration and compassion.

  I stared at the ashes, petals, and waves until my dustlike parents were completely gone from sight. From now on, there would be no more meetings—happy or unhappy—in this Red Dust.

  When we were back in the city, Lo asked, if I was not too tired, could he take me out.

  Sitting across from the officious lawyer inside a small café, it was the first time that I had a clear sense of this enigmatic man. In his fifties, with a slight build and neat appearance, he could have passed as a professor or a consultant. Lo was a man of important words and a serious nature.

  I ordered black coffee to match my mood, and L
o ordered mineral water, to match his blank mood, I guessed.

  After our drinks arrived and we took our first meditative sip, he said, “Miss Lin, I’m very relieved that finally your parents had their proper burial.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Lo. I wouldn’t have been able to do this without your help.”

  He paused to sip his water, then, “This doesn’t mean your mother’s business is over. Now that all items have been returned to the government and the chip from the terracotta soldier tested, we must continue to fight to have her name cleared.”

  “Thanks for doing all this for my mother. I hope you’re paid accordingly”—my voice had a slight taint of bitterness as I swallowed the rest of my sentence—“since I’m not.”

  “She was broke. I have not been paid for a long time.”

  I had wondered why he was so nice. Weren’t lawyers greedy and their devotion decided by their clients’ bank accounts?

  As if guessing what I was thinking, he said, “Miss Lin, you may be shocked when I tell you…” He stopped, tearing up.

  Seconds passed before I asked gingerly, “Yes?”

  He looked as if he was struggling very hard to say something extremely painful. Finally, “I’ve been in love with Miss Madison for a long time.”

  “What?” Another lover, my mother?

  Ignoring my shock, he continued as he dabbed the corners of his eyes with a napkin. “She was a very attractive woman, determined and courageous. Unfortunately when you met her, her beauty had been destroyed by her cancer, her incarceration, and her long legal struggle. In her prime she was so energetic that she made everyone around her feel confident and hopeful. I was but one of her many admirers.”

  This seemingly emotionless man had been grieving all along.

  “Are you married?”

  “I was, but I divorced after my ex-wife found out about my infatuation with Mindi. I never married again.”

  A man with a broken heart.

  “That’s why you try your best to help me?”

  He nodded.

  “You’re still in love with her, aren’t you?”

  “After her, I find other women uninteresting. Although Mindi never really loved me back, we did have an affair.”

  So he was the boyfriend that my mother had referred to!

  “You mean… until her death?”

  He nodded.

  Various perverse questions flashed through my mind: How could a man be still attracted to a cancer-ravaged ghost of a woman? Did they have sex? Where, in the prison cell? In what positions, the hanging-upside-down-lotus?

  Moments of silence passed before he took out a worn notebook and handed it to me. “Here’s the diary your mother kept during her trip on the Silk Road. You may find it of interest.”

  “Are you lending it to me or can I keep it?”

  “It’s yours. So you can know your mother better.”

  I flipped through a few pages here and there, not really reading, just trying to feel my mother’s lingering spirit through her neatly formed characters and intimate words.

  After another long silence, Lo asked, “Miss Lin, what are you going to do now?”

  “There’s nothing more for me here. I guess I will go back to New York and try to finish my novel. After that, try to get an agent and a publisher. But that’s really a long shot. A distant dream, I have to admit.”

  He looked at me deeply. “Don’t be discouraged. Just keep at it and you’ll succeed; you’ve got your mother’s fighting spirit.” He paused before he spoke again. “And her beauty.”

  I was amazed to see him blush.

  In the hotel, I stayed up most of the night reading my mother’s journal. When I finished, I finally understood why so many men were attracted to her. Maybe some mothers live through their daughters, but for me it had been the opposite. It was to relive parts of my mother’s life that I had taken my long, arduous journey along the Silk Road. She had found an unusual way to stimulate her daughter’s personal growth.

  There were so many passages in her journal that I savored, such as this one:

  August 3

  I might be the first woman who traversed the “Go-In-But-Never-Come-Out” Taklamakan Desert alone. If I lived in the West, pictures of me pulling my belongings on a sled would be all over newspapers and magazines. But in China no one even knows about my existence, or my deed, and I have to keep it this way.

  I keep thinking of death here in this harsh desert. If I “never come out,” then I will be like one of the billions of grains of sand, shifting in the soughing wind with not even ghosts for company. Yet even in this empty place, I always think of my little Lily who was two months old when I left Hong Kong to go back to China.

