A Certain Smile

by Judith Michael

  "Oh." Her eyes were wide. "You really will? This will really happen? Oh, Li..." She kissed him, again and again. "We'll be together; oh, how wonderful, wonderful . . ." She sat up. "I feel so light, as if nothing could keep me down, ever again. I can't believe this ... it's so incredibly wonderful ... I can't wait .... Oh. How long will it take? I haven't the faintest idea what we have to do. Can you just buy a ticket and come with me tomorrow? No, it's after midnight, isn't it? Today. Can you come home with me today? You have a passport, don't you?"

  "Yes, but it is not enough; I need a visa." He propped up fringed pillows and they sat back beneath the heavy coverlet, holding hands. "It is not simple to get into your country. Your government is afraid that if the doors were opened, millions of Chinese would flood America, needing to be taken care of."

  "But you're a professional; you can support yourself. And you'd be married to me."

  "That is not enough."

  "It has to be!"

  "There are other ways." They were practical and brisk, now, as if planning a business deal. Li smiled. A joint venture. "My company could send me to America to inspect construction sites, learn new techniques. That is done all the time. Or I could join a professional group touring the U.S., or a delegation of scientists. Something like that. Either way, it would be easy to get a temporary visa."

  "Temporary? How temporary?"

  "Usually about a month. But then if we married, I would simply stay."

  "Then it's all right! Oh. but how long does that take?"

  "To get a visa? A few weeks."

  "That's too long."

  "Isn't that how long it took to get yours from the Chinese embassy in Washington?"

  "Yes, but I wasn't in a hurry. This is different. I don't want to wait. And something could happen, your government could decide to crack down on engineers or something, and you couldn't get out at all. Li, there must be some other way."

  "There is, but it is not easy. We could get married here, in China. I know someone who did it and it was difficult but not impossible. I believe he could help me arrange it. If we were married, I might be able to get a visa more quickly, and then we would leave together."

  "Oh, let's do that. I'd rather be married here anyway."

  "And have it finished, do you mean? So even if your family objects, it would be too late."

  "No, no, that's not what I meant; I only thought it would be so much simpler. .." She frowned. "It would just be simpler," she repeated firmly. "How long would it take? I think I could stay for a few more days if we could do it soon."

  "We probably could arrange a marriage in three or four days. But getting a visa after that would still take at least two weeks. Nothing in China involving paperwork gets done quickly."

  "I can't stay that long." She looked at him closely. "You've researched this. Or does everyone know it?"

  "Most of us know most of it. But, yes, I did some research."

  "You didn't tell me."

  "We were not talking about this; we were avoiding it. And I could not be sure that we would get this far."

  She kissed him. "This far and much farther. A lifetime farther." Her eyes were bright. "I can't believe it: you're coming with me! We'll be together, we don't have to say goodbye ... oh, Li, I love you, I can't wait for us to live together—"

  "What will your children think?"

  "They'll be surprised and then they'll love you. They'll teach you American slang and they'll spout Chinese phrases at school and impress their friends. And you'll love them, Li, they're so bright and loving and funny."

  "I would love them because they are yours, even if they were not all those things. And your parents? What will they think?"

  "They'll be surprised."

  "An understatement, surely."

  She smiled. "They'll be astonished."

  "And unhappy. Angry. Furious. They will think you have brought the enemy into your life. They will think I have hypnotized you, to get you to do this in such a short time. They will be sure I do not love you, that I am using you to get to America. They will not speak to me and they will cut you out of their will."

  "No. Good heavens, how dramatic. You're right: they'll be unhappy; they won't understand it, but they love me and they don't want to lose me or the children, so they'll spend time with us, and after a while they'll love you, too."

  "They will never love me."

  "Well, that's probably true. But they'll respect you when they see that I'm happy; they might even like you if they let themselves."

  "And change their minds about the great devil communism?"

  "No, I'm sure they won't. But you're not a communist."

  "I was."

