by Jennie Liu
She digs around for a nightgown and turns around to change. I’m surprised when she climbs into the bed here in the front room and scoots against the wall to make space for me before collapsing into a heap on her side. Since the bedroom door is closed, I suppose she probably doesn’t want to disturb Baba. I root in my bag for my pajamas and put them on before shutting off the lamp and climbing into the bed beside Mama. I position myself so we’re back to back, not touching.
In all my nineteen years, except for when I was first born and the two weeks at Spring Festival every year, we have never lived together, and it’s strange now to be sharing a bed. I feel her flip around behind me, her breath on the back of my neck. She strokes my hair once before her breathing falls into the steady rhythm of sleep. I lie awake for a long time in the dark.
2
There is no window in the apartment, and I don’t hear an alarm, but somehow Mama knows when it is time to get up. I come fully awake as she carefully climbs over me, snaps on the lamp, then throws a shirt over it to soften the light. From bed, I watch as she pours water from a plastic jug into a pot on the burner, drops some tea leaves into a big glass jar, and changes her clothes. She does everything nearly soundlessly, moving like a dreamwalker until she’s standing over the pot, staring at the water, waiting for it to boil.
“Mama,” I say.
She turns to me, startled for a beat, as if she forgot I was there. “You’re awake? Go back to sleep. It’s too early.”
I sit up, hugging my knees over the sheet. “You’re going to work?” Because I just arrived, I want her to stay home. But she worked yesterday, so of course, she has to go in today. It makes me wonder how long ago Bao-bao died, given that she’s already back to work.
She nods as she pours hot water into her jar and a big thermos. “Here’s water for your tea and for Baba when he gets up.” She holds the thermos up before setting in on the ground. “But you don’t have to get up now. He won’t wake up for a while.”
She’s leaving me to take care of him, so I have to ask. “Mama, is he sick?”
She tilts her head back and blinks at the low, close ceiling, a look of utter despondency. “Yes. Very sick. About what happened.”
I toss the sheet aside and swing my legs over the edge of the bed. “But what happened? How did . . .”
Mama’s face begins to crumble. She covers her mouth with her hand as a cry escapes her. I jump out of the bed and rush over to her, making apologetic murmurs while inwardly cursing myself for bringing up Bao-bao. It’s too soon.
Her steaming tea is on the crowded cart. I find a towel to wrap around it and lead her to the side of the bed. We sit and I press the jar into her hands. “Drink this.”
Tears drip into the tea as Mama bends her head over it. She looks like she’s praying until she takes several noisy sips.
“What about food? What can I make you?” I change the subject, trying to put her distress further behind us, although I’m still impatient to know what happened to Bao-bao.
“There’s nothing here except instant noodles. I’ll get something on the street.” She is slowly pulling herself together into the efficient, in-charge Mama I know. “You should too. Later, you’ll have to go get something for you and Baba.” She reaches for her purse, pulls out several yuan, and lays them on the cart. “If Baba’s having a . . .” she stumbles for a word, “a hard time, go next door and ask Mr. or Mrs. Hu to stay with him. They’re trash pickers and usually finish their rounds by seven or eight o’clock in the morning.”
She reaches for the jar lid and screws it over the tea. A moment later she’s digging a comb out of her bag and running it roughly through her hair as she steps to the door. “Go back to sleep now. You had a long trip.”
Sleep is far from my mind. I’m not tired at all, but Mama stands there with her hand on the doorknob until I slip back into bed and pull up the sheet. Her mouth twitches as if she’s trying to put on a smile, but the expression is pained.
She opens the door and clicks off the lamp. Her shape is a silhouette in the faint light of the hallway as she hesitates before going through. “And Na . . .”
“Yes?”
“Don’t let Baba harm himself.”
She leaves before I can ask her what she means.
***
After Mama leaves I lie in the dark with a panic beating inside me. I tune my ears toward Baba’s room. The fan is droning softly, but I hear unsettled snoring from the flimsy door between us. Harm himself? Mama said he was sick, but now I register that she meant sick in the head. Sick with heartbreak.
