A Song Everlasting

by Ha Jin

  Despite his placating words, he felt upset and even betrayed. For years they had planned to immigrate so that they could start over, relying on their own strength and ability to build a new life in America. He’d been living here to set up a base for their family, but now Shuna had grown too attached to her old rut to make the leap to join him here. As a result, in between them stretched a country that would divide them further and further. Unlike his own belief in freedom as a necessary condition for his life, Shuna still defined her existence within the system of her work unit, her professorship, her WeChat coteries, the Chinese state, and she would remain fixed there. It was as if she and he had grown into different species—she was unwilling to pay the high price for a free and independent life. If only they had foreseen that such a gulf would emerge between them.

  39

  On the day that Tian’s wife and daughter were to fly back to Beijing, Tian didn’t drive them to the airport—Funi’s car hadn’t passed the annual inspection and its carburetor had to be cleaned and adjusted. Instead they took the subway. Waiting for the train at Quincy Center, Tian saw the busker who often sang on the platform with a guitar in his arms. He was a fiftysomething Irishman, bulky and slightly stooped, with a thick neck, and had short blond hair and shining eyes. What struck Tian most about this man was his gentle face. Whenever someone dropped a dollar or two into his guitar case opened on the ground, he would nod with appreciation, then go on singing. His voice wasn’t great, but he was confident and sang with charm.

  “Is he a beggar?” Tingting asked Tian.

  “No, he just enjoys singing.”

  A young woman stepped over and put a dollar into the case on the ground, which contained a small heap of bills. Shuna said, “Obviously he’s making money.”

  “Lots of artists perform on streets like him to make a living,” Tian told them, pulling out his billfold. “I once saw a famous Chinese composer playing the violin on a square in New York. It’s just a way of survival here. Some Chinese immigrants play the erhu in train stations. They always sit on a small stool and saw away. I don’t like it—the instrument gets too loud and too jarring when played indoors.” He took out a dollar and dropped it into the guitar case.

  The man nodded at Tian and his amber eyes twinkled. Tapping his foot, he went on singing, his voice suddenly charged with yearning, “Oh look at those mountains. How old and youthful they have always been….”

  At the airport Tian helped his wife and daughter get their boarding passes and paid eighty-six dollars for their excess baggage. Shuna had bought heaps of presents for her friends and colleagues, while Tingting had gotten only a pair of Nike sneakers for Jawei, who played basketball. Tian had taken them to the outlets in Wrentham, where they had seen many other Chinese tourists. He’d talked to two young Chinese men standing guard over a swarm of shopping bags stuffed with brand-name products—Burberry, Polo, Calvin Klein, Brooks Brothers. One of them told Tian that his fellow tourists had left their purchases with the two of them and gone to the stores for more shopping; they all belonged to a group from Jiangsu province and had come here on a large bus. Tian could see that the salespeople in the stores, waving discount coupons, were thrilled at the sight of the Chinese shoppers. Shuna bought some jewelry there and two handbags, a Coach and a Kate Spade, each one just above two hundred dollars. The bags were for her superiors at the university—they had asked Shuna to get them and had given her a budget of four hundred dollars each. She said her leaders would be delighted to get the genuine American products at half the price they’d been willing to pay.

  At Terminal E for international flights, Shuna and Tingting were ready to check into the waiting area, which was for ticketed passengers only. Tian hugged his daughter tightly and said she must work hard to get a high SAT score and that he’d love to see her here the next year. He then embraced Shuna, who whispered, “Take good care. Think about what I said last night.”

  “I will.” He nodded and stopped in his tracks to watch them moving through the check-in line. Now and again they turned and waved at him. Shuna mouthed, “Go back now. Bye.”