  "They won't understand that, but they'll explain it away by saying you were too young to know what you were doing."

  They laughed, and Li thought yet again how wonderfully close they were. Molded by totally different cultures, they were more harmonious than he was with many Chinese friends, even women he had slept with and cared for. Still, her parents will be a problem. Her father, especially.

  "You're worried about them," Miranda said. "Especially my father. It will be all right, Li, I promise. I know them. They've got lots of stock ideas about the world, but what they truly care about is family, and when they see how happy the four of us are, they'll find a way to make that fit with their other ideas. I don't know how they'll do it, but they will, because they need to feel sure of everything, and if my life doesn't match what they've always believed, they'll make up stories to make it match. To make their world orderly."

  "That is a harsh picture you paint."

  "No, just honest. I love them, but I understand them. They're good people; they're just afraid of anything they don't understand. But they'll try to understand you because they won't have any choice. Oh, you know, we could build you an office in my house, our house, and ask my father to help. He built an addiuon on his house so he'll recognize how good you are, and if you listen to his suggestions—you don't have to take them; just listen—he'll be a happy man. Communism is small potatoes to my father next to construction."

  "Small potatoes?"

  "Inconsequential. You're going to need a car, too and my father knows every dealer in town. What kind do you like?"

  "I don't know. There are not many choices in China."

  "There are in America. You'll have to get used to that." She kissed him again. "I feel so excited. As if I'm a little girl again, pushing away the days to my birthday."

  "All the days will be birthdays," Li said, keeping sudden doubts out of his voice. "For all of us." He looked at his watch. "One o'clock. Can you call your family? You can tell them you're staying awhile longer, even if we don't know exactly how long."

  She calculated the time. "It's ten in the morning there, on Saturday; Lisa has a ceramics class and Adam will be at soccer, with my parents watching. I'll call in a couple of hours; they should be home by then. But I can't stay here too long, Li; Talia expects me to report on the trip."

  "Then you will go first, and I will follow as soon as possible. As long as we are married, it will be all right."

  "You said three or four days. Couldn't we do it sooner?"

  "I'll know tomorrow, when I talk to my friend. How calmly and coolly we are talking about marriage."

  "Yes, it's very strange. As if we're discussing a business deal." She smiled. "A joint venture."

  He kissed her. "Would you like some dinner?"

  "Yes. What shall we make?"

  "Whatever takes as many ingredients as possible. I'll have to start cleaning out my cupboards." He felt an odd sinking within him. Cleaning out my cupboards. Because I am leaving my house forever.

  "What will you do with your house?" Miranda asked.

  "Rent it, perhaps. No, probably sell it. A friend can do that for me. These courtyard houses are hard to find; it should be easy to sell."

  An unexpected silence fell between them. Wearing his silk robes, they went to the kitchen and made dinn
er without speaking, the only sound the rhythmic chopping and scraping of cleavers and the hiss of stir-fry. Li put some music on so the silence would not seem oppressive as they ate. They talked sporadically as they cleaned up and returned to the living room, and then, exhausted, holding each other, they slept on the deep velvet couch until Li sat up with a start and looked at his watch. Three o'clock in the morning. The rain sfill fell, a steady drumming, the only sound in the stillness of his house.

  He lay back, holding Miranda close. Her body curved to his, even in sleep, and she murmured, "I love you," without waking. Li listened to

  her steady breathing. I feel so excited. As if I'm a little girl again, pushing away the days to my birthday. He tested himself for excitement. What was wrong with him that he was not excited? Everything he had dreamed of was coming together—his father's country, his imagined home, a new hfe, and Miranda, a love of wonder and exultation—as if a sorcerer had invoked magic words, and made it appear solid, within his reach. Then why did it waver in his mind like a mirage, evaporating into the sky?

