Beijing Comrades (30 page)

Thirty-Seven

One afternoon while I was at the office, Lan Yu called out of the blue to invite me to his home that evening. I didn't even have to think about it. I told him the traffic was cruddy and I wasn't coming.

“It takes ten minutes to get here, Handong!” he said, annoyed. “So if you don't want to come, just say so. But don't start coming up with excuses.”

“Fine, I'm coming,” I said. I didn't say it out loud, but I knew perfectly well that I was being the unreasonable one.

“Forget it,” he said coldly. “I won't be here.”

I wondered why I had rejected him. It's not like I had anything better to do that night. Virtually all my evenings at that point were spent either at the office or at Bamboo Garden or at my mother's place. The real reason I didn't want to see him, I knew, was that I couldn't bear confronting the empty shell of a relationship that Lan Yu and I had become.

It killed me. The cold, indifferent tone of his voice. The snide, apathetic smirk that always seemed to linger at the corners of his mouth. The cutting remarks. Especially anytime I tried talking about us, about our relationship.

What Zhou Wen had said was right: the point of two people being together is to find happiness. But Lan Yu and I had nothing. No bond of marriage, no consideration of property, profits, children, or social opinion. It's one thing to have nothing in the world but the happiness you feel. But when you have nothing and you're not happy to begin with, then what's the point?

That night, I went to One Two Three, where some Polish exchange student with passable Mandarin chatted me up as I knocked back a few drinks. It was nearly midnight when I stumbled back into the street, my compass set on Fang Village despite Lan Yu's explicit instructions not to go there. I had drunk far too much to be driving and was more than a little buzzed upon my arrival. I knocked on two or three apartment doors before realizing I wasn't even in the right building. Then I went back outside and walked in circles, muttering incoherently until I located the correct building. By the time I finally found his apartment door I was tired of looking, so I just twisted the knob. It was open.

“Who's there?” Lan Yu's voice called out from the bedroom. It was dark in the front entrance.

“It's me,” I said, noticing a cluster of empty beer bottles standing erect on the living room table. It was the same little table with the chipped blue paint from Lan Yu's old living room. He had brought it with him in the move from Gala to Fang.

Lan Yu came out of the bedroom, dragging his feet and looking drowsy, but just as fully dressed as if he had still been at work.

“You're still awake?” I asked.

“What time is it?” His eyes swept the wall in search of a clock before he gave on up the idea. He must have remembered that, like most of his belongings, it wasn't unpacked yet.
“What are you doing here at this hour?” he asked.

“What's wrong with that?” I answered him with a question. “Can't I come over?”

He looked at me with a sort of neutral gaze. He didn't seem particularly upset that I was there, but nor was he happy to see me. Wordlessly, he turned around and went back into the bedroom. I grabbed a chair from the blue table and followed.

His bedroom was a mess, and we had to navigate a sea of books and dirty clothes to get to the bed. Lan Yu sat up against the headboard, staring at me with a clinical eye, while I sat on the chair near the foot of the bed, trying my best to avoid eye contact. I lit a cigarette and stared at the wall. It was too quiet in that little room, so quiet that the only noise I could hear was the sound of two people breathing and the aggravating buzz of the ceiling light. I wanted Lan Yu to say something, but he must have wanted the same thing from me, because the minutes ticked away and neither of us said a word. Finally I spoke.

“So, I guess you don't want me here. You've pretty much had enough of me, huh?” I asked, still staring at the wall. A thick rope of cigarette ash fell to the floor, so I reached under the bed to pull out the ashtray he had always kept there for me. I turned to look at him. I wanted to see his expression so I could understand what he was thinking, but his face was hidden under dark shadows, barely visible in the dimness of the light. He remained silent, so I kept talking.

“Look, Lan Yu. If you have a problem with me or if you're just sick of this or whatever, I wish you would open your mouth and say so.”

More silence. I'd long since learned to expect silence from him, but that didn't mean I liked it.

