by Zoey Gong
Kai backed his way out of the room and rushed down the aisles toward the elevators.
“Kai!” Kitty called, chasing after him. He slowed and turned to her.
“Kitty,” he said, fighting back tears. “I’m sorry. I didn’t do it for me. It was for my mom. For her treatments.”
Kitty’s mouth gaped open and closed a few times as she seemed to suddenly remember the conversations they’d had over insurance. Then she nodded. “Of course. Please, come to my office. I’ve been put in charge of collecting the money from you.”
“I’m sorry to have gotten you involved in this,” Kai said as he followed her and they shut the door behind them. “I...I was desperate.”
“I know,” Kitty said, going to her desk. “I wish I had remembered about your mom sooner. I’m so sorry about that. But I was just so shocked, and then angry. You must realize that even a million yuan could be a fraction of what the company will lose. Not to mention the jobs that will be cut. You are lucky you aren’t going to jail.”
“I know,” Kai said. “But what am I going to do now? I have no job. How am I going to pay for Mom’s treatments?”
Kitty shook her head. “I wish I could do more,” she said. “But all I can do is help you work out a payment plan.”
“A payment plan?” Kai asked.
“You won’t have to pay all the money at once, but you will have to get it paid off within a year,” Kitty explained. “But if you are even one day late or one yuan short on the payments, you will be arrested. It’s the best I can do, but it might buy you some time to figure something out.”
“Could you suddenly figure out how to find a million yuan?” Kai snapped, and instantly felt guilty. This was his problem. He knew the risks and he did it anyway. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled.
“I am too,” Kitty said. “The first payment is due within twenty-four hours.” She handed him a small booklet with twelve payment vouchers with the due dates and amounts written on each one. Kai took it with a long sigh. The first payment would take most of what he had gotten from Whirlwind.
“Thanks,” he mumbled as he walked out of the office. He could feel the eyes of his former workmates burning on him as he headed to the elevator. He had betrayed all of them. As he walked to his car, his phone rang. It was Winnie. Normally, he would be excited to answer, but he wasn’t sure he could feign acting like everything was fine right now. But he couldn’t resist hearing her voice, so he answered on the third ring as he climbed into his car.
“Kai?” she asked, her voice small.
“Hey,” he said. “So what happened with your mom?”
“My sister is having some sort of complications with her pregnancy,” Winnie said. “I’m not sure what is wrong, but they are all flying to Shanghai, to the maternity hospital right now.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” he said, then it dawned on him that they were coming to Shanghai, where they thought Winnie lived. “Wait. What about you?”
“I’m coming too,” she said. “But my flight won’t arrive until early tomorrow morning. I was wondering if you could help cover for me.”
“Sure,” he said, his mood brightening, surprisingly. “I’m not sure what I can do, but I’ll do whatever you need.”
“Thank you so much,” Winnie said, and he could hear her exhale in relief. She must have been so worried, both about her sister and getting caught in her rouse. He felt his problems fading to the background for the moment. “I’m going to rent an AirBnB so it looks like I have an apartment there in Shanghai. They are going to stay there. If I send you the info, can you go get the keys?”
“No need,” Kai said. “I’ve been renting my apartment out as an AirBnB anyway. I don’t have any guests right now. They can stay with me. I’ll tell them it’s your place.”
“Oh my gosh,” Winnie said. “Thank you so much!”
“No problem,” Kai said, feeling glad he was able to help someone right now, even if he couldn’t help himself.
“Okay, can you go meet them at the hospital, make excuses for me?” she asked. “Remember, they think I’m a nurse. Tell them I was already scheduled to assist a surgery and I couldn’t get out of it, but I’ll come to the hospital as soon as I’m free. But that’s why they won’t be able to reach me on the phone.”
“Sure,” Kai said. “That makes sense.”
“Okay,” Winnie said. “I’m at the airport. I’ll board soon. But thank you a million times.”
“You don’t have to thank me,” Kai said with a chuckle, repeating what she had told him every time she helped with his mom.
“Well, I’ll owe you dinner at least,” she said.
“I...I’d like that,” Kai said.
“I’ll see you tomorrow then,” she said.
“Text me your flight info,” Kai said. “I’ll pick you up when you arrive.”
“Okay,” she said and hung up.
Kai was thankful for the distraction. It helped him feel useful and kept his mind off his own problems for the moment. Maybe, if he could stop worrying for a few minutes and just think, he could find a way out of this mess.
15
Ten hours later, Winnie was rushing through customs. She slipped her Chinese SIM card into her phone and checked her messages anxiously. She had missed a dozen calls from her mother, her father, and her brother-in-law. And Chang. But they were all time stamped from several hours ago. Eventually, they had stopped calling. Hopefully by then, Kai had reassured her family that she was coming. Lingling had probably gone into surgery. Why hadn’t they messaged her to let her know what happened? She wasn’t sure if she should be relieved or worried that people had stopped messaging her. She was nearly through immigration when her phone pinged.
I’m here, Kai said.
Winnie wanted to nearly weep with relief. Kai was waiting for her, just like he said he would be.
At immigration, she managed to text back through blurry eyes. See you in a minute.
