by Fan Wu
But Fenglan knows that her daughter said this just to console her.
“What will you do with your apartment in China after you move here?” Her daughter diverts the conversation.
“Let’s just keep it. If I don’t like living here, I’ll still have a place to stay in China.”
“I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to live alone. What if you get sick or have an accident? You have no one to look after you.”
“I’m quite healthy. Doctor Du in the Women’s and Children’s Hospital said that I could live to at least ninety. It’s normal for people my age to get ill now and then. No one can go against nature. But we won’t die so easily. Haven’t I been doing okay all these years since your father passed away? Of course, I wished I could see you and Guo-Ying more often. I used to think that you might move back to China. Now I realize that you like living here better.” Considering that her daughter might think she was complaining about living alone, she adds, “I understand that you and Guo-Ying have your own careers. If you choose to live here, it’s fine. I’m just happy that you are doing well.”
“Ma, I still think you should live with me. The air quality here is better, crossing the street is safer. Also, don’t you want to see Dongdong growing up? He’ll be very sad if you leave.”
“Of course I want to see him growing up, but…” She stops, feeling the dilemma. She has wanted to tell her daughter that she’d like to return to China in another few weeks so she wouldn’t be a burden to her and Bob. The more she thinks about it, the more she is convinced that her daughter must have been fighting with Bob about her—that’s why Guo-Mei has been beside herself lately. Bob is polite to her, but they cannot talk with each other. The first few days after she arrived, he would smile and say in Mandarin “good morning,” “good afternoon,” or “good evening.” But now he avoided her. If she was in the living room, he stayed away; if she was in the kitchen, he asked Dongdong to get him a beer or a glass of water. A few times he was about to step out of his bedroom, but as soon as he saw Fenglan in the hallway, he withdrew into the room. And if he couldn’t avoid her, he gave her an awkward and quick smile. She had sensed his discomfort and had tried to avoid him as well. Sometimes, she went for a walk so she wouldn’t be in the way.
She understands Bob: it must be difficult for him to live with an old woman from China who doesn’t speak English. Her being his mother-in-law must make things even more complicated. If her daughter were pregnant or had a newborn, Fenglan would feel more comfortable living with her and Bob because she could at least offer help. But Dongdong is old enough to play by himself, and with his schedule filled with school and all kinds of extra classes, he has little time to be with her. Extra, unnecessary: that’s how she sees herself in her daughter’s family.
Also, her life here is limited, as she has begun to see more clearly day by day: she cannot drive, cannot speak English, cannot read road signs, cannot take a bus, cannot go shopping, doesn’t have friends, and doesn’t dare walk far in case she gets lost. She regrets that she has agreed to emigrate. Now, her daughter has spent so much money on her. How can she just tell her that she’s changed her mind? What’s more, her daughter has tried hard to keep her entertained. On weekends, she takes her to beaches, parks, shopping malls, and other points of interest; she has subscribed to two Chinese newspapers and rents Chinese movies and TV shows all the time; she introduces her to her church friends and their parents and has hosted a few potlucks. Fenglan likes Guo-Mei’s church friends, especially Mingyi, Yaya, and Julia. The three of them visit her often, bringing small gifts, this time a tin of tea, next time a pair of warm socks. Sometimes, Mingyi stays for hours to chat with her. Just a few days ago, her daughter said that she would take some days off and accompany Fenglan to Disneyland, Las Vegas, and the Grand Canyon. Whenever Fenglan thinks of what her daughter has done for her, she feels that she must stay a little longer before announcing that she wants to go back to China.
Apparently having interpreted Fenglan’s silence as assent, her daughter says, “Ma, you’ll get used to living here soon. You’ve met some of my church friends’ parents, right? Didn’t they say that they liked living here?”
They are all couples and have been here for years, Fenglan thinks. But she doesn’t want to disappoint her daughter, so she says, “I’ll try.”
“It’s a little cold. I’ll start a fire,” her daughter says.
