Tales of Accidental Genius
Page 12
“About them getting hurt. Money is just a side worry.”
After the massage Weng asked someone at the front desk
to bring his car around.
By dawn, he had driven to over a dozen all-night supermarkets,
buying every box of Bunny Pops he could find and emptying
the contents into the backseat.
The next morning, Shirley couldn’t believe it,
“I feel like I really have won!”
When Weng went to pick her after school,
Shirley had someone with her.
“This is Melody, my best friend.”
Weng glared at Shirley.
“What?” She shrugged. “I’m just so excited you’re back.”
Then Melody got into the Rolls-Royce and said:
“It’s so nice of your dad to take us
to Chenghuang Miao market for new shoes.”
“I thought I was driving you home!”
“Too late—I already texted Grandma to say I was going to
Melody’s house, and she texted to say
she was coming to my house.”
Melody clapped her hands. “So we’re free to shop
all night or until the money runs out.”
“Which will be never,” Shirley laughed, unwrapping a Bunny
Pop and handing it to her friend. “Right, Dad?”
An hour later, Weng found himself negotiating
the price of girls’ sneakers with a very short woman who
wouldn’t budge on the price.
“You shouldn’t argue prices,” Melody said loudly,
“when you drive a Rolls-Royce.”
They walked around the night market
then had dinner in the back of the car
so that Weng could demonstrate the karaoke system.
The girls sang songs like “Planting Trees” and “Tadpoles Lost.”
Weng chose “Blue Flowers.”
That night, before going to sleep, Shirley made a drawing.
Here we are . . . , she said to herself as the crayon
moved across paper . . .
. . . Shirley and Melody at Chenghuang Miao market
with Dad buying new shoes. . . .
They were barefoot in the picture
and their feet were blue with cold.
Then she drew the shop, and the stout shopkeeper
with a gray coat and the mole on her cheek.
Everyone had hearts for eyes.
Their new shoes in the drawing were made of gold.
. . . Now we’re in Dad’s car, eating noodles and singing. . . .
Then Shirley picked her best red crayon and wrote to her
mother, using all the correct strokes to say,
It’s time to be a family again.
十二
A few days later,
Shirley offered to show Weng a park where people sing.
One group was about to start an opera
and its members were setting out colorful stools
for anyone willing to stay.
Weng bought Shirley an ice cream.
“Wish Melody was here,” she said.
“It’s good to have a best friend.”
Shirley nodded. “Do you have one?”
Weng thought about it. “I used to.”
“What happened to them?”
“We no longer speak.”
“That’s weird.”
“When you care about someone, Shirley, you do what is right
for them—which may not be what you want
or what makes you happy.”
Shirley licked her ice cream. “Is that why you
had to go away for so long?”
“And why I have to go away again,” Weng said.
On the walk back to the car,
they stood for a moment by the lake.
“I wonder if people long ago thought a part of them was trapped
in the water?” Weng said.
“Look,” Shirley said. “We’re trapped together.”
He knew that leaving was the right thing to do
but could not bring himself to say he was not her father;
it was a lie that felt true.
When they pulled up outside her apartment home,
Shirley was crying and wouldn’t take off her seat belt.
“You must go back now to your grandparents.”
“I know what you’re doing,” Shirley said.
“You’re going to Beijing.”
“Shirley, please go now.”
“Why can’t I come?”
“I can’t tell you without lying.”
“When will you be back?”
“I don’t know,” Weng said. “Take these Bunny Pops
to remember me.”
“I don’t want them,” Shirley said. “I want to come to Beijing
with you and surprise Mom.”
When he got back to the hotel,
Weng asked the porter to find him a dictionary.
“I don’t think we have one. We used to, but it’s gone now.”
“Never mind then,” Weng said turning,
but the porter held his arm gently.
“Why don’t you tell me the word, Mr. Fun, and I’ll look it up on
the Internet, print it out, then hand it to you silently so no one
has to know?”
Once back in his room, Weng read the character over and over:
爸爸 ba ba (he who uses an ax to cut wood to warm the home)
It didn’t say anything about blood,
and so Weng wondered if there was a chance
it could mean anyone.
Then he packed his bag,
Left an envelope with three Bunny Pops and ten thousand yuan
for the foot masseuse, and began the long journey back to Beijing.
In a gas station café someone had left a straw hat.
Weng picked it up, imagined the owner touching his head,
the sensation of unexpected loss.
Then about halfway home, he almost crashed into another car
because there was someone sitting in the backseat.