As she exited immigration, she didn’t even have to scan the crowd before her eyes instantly fell on Kai, his smiling face a welcome sight after the hours she had just spent imagining the worst-case scenarios running through her head. She ran to him and into his arms. She knew on some level she should have restrained herself, but the emotions came flooding out. And they were friends, right? She hugged Brock all the time and there was nothing to it.
“Is she okay?” Winnie asked, still holding tight. She was afraid to look at his face. She knew his face would betray the truth more brutally than his words if the worst had happened.
Kai nodded. “She’s okay,” he said. “They delivered the baby. Another boy.”
Winnie choked out a laugh. Of course it was a boy. Lingling was never one to disappoint. She pulled away, relieved enough to finally look at him. “What did the doctors say?”
Kai grimaced and shook his head. “Sorry,” he said. “I didn’t understand most of it. And...well...I couldn’t hear very well. I haven’t been the most welcome person in the room.”
Winnie sighed. “Sorry,” she said. “Thank you for putting up with all this.”
“It’s no problem,” he said, taking her bag from her shoulder. “The car is this way. Let’s get to the hospital. Then you can talk to the doctors yourself.”
“That’s a good idea,” she said. “Is my mother very angry?”
“Yes,” Kai said, not bothering to sugarcoat it. “But she’s too tired to yell. And she’s relieved that your sister is okay. She keeps rushing back and forth from Lingling to the baby. He’s in an incubator in the ICU.”
“Is the baby healthy?” Winnie asked as they climbed into the car.
“I think so,” Kai said. “Just early. I think he is in the incubator as a precaution, but I don’t know exactly.”
Winnie nodded. She would find out more once she got to the hospital. She took out her phone and texted her mom.
I’m out of surgery, she said. Kai picked me up. On my way now.
She waited, but her
mother did not reply. She worried her lower lip and felt nauseous. She had never known her mother to use the silent treatment when angry. This was uncharted territory, and Winnie was bracing for a storm.
The maternity hospital was one of the best in the city, which made it one of the best in the country. But Winnie was immediately alarmed by how crowded it was. Every room was full to capacity, and there were no private rooms to be seen. It was late at night, so she did not see many doctors around, and only saw a few nurses. She knew in her mind that she needed to turn off her “doctor brain” and focus on just being there for her sister, but she couldn’t ignore the alarm bells that were telling her that something was very wrong as soon as she walked into the room.
“Hey, Lingling,” Winnie said, going to her sister’s bedside. Her mother stood on the other side of the bed, a scowl on her face, but Winnie only gave her a smile, trying to reassure her that at least she was here now.
“Hey…” Lingling said, her voice raspy. She was clearly exhausted, which was normal after giving birth, but her coloring seemed off. Winnie put her hand on Lingling’s forehead and noticed she was cold.
“How are you feeling?” Winnie asked. “Really. I need to know.”
Lingling shook her head and coughed. “Everything hurts,” she said. “They cut me open.”
“You mean they did a C-section?” Winnie asked, and Lingling nodded. “Were there any complications?”
Lingling shook her head and closed her eyes. “I don’t know. They took him away--” She was cut short by another round of coughing, and then she winced and clutched her stomach.
“May I see?” Winnie asked. Lingling laid back and nodded. But as Winnie tried to raise the sheet to check the incision, her mother slapped her hand away.
“What are you doing?” her mother asked. “Leave her alone. The doctors said she needed rest.”
“I just want to make sure everything is okay,” Winnie said, trying to look again, but again her mother ushered her away.
“You think you know better than the doctors who delivered the baby?” her mother asked.
Winnie wanted to say yes, but held her tongue. She didn’t doubt that the doctors did a good job of delivering the baby, but she could already see that the doctors here were overworked. She was worried that any post-birth complications might go unnoticed.
“Ma,” Winnie said calmly. “I just want to check. The doctors have already gone home for the night, yes? I’m just doing a check they aren’t here to do.”
“Why do you always think you know better?” her mother snapped. “Where were you? Why weren’t you here? You never put your family first!”
“I…” Lingling’s husband stepped in. “Umm...We need quiet, I think.”
Winnie almost laughed. She had never known him to stand up to Lingling or their mother. But she nodded and walked out of the room, grabbing Lingling’s chart on the way out.
She noted that the operation seemed to go according to routine. The baby’s heart rate had suddenly dropped, prompting the C-section, but both mother and baby appeared healthy afterward. But she noted that the chart had not been updated in three hours.
“When was the last time a nurse was here to clean the wound and take Lingling’s vitals?” Winnie asked.
“Wenwen,” her mother said, taking the chart. “Stop. We have more important matters to discuss.”
“More important than Lingling’s life?” Winnie asked.
“The doctors already gave us the first bill,” her mother said, shaking her head. “It’s so much. More than we have in our savings.”
Winnie’s heart sank. She hadn’t even considered this. In Australia, most healthcare was subsidized by the State. She forgot that most medical issues here in China had to be paid out of pocket. And more than her parents had in savings? Just how much could she be talking about?
“If we don’t have the money by morning, Lingling will be discharged, and the baby.”
“No!” Winnie said. “It’s too soon, for both of them.”
