The Flying Chinese Wonders

by jeff brown

  Stanley took a deep breath. With a grunt, he started pulling himself up.

  When he reached the top, Stanley flopped facedown on the ground with a slap. He’d finally made it—

  “Hey, Stanley!” Yin’s voice called.

  “Keep moving like that,” echoed Yang, “and we’ll never get to Beijing.”

  Stanley peeled himself from the ground. In front of him stretched a staircase carved into the rock.

  I promised I’d do my best, thought Stanley. He forced himself to go on.

  At last, his whole body aching, Stanley reached the end of the staircase. Before him stood an ancient temple.

  Now where are Yin and Yang? he thought.

  Suddenly, Yang’s upside-down face appeared before his eyes. Yin was dangling her brother by the foot from the roof of the temple.

  “You coming?” asked Yang, grabbing Stanley’s hands.

  Stanley landed flat on his back on the roof with a thud.

  “Ow,” Stanley groaned.

  Yin and Yang smiled down at him.

  “Finally,” said Yang.

  “We can begin your training at last!” said Yin.

  On the temple roof atop one of the five peaks of Mount Huashan, Yin twirled on one foot like a ballerina. With Stanley holding her wrists, she swung his body round and round over her head. He was getting dizzier and dizzier.

  He felt sick. His palms were sweaty . . . and then they started to slip.

  In an instant Stanley had lost his grip.

  “Stanley!” cried Yin, as Stanley soared off the mountain peak. He sensed a gust of wind and arched his back. The wind lifted him, and he did a backflip to land on the roof.

  “Ta-da!” he panted.

  Yin laughed. “You are crazier than a yak!”

  Yang turned down the corners of his mouth. “Again,” he said, perched like a stork on his good foot.

  With only five days left, Stanley, Yin, and Yang stood in a narrow pit filled with row after row of warriors made of clay. Some were taller than Stanley.

  Arthur would love this! he thought.

  “This is the Terracotta Army. They were buried with the first emperor of China in 210 B.C.,” explained Yin. “Only a few foreigners, like Queen Elizabeth the Second, have been allowed to walk through the pits as you do now. These artifacts are priceless!”

  “I’ll try not to break any,” joked Stanley.

  “Good idea,” replied Yang without smiling.

  Without warning, Yin dived headfirst into the army. She bounced and flipped, springing among the soldiers like a grasshopper. Without toppling a single one, she landed back beside Stanley.

  “Now, Turnip Cake,” Yang said.

  Stanley’s mouth hung open. Yin and Yang raised their eyebrows at him.

  He shut his mouth. Shaking his head, Stanley took a deep breath and plunged into the army.

  He hit the ground with both hands and pushed back up, landing on his toes. He cartwheeled into a flip and—

  His right pinkie toe hit a clay horse. It somersaulted into the air.

  Stanley perched his fingers and toes on the heads of two soldiers. He arched his back. The horse bounced off his belly like a trampoline. To his surprise, the horse landed back in its place.

  Stanley touched down next to Yin and Yang.

  “You have more flow than the Yangtze River!” said Yin.

  Stanley beamed.

  Yang did not look at him. “Beginner’s luck,” he pronounced.

  The big performance was only three days away. Stanley couldn’t believe where they were now: on top of the Great Wall of China!

  Of all the places in the world Stanley had always wanted to visit, the Great Wall was at the top of his list. He’d learned in school that it was more than 4,000 miles long. That was more miles than it takes to cross the entire United States of America!

  “Let’s teach Stanley the Ancient Wheel!” said Yin, as a group of schoolchildren in uniforms flowed past.

  Yang shook his head. “He is not ready.”

  “How hard can it be?” Stanley asked. After all, he’d been training for over a week.

  “But, brother,” said Yin, “the performance in the Forbidden City is the day after tomorrow!”

  “The Ancient Wheel is what injured me,” Yang responded. “We cannot afford another accident.”

  “You mean the human circle?!” cried Stanley, remembering the performance in his school auditorium. “That’s my favorite part!”

