Green Island

by Shawna Yang Ryan

  Wei popped his head through the doorway, as if he had just paused to tell me that we were out of eggs. I glanced at him over my shoulder.

  “I want to tell you that I had an affair,” he said, and walked away.

  I had misheard him. Like a mechanical doll, I continued clipping. The scissors squealed, the blades resting flush. I was certain I had misheard him.

  Gripping the arms of the chair, I hauled myself up. I found Wei in the hall, fiddling with the mail. The little being, in tune with my disturbance, danced inside of me. Massaging my stomach, I realized the acrobatics were my heart. I clutched Wei’s arm.

  “What did you say?”

  He tapped the stack of mail against the hall table to align it and set it down. He didn’t face me when he answered. “Can we talk in the den? You know, I don’t want the girls to”—he lowered his voice—“hear us.”

  Wei followed me and shut the door.

  “Say it again,” I demanded.

  He shook his head and I knew I had heard him correctly the first time.

  “Why are you telling me this?”

  “Because I love you.”

  I wanted to run out of the house and keep going, all the way down University Avenue to the marina, and baptize myself in sea spray. Instead, I eased myself into the armchair. I laughed meanly. “How long? Who? I mean, fuck, Wei, how could you?”

  It hadn’t gone on long, he claimed. He’d needed an escape after Jia Bao’s death. I was distant. He’d thought I was in love with someone else. He was weak. The usual litany of excuses.

  “Distant? Our friend was murdered. He was murdered, Wei!” I wrestled myself back to a pretense of calm. “And you thought it was about us? Are you kidding me?” I clutched my belly, seeking comfort from this other being and silently apologizing for flooding it with my sorrow.

  I lifted my head. “Who was it? A student?”

  “God no. Oh no. Are you kidding?”

  “Who was it then?”

  He sat on the floor, faced me, and gripped both my knees. “It was Helen.”

  I kicked his hands off me. “Don’t touch me. Helen-and-James Helen?” We had just seen them the previous month at a mutual friend’s party. I tried to imagine how it had started and what he had seen in her. The night at Jia Bao’s welcoming party, when I had come across them alone in the den? A pat on the arm at Jia Bao’s funeral? Some kinship in a shared glance? Where had they first made love? What had she looked like gazing up beneath him? Did he take off those stupid glasses with the purple tint or did she?

  “Are you leaving me for her?” I whispered. “Is she leaving James?”

  In the pause before he answered, my agitated nails dug into my palms.

  “I don’t want to leave you. I don’t want a divorce,” he said.

  “Then why are you telling me?”

  “I need to unburden myself.”

  “Selfish prick,” I said. “Why did you? How could you?”

  “Maybe I was still mad that you’d left,” Wei said. He didn’t sound defensive, but afraid.

  “You mean with the girls?”

  “Yes.”

  I thought back to the long runs that began after Jia Bao’s death. The runs that I assumed were Wei’s strategy to trade pain for exhaustion and, at the same time, keep in touch with Jia Bao’s spirit. And the showers, washing away his guilty sweat before I could catch a whiff. All of it was an awful cliché. “How long did it go on? What about the running?” I asked.

  He dropped his head, as if he had forgotten that his habit had been born out of that moment. Running had become a daily ritual, and he joked about his “addiction.” Each milestone demanded another; he’d run two marathons since Jia Bao’s murder.

  “I was really running,” he protested without much conviction. “Part of the time.” He spread out his fingers and stared at his hands. “How long? A year?”

  “A year?” All my strength drew out of my limbs in a shiver of revulsion. “Why are you telling me now?” I asked again, sickened. I felt like I was going to dissolve into a heap of boneless flesh.

  “I need to be forgiven.”

  I turned away and hid my face again. What was forgiveness? I wanted to ask him, even as I realized my own hypocrisy: after all, I had never confessed to him about Mr. Lu.

  But this was different. This was betrayal by heart and body.

  “We can never see them again. Helen and James,” I said.

  “We won’t.”