“Isn’t the heater on? Why waste money to burn logs?” She has seen firewood at Safeway—more than ten dollars, one fifth of her monthly salary from her factory, for only five or six logs. Ridiculously expensive.
But her daughter seems not to have heard her. She walks to the garage and returns with an armful of logs. As she starts the fire she says, “It is awfully cold tonight, don’t you think? The weather is unpredictable these days. One day it’s warm enough to wear shirtsleeves; the next day you have to wear a sweater.”
The logs are dry. Soon the fire burns vigorously, its flames licking the chimney walls. “Now it’s warm,” her daughter says to herself, sitting on the floor next to the fireplace, her legs drawn up, her chin on her knees. She stares at the fire intently.
“I’ve never told you this, but your father and I met at an evening dance,” Fenglan tells her daughter. “It was held outside, in an empty field, lit by bonfires. Most of the people there were young, and we did a group dance popular at the time.”
“Did Baba know how to dance?” There is doubt in Guo-Mei’s tone.
“He was a good dancer. Girls liked to dance with him because he knew how to lead.”
Her daughter is silent, then asks suddenly, “Ma, did you ever love Baba?”
Fenglan is startled, thinking that her daughter is becoming an American now, asking her own mother such a question.
“Who talked about love in our generation? Your baba and I were together for almost thirty years.”
“Did you love Baba when you married him?”
“We weren’t intellectuals. As long as we had a place to live and something to eat, we were happy. In those days, people just didn’t date like you do now. A lot of times, your work unit arranged your marriage for you.”
“If you had the freedom, would you have chosen Baba?” Her daughter is strangely stubborn, looking into her face.
“Guo-Mei, what kind of question is this?” Fenglan pretends to be angry, avoiding eye contact.
Her daughter shakes her head slightly, as if to say, “I knew you wouldn’t tell me the truth.” Then she looks back at the fire. “Do you remember that our house caught fire once?”
“Of course I remember. You were barely seven at the time. If our neighbor hadn’t found out and saved you and your sister…What a nightmare! Thinking of it gives me goose bumps.”
“We lost a nice cabinet and a stool Guo-Ying liked.”
“The cabinet was one of the only two pieces of furniture your baba and I bought when we got married. Your baba knew a carpenter and got a good price from him. The other was our bed, the one I still sleep in today.”
“I set the fire.” Her daughter’s voice is low yet calm.
“Oh…hmm…Is it true?” She leans forward.
“Every day you and Baba left home early and came home late. When neither of you was home, I had to take care of Guo-Ying—feeding her, dressing her, playing with her, cleaning her. Once, in winter, Baba was gone for a few months. You said he went on a business trip. Of course you were lying to me. I thought that he didn’t want us anymore. One day during Baba’s absence, as soon as you left the house, Guo-Ying began to cry and wouldn’t stop. Then she wet her pants. I took off her pants but couldn’t find dry ones, so I used my face towel to wrap her. The scratchy towel must have been very uncomfortable. She cried louder. I was sleepy, hungry, and cold. There wasn’t enough food in the house—and I had to feed Guo-Ying first.”
Her daughter shoots her a quick smile as if this will somehow lessen the tragic effect of her words. Fenglan forces herself to hold her d
aughter’s eyes: they are hers, her husband used to say. Her daughter looks away and continues.
“Somehow I remembered Hans Christian Andersen’s story of a girl selling matches, which I had heard from someone. The little girl has to sell matches on a snowy and windy evening, wearing neither a hat nor shoes. She doesn’t have much luck, and when she is freezing she lights a match to warm herself. In the match’s faint flame, she feels that she is sitting next to a burning stove. But as the wind blows out the flame, the stove disappears. She lights a match again—this time, she sees delicious food and even a roasted goose. But again they disappear when the match goes out. By the light of the third match, she sees her grandma, whom she loves. Afraid of losing her, the little girl lights all her remaining matches. Then she dies, with a smile on her face.