  Yin bit her lip. “My brother is right,” she admitted abruptly. “You’re not ready.”

  “What?” Stanley gasped. “Why?”

  “The sacred art of balance is difficult to master,” said Yang. His broken foot quivered in the air. “It requires wisdom. The Ancient Wheel is not to be taken lightly!”

  “I’m sorry,” said Stanley. “I just . . . Please let me try.”

  Yin and Yang exchanged doubtful looks.

  Moments later, Stanley hung upside down, holding Yin’s feet while she held his. They curved their bodies outward and expanded into a circle.

  Together they exhaled, and the Ancient Wheel started to roll.

  The stones of the ground rolled up and Stanley shut his eyes. He opened them again to see the sky rise swiftly in his view. Just as quickly, it dipped down and his nose met the ground again.

  Darkness, sky, ground. Darkness, sky, ground. Faster and faster and faster.

  “Slow down!” Yin’s voice sounded from far away.

  Somebody screamed, and Stanley glimpsed a flurry of black shoes. They were about to barrel into the schoolchildren!

  Stanley stuck out a foot in an attempt to stop. Instead, he lurched over the edge of the Great Wall. Their circle came undone. Stanley felt himself falling, but then Yin grabbed his foot and pulled hard. Miraculously, they landed again on the edge of the wall.

  “You must be luckier than the number eight,” panted Yin.

  All the schoolchildren in their black shoes cheered, as if Stanley and Yin had meant to do all this on purpose. Their teacher, however, frowned at Stanley and Yin, and swiftly corralled the children away.

  Stanley waved sheepishly to Yang, who was standing back where the Wheel had begun, but Yang did not wave back. Instead, he bowed his head sadly and turned away.

  Chapter 5

  To Beijing

  Stanley and Yin finally found Yang high up in the branches of a tree.

  They called to him, but he would not answer.

  Stanley leaned his chest against the trunk, and Yin bounced off his back and up into the branches. She hung upside down from her knees and pulled him up after her.

  They perched silently on a thick branch on either side of Yang. Eventually he spoke.

  “The great balance of Yin and Yang is off,” he said. “I know you want to help, Turnip Cake. But there are only two of us: Yin and Yang. Night and day. Hot and cold. Opposing forces in balance.”

  “But it’s my job to keep you in balance!” said Stanley. “That’s what Great Uncle Yang said!”

  “How?” wondered Yang. “By showing off and being careless? By putting schoolchildren in danger?”

  Stanley sighed. Yang was right: Stanley was just a third wheel. He’d never be as good as them.

  “I was trying to prove I could do it.” Stanley pouted.

  “You do not understand,” said Yin gently. “Forget what you can do. Forget everything. When you stop trying . . .”

  “That is when you will be ready,” finished Yang.

  All that day and through the next, Stanley practiced with Yin and Yang. He learned the Flying Monkey. He mastered the Leaping Fish. He was fitted for a Flying Wonders costume.

  And then it was time to go.

  They arrived in Beijing on the morning of the big performance. It was only there that Stanley realized how famous Yin and Yang were. They rode in a limousine, which was led through the streets by police cars. Yin and Yang rolled down the windows and waved to the crowds.

  Nearly eve
ry shop and building was hung with red decorations to celebrate the Chinese New Year, and the sidewalks were full of children carrying red lanterns shaped like birds, dragons, and butterflies. Yin explained that tonight was the Lantern Festival, the culmination of the New Year celebrations. It was for this occasion that the Flying Chinese Wonders had been invited to perform within the Forbidden City in the center of Beijing.

  “Is the city really forbidden?” Stanley asked.

  “Not anymore,” said Yang.

  “Now anyone can go to the Palace Museum,” continued Yin. “But for five hundred years, the Imperial Palace had been home to Chinese emperors!”

  The limousine stopped and a police officer opened the door. Stanley climbed out after Yin and Yang. A short man in glasses pumped their hands enthusiastically.

  “This is the mayor of Beijing!” Yin explained. “He wants to give us a special tour of the zoo.”