  He tried to picture the landscape he had dreamed of for most of his life. He pictured himself and Miranda coming out of her house, crossing the wooden bridge over the small stream running through her front yard, walking down the long street with its leafy parkway sloping all the way to the center of Boulder Colorado. He pictured them in her kitchen, her dining room, her bedroom, laughing, making love, holding each other through the night until the skies brightened and made visible the mountains nearby. He could picture that, and excitement flickered within him. There we are, at home, making our own life, and everything about it is good.

  He pictured himself on construction sites: American union workers in hard hats, American supervisors, American techniques, and Yuan Li working on buildings in Colorado, not in Beijing and Shanghai and Hangzhou, where everything was familiar, which rules to follow and which to break with impunity, which people to trust and which to bribe, the very fabric of each working day.

  He pictured himself in someone else's company, working with strangers instead of with the contractors and suppliers with whom he met once a month, at dinner, to compare techniques, solve problems, trade stories, deal with emerging labor problems, and share new ways to outwit the bureaucracy: contractors who, like himself, were changing the skyUnes of his country.

  He pictured himself halfway around the world from Sheng and Shuiying, whom he loved and who suddenly were drawing close to him, and from his granddaughter Ming, whom he adored, and his grandson Rongji who now, it seemed would become more a part of his life.

  He pictured himself in America, surrounded by newspapers and magazines in English, street signs and shop windows in English, television and movies in English, the talk on streets and buses and trains, in conversations at work, in dinner parties at private homes, all, all in the flat monotone of English, the very air American, not Chinese.

  He willed himself to see America as the fulfillment of all his dreams, the realization of all that he had ever said was essential for his

  happiness, and for the first time he understood that there were too many dreams for any one landscape to be large enough, or fertile enough, to sustain and nurture all of them.

  But, still, as Miranda stirred in his arms, he willed himself again to see her country as his, the place where he would settle and be complete. And what he saw was Yuan Li, trying to merge with the American landscape, skimming the surface of America, putting down roots in Miranda's house but nowhere else. Yuan Li, torn from the fabric of China.

  And he knew he could not do it.

  My love, my love, he thought, his face buried in Miranda's hair. I don't know if I can tell you this. But I cannot tell you anything else.

  He took a long breath and kissed her eyes and lips, and she woke, looking into his eyes. "I fell asleep. Is it morning?"

  "A little after three o'clock."

  "Oh, I have to call my mother."

  "Not yet. Wait."

  "Why? It's lunch time there; the best time."

  "Not yet," Li said again. He tried to say more, to find some words to move them forward to what he had to say, but no words came. Miranda's eyes searched his, and he saw their clear look become puzzlement, then slow comprehension, and then wild dismay.

  "You've changed your mind! Li? You're not coming with me?"

  "My love, I cannot—"

  "Don't say it!" She pulled away, back and back, until she was at the other end of the couch, her eyes wide and bright with tears. She tried to stand up, but the tangles of her robe held her fast and she fought to straighten them, pulling them from under her, fumbling with the sleeves and the sash until she cried, "Oh, I can't do this!" and she began to sob.

  Li thought his heart would break. He gently straightened her robe, closing it around her and tying the sash, then put his arms around her and held her. She looked up, tendrils of wet hair clinging to her cheeks. "Why?"

  "Because I cannot turn my back on everything, any more than you can. Come, sit with me. I will explain, if I can." She curled up beside him in the deep cushions, her head on his chest. She was shivering. "You're cold; I'll turn up the heat."

  "I'm not cold. I'm afraid."

  He held her close. She seemed smaller and more fragile than in the passionate hours they had shared these past days, when she had met him with a ferocity that equaled his, and his arms encircled her now as

  if to ward off anthing that might crush that fragilit}-. And how could he do that when they were thousands of miles apan?

  "I can't." he murmured, the words breaking from him, and he did not know what he meant: protect her, leave her, stay with her.

  '■Miat did you say?"