“I went to the kitchen and got a box of matches, thinking that I might see something nice if I struck a match. As soon as I struck a match, Guo-Ying stopped crying and stared at the flame. I did another one; this time, she applauded and smiled. I suddenly thought that if I wasn’t alive, I wouldn’t have to babysit Guo-Ying and I wouldn’t feel sleepy, cold, or hungry. How nice that would be! But if I died, what about Guo-Ying? She’d only cry louder. So I decided that we had to die together. I lit a bundle of dry straw in the kitchen, then sat with Guo-Ying in the outer room, where we could see the fire. You should have seen how happy she was. She was dancing, laughing, almost choking herself with giggles. I was happy too, forgetting my hunger and cold, and laughed with her. I saw the fire coming toward me, and I felt warm. I don’t know when I lost consciousness, but when I woke up, I was sleeping on the neighbor’s bed, with Guo-Ying next to me.”
Fenglan is frozen in her chair; she has trouble breathing. She turns her head away from her daughter’s gaze so she can recover.
“Ma, don’t feel sad. It’s all in the past. Aren’t Guo-Ying and I doing well?” Her daughter stirs the fire with a wrought-iron poker to make the logs burn better.
Fenglan speaks after a long silence, her voice dry. “Your baba was condemned at that time. I had to work to make money and had to try to save your baba. We wanted to be with you and Guo-Ying, but we couldn’t.” What a weak explanation, she thinks. Really, she was a terrible mother, leaving her small children at home like that. But where could she find people willing to look after two children with a condemned father and a mother with a capitalist background?
“You don’t have to explain. I understand your and Baba’s situations. Few families could lead a normal life at that time. I hadn’t wanted to tell you about the fire; somehow, it just came up. It’s odd, but all these years I’ve always felt that I have to take care of Guo-Ying. I almost killed her, you know.” Her daughter moves to the sofa opposite her mother. “Ma, there’s one thing that I’ve always wanted to ask you.”
“What is it?”
“Am I your blood daughter or not?”
“Why do you ask? Of course you are.”
“I’m a mother myself now. I can take the truth.”
“But you’re your baba’s and my blood daughter.”
“I don’t believe you. If I were your blood daughter, why did you send me to a village to live with strangers when you were pregnant with Guo-Ying? Everyone in that village said I was illegitimate, and no kids wanted to play with me. I just want to know the truth.”
Fenglan sees bitterness and anger in her daughter’s eyes. Maybe she’ll have to tell her the truth, she thinks—it’s impossible to keep silent or lie in front of those eyes. She had thought that she could take the secret with her to her grave. But now the time has come.
“You’re our blood daughter, but Guo-Ying has a different father.”
Guo-Mei’s eyes narrow with disbelief.
“I never betrayed your father, if that’s what you are thinking.” As Fenglan launches into her speech, she plays every detail in her mind. If time is a jigsaw puzzle, she is putting it together piece by piece.
“One day, a group of Red Guards came to our house and told your father that it had been a crime to marry me, someone with an undesirable family background. They said that if he would divorce me, he would still be Mao’s good soldier. He said no, he’d never divorce me. The Red Guards took him away, and that night he didn’t come home.”
“I remember that night,” her daughter says. “But just a little. You sat on a stool, looking out the window for hours.”
“You were only five years old. I thought you’d be too young to remember anything at all. The next day I looked for your father everywhere and was later told that he was in the hands of someone called Old Hu. It took me a while to find Old Hu. In his office, he told me that your father had damaged his house with some Red Guards one year earlier. Now the days were different, and he, previously a condemned rightist, had become a powerful leader. He wanted revenge. What a horrible smile he had on his face when he said that! I begged him to release your father. At last he said he would do it if I agreed to one thing.” She pauses and takes a deep breath. When she meets her daughter’s widened eyes, she turns away to look at the floor.