  In no time his wife and daughter had disappeared into the crowd, and he turned around and made for the Silver Line bus to get back to the train station. The night before, he and Shuna had talked about his life here. She suggested he have a woman at his side because she realized how hard life was for him here. Honestly, Tian told her, he felt fine and was relishing his new freedom from the endless political studies and the official lines he’d had to toe back home. “But you need someone who can help you,” she said earnestly. “I wish I were a better wife to you, Tian.”

  Now, he began to have misgivings about the motivation of what Shuna had said. He could tell that this time she was serious about her suggestion, since she might not be able to come join him in the States eventually. Perhaps she already had another man in her life back in Beijing. They both knew something was amiss in their marriage. They’d made love every night since she had come, but the passion and the intensity were no longer there. Every time it was finished within a few minutes. She surely couldn’t be happy about this, as he remembered how much she’d enjoyed sex when they had been back in Beijing. She’d often joked that he had better be careful about one-night stands because any woman who went to bed with him once would stick to him for a long time. Now, unable to make love to her as he used to, all he could do was mock himself, saying he would need to practice more in bed to get his sexual drive back and that immigration must have desexualized a lot of folks. Or maybe he was just getting old. Another truth he wouldn’t disclose to anyone: Since his brief fling with Freda he had remained guarded, fearful of being embroiled with another woman who might disrupt his life.

  Deep inside, he felt another kind of change that was unsettling to him. He used to be able to respond to Shuna’s feelings instinctively: Whenever she was upset or hurt, he would hurt for her. He could feel her presence in a room even if she came in noiselessly, and if she let out a cry in the kitchen, he’d get jolted. They were truly together, physically and mentally. Now he could no longer hurt for Shuna, but he could for Tingting. This emotional change disturbed him. Worse yet, he and his wife would be separated for a long time once more, and there’d be no opportunity for them to regain their intimate connection, the feeling of hurting for each other.

  * * *

  —

  Funi moved back in after his wife and daughter had left, resuming her quiet life as if his takeover of the apartment had caused her no disruption. When he thanked her again for being so accommodating to his family, she wondered aloud whether Shuna had been disapproving.

  “Disapproving of what?” he asked.

  “Of you staying with me under the same roof. I was afraid she might want you to move out of here.”

  “Oh, she didn’t mind that at all. Actually she appreciates your helping me all these years.”

  “Come on, you helped me more.” Funi looked embarrassed, twitching her pug nose.

  He felt at peace and at ease in this apartment. He and Funi were just like two small boats moored by chance at the same dock. Ultimately they were each supposed to go their own way, but for now this was a sensible arrangement that he wouldn’t upset.

  Since her miscarriage, Funi seemed to be done with men, as she claimed. Tian knew that Sami had been trying to introduce her to some young men, but Funi wouldn’t bother to meet any of them. He once reminded her of her dream of having a family, but she merely smiled and said she was already lucky enough to have a stable job and a roof over her head. He guessed that her positivity might have something to do with the Buddhist congregation she was a part of, whose members gathered to meditate and worship on weekends. He wished he could be as serene as she was.

  For months he kept busy working, trying to make as much as possible so that he could contribute some to his daughter’s education. Tingting had just taken the SAT and done decently, t
hough her score, only 1340, made it unlikely that she’d be admitted by a top college. This saddened her mother, who had believed their daughter was destined to become an Ivy Leaguer. But for Tian, as long as Tingting got into a decent school where she could study what she liked, he’d be happy for her. He didn’t argue the point with his wife, saying only that she should give the girl more room for self-development. As a result, Tingting began to communicate with him more often than before. She was using Hotmail, which allowed messages to reach him most of the time, though there were still emails expunged or blocked by the Internet policing.