  Stanley had seen a lot of animals up close when he was in Africa, but this was by far the best zoo he’d been to. He saw tiny golden snub-nosed monkeys, which lived only in China. He saw Manchurian tigers—tigers didn’t exist naturally in Africa. He even saw a sea turtle bigger than the bulletin board that flattened him.

  And then Stanley saw the giant pandas. They stared out from their enclosure with their big, friendly black eyes on either side of their furry white faces.

  “My mom loves giant pandas!” said Stanley. “Can one of you take a picture of me in front of them?”

  Yang held up the camera and frowned. “I wish you could get closer.”

  The mayor and police officers had moved on down the path. Without saying another word, Yang looked meaningfully at Stanley as Yin gestured silently to his feet.

  Stanley looked down and saw that the fence surrounding the pandas stopped less than an inch above the ground. His eyes widened.

  Yin and Yang nodded quickly.

  Without a word, Stanley slid under the fence and popped up on the other side.

  He smiled his biggest smile for the camera.

  A growl rose up behind him.

  The camera flashed. A searing pain tore down Stanley’s right side.

  Stanley looked down . . . and then he passed out.

  Chapter 6

  The Lucky One

  Stanley opened his eyes.

  He saw a diagram of a body on the wall and realized that he was lying in some kind of doctor’s office. A man in a white coat appeared above him, flanked by Yin and Yang.

  “I am Doctor Don,” said the man.

  “Doctor Dan?” said Stanley.

  “Doctor Don,” repeated the man, as he fiddled with something at the other end of the table.

  Stanley felt a small pinch in his foot. At once, the pain in his side disappeared.

  He tucked his chin so he could see what Doctor Don was doing.

  Stanley gasped. There was a quivering needle as thin as a thread sticking right through his flat foot!

  “Chinese acupuncture,” explained Doctor Don. “It is very good for the relief of pain.”

  “How does it work?” asked Stanley.

  Doctor Don smiled. “Sometimes we doctors can only marvel at how little we really know.”

  Stanley blinked. He was sure Doctor Dan had said almost the exact same thing after Stanley was flattened!

  “What happened to me?” Stanley asked.

  “It was the panda,” Yin said. Yang held up the photograph. There was Stanley, smiling broadly as a big white furry face with black eyes lunged ferociously behind him.

  Stanley sat up and peeled back the bandage that stretched along the right side of his stomach. Close to his edge, he found a tear a few inches long.

  He could see right through himself.

  I’m hurt! Stanley thought in shock. This was the first time he had been hurt since becoming flat. He’d always known it could happen, but somehow he’d never really believed it.

  The sight of his rip was making Stanley dizzy, so he lay back down.

  “You are very lucky,” said Doctor Don. “There was almost no blood.”

  Suddenly, Stanley jumped up again. He remembered what day it was. “The performance!” he cried. “What time is it?”

  “We have to be in the Forbidden City soon,” replied Yin.

  “I can do it,” Stanley said in a brave voice.

  “I don’t think that would be wise,” cautioned Doctor Don.

  “But it doesn’t hurt anymore!” said Stanley.

  Yang shook his head. “The tear has changed the shape of your body, Turnip Cake. Air will not flow around you in the same way.”

  “But . . . what will you do?”

  Yang took a deep breath. “Confucius said, ‘Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in getting up every time we do.’”

  With that, Yang lowered his broken foot and walked carefully across the room. Gaining speed, he walked up the wall and backflipped to the ground.

  “Brother, you are healed!” cried Yin.

  Doctor Don bent down and wiggled Yang’s foot. “Remarkable,” he murmured.

  Stanley felt like a heavy rock was falling deep inside his stomach.

  “You don’t need me,” he said in a soft voice. He tried to smile. “I’m sure you two will be great.”

  Chapter 7

  In Balance

  “Mom?” Stanley said into the phone.

  “Stanley, is that you?” Harriet Lambchop’s voice nearly leaped through the receiver. “Oh, how we miss you! How’s China?”