  He rested his cheek on her head. "Ah the things that make me what I am are here. My family, my work, my country. I cannot cut them out of me as if they are separate pieces that fall away and leave me unchanged, because I would not be whole without them. I thought they did not matter, or at least not enough, but they do matter; they are the forces that shape me and drive me. Especially now. when I am beginning to rediscover my family, and China, too. So much is happening now. the changes in the economy, in the government—"

  "Your government! Miat do you care about your government?" She sat up angrily. "You use your government as a role model for criminal acts! Oh. I'm sorr>". I'm sorry; I know you did those things to save yourself, and Sheng; I know you're not proud of them, but that's the point. Your government makes you do things you don't believe in."

  "Sometimes. But change is everywhere, now. People call this the Beijing .Autumn because—"

  "I know why." Miranda was frowning, remembering. "Sima Tmg, the Chinese woman I met in Boulder, talked about that. .And ... other things."

  "^"hat other things?"

  Slowly, wishing she had not begun this. Miranda said, "She said I couldn't understand her longing for home because I was home. She said her bones were Chinese and they hurt when they weren't touchmg the ground in China. That she could ne"er truly become an .American any more than I truly could become a Chinese. But, Li. others do it I MiUions of people all over the world move to new countries, and are happy there and never want to go back."

  "Some can do it," he agreed. ".And some cannot. Miranda, there are so many reasons. ... How can I leave Sheng? My father left me; can I do the same to my son?"

  "You were a child! He's a groun man!"

  "There are many kinds of need. .Age may change them but it does not wipe them out. .And Shuiying will need help when her husband gets into trouble, and whom can she turn to? I promised myself once that I would not abandon either of them as my father did me. .And people in my companv depend on me. And there are other things I have to do..." '

  "Like what? March in Tiananmen Square?"

  "I don't know. Miatever seems the right thing to do."

  "Nothing is the right thing in China!" Her hands twisted in her lap and once again tears were in her eyes. "You'll be arrested and spend years in jail and
how will that help your family and your work and your countr\' You'd be better off in .America, with mel"

  "Possibly. But it seems to me that I would be a hollow man in America—"

  "Even with me'!'"

  "Even with you. because I would have torn this life out of myself." He took Miranda's hand between his. "It is not only Sheng and Shuiying. I would like to see Ming grow up. and Ronsji; I like being a grandfather, you know; and perhaps I could make their lives easier in what will be difficult times. Isn't that what all grandparents hope to do'^"

  Miranda was silent. She cannot answer that, Li thought sadly. How can she tell me I am wTong to stay with my family?

  "All our dreams." she murmured. "None of them strong enough—"

  "They are." Li insisted. "Listen to me. They are strong enough, but why must there be only one way to reach them? Stay with me, Miranda. Even-'thing that we can build in America we can build here."

  They sat, looking away from each other, while the rain swelled to a deluge. The skies are weeping for us. Li thought, as we are weeping inside. With your rejoicing comes my laughter: with your sadness, start my tears. Do you not see that you and I are as the branches of one tree? Yes, oh yes, we are, he thought, but perhaps it is not enough.

  A shudder tore through Miranda's body. "I can't. I can't live here. I can't imagine bnnging my children to a countr- where you get used to being followed, you accept it. There's someone outside now, isn't there? Waiting for us. And we both know it and we hardly think about it; it's so normal. Your phones are tapped, your rooms are bugged, your mail is opened, and you accept it all. And you do things you hate, illegal things that aren't like you at all. because that's the way the system works. I can't imagine living that way. I can't imagine bringing up my children in a countr.' that takes all that for granted." She paused, then slowly shook her head. "I thought it didn't matter where we lived; all I wanted was to be with you. But I can't picmre myself living in China; I can't see myself leaving America. I'm too used to freedom, Li. I'm too used to having a goemment that protects its people instead of attacking them, and people who aren't afraid to criticize it often and loudly and passionately. And I like having friends and family and familiar places nearby, and customs I understand and a language that embraces me instead of pushing me away. America is complicated and