“Fine,” I said. I was starting to get pissed. “I suppose you've got it all planned out, right? Just keep playing games with me till you get on the plane, then
see ya later
! Is that it?” I
smashed the cigarette butt angrily into the ashtray. His silence made me seethe with rage.

“Goddamn it, fucking say something, Lan Yu!” I shouted as I stood up from the chair. “I mean, look at the way you're behaving. Quit acting like the entire fucking world revolves around you, like it owes you something!”

“The way
I'm
behaving?” he scoffed. “What about you?”

Maybe it was only because I was drunk, but when Lan Yu finally opened his mouth it made me laugh. A cynical laugh. “Me?” I asked sardonically. “I'm just a big whore, remember?”

Lan Yu didn't think it was funny. His big, sad eyes looked like black holes carved out with a knife. He lowered his head.

“Listen, Lan Yu,” I continued, sitting down again. “Ever since my divorce—since we got back together—all I've wanted is to be with you. To
really
be with you. Especially since I got out of jail. I even made a vow to myself—” I faltered, unable to tell him the promise I'd made.

“If you don't believe me, just look at what my life has become! I've trampled on my parents' wishes. I've insulted my friends. I've lost face in every possible way I can.” I laughed darkly and shook my head in disbelief. “I must have been on some weird fucking drugs to do all that!”

This made Lan Yu snap. “What the hell do you want from me, Handong?” His voice seethed with anger.

The battle was beginning to wear me out. I barely had the energy to speak, but somehow managed to assemble my forces and look him in the eye.

“Nothing,” I said resolutely. “You should just know that I'm done with your games. It's over.”

I stood up from the chair and stalked toward the front door. I was about to turn the knob when I heard his voice. “Chen Handong.”

Still clutching the doorknob, I turned around halfway and found Lan Yu standing in the bedroom doorway. His eyes flashed with anger, but it was an anger infused with sadness. We looked at each other as best we could in the darkness that enshrouded the room.

“It's just that—you made up that stupid excuse not to come here!” There was a distinct tone of anger in his voice, but I didn't mind. What mattered was that his voice lacked the sarcastic aloofness of recent weeks and there was no trace of that infuriating smirk. He looked worried, frustrated, like an anxiety-ridden kid. It had been ages since I'd seen him like that.

“Right,” I said calmly, letting go of the door handle to fully face him. “Because you didn't want me here.”

He cocked his head and looked at me with a kind of tortured smile. He wanted so desperately to say something. What was it? What was that thing he wanted to say so badly, but couldn't, or wouldn't? For a moment I really believed that whatever it was, he was finally about to say it, but instead he just looked at me with tears in his eyes.

“Why did I move so far away?” he said, more to himself than to me, shaking his head and looking up at the ceiling to suppress the tears. “This guy I know, he said he could help me find a place over by Blackstone Bridge 'cause . . . 'cause I know how much you hate traffic and how hard it is to get here and how you'd rather sleep at your office and—” He looked at me helplessly. “Do you know how long it takes me to get to work now?”

There was nothing I could say at this point. We stood in the darkness staring at each other until I had the sudden urge to pull him into my arms and hold him. Lan Yu leaned against my chest, arms hanging lifelessly at his sides. We stood like that for a long time until he pulled his head back and looked
up at me numbly. I released him from my embrace and went back to the bedroom, where I lay on the bed fully clothed. He followed. There we remained, two heartbroken men, for god knows how long till at last we fell asleep.

The following day I wanted to put aside the problems of the previous night so I went to Lan Yu's office to surprise him when he got off work. Sure enough, he was astonished to find me standing outside the main entrance to Skytalk, leaning up against the metal railing with my arms folded and a warm smile on my face. His shock quickly melted away, though, and was replaced by a radiant smile that made me wonder how it was that after nearly ten years of knowing him, this man still held such an intense power over me.

It was nearly ten by the time we finished dinner and got back to Lan Yu's place. He busied himself with apartment stuff—putting his room in order, throwing clothes in the washing machine—and I had to make a phone call. My client and I entered into a protracted session of haggling over some details, and the conversation soon turned into a bit of an argument. When the washing machine switched cycles, it suddenly became so loud that I had trouble hearing my client, so I raised a hand to cover my ear. Lan Yu stood on the sidelines, watching me try to talk in the droning hum of the washing machine and laughing at what he apparently thought was a highly comedic scene.