  Tingting disclosed to him, without letting her mother know, that her boyfriend was applying to American colleges too. Jawei wanted to double-major in economics and philosophy so that he could prepare for a leadership position of some kind—an official or a CEO. The boy’s father ran a think tank, which seemed rather spurious to Tian—very few independent thinkers were able to exist in China, and such an institute might serve no purpose at all. Still, the boy’s ambition pleased Tian. He’d hate to see his daughter marry a young man who avoided challenges or who was obsessed only with making money. Tingting also revealed that she and Jawei would like to attend schools close to each other, so for her, a top college didn’t mean that much. She wanted to study art history, which sounded impractical, but Tian wouldn’t oppose her. He believed that cultural pragmatism had been holding the Chinese back for millennia, limiting people’s visions and pursuits—this must be a major reason why historically they’d been underdeveloped in science. As long as Tingting was happy, Tian would be happy too.

  PART FIVE

  40

  Tian joined the Divine Grace again during the next holiday season. Now he had learned many songs popular among young people, and his singing was well received. The troupe’s reputation was continuing to rise. In addition to enlisting Tan Mai—who had become Tian’s friend even though they never saw each other outside their professional engagements—the Divine Grace had also hired an accomplished zither player, and their shows were being praised as “genuine Chinese art.” To an extent, he felt his career coming back. Perhaps in the near future he’d be able to sing full-time again, but in the meantime he wouldn’t give up his part-time job at Twin Waters yet. He might need the money for his daughter if she came to America in the fall. He took the bus to the casino at least twice a week and cherished the flexible schedule that Jesse allowed him.

  In March Shuna sold their second apartment for 1,890,000 yuan—almost three hundred thousand dollars. Tian felt good about this, finally certain that they had enough funds for Tingting’s college education in America. But his daughter soon began to receive rejection letters from the schools she’d wanted to attend most. Tian regretted not having helped her with the college essays. He had seen the ones she’d written with Freda’s assistance and thought they were decent, but now he came to realize that an applicant’s essays should be as original as possible, the more unorthodox, the better. It was just reported that a high-schooler in Nanjing had been admitted by a top U.S. college on the strength of his essay on the brand of instant noodles he loved. If only Tian had been more involved with his daughter’s applications! He’d been too nervous about Freda to interfere.

  Compared to Tingting, Jawei was doing a little better. He’d been admitted by Dartmouth and Brandeis, which made Tingting more determined to come to Boston for college. But she had to wait to hear from the last batch of schools she had applied to.

  Not until early April did she get admission letters from UMass-Boston and the University of Michigan. Originally she had applied to Michigan only because Jawei wanted to go there, but he hadn’t gotten in, so Tingting decided to give up that school. Shuna was furious and tried to insist that she go to Michigan, but the girl accepted UMass-Boston’s offer as soon as Jawei had chosen Brandeis over Dartmouth. About this mother and daughter quarreled. Tian took Tingting’s side and told Shuna that UMass-Boston would save them considerable money because he’d be naturalized soon. Once he became a U.S. citizen living in Massachusetts, they could pay in-state tuition, which would be only a third of that for an international student. But at hearing this Shuna exploded at him on the phone: “Money, money, all you care about is money! Has America made you so materialistic? I want our daughter to go to the best school she can get into and I’ll be happy to pay every penny for it.”

  Later Tingting wrote to Tian to complain about her mother, saying, “She acts like all the top colleges belong to our family. Unlike her, I know I’m a small potato and don’t mind remaining one.”

  “Don’t bad-mouth your mom,” he typed back. “She only wants the best for you, and you should appreciate that.”

  “I know what’s best for me. She’s crazy, an old fuddy-duddy who worships only books.”

  He changed the topic, afraid that the girl might say something more outrageous. Unlike his wife, who’d gone to Peking University, Tian had gotten his BA from a small college, studying English. In China, it’s a great privilege to graduate from a top university, like belonging to an exclusive club whose network spreads everywhere. He guessed it must be the same here. He’d never met a Harvard graduate or a Yalie or a Princetonian who didn’t have a decent job. But Tingting would need to settle for UMass-Boston. Shuna went so far as to claim that their daughter had broken her heart. Tian didn’t counter her, though he thought she sounded ridiculous. Tingting didn’t seem to be interested in science or scholarship. He’d feel fortunate if she could finish her undergraduate studies at UMass-Boston, given all the difficulties she’d have to overcome. English alone could drive some Chinese students to drop out of college. Two months earlier it was reported that a sophomore from Changsha had jumped out of an apartment building in Baltimore, driven to despair by frustration and anxiety. Tian remembered a poem by a young Chinese who had once been a college student on the West Coast, which ends with these lines: “I’ve landed in a place my ancestors had never heard of, / And I must cultivate a new kind of fortitude.”