  Stanley couldn’t speak.

  “What is it, dear? Is everything all right?”

  “I got hurt,” Stanley blurted. All at once, he started to cry.

  Mr. Lambchop picked up the other extension. “Now calm down, Stanley. I’m sure you’re all right. What happened?”

  “I bot born by a banda bear,” blubbered Stanley.

  “A panda bear?” gasped his mother.

  “Uh huh,” replied Stanley.

  “But they’re so adorable!” said Harriet Lambchop.

  Stanley tried to catch his breath long enough to get the next part out. “It was really scary. I got a rip from its claw. You can see right through me.”

  There was a loud thump on the other end of the phone.

  “Hello?” said Stanley.

  “Stanley, talk to your brother for a moment,” said Mr. Lambchop. “I think your mother just fainted.”

  Arthur got on the line. “What’s up, bro?”

  “Hi, Arthur.”

  “When’s the big show?”

  “In an hour,” sighed Stanley. “But I can’t be in it.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I got hurt! I worked so hard, Arthur. I climbed a mountain and bounced through an army and rolled on the Great Wall. I finally mastered a Double Flying Dragon. But now I won’t get to do any of it!”

  “Slow down,” said Arthur. “I didn’t understand half of what you just said. Start from the beginning, and tell me everything.”

  Stanley did. He told Arthur about the twins’ Great Grandmother Yin and Great Uncle Yang, and the meaning of Yin and Yang, and how he learned to use chopsticks. He told him about climbing Mount Huashan and practicing on the roof of the temple, and about when they trained among the Terracotta Army soldiers, which Arthur thought was terrific, just like Stanley thought he would. He told him about the accident on the Great Wall and how Yang responded, and the two days of intense practice that followed. He told him about Beijing, and the limousine, and the zoo, and the panda, and the picture, and Doctor Don who was just like Doctor Dan, and Yang’s miraculous recovery, and how now he was all alone calling home and feeling sorry for himself.

  Arthur didn’t say anything for a long time.

  Then he said, “Have you tried duct tape?”

  “What do you mean have I tried—” Stanley froze. He lifted up his shirt and peered at his wound.

  “Arthur,” Stanley cried, “you’re a genius!”

  * * *

  I
n the center of Beijing, in the heart of the Forbidden City, Stanley stood nervously between Yin and Yang as a giant red velvet curtain parted before their eyes. A wave of rapturous applause rushed over them.

  They bowed slowly. In a balcony, the president of China nodded and smiled.

  And then, together, the three Flying Wonders shot into the air.

  Stanley felt the rushing air on his skin, and the grasp of the twins’ hands, and the light rubbery bounce of his toes touching down and springing back up. He felt the top of his head brush the back of his ankles. At times, he could not tell where his body ended and theirs began.

  A giant flaming torch rose up in the center of the stage, and Yin and Yang encircled it and stretched Stanley before the audience. He felt the heat on his back as the light glowed through his thinning body: a human Chinese New Year’s lantern. The crowd went wild.

  Yin turned upside down beside Stanley. He faced her back, while Yang faced his. The twins curved their bodies outward, the three of them exhaled deeply, and the Wheel started to turn. It rolled majestically around the stage, with Stanley’s flat body forming an S through its center.

  They were the essence of the ancient symbol of Yin and Yang: opposing forces in balance.

  The audience rose to their feet. In the front row, Great Grandmother Yin and Great Uncle Yang cheered loudest of all.

  Chapter 8

  Small Wonders

  Arthur crouched on top of the bookshelf in the corner of the room he and Stanley shared. “Ready?” he asked.

  “Ready,” said Stanley. “Remember, don’t—”

  Arthur leaped from the bookshelf and belly-flopped onto the bed. He bounced up into the air . . . waved his arms and legs . . . and crashed right into Stanley, flattening him to the ground.

  Mr. Lambchop appeared in the doorway. “Arthur,” he asked, “don’t you think your brother is flat enough already?”

  Arthur got up off Stanley. “Stanley’s training me!” he said excitedly.