After Lan Yu was done cleaning and I had finished my call, I took a shower and jumped into bed. Lan Yu sat up next to me watching TV.

“It's almost eleven,” I mumbled as I pulled the bedsheet over my head. “Let's go to sleep. I'll drive you to work tomorrow.”
I turned onto my side with my back against him and closed my eyes.

Lan Yu snuggled up behind me, kissing my upper back and the nape of my neck. I knew from the way he was touching me that he wanted to make love. “Handong . . .,” he purred into my ear, rolling me over onto my back and crawling on top of me.

“Nnnnnnnn . . .,” I groaned. “I don't feel like it.”

He stopped what he was doing and looked down at me. “It's been two weeks! You must have blue balls by now.”

“C'mon, stop it,” I said, gently pushing him away.

Lan Yu had no way of knowing I had fooled around with Annie just a few nights earlier. And yet, he must have sensed something, because he rolled off me and returned to his side of the bed. A long silence ensued.

“Is there someone else, Handong?” his voice finally broke the silence. I stayed put with my back against him.

“Yes,” I answered quietly.

“Fuck,” he scoffed and looked up at the ceiling. “I knew it! A man or a woman?”

“A man, of course,” I said, jumping up and pouncing onto him. “Surname Lan, given name Yu!”

I took him into my arms, laughing and kissing his face. Lan Yu exploded in laughter, allowing me to believe for one blissful moment that everything was all right.

I didn't want to lie to Lan Yu. But at the same time there were some things I just couldn't explain. Annie was one of them.

I peeled off Lan Yu's clothes, then laid him on his stomach spread eagle so I could feast on him with my eyes. I gazed at his profile—somberly earnest but distant, and steeped in a
cautious restraint I hadn't seen in a long while. It didn't matter how many times I looked at Lan Yu, I was always struck by his face, so beautiful with its high arched nose and full red lips. Looking at him now, it was impossible not to notice how he had changed. The youthfulness of his face, gone; his body, thinner than when we first met. But still so pure, so handsome. He still had those broad shoulders and those thick, strong arms. I collapsed on top of him, digging my nails into his skin and kissing him behind his ear.

“You see what you do to me?” I exclaimed, almost in tears. “I'm lost in you!”

Hooking his ankles around my calves, Lan Yu pushed his ass up into my groin. I would have done anything for him. Nothing we had gone through mattered. The years of hurt, the sorrow. I was going to keep him by my side forever.

Since the day we met, Lan Yu and I had been together and apart so many times. We really were like the butterfly lovers, doing whatever we could to stay together despite the odds. I knew him so well. What excited him, what got him off. I knew his limits and how to control them.

When we made love I rarely let him come in my hand and even less in my mouth. Often, I didn't even let him come when I fucked him. My pleasure was the pleasure of control: controlling him, controlling myself. I reveled in Lan Yu's pleasure, but it was mine to give, drop by drop, until he exploded in ecstasy. What got me off was torturing him, not just with pleasure, but with the promise of ever-greater horizons of pleasure to come. Sex with Lan Yu meant denying him release until he showed me he was ready. When I entered him, his deep moan intoxicated me, and together we went to a place of bliss.

“I'm in heaven!” I would cry out loud. I looked into his eyes and saw excitement, expectation. There was never a moment
when he wasn't immersed in the euphoria of the present. I'll do anything for you, I thought. None of the sacrifices I'd made mattered. I was going to keep him forever. He was mine!

That night I held Lan Yu in my arms and pondered the mysteries of makeup sex, nature's superglue for lovers. Everything was back to normal. We could forget the fight we'd had the night before when I showed up drunk on his doorstep. We were good again.

“You fucked me so long before coming!” Lan Yu laughed.

“And what's wrong with that?” I countered playfully. “Don't you want a man with a little endurance?”