“I had no other option. I thought then that I’d kill myself after your father returned safely—at least he could look after you. Your father came back a few days later. By then I was so full of shame and guilt that I was determined to die. Among the people I knew, quite a few had committed suicide, so I wasn’t so scared of this idea. Your father guessed what had happened and told me that if I died, he’d kill himself as well. I knew he said this to keep me alive. I listened to him eventually, but I became hysterical and often had nightmares and delusions. Once, I almost choked you to death while dreaming. Another time, as I bathed you, I was so haunted by my memory that I imagined you being the vicious Old Hu. I pressed your head into the water, and it was not until your father heard you screaming and came to rescue you that I realized what I was doing.
“After all these accidents, your father suggested we send you away for a while, saying that at least you would be safe. We couldn’t find anyone in the city willing to look after you. A friend mentioned distant relatives of his in a village who might let you stay with them temporarily, in exchange for food and money. So we sent you there. Then I found out I was pregnant by Old Hu. I wanted to get an abortion, but the doctor said I was too weak and the procedure might kill me. With so many doctors exiled to the countryside and the hospitals being chaotic, I might not even be able to find someone to perform the abortion. Your father begged me to keep the baby. I agreed, but behind his back I ate the herbs said to cause an abortion, and in the winter I went to the creek and stood in the icy water till I nearly lost consciousness. When all this didn’t work, I began to think that I should give the birth to the baby: she hadn’t done anything wrong and didn’t deserve to die.”
Fenglan hears her daughter’s sobbing but decides to continue the story: Guo-Mei is a mother herself now, and she should know the truth, to know that her parents weren’t as heartless as she thought.
“So Guo-Ying came into the world. I wasn’t planning to raise her myself—whenever I saw her, I was reminded of my humiliation and guilt. I thought I’d leave her outside a decent-looking house and maybe that family would adopt her. But whenever I put her down outside some stranger’s house, she smiled at me, as if I were playing a game with her. Then I didn’t have the heart to abandon her. I took her out in a basket many times, but each time I brought her back home.”
Though Fenglan’s voice had faltered slightly at first, as she continues to speak, it becomes composed and smooth, and her face tranquil, as if she were telling a story from an ancient book. Only she knows that this calmness and distance have protected her, keeping her sane and alive. As for her tears, they dried a long time ago. What is left in her eyes is peace. Now she suddenly feels tired and cold, sensing the illusion that she was standing on a barren field, alone, surrounded by chilly wind: only the soft cream-colored carpet and the fire still burning in the fireplace, though no longer blazing, assure her that she is
in her daughter’s snug and cozy house.
Head bowed, her daughter covers her face slowly with the palms of her hands. She sits like this for a while, then walks over to Fenglan. She sits next to her, snuggles up, then embraces her with both hands, pressing a cheek against hers. Fenglan strokes her daughter’s head and teary face.
In Dongdong’s room, Bob and Dongdong burst into laughter. Dongdong shouts in Mandarin, “Wai po, Mama, come here! Look at the monster that Dad has put together for me! Come quick!”
ELEVEN
January
ON A THURSDAY AFTERNOON, Ingrid drives to Sunnyvale. Today is her thirty-second birthday. Mary has called several times, asking her to arrive early.
Her mother is in the kitchen making cold dishes: tofu and preserved eggs, spicy seaweed, roasted peanuts with small dry fish, and sweet-and-sour cucumber slices. Alex insists on helping his grandma fetch different ingredients. Not being able to reach the cabinet, he has to get a stool from his room. But when he comes back, his impatient grandma has already gotten them herself. He forces her to put everything back where it was, then stands on the stool and takes down the bottles one by one.
“Dongdong, you only know how to give me trouble,” his grandma says, pretending to be angry, though she is smiling.
“The food will taste better if I help you prepare it,” Alex disputes, speaking Mandarin, then turns to Ingrid, who is steadying the stool for him. “Aunt, isn’t it true?”
“Of course, it’s true. You have a magic hand. Everything you’ve touched becomes better,” she says, passing the bottles to her mother. As Alex gets down, he puts his arms around Ingrid’s neck. She holds him to her chest and whirls him around, making sure his flying feet won’t hit anything. “Hold tight! We’re flying.” Alex presses his cheek to her neck. “Aunt and I are flying to Shanghai to see San Mao!”