  I pressed my fists to my sore eyes. “How could you, Wei?”

  “I know you can’t forgive me.” He touched my bowed head. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” I finally released my tears, feeling all the worse that the person I most wanted to seek comfort from was the one who had hurt me.

  —

  Wei and I barely spoke on the plane. The girls sat between us and we zeroed our attention onto them. After a long layover in Honolulu, we were on to Taipei. We would arrive in the early morning as the city was just waking up. In the last hours before landing, I tried to describe Taiwan to the girls.

  “How hot is ‘hot’?” Emily asked. She had turned the novel she was reading page-side down onto her lap and was nervously rolling up the sides.

  “Emily, stop that. You’re going to ruin it.”

  “I mean, is it like Death Valley hot?”

  “It’s a humid heat, not a dry heat. It’s like a bathroom after a really hot bath.”

  She bit her lip and considered this. “You mean like a sauna?”

  “What do you know about saunas?” Every day, I forgot how old she was, expecting her to open her mouth and still sound like the toddler she had been not that long ago. “Yes, it’s like a sauna. Exactly. Great comparison.”

  Stephanie pulled on my sleeve. “What kind of desserts will we have?”

  “Cakes, shaved ice, and some things you’ve never tried before. All tasty.”

  “And they have cars there?” Stephanie asked. “And toilets?” She was very particular about bathrooms. A number of times we’d had to rush home from the grocery store because she refused to use the public restroom.

  Emily rolled her eyes. “Of course! Duh? You think people in Taiwan don’t have to go to the bathroom?” Palpably proud, in the fall, she’d be going into fourth grade, one of the upper grades, with a playground separate from the younger kids. Wei and I had spent the last few weeks trying to restrain her ego.

  “Watch it, Emily.”

  Wei caught my eye and smiled at me. I turned away. Principles were one thing, and I had some grudging respect for his honesty, but he was going to have to suffer for a little while longer yet. For days he had trod around me as if I were an invalid, cooing nicknames at me, on his best behavior, quick to help in the kitchen or with the girls, or to offer to serve me. All it did was remind me of his crime.

  A few rows down, I heard a flight attendant ask someone to pull down their tray. Feeding time had come again for the penned livestock.

  Wei elbowed Stephanie. “Don’t eat the fish.”

  “Why?”

  “Don’t listen to your dad. He’s being silly,” I said. “He’s not being serious.” To Wei, I said, “If you have to explain a joke, it’s not funny.”

  “What’s wrong with the fish?” Stephanie looked back and forth between us.

  “Nothing’s wrong with it. In fact, your dad is going to have fish as well.” I narrowed my eyes. “Right, dear?”

  “Yes, I am going to eat the fish.” He sighed. “And crow too.”

  I shook my head. He could joke and moon around, trying to convince me he was adorable and sincere, but I couldn’t let it be that easy.

  —

  We showed our visas, filled out our arrival slip, which stated we’d be staying at Wei’s parents’ house, then pushed our cart with the crowd of fatigued travelers to the customs inspection counter.

  “Please open your bags,” the narrow-faced young man said. He looked as if he’d just completed his mandatory military service. Wei hef
ted our luggage onto the counter and unzipped each one while the young man slipped on a pair of gloves.

  “We don’t have—” Wei began, but I hushed him.

  The girls were sufficiently sobered by the uniform that they said nothing, their wide eyes nodding up and down as the man flipped through our clothes, holding some shirts up to the light. Another man, with an older, war-weary face darkened with stubble and creases, strolled over and observed the inspection.

  The young man held up my underwear for no reason I could discern except to embarrass me. Stephanie turned and put her small hands on my stomach for comfort. “Is the baby moving?” she whispered.

  “Not now, darling,” I whispered back.

  He pulled out a few books that I had brought and called for a third inspector, who shuffled over.

  “They’re just novels,” I said as the man carried them away. “Where’s he going? They’re just novels.” I was tired, sore, pregnant, and angry. “What, you think I’m going to incite a revolution with Jane Austen?”