“Stay calm,” the figure said. “Focus on driving.”
But Weng was in shock. “What are you doing in my car!” he
screamed. “Did you get in at the service station?”
“No, no, nothing like that,” the shadow told him. “by the way, is
this the new Phantom?”
Blinking several times to ensure he wasn’t dreaming,
Weng said nervously that it was.
“It seems different somehow,” the voice said,
“I can’t put my finger on it. . . .”
“It’s the floor model with karaoke upgrade.”
“Ah that must be it! My son’s has the humidor,
and the picnic set—but not the karaoke.”
“What do you mean?” Weng said. “Your son has a Rolls-Royce?
Did you get into the wrong one?”
“Not exactly, Fun Weng. I am the ghost pig farmer of
Guanshan—and late father of Mr. Yi.”
Weng turned in disbelief, and the car veered toward a low stone
wall.
“Better watch what you’re doing,” Mr. Yi’s late father laughed.
“Or we’ll both be sitting back here with all these Bunny Pops
and the fishy smell.”
“Have I done something wrong?”
“No, no,” the ghost said. “I’m here because
you’ve done something right.”
“Do you appear to your son like this?”
“Of course not! It would be much too complicated,
seeing as I’m technically dead.”
“But you’re here now,” Weng pointed out,
“in the back of my Rolls-Royce.”
“No,” said the late Mr. Yi, “I’ve just willed myself into the shape
I had bef
ore so that I can ask you to help my son.”
“I don’t understand. I can see you. . . .”
“Okay, watch this,” said the ghost and disappeared.
A moment later the Hello Kitty bobbleheads on the back
window opened their mouths and began
singing the Chinese national anthem.
Then the ghost reappeared in the shape of Mr. Yi.
“I’m just a spirit—conjured in part by you. But listen to me
now, Fun Weng,” the ghost said. “I’m worried about my son. He
is deeply unhappy, and very alone. At this rate, he’ll never meet
anyone, and the living Mrs. Yi and I want grandchildren.”
“But you’re dead.”
“That doesn’t matter—a grandparent’s wish for grandchildren
goes beyond the grave.”
“But what can I do? How can I help?”
“Be a friend to him, Weng, that’s all. Reach out to him when
you get back and his life will begin changing for the better.”
“I’ll do my best.”
“Good,” the spirit said. “Just be a friend and the rest will take
care of itself—these things I know—
but make haste, please. . . .”
“I will call the moment I get back.”
“Thank you,” the voice said. “You are my Golden Helper.”
About the time Weng returned to Beijing,
Cherry got the drawing from her daughter in the mail,
and texted her Uncle Ping immediately:
丈夫回来了!
非常富有吗?
真倒霉 ☹
HUSBAND RETURNED!
VERY RICH?
WHAT BAD LUCK ☹
Uncle Ping texted back:
给雪莉打电话。问问她事情进展地怎么样了。
离婚还有可能吗? ☺生活就像跳舞
CALL SHIRLEY. FIND OUT WHAT’S GOING ON.
DIVORCE STILL POSSIBLE? ☺ LIFE ABOUT DANCING
When Cherry telephoned her daughter,
the terrible news was confirmed.
“Yes, Mom, it’s true!” Shirley exclaimed. “And Dad’s on his way
right now from Ningbo to get you!”
After the call, Shirley put on her silk scarf,
then sat a long time on her bed touching the knot,
staring out through hanging clothes
at the night sky.
The next day, when a Rolls-Royce Phantom crawled
through Cherry’s hutong district, past the bicycles,
and the women sleeping, and the steam from pots,
people wondered what was happening.
Was someone buying up property to build another mall?
Had a neighbor won a competition?
Gotten lucky in Macao?
Or inherited a vast sum from an unmarried great-aunt
in Hong Kong?
At first Cherry wouldn’t answer the door,
but the person kept knocking
then a voice came through the wood.
“I was wondering if you would like to ballroom with me? I
think you would be successful if you tried.”
Cherry touched the back of the door with both hands.
“We’re not getting any younger,” the voice said.
“We might as well try.”
After some time, the handle turned,
and the door opened slowly.
There was Weng with his arms in position.
“Don’t look at your feet,” he said as they began to move.
“Look at me.”
After a few times around the car,
old people appeared from nowhere and joined in.
Later on, over dinner, Cherry laughed at the story of Shirley
and Melody buying new shoes at the night market.
Although she was ashamed of it, Cherry admitted to Weng
how glad she was that her real husband was still missing.