  Three days later, Lo told me that because Mindy Madison had passed away, the government decided to drop all accusations against her. But as expected, the three million dollars were not to be released. I asked why, and his answer was: It’s not a smart thing to challenge the government by asking why. Anyway, since I knew nothing about the Chinese legal system and had no connections there, I finally accepted that the best thing for me was to keep my mouth shut, return to the States, and move on with life.

  35

  Back to New York

  Manhattan, which I had always thought was the most sophisticated city on earth, now seemed bland in comparison to the Silk Road cities where I’d traveled. Indeed, back home everything looked so ordinary that my Silk Road adventures seemed to have happened in another life. But since there was no three million dollars I had no choice but to return to my tiny studio near Union Square.

  As soon as I arrived home I dialed Alex’s number, hoping his comforting voice and endearing words would ease my transition back into my normal life. But, as before, no one answered the phone. I even tried calling the registrar’s office at Columbia University and asked for Alex’s phone and address. However, other than confirming him as a graduate student there, they refused to provide any further information, citing confidentiality.

  Where was he? Had he gone back to China to look for me? Very unlikely. Then the scenario I most dreaded popped into my mind: Maybe this time Alex had really fallen passionately in love with another girl his own age!

  Depressed at the thought, I called Chris instead.

  He sounded so ecstatic that I, disappointed by Alex’s disappearance, felt wanted again.

  “Darling Lily, I’m so glad to hear your voice! You’ve really been torturing me by being away so long. I’m sure you’ve got a lot to tell. Can I come over tonight?”

  I thought for a while. “Chris, how come you’re so available all the time? Where are Jenny and Preston?”

  “You know, Lily, you’ve been away a long time. What do you think I did without you all this time? I spent my time with my family. I took my son to McDonald’s, the zoo, movies, ball games, shopping.”

  “Was Jenny involved?”

  “Of course, she’s his mother.”

  “That means you don’t actually need me.”

  “Oh, Lily, don’t be difficult. Of course I do.”

  “Did you have another woman, I mean other than Jenny, while I was away?” I felt a little uncomfortable asking this. For I could not really consider myself faithful to him since, even setting aside the hanging-upside-down-lotus, I’d been with Alex in China.

  He sighed. “Please, Lily. No other woman, only my family.”

  “So you have sex with her?”

  There was some silence before he said, his voice like a deflated balloon expelling its last puff of air, “What do you expect? You were away for so long, did you expect me to turn into a monk? Please, can I come over tonight?”

  “You still haven’t answered my question. What will you tell Jenny about where you are going?”

  “I don’t need to report everything to her. Besides, I’ve been a family man for six long months. I’m entitled to a break.”

  “I can’t see you tonight,” I said, thinking of Alex and wanting to wait for him.

/>   “Are you serious?” He raised his voice. “Then why did you call, to tease me?”

  “Maybe just a courtesy call for an old friend,” I said, then hung up and unplugged the phone.

  At six in the evening, heavy knocks at the door woke me from my nap. I rushed to the door and saw my former professor through the peephole.

  I flung open the door. “Chris!”

  He was holding, as usual, two bags of food. “Since you wouldn’t answer the phone, here I am delivering your favorite Chinese takeout.”

  Standing there, I couldn’t think of a way to make him leave.

  “Aren’t you going to invite me in?”

  “Hmm…”

  “Goddamn it, Lily, just let me in!”

  I did, then closed the door and followed Chris to the dining table. He took out the containers of food and set them down on the table. After that, he tried to pull me to him to kiss me. I pushed him away.

  “What’s wrong, Lily, you’re not happy to see me?”

  “I’m tired.”

  He studied me for a long moment. “Poor thing, you must be hungry, so let’s eat, and we’ll talk later.”

  So we sat down and began to eat in silence.

  Fifteen minutes later, after all the food was gone, Chris asked, “Aren’t you at least going to show me some affection after all these months?”

  I leaned to peck his cheek.

  “Why don’t we go to bed now?”

  “Sure, but only by myself.”

  “What do you mean? We always go to bed together!”

  “But from now on, I don’t want it anymore.”

  “Are you kidding me?”

  I didn’t respond.

  He reached to hug me and this time I let him. “You must be really tired.” Moments after he detached from me, he suddenly popped the question I’d been dreading. “Lily, I think at least I’m entitled to know your reason for going to the desert alone.”

  I decided I might as well tell him the truth, since there was no three million dollars for him to covet. “Are you prepared to hear the whole thing?”