I tell myself that at least he isn’t physically ill. To be sick with grief after a death makes sense. What doesn’t make sense is how I feel. As his sister I should be a weepy mess like Mama or immobilized with sorrow like Baba, but about Bao-bao’s death, I am inconceivably detached. I know that’s an awful thing to say, but Bao-bao and I haven’t lived together for six years—rarely spoke or saw each other except for the annual holiday. And in truth, I resented him.
We were close once. Bao-bao was born a year after me, since second children were allowed to families in the countryside if the first one was a girl. Baba was still old-fashioned enough to want a boy. He felt that a daughter is like spilled water, since traditionally once a girl marries, she becomes part of the husband’s family.
Like most children from the countryside, Bao-bao and I were left-behinds, raised by grandparents while our parents migrated to work in the city. Nainai raised us, and when we were sad or angry that our parents left us, she scolded and explained that children were expensive and Mama and Baba had to work to support us—two of us no less—when they could’ve saved their money to build a new white-tiled house instead.
When Mama and Baba came home for the Spring Festival each year, they showered both of us with gifts, sweets, and supplemental workbooks. They gave us long lectures about studying and demanded to see our graded papers. When Mama saw all my perfect marks and noted my class rankings, she gave me extra talks about helping Bao-bao with school, making sure he did his homework and kept up his grades.
I was proud to help. Bao-bao was quite smart and only a little lazy, and he listened to me. Like I said, we were close then. Many of the children in the village were singletons, alone with their aging grandparents, but for us, having a sibling took away the sting that our parents were never with us.
The summer after Bao-bao finished primary school, Mama and Baba came home to the village unexpectedly. We were both surprised. And even more surprised when they took Bao-bao away to live with them and start middle school in the city. I was thirteen and left behind again, suddenly alone with Nainai, wondering why Mama and Baba hadn’t taken me. I was the firstborn, the better student. The one who should have gone to school in the city. If I had been a singleton, it would have been me going with them.
Now in Taiyuan, I hear guttural coughing erupt from Baba in the next room. I quickly set down the bowl of instant noodles I’ve been eating, grab the tea I made earlier, and move to put my ear against the door. The hacking settles for a moment, but when it starts up again, I tap on the door. “Baba?” I whisper, uncertain whether I should check on him or just leave him alone. My sense of time has been distorted by the windowless room, but it must be late morning. I’ve been up for several hours already, dressed and waiting.
His coughing stops, but I hear heavy, labored breathing. I softly knock again before I push the door open.
The smells of ash, sour alcohol, and an unwashed body hit me. Light from the lamp behind me steals into the room, which is half the size of the front room. My eye falls briefly on the desk, facing the door, littered with beer and liquor bottles along with several overflowing ashtrays.
Baba, in a dirty singlet and underwear, is sprawled on the narrow cot against the wall. His chest rises and falls, and his eyes flutter as if he’s halfway between awake and asleep. The skin of his face is gray-tinged in the gloom. I start to step back and leave him, but suddenly his eyes ope
n, and he’s looking at me. His expression is dispassionate at first. He could be looking at a store clerk or a bus driver. But slowly his eyes grow round and his mouth falls open. There’s joy in his face, and I swell up inside.
He struggles to sit up in bed. His movements are lurching, and he lists to one side. “Bao-bao! My son!”
My heart shrivels, and I freeze. He’s confusing me with Bao-bao. When we were younger people always commented that we looked like twins with our heart-shaped faces and widow’s peak hairlines. Last time I saw him, thin hair had grown over his lip, and he’d gained weight from Mama’s cooking, but in the underlit room with my hair pulled back in a tight braid as it is, I can imagine how I resemble a younger Bao-bao.
I move toward him. “Baba, it’s me— ”
He doesn’t seem to hear me. Fear is shadowing his eyes now. A low, long wail comes out of him and he pushes back against the wall, cowering like a frightened child. I set the tea on the desk, but my movement rattles him.
“You’ve come back to . . . too much . . . gaokao . . . all the money . . . fail . . . why!” He is yelling, slurring, blubbering. I can’t understand him.