“Though a divorce could take years,” she warned him.
Weng thought the most important thing was for mother and
daughter to reunite. “Take some time off,” he said.
“I’ll drive you to Ningbo and you can explain
how I am just a friend and there was a mix-up. Then Shirley can
come to Beijing and live with you.”
“But her school . . .”
“There are schools here too,” Weng said. “And night markets.”
“What about her grandparents?”
“Bring them as well . . . we can all be unemployed together.”
When they arrived at the factory where Cherry worked,
her supervisor and coworkers wanted to know
if this was the man who had bought Cherry
such a pretty silk scarf?
Once Weng had explained his good fortune,
the boss agreed to give Cherry time off,
but wanted a favor in return.
“My son is partially sighted and attends a school for the blind.
He loves cars but has never had a chance to experience a
nice one. Would you take him for a ride in your Rolls-Royce
sometime?”
That night Weng tried calling Mr. Yi again.
He had been telephoning daily since his return from Ningbo
but with no answer.
This time his secretary picked up and said he was on a business
trip—would not be back for many days.
“A business trip?”
“Yes, Mr. Yi is in New England.”
“Where’s that?”
“I don’t know, maybe next to the old one?”
“Well, please tell him it is extremely urgent that we speak.”
That night, as Weng and Cherry packed the car for Ningbo,
Shirley was planning a trip of her own.
She had taken a picture of a train schedule with her phone,
and found times for the early morning express to Beijing.
Sneaking on shouldn’t be too hard, she thought.
Children always find a way.
She wanted to surprise her mother and win her father’s
admiration for embarking on such a daring journey.
Shirley kissed her grandparents many times that night,
knowing they would suffer when her breakfast went cold.
She also kissed the photograph of her mother and drew hearts
on the plastic glass for eyes.
Seven hundred miles north of Ningbo, on a lonely stretch of the
Rongwu Expressway, Cherry noticed someone sitting
in the backseat and started screaming.
Weng glanced quickly, expecting to see Mr. Yi’s father,
but instead it was the face of a man he didn’t know,
wearing a sad, vacant expression.
Cherry was so hysterical, Weng had to pull
to the side of the road.
When the car stopped, she flung open the door
and ran into the middle of a field.
It was hard to speak, but at last she was able
to tell Weng who the man in the backseat was.
When Cherry was ready to listen, Weng told her about Mr. Yi’s
father, and how he’d turned the Hello Kitty bobbleheads into a
choir.
Cherry just couldn’t understand how it was possible.
Weng didn’t know either.
“Maybe it came with the karaoke package?”
“We should find out what he has to say,” Weng said. “Get back
in the car before he disappears.”
When they were on the highway again, Cherry undid her seat
belt, and turned around to face the husband
she had not seen for so many years.
“Are you alive?” she said.
The ghost closed his eyes and shook his head from side to side.
; Weng asked how it happened.
“Knocked off my bicycle by a vegetable truck.”
“Even though I thought I didn’t love you anymore,” Cherry
told the ghost, “seeing you like this has brought some of the old
tenderness back.”
“None of what happened was your fault,” the ghost confessed.
“I lived drunk and I died drunk. But listen, now. I have come
back to tell you something important. Right now, Shirley is
making her way through the dark streets to Ningbo station,
where she plans to board an early train. You have to get there
before the 5:13 A.M. leaves for Beijing.”
“But that’s only five hours!” Cherry exclaimed,
“and we’re not even halfway—”
“I know,” the ghost said, drifting toward Fun Weng,
“Which is another reason I’m here—now you know why
they call it the Phantom.”
Within a few seconds, the Phantom had reached its top speed.
Any cars they passed shook violently in a flash of lights,
leaving the occupants to wonder whether they had been
brushed by a low-flying jet,
or were part of a military experiment.
When they arrived at the outskirts of Ningbo,
it was twenty minutes before Shirley’s train was due to depart.
“I’m going now,” the ghost told them. “I hope I’ve been more
use in death than I was in life.” Cherry reached out her hand,
but the ghost didn’t move.
“My body was never identified, but there’s a police record of the
accident, so you should be able to get married.”
“Thanks for helping us,” Cherry said.
“Hurry now,” the voice instructed.
“There’s less time than you think.”
They dumped the Rolls in a vacant bus lane and ran into the
station. Weng took one platform while Cherry took another.
When it came time for the train to leave, there was still no sign
of Shirley, so Weng told the guard,
who used his radio to delay the train.