“I know,” her mother said. “We are doing the best we can. But even if we pay them, what next? If she has to say a day, a week, a month? How will we get the money?”
“What about Lingling’s in-laws?” Winnie asked. “This is their grandbaby too.”
Winnie’s mom nodded. “They are trying. They were going to fly out here to support them, but they sent us the money they were going to use on the flights instead. It’s still not enough.”
Winnie put her hand to her mouth and shook her head. Even if she could care for Lingling at home, she wasn’t sure the baby could survive without the incubator.
“Any money you have saved,” her mother said, “now would be the time to hand it over.”
Winnie shook her head. “I don’t have any,” she said. “I spent so much coming home for Chinese New Year. And I send you money every month.”
“Oh, so this is my fault?” her mother asked. “It’s your responsibility--”
“Ma,” Winnie said, cutting her off. “I’m not saying that. I’m just explaining…” She exhaled and pinched the bridge of her nose. “Where else can we get money.”
“Chang--” her mother started to say.
“No!” Winnie cut in. “He’s not my boyfriend!”
“Then what about your actual boyfriend?” her mother asked crossing her arms. “You want me to accept the boy you chose? Show me why. Can he help us in our moment of need?”
Winnie pinched her lips together and scrunched up her nose. Even if Kai was a real boyfriend, she wouldn’t have picked him based on the size of his bank account. But now was not the time to argue about the merits of marrying for love and compatibility.
“I’ll ask him,” Winnie said, but she had a feeling Kai would not be able to help. She knew that Kai was dealing with his own mother’s health issues, and her treatments were also costly.
Her mother nodded and went back into Lingling’s room.
Winnie stood in the doorway and watched her family as they gathered around Lingling. Her mother stroked Lingling’s arm and patted her head. Lingling’s husband held their older son up so he could see his mama. Even their father was standing at the foot of the bed, looking at Lingling adoringly. And Winnie was on the sidelines. She’d never felt as though she was one of them. She was always just outside the bonds that the family had forged. It was as though the family had grown together without her.
“Hey, Wen...Winnie.”
Winnie turned and saw that Chang had walked up next to her.
Winnie crossed her arms and looked away. “What are you doing here?” she asked.
“Just checking to see how things are going,” he said. “I went to your apartment for a rest, but couldn’t really sleep, I was so worried. I’m glad you finally made it.”
“No,” Winnie said, facing him. “Why are you here? Inserting yourself into my family and my business. I don’t want to marry you. Why are you pushing this?”
Chang shrugged. “My parents wanted me to get married and worked things out with your parents,” he said. “I don’t see a reason to fight it. You’re smart, pretty. You check all the boxes. Why not?”
Winnie shook her head. “Don’t you want to pick your own wife? Someone you love?”
Chang chuckled. “And risk getting my heart broken later when things don’t work out? No thanks. If we marry for our families, because it’s the right thing to do, we can get our needs met without all the mess.”
And Winnie thought she was always the reasonable one. She knew many women who had married for similar reasons. Financial stability. Family support. To have children. It had always seemed to her that an arranged marriage was the easy way through life. Until it wasn’t. Until there was a crisis. Until you needed the support of a partner and he wasn’t there. Of course, Chang was partly right. Even in a marriage where you chose your partner, betrayal happened. Divorce happened. Life happened.
But whatever happened in Winnie’s life, she wanted to be responsible
for her own choices. She didn’t want to live with regrets or what-ifs. If she married or not, if she had kids or not, if she divorced or not, she wanted to be the one in control of whatever happened next. She couldn’t just marry someone she was ordered to.
“I know what you mean,” Winnie finally said. “But that kind of marriage isn’t for me. You should go find someone else.”
“We’ll see,” Chang said, seemingly unperturbed.
“However,” Winnie said, “there is something I need to ask you.”
Chang waited expectantly.
“I need money,” she said. “For Lingling’s medical bills.”
Chang scoffed. “You won’t marry me, but you want me to give you thousands of yuan? Have you actually seen the bill?”
“A business arrangement,” Winnie said. “A loan. I’ll pay you back. I promise. I have a good job. Or I’ll take out a bank loan when all this blows over. Just help me out for now.”
She knew she shouldn’t do it, but she didn’t see another way out. She needed the money; Chang’s family had money. She would face the consequences later.
Chang seemed to consider this for a moment, and Winnie wondered just what kind of scheme he was running around in his head. But finally, he smiled.
“Of course I’ll help you,” he said. “I wouldn’t hold your sister’s health hostage.”
“Th-thanks,” Winnie said, surprised he agreed. “But don’t tell my parents. Just put it in my account and I’ll take care of it when the billing department opens in the morning. I don’t want them to worry about it.”
“Sure,” Chang said. “Don’t worry about a thing.” With that, he wandered off.
Winnie had a bad feeling she had just made a huge mistake. Chang was going to hold that loan over her head eventually, she was sure. But she had stopped the flood of damage for now. And maybe even got a bonus. She would tell her mother the money came from Kai. That would endear him to her and, hopefully, she would stop pushing Chang on her so strongly. It was fine. Everything was fine. It was all going to be fine.