  Wei squeezed my arm, urging me to shut up. Without raising his head, the younger man looked at me from under the hoods of his eyes. I decided to be patient.

  Next, he pulled out the urn, which Wei had wrapped in layers of newspapers and sealed with duct tape. He showed it to the older man.

  “What is this?” the older man snapped.

  “It’s an urn. We’re coming for a funeral.” Wei’s tone was a dare. “Human remains. I have a certificate from the crematorium.” He pulled it from his satchel and held it up for them.

  The younger man sneered, set down the container, and rubbed his hands distastefully.

  “Fine,” he said. “Clean up your stuff and you can go.” He marked our landing form.

  “What about my books?” I asked.

  “You can leave them or you can wait. Over there.” He gestured past the counter.

  Wei tamped down the disordered clothes and zipped, poking loose bits back in here and there.

  “This is bullshit,” he hissed to me in English as we finally passed through.

  Our luggage again stacked on the cart, we lingered a few feet away.

  “Why can’t we go?” Stephanie whined.

  “Because we have to wait for Mom’s books, stupid.”

  I couldn’t blame Emily for being snappy; we’d been traveling for twenty hours. Wearily, Wei stepped in with just one effective word. “Don’t.”

  Stephanie climbed atop the suitcases and sat swinging her legs, while Emily wandered in tiny circles and sang softly to herself. I leaned against the cart, wishing I could take the shoes off my swollen feet.

  “Forget it, Wei. Let’s just leave them. I can buy new copies when we get home.”

  “No. We’ll wait. I won’t let them scare us off.” He eyed the customs agent like he was preparing for a bar fight. “Assholes.”

  Twenty long minutes later, the man returned with the books. I thanked him and slipped them into my purse without another glance. I couldn’t wait to get out of the airport.

  “What a waste of time,” Wei said after the inspector had walked away.

  In the terminal, among the anxious people waiting for relatives they hadn’t seen in years, Wei’s parents hopped up and down and waved when they caught sight of us. My annoyance lifted away and I waved back.

  “Look at you all!” Wei’s mother exclaimed.

  Stephanie grabbed my hand and swung back, half hidden behind me, but Emily shouted, “Hi!” and ran to hug both of them. Wei’s father patted her back.

  “Okay, okay, enough,” he said gruffly, but I saw his sheepish pleased smile. I wiped my eyes.

  “You’re much further along than we expected,” Wei’s mother said.

  I rubbed my belly, felt the slow, watery movement of a foot or elbow sliding under my flesh, and thought of the movie I’d taken the girls to the week before we left, and the telescope-necked alien reaching out his finger to promise, “I’ll be right here.” We had all cried. The entire theater had cried.

  “I want a brother,” Emily said. “One sister is enough.”

  “Emily,” I warned.

  She had some notion that charming adults meant saying terrible things about her sister. The thing was she was right. Most people laughed and thought it droll. It was a habit Wei and I were trying to break.

  “Boy or girl—as long as it’s healthy,” I said. For now, the baby was both real and abstract; it might as well have been an alien. It’s becoming. It’s still becoming, I thought. There was something uncanny about it.

  “Enough chitchat. Let’s get out of here,” Wei said, his teeth still clenched from the inspection.

  —

  The city planners had made the road from the airport the grandest in Taipei: broad and treelined. The white-helmeted Garrison Command patrolled the streets; pedestrians wordlessly parted before them. Stopped at a light, I stared at one sentry. Specifically, at his rifle, which looked like a toy, too much to be real. His eyes latched on to mine. Even behind the window, sheltered by my family and my pregnancy, my neck felt ice cold and chicken flesh broke on my arms. I quickly looked away.

  —

  After a full day driving around from meal to meal in this city we had not seen for a decade, that evening we finally settled around the dining table with a bottle of whisky—glasses of tea for me and Wei’s mother—while the girls, knocked out by jet lag, slept.

  Wei’s father, whom I no longer called Uncle Lin, but Lin Baba, cleared his throat.