  There was another way to counter Shuna’s resistance. Just think how many Chinese students had had to cram for the national entrance exam! All because their parents couldn’t afford to send them abroad for college for a genuine education. Tian and Shuna were lucky—they happened to live in Beijing, where real estate was many times more valuable than it was in other cities. Tian had once met a young man studying at Boston College whose parents were middle school teachers in Jilin City, and he’d told Tian that his family had had to sell four apartments to pay for his college here. He added, “My parents were lucky to have bought those properties many years ago when they were still cheap.” How many lucky people can be out there? There are millions of children in China’s countryside who can only go to schools where the windows and doors are just gaping holes in the walls. They have no books other than tattered textbooks, their classrooms are not heated in the winter, and their PE class offers just soccer because the only equipment needed for the game is a ball. Very few of those kids can even graduate high school, and to them, attending college is as unimaginable as growing wings and learning to fly. In every sense Tingting was fortunate, and Shuna shouldn’t throw such a tantrum about her going to an unremarkable university in the States.

  In his heart Tian had another motive that he wouldn’t reveal to his wife: He’d wanted their daughter to be close to him, though he was almost certain that Shuna had intuited his secret wish. She seemed resolved to keep Tingting and Jawei apart and often referred to Jawei as “the dandy.” Tian wasn’t sure he trusted her judgment of the boy, but then he’d never met Jawei and couldn’t form his own opinion.

  * * *

  —

  This summer blisters were growing on Tian’s fingers again. Back in China he’d seen several dermatologists, but none of them had been able to diagnose the problem. One thought he must be allergic to gluten. For a short period of time Tian tried a gluten-free diet, which was hard to maintain in China
and didn’t help with the blisters. This year he also had shoulder pain that bothered him more. Yet he had no medical insurance now and wasn’t willing to see a doctor for these seemingly minor complaints. Besides, Tingting would arrive soon, and he had to make preparations for her.

  In mid-August his daughter and her boyfriend came to Boston together to start college. Tian went to the airport to meet them. Jawei struck him as cheerful and congenial, a tall young man with a mop of thick hair and a straight nose and eyebrows slanting toward the temples. He wore a green T-shirt and black chinos and white sneakers. In spite of the long flight, he appeared lively and kept smiling with his mouth wide open. Jawei knew Tian on sight, probably from his albums and press photos. The boy seemed restless around Tingting, ready to attend to her. When her baggage came out on the carousel, he grabbed the two suitcases and lugged them up to her and Tian. Jawei seemed considerate of Tingting and acted like a man already. Tian offered to give him a ride to his university, but a van from Brandeis was already waiting at the front of the terminal to collect international students. Still, Jawei thanked him with a little bow before he left with the van. Tian loaded Tingting’s baggage into his trunk and drove her to Quincy.

  She stayed with him that night, sleeping in his bed while he slept on an air mattress on the floor. Originally he had offered to rent an apartment for both of them so that she could stay with him, but the girl wanted to live on campus, especially for her freshman year. He didn’t insist, since her mother would pay for her rent. Unlike Shuna, he wanted to let Tingting manage her own life.

  Funi cooked a big breakfast the next morning—omelets, bacon, toast, rice porridge, sautéed slivers of pickled mustard tubers with lean pork. She even served them the food herself. Tian was moved. When he thanked her, she whispered to him, “I like your daughter.”