“Baba, I’m Na. It’s not Bao-bao, it’s Na!” I plead with him, but I stay back, my hands wringing together in a helpless fluster, because I don’t know what to do. He just moans more loudly and shrinks farther away. He thinks I’m a ghost. Bao-bao’s ghost.
I hear a sharp rapping on the front door. Startled, but desperate to escape this moment with Baba, I run to the other room and fling the door open. A woman holding a bottle of clear liquor pushes me aside and heads to Baba’s room.
I shut the door to the hallway, but not before I glimpse several neighbors poking their heads out of their apartments.
Afraid that I’ll further agitate Baba, I don’t follow the woman back into his room. I stay in the front, biting my thumbnail, listening.
“Pah! What are you yelling about?” the woman scolds loudly over Baba’s voice. She clicks her tongue in reproach. “You’re scaring that girl—your daughter! Drink this. Here, here! Calm yourself now!” I hear Baba cough again, sputtering on the strong liquor. “Yes, drink up. That’s your daughter out there! What’s this business of shouting like that?”
Baba’s moans begin to die down. Soon he is only sniveling, and the old woman’s murmurings become more soothing. A few more minutes pass until all is quiet, and the old woman comes out with the empty teacup and the bottle of liquor. I can see it’s been drunk down a few centimeters.
“He’s asleep again, but he should have something to eat soon. I’ll get my husband to come over here so you and I can go to the wet market.”
“You’re Mrs. Hu?” She’s older than Mama, her hair half gray and her middle thick, straining against a flowered shirt and clashing plaid pants.
She nods. “That’s me. Listen, I’m going to put this here.” She tucks the bottle of liquor amongst my bags in the corner, hidden from view. “You’ll have to give him some later, but be stingy with it until your ma gets home.”
“Thank you for coming.” I release a shaky breath. “I didn’t know what to do.”
“Aiyo!” She shakes her head dolefully. “What’s to be done? It’s terrible, just terrible. Put your shoes on while I get my Old Hu.”
She’s back in a few minutes. Mr. Hu shuffles in behind her with his reading glasses, a thermos of tea, and some newspapers. After he nods to me, he parks himself on a short stool in the front room.
I grab the money Mama left and stuff it into my purse. Mrs. Hu and I thread through the passageway, up the stairs, through the lobby. Despite the smog of the city, the glare of day hits me as we go out. Cars fly by on the overpass and highways. I have to stop and squint as the oppressive darkness of the sublevel leaves me. Mrs. Hu doesn’t stop, and I hurry to catch up as she crosses the plaza of Glorious Towers and exits through the gate.
The wet market is packed. I follow Mrs. Hu as she weaves through the crowd, eyeing vegetables of every color, raw fleshy meats, and grains loaded on tables and plastic bins that edge into the wide alley from the tiny stalls and carts. She pauses every now and again to squeeze an eggplant or examine a tuber as she makes her way to her favorite sellers. I hastily select some eggs and greens to cook for Baba. I’m used to cooking for myself because it’s cheaper than eating in the dining hall at school, but my mind’s not on the shopping.
I’ve been replaying how Mrs. Hu handled Baba. She came at just the right moment, saving me from . . . I can’t imagine. I don’t know what I would have done, what Baba would have done. I realize that she must be closer to my parents than anyone else, and that she is the person to ask about what happened to Bao-bao.
She glances into my shopping basket. “Your baba is going to need something more than eggs to soak up all that baijiu. We’ll get some pork buns down the street. And you have to help your mama—get something for her dinner. She’s probably not taking any better care of herself than your baba is.”
A small piece of pork, more vegetables, and a bag of rice go into my basket. I’m waiting for just the right moment to question her. After we pay and move away out of the alley, I get my nerve up. “Mrs. Hu, my baba and mama have been so upset, they haven’t told me what happened to my brother. I don’t even know when he died.”
My chest tightens as I admit this. It’s humiliating that my brother is dead and that my own parents don’t think enough of me to explain how it happened. I know they’re in a dark hole of misery, and it’s selfish of me to think like this, but it’s not right that no one has told me anything.