  “So, you’re going to see Tang Jia Bao’s family?” he asked.

  “We are going to deliver his ashes.”

  Lin Baba refilled his and Wei’s glasses, then toasted his son. Wei mirrored the gesture. “Bottoms up.” Lin Baba set down his empty glass and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Now, don’t look for any trouble.”

  Wei slammed down his glass. “We just got here. You really want to get into this?”

  I touched his arm. “Wei.”

  Wei’s outburst failed to ruffle his father, who said, “Taiwan and America are different countries. Remember that. Look, even America wasn’t safe enough for Jia Bao.”

  “Do you want to check my bags? I already went through customs, but you’re welcome to inspect them again.” Wei stood up. “Come on, I’ll show you.”

  “Sit down,” his dad said.

  “Enough, enough, enough,” his mother said. “Let’s put the alcohol away now. We’re all tired.”

  “Sit down, Wei,” I echoed in English. “Just sit down.”

  The two men ignored us. Lin Baba continued. “I just want you to be careful. Big fish, small fish—they will take them all. Don’t forget that.”

  “I know!” Wei snarled. Under our parents’ roof, even with our own children here, we were turned into children again. Wei had always skated on the edge of filial, not quite brainwashed by Confucianism like the rest of us, and I envisioned dozens of past fights of the same ilk. Easygoing Lin Baba let Wei get away with it. My own father never would have.

  “Enough, enough,” Lin Mama said. “You should thank your father for his concern.”

  Wei sat down. “Thank you, Baba, for your concern.”

  “Honey,” I said in English, “I think it’s time for bed.”

  Wei continued on in Taiwanese. “I just want to pay respect to my friend and have a nice visit with my family. I’m not looking for trouble.”

  “Enough, enough,” Lin Mama said. “Let’s change the topic.”

  We moved on, and Wei and his father continued to drink, but the mood had soured; disquiet hung over the table, and any topic might lead back to what we were avoiding. Obliged to play our roles, we forced the conversation until the whisky was done.

  50

  ON OUR SECOND EVENING in Taipei, Wei announced he was going out “shrimping” with some old friends. Shrimping—catching shrimp from huge, artificially abundant cement pools seeded with shrimp and then grilling them on-site—was not his style. It was too blu
e collar for his tastes. I was suspicious.

  “You promised you’d behave,” I said.

  “This is not misbehaving. I’m just catching up with some old college friends.”

  “Wei.” I sighed. I wanted my hurt to be enough to make him stay. The baby poked me near my rib; I winced and pressed back in greeting.

  “I swear to you these are nothing more than college friends. Just the guys. Beer, shrimp, and old friends.” He exhaled sharply; he was already impatient with my distrust. “You’re right. I won’t go. I’ll stay home with you.”

  Was I shrill? Was I unreasonable? Feeling strangely guilty, I urged him to go.

  —

  In the metal echo of the iron-roofed shrimping hall, Wei and his buddies discussed the recent death of a criminal by drowning. He had escaped, the police claimed, and jumped into a river and drowned. Wei was outraged by the obvious lie. But even if no one believed the lie, they could do nothing but shut up and take it and write thinly veiled poems and make thinly veiled films and write thinly veiled songs. The whole country existed in metaphor.

  At the Lins’, waiting up for Wei after everyone had gone to bed, I curled on the sofa with a notebook. I had an assignment to write a first-person introduction to Taiwan—a story I myself had pitched—something light for armchair explorers. Something even a child could understand. I recalled a fight I’d had with Emily as she worked on a family tree report for school. She was assigned to interview a member of her family and she chose me. She wrote on the worksheet that I was from China.

  “I’m not from China,” I had said.

  “But the boxes of clothes we get from Ah Ma say ‘Republic of China’!” she insisted.

  “Yes, Republic of China. That’s not China.”

  “But it says China.”

  “We are from Taiwan.”

  “Then why do they call it China?” Her nostrils flared. She furiously erased the worksheet and the dark litter perfectly expressed her frustration.