Mrs. Hu’s eyes shoot to me before she looks away. “Your poor parents! The worst kind of trouble.”
“But what happened?”
She shakes her head, and it seems like she’s avoiding my gaze. She moves toward the steamed bun vendor on the cross-street from the alley. I wait patiently as she orders six buns for me and two for herself, but I begin to worry that she isn’t going to tell me anything.
Only after we get our buns and step away from the bun seller do I try again. My chest is tight with frustration, but I try to keep it out of my voice. “Please tell me, Mrs. Hu. I don’t want to make Mama talk about it right now. It just makes her upset.” I try to sound calm and practical. “Who else will tell me if not you?”
Mrs. Hu pulls a napkin out of her purse and swipes the sweat from her forehead and neck. It’s nearly midday. Heat radiates from the concrete and asphalt of the buildings, sidewalks, and roads.
“Last Friday, around dinnertime,” she says, checking the traffic before we cross the street.
I wait for her to continue, but when she doesn’t, I place my hand on her arm to stop her from crossing. “Yes?”
She looks at me for a long time as if trying to decide whether to say more. Finally she says, “It’s always noisy in the sublevel after everyone gets off work—the TVs, music, everyone coming and going. Old Hu is a little hard of hearing and he had our TV turned way up, but at some point I heard noise from your parents’ apartment. It didn’t sound like ordinary arguing. I told Old Hu to shut off the TV for a minute, and that’s when I heard your baba shouting, then your ma scream.” Her eyes dart left and right as if she’s hoping to cross the street and get away from my questions.
“Then what?”
The skin on her face is stretched tight. When she finally continues, her voice is toneless. “I went out to the hallway and knocked on your parents’ door. I could hear your ba crying, so maybe they didn’t hear me right away. Finally your ma opened the door. She could hardly speak. She just moved aside like a ghost. By then the neighbors were trying to crowd in. I pushed them all back and shut the door, then went back to the bedroom.”
She closes her eyes and shakes her head, more of a shudder, as if she’s trying to erase what she is seeing. I’m afraid she won’t say any more, and I open my mouth to prompt her, but before I do she adds, “Your ba was sitting on the bed, sobbing and rocking and cradling your brother like a small child.”
My stomach is queasy at the picture, and I feel sick about my need to know. It’s like a morbid curiosity, but I’m unwilling to let it drop there. “Was he already—gone?”
She nods curtly.
“But how? How did he die?”
She swallows, but doesn’t answer.
“Mrs. Hu, please,” I say.
She lets out a long, low breath. “There was a box of rat poison. It was spilled on the floor, and white powder was all around your brother’s mouth.”
3
My stomach sours as Mrs. Hu and I walk home from the wet market. She told the story so vividly, I could see Baba coming home from work, going into the bedroom, finding Bao-bao lying on the bed with the rat poison next to him. Baba must’ve cried out, rushed over, shaken him. Mama would’ve come in and shrieked to see Baba collecting Bao-bao in his arms, while he yelled at her to call an ambulance even though by then they knew he was dead.
But Mrs. Hu said that there was no ambulance. She had sent Mr. Hu for the on-duty police officer they knew from their trash and recycling rounds. The officer called in the coroner. And once it came out that gaokao results had been published that day, and Mrs. Hu told him about Bao-bao’s score, his death was easily ruled a suicide.
“A couple of other suicide attempts by students had already made the news in the previous weeks,” Mrs. Hu explained. “Like every year around gaokao time.”
The gaokao. The all-important National Higher Education Entrance Exam, which every kid who wants a better future has to take. The brutal test Bao-bao spent the past six years—longer than that, really—preparing for. The test I never got to take.
Mrs. Hu tells me that Bao-bao scored 398/750, too low to even test into a second-rate college in a third-tier city. I’m shocked that he did so poorly and I say so to Mrs. Hu, but she only flips up her hands in a don’t know gesture.
“What about all the cram sessions and extra classes? The Sunday morning practice exams?”
Mrs. Hu sighs. Her shoulders lift and drop.
